grocery shopping doesn't have to suck

7 easy tips to become a happier, more efficient shopper.

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I used to loathe grocery shopping. This is an inherited trait — one of my core childhood memories is my mother grumbling about having to go to the grocery store *again*, and then dragging us kids along, for us all to grumble together.

Here’s why it sucks (for me, anyway): feeding my family is already a lot. Because it’s not just the cooking, is it? I have to actually plan what to feed them, and then buy said food, and THEN cook it. I would add that there’s then the cleaning, but I do not clean. That’s George’s job.

So sometimes, in the interest of not going completely insane, I skip the planning part. Because who’s got the damn time. On these occasions, I get to the grocery store, because I have to feed the people the food, and I have no plan, and I just flail around the aisles aimlessly. I try to pull up random recipes (my own, TBH), but I have no service deep in the abyss of the Carmel Valley grocery store, so I just wind up panic buying a bunch of random ingredients that go home to die a slow (or sometimes fast, what up raspberries?) death in my refrigerator.

Sound familiar?

In the past year or so, I’ve REALLY improved my methods (ahem: THE MENU!) and cut down on food and time waste. These things have helped me hate grocery shopping less, and they might help you too.

So let’s dive in — here are my tips for making grocery shopping suck less, and next week (because this post got way too long) I’ll send my list of pantry favorites that I always have on hand.

make grocery shopping suck less.

1. Do it from your couch. I have been a Thrive Market evangelist for a million years because the prices are WAY better than what you can get at your normal grocery store (as opposed to InstaCart where they jack prices way up! and Thrive price matches!), and the online and app shopping experience is so enjoyable. They’ve got meat, fish, wine, the best kid snacks, and all of the best pantry goods. You can sort by dietary restrictions. Every time I run out of a pantry staple, I add it to a list in my kitchen, and when I know I’m at about the $50 mark (the free shipping minimum), I place an order.

2. Keep your go-to meats stocked in the freezer. Ground beef, boneless skinless chicken thighs, shrimp. They’re always in there waiting for me.

3. If meal planning for the week is daunting, only plan for 2 to 3 days in advance. Or even just one! Once you have a well-stocked pantry, grocery trips for fresh ingredients are quick and painless. But seriously, have you tried utilizing The Menu method?

4. Go to cool stores/markets to make grocery shopping, daresay, fun. When you’re not buying TONS of ingredients every time you grocery shop, it frees you up a bit to go to cooler speciality stores where the ingredients will be more high quality, but also more expensive. I love popping into this cool market (Elroy’s!) in Monterey for fresh pasta, and I love taking the beasts to the Carmel Valley Farmer’s Market on Sundays to buy seasonal produce that I then build our meals around. For instance, if you see fennel at the market, buy it then search “fennel” on the What To Cook site to find ideas for how to use it! If your pantry and freezer are well-stocked, you’ll already have everything else you need to make dinner.

5. Maybe you should stop bulk buying? It took me a lot of spoiled produce to realize that at this phase in my life, my family is just not good candidates for a Costco membership. So much spinach was sacrificed while learning this lesson, RIP. Thrive prices are just as good as Costco, without having to cram cans of tomatoes and tubes of toothpaste into every spare nook and cranny of your house.

6. Shop your fridge before you buy more. If you cook a recipe on Sunday and it only uses half of the bag of, say, carrots, search for recipes that use carrots while planning your next meal. Don’t buy new produce before you’ve used up what needs to be cooked. When you need to just use up a ton of random bits and bobs in the veggie drawer: make a veggie-packed fried rice. I used this recipe to make a Brussels sprouts fried rice this weekend and it was so good.

7. If you’re missing an ingredient, you do not need to run to the store for it. Hence the substitutions section of WTC. I’ll never be able to include all of the possible subs in the world, so use those as a starting place. Even if an ingredient is the headliner — you can likely swap it out for something you already own!