In an attempt to gauge exactly how badly I’m wasting money on food, I wanted to poll people and find out how much you spend per month on food, and roughly what percentage of that is from each source (groceries/restaurant/etc.)
If you are buying based on more people than just yourself, try and divide so it’s just your own costs.
No current figures since my food is all bought with cash or debit, but with my ex ex BF, I did all the grocery shopping and paid by check so I could track spending- it averaged around $300 a month, so about $150 for me. If you add in the occasional restaurant/take-out/fast food, probably about $200 a month for me.
ETA: I like to cook, and try to buy the least pre-packaged, processed food possible. It usually ends up cheaper that way. And better for you.
I bet that every day for breakfast, it’s about $1.75. 1.00 on cereal, .75 on yogurt.
Now, it’s hard to estimate everything else.
Somedays it’s cheap, like a quarter of a chicken, rice from a 20# bag, and a cup of frozen peas. That might be a $3.00 supper, and a $3.00 lunch on left-overs the next day. Even then, I’m up around $8 on a CHEAP day.
If you eat out, you can spend $15-$20 a day easy.
But, I bet I spend about $10-$12 a day on food, so $325, maybe. At least another $100 on drinks.
And, I’m a guy who cooks a lot. But, I cook well. Meat, butter, decent ingredients.
I get around to ordering from FreshDirect, the internet grocery delivery service here, about twice per month, and rack up a $75 bill or so on average.
I might spend another $100 at the bodegas & mini-markets.
Perhaps $200-300 a month on restaurants, including lunches and dinner.
So 75*2+100+~250= ~$500.
For this amount of money I could dine twice at Daniel or Per Se, and stay home and eat baloney and pasta the rest of the month. Hmmmm…
I’d say about $500-$600 total for a three-person family. The little one doesn’t eat much, so I’d say that it comes out to closer to $400 for me and the husband. Husband eats out more than I do so probably about $100-$150 per month for me and $250 per month for the husband, with about $100-$150 per month for the little guy.
My goal, which I generally don’t achieve, is $100 per week at the grocery store for my four person family. However, let’s pretend I achieve it, to correct for money spent on laundry detergent and cat food and such. Divide by four and add a bit more for the night I eat at McDonald’s, and it’s about $105.
Fifteen bucks a day for just me? I must be doing something wrong.
I spend $100 at the grocery store every 7 - 10 days not all of that is food obviously. I eat subway or go to the pub for wings maybe once a week on top of that. I used to eat out a lot more and as Trunk already stated that adds up fast.
Probably around $1000 a month.
I have a wife and 3 kids, ages 9, 5 and 2.
Part of the expense comes from living in an expensive area, I guess. Part of it comes from my personal desire for fresh ingredients, recognizable meat and portions befitting a person not being punished. Part of it comes from the fact that nobody in my house cooks except for me, which means there’s more prepared foods than there should be.
I was, of course. :smack: A hundred divided by four is $25, plus five for McD’s, and I’ve got $35 a week, $5 a day.
For me, singly? My share of the grocery fund averages $110-135/month. I do all the shopping and cooking for four adults, but because this is my hobby as much as my responsibility, I buy all of my specialty ingredients (wine, spices, accessories, good cheese, etc.) out of my own pocket. I have budgeted myself $100/month for this - sometimes I meet it, and sometimes I don’t. I definitely did this month - a shopping spree at the Spice House and croque monsieur this month killed my culinary funny money fund.
“Out” food - maybe $30/month on fast food, add in another $15-50 on a “sit down” restaurant (about monthly), and about $50 a month on drinks (beer, SlimFast, coffee, soda…). So, at max: $380. I would say I don’t reach this figure very often, it’s more probably around $280. I consider food part necessity and part entertainment, for obvious reasons. If I wanted to get down to the nitty-gritty and invoke Grandma’s Depression-era tactics, I could whittle it down substantially, and have on occasion.
Oh, I forgot all the non-food items I buy at the grocery store. Hmmm… maybe closer to $175 a month for me?
Hard to give a good per person per time estimate. We spend about 500-600 a month at the supermarket. We are four, but kids are 2 and 3yo. We entertain a lot, though. At least 3 times a month, I cook for 10 or so.
It would be tough for me to come up with an accurate tally for myself, but I had to share a nifty government website:
http://www.cnpp.usda.gov/USDAFoodPlansCostofFood.htm
Oh shoot, this is a hard one - I’m generally using my debit card to pay, so I don’t keep careful track.
My household is just my husband and me, and we eat out a lot.
I’d say that we generally spend about $75 a week on actual food items from the grocery store. A little more if I do the shopping, as I tend to buy organic and extra fruit.
Breakfast
Weekdays in the office (3): I generally spend either $2.01 or ~$3.20, depending on whether I go with an english muffin or fruit and hard boiled eggs.
Weekdays at home (2): Leftovers or cereal
Weekends: About $4.00?, for coffee and a bagel.
Lunch
Weekdays in the office: Either ~$5.50 for a sandwich and iced tea if I eat in, or anywhere from $5.00 to $9.00 if I eat out.
Weekdays at home: Usually eat what’s in the house one day, and buy a salad or similar item one day. Again $5.00 to $9.00.
Weekends: About $10.00? if we eat out, which is usually at least one day.
Dinner
Anywhere from $10 to $35 if we eat out. We probably eat out roughly four days out of seven.
(Neither of us is prone to dessert or snacking outside of mealtimes.)
So adding it all up… insert frantic scratching, clicking, beeping, ominous screeches … it looks like I spend anywhere from $60 to $175 a week eating out. I’d call it $100.
I estimate about $240 CDN a month for just me. That translates to about $240 US. 
Interesting. I budget $280 a month for groceries for one person which is right in line with the governments estimate of $281 for the “liberal” plan.
I usually spend more like $300 on groceries and $50 on restaurant food. The division is a little misleading; I don’t really cook so most of the grocery purchase is freshly cooked food I buy for eating at home. I’m adamant about eating high quality, healthy food and not cheap, processed stuff.
Eating out, I actually prefer inexpensive restaurants and my average share is usually around $5-$8 bucks (including tip). I eat out a couple of times a week.
For a five person family I’m estimating a close $1,100.
Groceries are about $850, and the rest is eat out meals.
I’ve included the costs of him eating my prepared lunch at work, the same with the kids for school, and the cost of their milk.
Kids are age 3,6 and 12.
But looking at the numbers I see we need to eat out a lot less.
At the bottom of the chart they note:
For the OP’s perusal: A pdf of Consumer Expenditures in 2005 from the U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics gives an average annual expenditure on food of $5931, with $3297 spent on food at home and $2634 spent on food while out.
On further looking, I think I might have misinterpreted that chart note, tremorviolet.
Approximately $230 a month feeds my husband and me. We’re not dining on filet mignon, but we’re pretty happy with what we eat. Our income is low enough that we could qualify for food stamps, but we’ve never applied.