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Cooking your meals at home is often cheaper and healthier than ordering takeout. If you're stretched for time, making your own meals does not have to be an elaborate process. A few things, like doing some quick planning and research before you head to the grocery store, can help when it comes to eating healthy and not going broke in the process.

Before you go grocery shopping, here are six tips to help you stay in your budget, maximize your time and eat healthy.

Meal plan

If you are looking to eat healthy and save money on groceries, meal planning is a great place to start. Planning your meals and snacks can help you put together your grocery list, avoid buying more groceries than you need and be more efficient with your time.

If you feel like you don’t have much room in your schedule to cook, plan to make larger meal portions a couple times during the week and save leftovers to eat for a few days. Search food blogs or recipe books for some simple, healthy meal ideas to get a start on your planning.

Shop the sales

King Soopers, Target, Sprouts and Whole Foods all have weekly ads online that let you know what’s on sale. Get into the habit of reviewing these weekly ads as you meal plan and before you go to the grocery store. Planning your meals and snacks around the weekly ads will help you save money and help you create your grocery list.

Have a snack before grocery shopping

When we go grocery shopping on an empty stomach, we often are tempted to purchase things that are not on our list. This causes us to sometimes buy things that aren’t the healthiest choice or that we won’t end up eating. Having a snack before going to the store can help you avoid temptation and overspending on extra groceries.

Stick to your list

When you shop for groceries, commit to only purchasing the items on your list. Again, items you see at the store can easily tempt you, but this can lead to extra costs and extra food you may not eat. Your list also will help you stay on track and make your trip to the store more efficient. 

Shop the perimeter

The perimeter of the grocery store is where you’ll find the freshest ingredients that won’t break the bank:

• Fruits and vegetables are a healthy, and often cheap, addition to any meal. Keep in mind that fruits and vegetables are the least expensive when they are in-season.
• Meat can be on the more expensive side, but you can usually find items on sale in the grocery store’s weekly ad. If you find a good deal and have room in your budget, you could buy extra meat and freeze what you don’t need right away to use later. 
• The bakery department in the grocery store is the place for fresh and inexpensive bread, rolls and buns. Often the price of day-old items is marked down. To help your bread items last longer, freeze what you don’t use right away.
• Eggs and Greek yogurt in the dairy aisle are often on sale and can be good sources of protein and calcium.

Choose generic brands

There is typically no difference in quality between name brand and store-brand grocery items, except in price. Be aware that many of the cheaper store brand and generic items reside on the bottom shelves at the store.