The Art of the Grocery List

Some people need to go to the grocery store on a full stomach or they walk off having left half their paycheck and with way too many things, most of which are non-essentials for special occasions, even though this isn’t one of them. Some people need to go on an empty stomach or they just don’t feel like buying anything. All people need to go to the grocery store (online or brick and mortar) with a list of grocery items.

Drawing up a shopping list is a sort of art form of the modern age. We’re all tight for time and usually short of money. Organizing your meals and shopping can save you both. One easy idea is to get a whiteboard and include all your usual suspects like milk, rice, chicken, assorted fruits and veggies, snacks, breakfast favorites, quick dinner ingredients (I see you rice), and not-too-luxurious desserts. Then you can check them when you’re out to include them on your list. You can also organize what you need by group: fruit, vegetable, meat, spices, drinks, bakery and baking, pasta and rice, condiments, canned goods, deli (cold cuts and cheeses).

Tips to make your grocery list

We have a few tips for when you’re chewing on your pencil trying to decide what to get or order or how exactly to organize your shopping.

• Make a master list of things you always need and are cyclically running out of. Tea. Coffee. Olive oil. Rice. Eggs. Sugar.
• Try to get whatever you can from local producers. At Food Crowd we have a filter so you can see whatever we have available that’s straight outta the United Arab Emirates. You’re doing yourself and the planet a favor by prioritizing freshness and keeping transport emissions to a minimum.
• Get produce that’s in season. Check online to see what’s being harvested right now in the UAE and try to fit that in. The rest is going to have to be sourced from some exotic location, usually far overseas.
• If you can, buy non-perishables in bulk. At Food Crowd we offer bulk spices and rice, for instance, in bigger portions and lower prices per unit.
• Do your meal prep weekly. Don’t go shopping every day; you’ll end up buying things you don’t need or that go bad. Know what you’re going to make and need and get it beforehand.
• Buy frozen veggies if you’re not sure to reduce food waste. Freezing food is an age-old and proven food preservation method. Besides lowering waste from produce going bad it means you have a quick meal fix when something comes up.

Pick and plan to pick the healthy alternative. How many ingredients does that prepared dish have? (Less is more.) Are there tons of added sugars? (Added sugars bad.) Try to make your list produce and meat, fish, eggs, and poultry heavy and snack, carb, prepared food light. Avoid the salty, the sugary, the saturated fatty, the cholesterol-ly.

Food Crowd aims to keep your pantries stocked and the food you love on your table as well as support local farmers and producers. We aim to be your one-stop-one-stop grocery store for everything on your grocery list.