For the Month of August the Sisterhood challenged us to clean out our pantries and get things organized. Never one to shrink away from the ultimate control freak high - putting things in their proper order - I tackled this project with all I had.
My final report was complete with pictures of my stash and a new challenge for myself - do only limited grocery shopping for the month and eat mostly from the pantry.
I decided that I would spend $15 or less weekly on groceries - allowing only enough for fresh produce, eggs, and milk. I'll let you in on a secret: in my house we don't eat that many eggs and we certainly don't drink/use much milk. The mutant is apparently a fruitphobe and only eats veggies when I cook them for dinner.
Given the quantity of food items in my house and our lack of fresh food eating, I never really expected this challenge to be difficult. It was mostly for my purposes, to try to get creative with cooking as well as seeing how long our food stockpile would last.
I'll just tell you - I barely made a dent in it. There were those lazy nights where I just made pizza rolls or baked frozen chimichangas with cheese sauce on top. There were also nights where I dug deep into the cabinets and made old favorites with what we had stocked up.
The final result?
$40.56 spent on groceries for the month (not including the weekend I was on vacation). That's a $13.52 per week average.
Frozen convenience food was the only portion of our pantry that was used up, although the meat stash is starting to become slim pickins. Jay and I are considering buying a 1/2 of a cow (not sure who we would split it with) to refill our freezer for the winter.
If you've bought a whole cow like this before - please let me know what you though of it and any advice you might have!
The project did get me back into the habit of meal planning, although with lunches I've still got some work to be done. I'm also excited to be pulling the "beef for stewing" out of the freezer for dinner this week. Our temperatures have plummeted and its definitely beef stew weather!
That is awesome. I need to get better at Grocery Shopping and using what I have first before buying new stuff.
ReplyDeleteThat is the most impressive grocery bill I've ever seen!
ReplyDeleteI'm glad you did so well on your challenge! I've tried to eat out of the pantry only, but I still end up spending a bunch on produce, milk (b/c of my growing boy!) & lunch stuff for the kids. It's a great idea, though. I've never bought a cow, but I know of people who have. I think that's awesome! I'd split it with you if you lived near by. It'd be cool!
ReplyDeleteWow. I cannot imagine such a low grocery bill. That is AWESOME.
ReplyDeletethat's an awesome grocery bill! unfortunately...or not, i suppose...i go through a lot of fresh produce. i'm thinking of buying and freezing some of it though, especially celery for soups, etc. hmmmm. :) i suppose that would count as "pantry" food then, eh?
ReplyDeleteperhaps i should do a mini-challenge for myself!