Coupons With Meal Planning

If you have missed the first part to this series you may click here.

Since becoming more frugal and trying to expand our dollars I have learned that coupons can help.  Before I sit down to make my menu plans I go to my usual coupon websites (here, here and here) and plan my meals around what is on sale.  For example, every couple of weeks there is a coupon available for 75 cents off a pound of Butterball ground turkey and this tends to be around the time the Commissary marks down their ground turkey to 99 cents a pound.  So in the end I purchase a pound of ground turkey for about 25 cents! 

When you have found your coupons you can then plan your menus.  Try to match your meals with your coupons or ingredients that could be used in many different meals.  Also, if your store has a clearance section stop by to check it out.  I have found many items on clearance that I have had coupons for. 

Remember do not purchase something that you normally would not because you have a coupon.  Of course there are exceptions; sometimes if I want to try something and I have coupon I then would purchase it.  That way if I do not like it then I do not feel so guilty over the purchase. 

Do you use coupons? Do you meal plan around coupons?