Each week the NZ Herald and Newstalk ZB's Cooking The Books podcast tackles a different money problem. Today, it's the various tactics to attack the food bill. Hosted by Frances Cook.

If you want to cut back your spending, it makes sense to focus on the biggest core expenses.

Food is undeniably one of those. If you’re ruled by your tastebuds like I sometimes am, it might even be your number one expense.

Eating good food is one of the great joys in life, and nobody wants to give that up.

But the average New Zealand family wastes $500 of food in a year, and because that’s an average, some of us waste far more.

So there are savings to be made if you know the storage tricks, the seasonal tactics, and how to work with your family dynamics.

I talked to Jenny Marshall from Love Food Hate Waste for the latest Cooking the Books.

We discussed the biggest items that blow out the budget, and ways to spend less without feeling deprived.

For the interview, listen to the podcast.

If you have a question about this podcast, or an idea for the next one, come and talk to me about it. I'm on Facebook here https://www.facebook.com/FrancesCookJournalist/, Instagram here https://www.instagram.com/francescooknz/ and Twitter here https://twitter.com/FrancesCook