Today we wanted to talk to you about how to purchase organic and non-GMO foods on a budget. One challenge you face when you were wanting to feed your family as much organic and non-GMO foods as possible is the cost of these items.
We strive to feed our family as much organic and non-GMO foods that we can within our budget. Obviously we would like to eat 100% organic and non-GMO foods but our budget just doesn’t allow for this. We have put quite a bit of thought into this and it seems as though our society and our marketplaces make it hard to eat this way when you are on a low or strict budget.
Here’s our list of what we are able to purchase within our budget:
- Milk
- Canned Goods
- Frozen Goods
- Pantry Items
- Flour
- Some Meats
- Some Fruits and Vegetables
Our explanation of the cost of these items
Organic Milk comes in at about $5 per gallon. We’re able to justify this cost just due to how much milk our daughter consumes.
We try to buy all canned goods, frozen goods, and pantry items that we can organic. Typically the organic versions of these items isn’t much more than the non-organic version. We only purchase organic flour because we do not agree with the way the wheat berries for non-organic flour are harvested. We prefer Bob’s Red Mill Organic White and Wheat Pastry Flours which come it at about $5 per 5 lb bag. Below you will find links to the flours mentioned.
We recently started buying organic cereal but try to eat oatmeal and other hot items for breakfast instead. These boxes of organic cereal are about $5 per box. In addition, purchase any organic foods you can in the bulk section of your local grocery stores.
As far as organic meats, these become quite costly but we try to buy these whenever possible. In addition, we only purchase meats that are nitrate free.
We try to purchase organic fruits and vegetables based on the dirty dozen philosophy. This philosophy implies that you purchase organic or not depending on whether or not you plan to eat the skin. If you are going to eat the skin such as an an apple, pear, peach, tomato than you will want to purchase organic. While if you are not going to eat the skin such as a potato, oranges, bananas or avocados you don’t have to purchase these organic products.
There’s a lot of controversy around this because some believe these things still come through in the produce. But this is something to consider when you’re trying to eat organic and non-GMO free on a tight budget.
According to the USDA for any plant based items to be certified USDA organic they must also be non-GMO. This is really great to keep in mind and takes a lot of the guessing work out of finding this out.
There is a growing trend for more people wanting to eat or feed their families this way. The only way our society will get there faster is if more people began to purchase organic and non-GMO foods. If everyone purchased whatever of these products that their family could afford, this would create a demand for stores to carry these products instead of commercially produced foods.
We’d love to hear what organic and non-GMO foods you are able to purchase on a budget. Let us know in the comments below. Thank you for stopping by and visiting Sunup to Sundown! We’ll be back soon with another recipe or update regarding our garden or our journey to becoming more self-reliant.
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