10 foods you should never skimp on at the grocery store

by Weetabix, Elastic Waist I'm pretty ruthless while grocery shopping. In fact, I make an effort to get in and out of the store as quickly as possible. Hey, walking really fast while pushing a cart full of canned beans and a whole watermelon is resistance training, right? And sometimes this method fails me because I don't take the time to do the math and identify whether or not I'm making a good decision with my grocery dollar.

I end up buying a lot of precut stuff, which is just wasteful because we all know it's cheaper if you do the chopping yourself. And we all know that many of the store brands are the exact same product as the one with the fancy label (and catchy commercial jingle) but in some cases, spending a little bit more can make a big difference in the quality of your groceries. Cheap Healthy Good breaks down some items where spending just a little bit more will pay off when it comes to taste, texture or general edibility (is that a word?) of your chow. Her list: Coffee Pickles Premade pasta sauce and salad dressing Lemon juice Garlic Pasta Beer Chocolate Fish Cheese Reading the post, however, I was stunned by what I consider automatics. For instance, we always have a jar of reconstituted lemon juice in the fridge for when you need an unexpected little acidity, but whenever I'm making something that requires lemon juice, I always buy fresh. I wouldn't even consider buying cheap cheese (although this might be a regional attitude, being from a state that prides itself on its artisanal cheeses). While we do buy some jarred pasta sauce, it's typically Newman's Own Five Cheese blend, because in a pinch, it's not only edible, it's absolutely delicious when tossed with hot pasta and Pecorino. And Esteban has threatened to send me back to the store if I come home with a pasta that isn't Creamette. Chocolate? Puhlease. In my mind, the only actual chocolate is the kind that doesn't taste like wax, and I get a much better high off of a single $2 bar of Lindt than I do from $10 worth of Hershey's. It's also just good nutritional sense to go with the bar that gets the job done with the least amount of fat and sugar. However, we totally get jarred garlic all the time. But it's not a cost thing, it's a laziness thing. One thing not mentioned on the list, though, is peanut butter. I won't touch anything in the grocery store that costs less than Jif, but my favorite is Whole Foods' 365 brand of smooth all natural, and at $2 a jar, it's about twice the price as generic. The taste, though? A million times better. End of debate. Posted on: Healthy Living / Yahoo! Shine