HUNTINGTON -- The TOPS Club (Take Off Pounds Sensibly) is offering tips for eating well on a budget.

Advice from the nonprofit weight-loss support organization includes:

Make at least one meal meatless. Choose recipes that utilize eggs or dried beans -- like pinto or northern beans -- as the main protein.

Double your recipes and freeze leftovers or extra amounts of meat, bread and cooked vegetables. Bring leftovers to work for lunch or use the excess ingredients as inspiration for future meals.

Eat dinner as a family, or consider having a weekly potluck with neighbors to reduce the cost per person of your meals.

Clip coupons, avoiding "new food" coupon gimmicks that often are low in nutritional value.

Subscribe to a healthy cooking magazine, or peruse recipe books for healthy ideas.

Plan meals for the week in advance. A meal planning chart or simple shopping list for the week are great tools for the budget-minded, health-conscious consumer. Knowing what you already have in the pantry and what you intend to make ahead of time reduces impulse spending, saves time, and improves the nutritional value of your meal.

Read the supermarket circulars in your local newspaper, or look online for weekly specials that can help guide your meal planning.

Post meal plans on the refrigerator door where the entire family can see it and refer back to it throughout the week. This also helps avoid the question, "What's for dinner?"

Only shop once a week. This makes it easier to avoid unnecessary purchases and encourages you to stick to your weekly menu.

Have a snack before you visit the grocery store. Shopping on an empty stomach can lead to impulse buying.

Shop the perimeter of the store, remembering that the least healthy and most overpriced packaged foods are concentrated in the middle aisles.

Choose prepared foods with short ingredient lists and minimal additives or artificial ingredients.

Use unit pricing to get the best value. Savvy shoppers know that using unit pricing can maximize their purchasing power. Commonly listed in small print below or to the side of the total price and as dollars or cents per unit of weight -- such as pounds, ounces, or grams -- unit pricing can be a valuable tool that helps you make an informed choice about your purchases.

Buying economy or family-size containers is sometimes, but not always, a better buy. Larger packages that have a lower cost per unit than their smaller counterparts are only going to save you money if you will truly eat all of the food in the package. If it spoils and has to be thrown away, it could just be a waste of your money.

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