Yes, I spend 100/month of groceries. As mentioned, I never eat out, except maybe once a month, and put that under Misc. I only eat out for purely social reasons, it is almost physically painful for me to be spending 3-4 times as much on food than I normally would. I live in the Midwest and buy my food at Meijer. 90% of what I buy is on sale, 8% is low cost staple itmes and 2% are "splurges." usually just one or two items.
I do not drink, smoke, or drink pop. Yes, it is only called pop in my state. I eat some sort of frozen vegetable, pasta, orange juice, milk and tea every day, I may mix it up a bit for the other items. A eat 1/3 of the frozen beans, which costs 35 cents a serving, the pasta costs about 40 cents a serving, including the no-fat/no-cholesterol squeeze "butter" I put on it, the orange juice is about 50 cents a glass, the milk is about 30 cents, the tea ranges from low quality to high, so can range from 20 cents to 50 cents (since I drink multiple servings of it). I also usually eat a bag of pretzels as a snack throughout the day which is 1 dollar. This adds up to...about 2.75 on a normal day. The other .66 a day goes to my splurge item (fresh asparagus/cherry strudel) and household items (toilet paper/paper toweling/one other household item).
Oh yea, my credit card discounts 2% off all my groceries as well. 5% on gas (but it is still 150 even after that
). Obviously, I don't pay a fee for the credit card and the amount is automatically deducted from my bill each month.
One year in undergrad, I was on a ramen noodles diet for a bit when I was stuck in a dorm without a stove, that got old very fast, I have a much more balanced diet now, thanks to having access to a stove and some experience buying groceries. My salt intake is a bit high still, but not too bad, I only sometimes go over the daily recommended amount. There is way to much salt for my liking in a lot of foods. Mac/cheese, ramen, boxed rice are pretty nasty in regular quantities. I would like to get a rice cooker though at some point, as I like white fluffy rice, especially with some sort of sweet or salty sauce, but the packaged stuff has a gigantic amount of overkill on butter and salt.
If I am working, I bring a low cost microwave meal, something in the $1-$1.50 range (often healthy choice on sale). Also go through 75 cents in snacks. However, my work provides some fairly decent green tea for free, which offsets the extra cost of the convenience meal, I usually go through 8-10 cups.
I had to fix my tires twice this month (two different tires went flat) but it was free thanks to the warranty through discount tire.