• Inflation is picking back up, stretching household budgets.
• High prices are pushing many to get creative with grocery and restaurant spending.
• Business Insider wants to know: How are you balancing your food costs?

"What's for dinner?"

For many Americans, the nightly question is often as much about taste preferences as it is about economic realities.

My own family's mealtimes invariably require tradeoffs of time, money, and skill that we must navigate every single day.

Now, rising inflation is once again squeezing families' finances across the US.

Food costs have so far held relatively steady this year, with increases and decreases mostly offsetting each other in a basket of goods. But soaring gas prices and other consumer expenses are eating up a larger share of household budgets, according to the latest consumer price index.

For some families, that might mean cutting down on restaurant dining in favor of home-cooked meals. For others, it's swapping out beef for a less expensive protein.

Time-strapped shoppers may find themselves increasingly eyeing their grocery store's prepared foods options as a lower-cost alternative to getting delivery.

At Business Insider, we want to know how our readers are navigating these decisions, and how that has changed in the past year.

In my family of four, for example, my wife and I decided to sharply reduce restaurant and delivery spending. By cooking more meals at home, we have basically stopped ordering delivery, and we eat out at restaurants about once a week. According to our budgeting app, we've cut our spending in that category in half.

How have you been balancing food costs with other expenses over the past year? What changes, big and small, have helped you feed yourself well and save money?

We also want to see the receipts.

What have you stopped buying? What do you now spend more on? What do you splurge on? How have gas prices affected you?

Please get in touch via email or share your info in the survey below:

• Walmart took a $175 million hit to profit growth last quarter because of fuel expenses.
• The retailer's CFO said it took the hit to preserve "trust" with customers rather than raise prices.
• If costs remain high through this year, the company said it would need to increase prices.

Walmart says it managed to keep prices steady in the face of rising fuel costs last quarter by taking a $175 million hit to profit growth.

That might not last.

Chief Financial Officer John David Rainey said the company is facing hundreds of millions in new energy costs this year, which would lead to price hikes later in the year if fuel costs don't come down soon.

"We're confident this was the right approach to reinforce customer trust and support share gains over the long term," Chief Financial Officer John David Rainey said Thursday on the company's first quarter earnings call. "That said, these are real impacts to cost of goods sold for us and our suppliers."

Walmart reported $177.8 billion in revenue for the first quarter, up 7.3% from the same period last year. US stores saw comparable sales growth of 4.1%, beating Bloomberg analyst estimates. Its operating income of $7.5 billion was up 5% year over year, with the fuel impact accounting for a quarter of a percentage-point drag.

The company also said its growth in other revenue streams, such as e-commerce, memberships, and advertising, helped it hold the line on prices during a challenging quarter for energy costs.

The cost pressures led Walmart to set adjusted earnings per share guidance of about $0.73 for the coming quarter, below the expected $0.75. The full-year outlook remained unchanged but was below expectations.

Walmart's stock fell about 7% after the market opened on Thursday morning.

"We're not bulletproof to some of these things that are happening in the economy," Rainey said.

Walmart has passed other costs along to shoppers in the past. Rainey said last year that tariffs were "too high" and the company would raise prices. It was one of the first major retailers to do so. Rainey said this year that any tariff refunds it receives from the government would be invested in lowering prices.

Last quarter, US drivers turned to Walmart's warehouse chain, Sam's Club, in a big way for relief on gas prices, lifting that segment's comparable sales growth to 5.9%.

"That tells you that customers are coming to us looking for value," Rainey said of Sam's Club gas purchases.

But Sam's Club also flashed affordability warning signs.

"The number of gallons that customers fill up with when they come to our fuel stations fell below 10 for the first time since 2022. That's an indication of stress," Rainey said.