How to Meal Plan to Cut Your Grocery Bill

Most grocery overspending comes from buying without a plan: duplicate items, impulse buys and food that goes off before it's used. A 20-minute weekly routine fixes most of it.

The routine

1. Check what you have. Fridge first, then freezer and pantry. Plan meals around what's about to go off.
2. Choose meals for the week. Reuse ingredients across meals (one bunch of herbs, two dinners). Plan one leftovers night.
3. Set servings for each meal. Scaling recipes to the real number of eaters is where waste disappears.
4. Build the list from the plan: quantity per serving × servings, totalled per ingredient, minus what you already have.
5. Group the list by aisle so you're in and out quickly.
6. Price it. Keeping a cost per unit for your regular items gives you a weekly estimate before you shop.

Keep a recipe library

Write each recipe down once with its quantities per serving. After a few weeks you'll have a rotation you can plan in minutes.

Our spreadsheet does steps 3–6 automatically: pick recipes and servings for 21 meals, and the grocery list, quantities and estimated cost fill themselves in.

Meal Planner & Grocery List: do this math automatically in Excel or Google Sheets.

See the Meal Planner & Grocery List