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What is your grocery budget?


mommyoffive
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The prices quoted above are jaw-dropping to me. Last week I bought four (gluten-free) hamburger buns for over $5, spent $2 for a box of gf pasta, $1.60 for a bunch of (organic) bananas, about $.50 each for peaches, $3.50 for peanut butter, $1.99 each for grapefruit, $5.49 for a package of deli ham.... I'd say I waste $5 to $10 a week on food that winds up not getting eaten and another $15 on food that's frivolous/just because we want it, but a $70 budget is not happening.

I think I'm spending right about $250 a week for a gluten-free family of three (all with fast metabolisms; DS eats as much as I do). That includes detergent but not cat stuff (bought elsewhere), shampoo and medicine (likewise), DH's lunches on weekdays (he usually eats out; very nearly all our other meals are at home), paper/plastic goods (a package of paper towels or a case of TP lasts us months; I don't do Ziplocs/Kleenex/paper napkins). We mostly drink tap water.

And I'm making my own yogurt, many bread products (considerable price difference between wheat flour and gf flours!!), usually cooking beans from dried, etc. I could do worse. This is a moderate COL area, but I'm able to support local farms and reduce our trash/recycling output by spending $8/gallon for milk in returnable glass bottles and $6/dozen for pasture-raised eggs in a returnable carton. I don't have to budget very tightly just now, or I wouldn't have some of these options. But if I only had $70 a week to feed us, I'd be looking for ways to get more money, not trying to trim it further.

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$300 a week is as low as we can go with a family of 4 with multiple special food needs. This does not include eating out.

ETA - if we are not being careful we can EASILY spend $2000 a month on food or more.

We mainly shop at Whole Foods & Costco - the price above does NOT include paper towels, toilet paper, or cleaning products, but I spend much less on those than others do, i think. It also does not include all of our supplements. 

We do not buy health insurance, and rarely get sick. We watch our food more and spend more time working and using what we have well than always finding the best deals. We are aware of sale items and coupons though and shop according to them, when we can. 

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I’m picking up groceries later today, and our total bill is just under $250.  It includes paper goods, some cleaning supplies and bird seed - all of which we don’t buy each week.  But we have a well stocked fridge and pantry, too.  DH will eat out for lunch tomorrow, and we have a dinner out planned for tonight. We spend a lot on food. It’s a fairly HCOL here, and we have special diet needs.

Years ago, I did a lot of couponing and sale shopping.  I have found that now all of my extra food shopping energy goes to finding safe food for DS.  He has multiple life threatening allergies and not all are listed on the ingredients.  I have to email or call every single company, regularly.  A lot of the budget friendly options are not safe, so we just eat what we can.  I go to four different stores to find DS’s safe foods.  I suppose I could take time to compare each store’s loss leaders, etc, but just getting food that won’t (literally) kill my child feels like a full time job.  

Food budgets are so very personal and varied.

I view the MSM blog as entertainment.  I suspect there’s more to her story, and she obviously has monetary motivation for promoting that lifestyle (which is unsustainable, and for her kids’ sake I hope it’s not true!).

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41 minutes ago, SamanthaCarter said:

Grocery budget related question: when you stock up on something you find on a good sale, do you find that you use it more freely than you would had you bought it as you needed it? I

My examples are snacks and convenience foods, but I find it’s the same with other things like baking nuts or dairy, etc. 

How do you deal with this, so that you actually realize significant savings from bulk purchases? 

I don't stock up on frivolous foods (like prepared snack foods) or perishables.

I have not found that we eat more pasta, chick peas, or cheese just because I stocked up at a sale.

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1 hour ago, SamanthaCarter said:

Grocery budget related question: when you stock up on something you find on a good sale, do you find that you use it more freely than you would had you bought it as you needed it? 

 

Nope, we just use at the usual speed.  We stock up on sugar for my coffee, toilet paper for DS12 because he uses the most toilet paper, milk for DS13 because he loves milk and rice because my husband has rice for work lunch so buying more on sale (about half off) is worth it. For sugar, my husband would buy like eight of the 4lb packs when they are on sale as that is the size that is manageable for me to pour into my Rubbermaid container which I use for sugar. For milk, we would buy three to four gallons worth since we have a small fridge so not a stockpile just that it’s mainly for DS13. 

 

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1 hour ago, regentrude said:

I don't stock up on frivolous foods (like prepared snack foods) or perishables.

I have not found that we eat more pasta, chick peas, or cheese just because I stocked up at a sale.

I think it might be a bit of a discipline problem here. My kids have been raiding the top of the fridge since they could climb on top of the counter or stand on the top bar of the step stool. Also, if I had a glass jar of chocolate chips a pantry as pp said she does, they’d be gone. I’ve got one serious snacker and one sweet tooth and a neighbor kid worse than them both. (My oldest child doesn’t eat nearly enough).

Cheese and pasta stockpiles would get used up faster than if I bought them as needed. Chickpeas, no. 

 

 

 

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2 minutes ago, SamanthaCarter said:

I think it might be a bit of a discipline problem here. My kids have been raiding the top of the fridge since they could climb on top of the counter or stand on the top bar of the step stool. Also, if I had a glass jar of chocolate chips a pantry as pp said she does, they’d be gone. I’ve got one serious snacker and one sweet tooth and a neighbor kid worse than them both. (My oldest child doesn’t eat nearly enough).

Cheese and pasta stockpiles would get used up faster than if I bought them as needed. Chickpeas, no. 

 

 

 

In that case, saving money is costing you money. 

 

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We are going through horrendous volumes of food right now because of teenage boys. We have a separate garage freezer and a separate garage refrigerator.  We use the freezer primarily for bulk chicken (Zaycon) and produce. It's easy enough to portion out the 40# boxes into meal portions on the day I do my chicken pickup.  I purchased 80# of chicken at .99/lb with the latest sale.  I will portion that out to different bags for fajitas, curry, and then protein-based meals. The bags for fajitas will have bags with pre-sliced onion and peppers staped to them. I can definitely count those as meals.

Likewise, when I start bulk berry buying this month, I will also pre-portion those out for smoothies.  

As for the other stuff.....like yogurt, string cheese, or other things that I get on sales at Costco or the like....the extra goes out to the garage fridge. Before we had a garage fridge, it would get tagged with post-it notes or put into tied plastic grocery bags so that it wouldn't get consumed.

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Ds and I are talking about this.....back in ye olden days, when my kids were all younger and had less self-control, we would pre-portion out animal cookies to 1 oz bags. We kept an ice-cream bucket with a lid on it for bulk storage....the extra bags were kept there, and we would ration out bags for a few days to be kept in a place that was considered free game.    We still do this when I buy almonds or cashews....make 1 oz bags instead of leaving the entire 3lb. jar out.

We don't really have money in our grocery budget for crackers or cookies or the like right now. 

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3 minutes ago, HomeAgain said:

In that case, saving money is costing you money. 

 

Maybe. It does bother me, but not enough to actually figure out if what we’d be consuming alternatively would be more expensive. Obviously it is if they are grazing and there are no real caloric needs, then the alternative would be zero. I like some of the ideas mentioned

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4 hours ago, regentrude said:

I don't stock up on frivolous foods (like prepared snack foods) or perishables.

I have not found that we eat more pasta, chick peas, or cheese just because I stocked up at a sale.

 

Same with the exception of clif bar type things for my autistic son who has a propensity to skip lunch at school and then  crash.  So he keeps a few bars in his bag and I will snag a lot when there’s a good sale.  

We don’t stock up on anything we don’t eat regularly as a staple.  I also learned my lesson- don’t stock up on chocolate because it doesn’t keep for long periods in all climates.  

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When we stock up on things we don't end up eating more.  Well if we stock up on say pasta, then we might have a week with more pasta.  

But cheese, snacks, cereal nope they don't go any faster than normal.  So we end up with extras after the week goes by which we normally would not.  So it does save us money. 

The only time we stock up and then eat more is with fruit and veggies. 

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On 6/4/2018 at 12:10 PM, happysmileylady said:

Tonight I made some fried chicken breasts.  The name of the recipe is actually Swiss mushroom chicken. Chicken breasts, cracker crumbs (actually the actual crackers purchased and pictured in her pics, on the exact same sale. ) ham slices, Swiss cheese, and mushrooms. Of those things, the chicken was purchased weeks ago, the Swiss cheese last week, the ham over 2 weeks ago and frozen, and the mushrooms on mark down at Meijer on Saturday.  So for us, most of tonight’s dinner was NOT purchased this week. (Oh I almost forgot, I bought green beans last week that I ended up not using, so I sautéed them so we didn’t pitch them. ). 

What comprised over a third of my $132 that I spent this week on groceries?   8 bags of chicken nuggets.  They are my fall back for my younger two picky kids (DD7 has an ASD diagnosis, DS5 might end up with one...so on the bubble).   The nuggets were on sale last week and GONE.  I got a rain check and the 8 nuggets I bought will cover us till we move because we go through about 2 bags a week   

Next week, having already run the numbers, I am looking at about $105.  Which isn’t $70, but I am buying swordfish and bacon(omg DS5 can eat a pound on his own!  I started a previous thread on it)

DH and I update our budget spreadsheets multiple times a WEEK.  Shoot, if I had a working computer right now, I could tell you how many times i updated it TODAY.  I logged into our bank like 4 times today, not counting the stop at the ATM at 6pm.  The bank account is the second thing I check when waking up (weather is first.)

Yes but her lists still don't allow enough for their to be much left over.

I can't speak to amounts because food costs are roughly double here.  I spent $70 at store the other day on all clearance or half price products.  At a major stretch that would have been the meat for the week, some of the bread and some dairy, but not all.  No fruit and veg because I already had them in.  

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7 hours ago, SamanthaCarter said:

Grocery budget related question: when you stock up on something you find on a good sale, do you find that you use it more freely than you would had you bought it as you needed it? I find this the cases particularly with yummy stuff. For instance, if I by a dozen 6 packs of individual applesauce and put them in the basement, kiddos eat them freely, and then they are gone. Same with something like popsicles or crackers. For me, the cook, its the same with things like chicken nuggets. If I can choose between making chicken nuggets or sandwiches or Mac and cheese for my kids for lunch, I’m probably going to reach for the bag of nuggets.

My examples are snacks and convenience foods, but I find it’s the same with other things like baking nuts or dairy, etc. 

How do you deal with this, so that you actually realize significant savings from bulk purchases? 

Yes absolutely.  If you have a separate area to store boxed bulk buys that can help or even just putting them at the back of a top shelf.  But this is why I don't bulk buy much unless it's stuff like meat or frozen veg that's somewhat self limiting.

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I'm actually experimenting with keeping a more minimalist pantry instead of a well-stocked one, because I do think it ends up costing us more, or we choose less healthy options.  Shelf-stable snacks get picked over fruit, or one weird random ingredient requires a $10-12 trip just to find something to use it in.  Have chocolate chips, will bake.  Or, I end up wondering in six months, "Why on earth did I buy this?" and throw it out.  I have yet to buy a bottle of rice vinegar that I remember what the heck I planned on using it for.

I'm making chicken and dumplings tomorrow night with the last box of a gluten free pancake mix that I bought a bunch of when it was on the mark-downs shelf for $2.50/box or something, before it expires.  Turns out, they make incredibly disgusting pancakes, hence the discontinuation.  But pretend it's a biscuit mix and soak those bad boys in chicken broth, and you've got a tasty dumpling.  It's 90ish degrees outside and chicken and dumplings isn't a light, veggie-heavy summer dish, although we have salad and sliced fruit too.  For nearly the same price in ingredients, we could have had a healthier stir fry or dinner salad or grilled veggie/chicken bowls.  But mmmm.... dumplings.

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6 minutes ago, BarbecueMom said:

I'm actually experimenting with keeping a more minimalist pantry instead of a well-stocked one, because I do think it ends up costing us more, or we choose less healthy options.  Shelf-stable snacks get picked over fruit, or one weird random ingredient requires a $10-12 trip just to find something to use it in.  Have chocolate chips, will bake.  Or, I end up wondering in six months, "Why on earth did I buy this?" and throw it out.  I have yet to buy a bottle of rice vinegar that I remember what the heck I planned on using it for.

I'm making chicken and dumplings tomorrow night with the last box of a gluten free pancake mix that I bought a bunch of when it was on the mark-downs shelf for $2.50/box or something, before it expires.  Turns out, they make incredibly disgusting pancakes, hence the discontinuation.  But pretend it's a biscuit mix and soak those bad boys in chicken broth, and you've got a tasty dumpling.  It's 90ish degrees outside and chicken and dumplings isn't a light, veggie-heavy summer dish, although we have salad and sliced fruit too.  For nearly the same price in ingredients, we could have had a healthier stir fry or dinner salad or grilled veggie/chicken bowls.  But mmmm.... dumplings.

 

This is such an interesting thought.  

Does stocking your pantry save you money or cost you

Do you eat better foods not having a stocked up pantry?  

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Ended up on a grocery run today. $83.20 for a few days' worth and dh's snacks.  Dinner tonight/lunch tomorrow was sesame beef lo mein:

$9.71 for the skirt steak to grill and shred  (I had ground beef, but tomorrow is taco night and I'll be too rushed to do shedded meat)
$2.50 for the noodles (made fresh and trucked to the store)
$2.75 for the bok choy to supplement what I had in my garden
$1.00 for two limes

That's, what, $16 for a total of two meals for four people?  $8 a meal, or just about $2 a serving to make a wok full of food.  But.....

In addition....
the mint and cilantro came from my garden
the soy sauce, sesame oil, sesame seeds, garlic, and chili paste came from the pantry
the cabbage, carrots, and peppers I threw in were leftovers in the fridge.

So, yeah, I'm not sure I could do under and eat as healthy or as much variety as we do.  However, I do remember having a really healthy diet as a kid and my parents were very frugal about food.  But I lived in the middle of farms and had access to gardens and "seconds" - produce that was bruised or otherwise unsalable so my mom would buy it up by the flat and can or dry it.  We had a healthy diet, but I didn't try rice until...late jr. high?  It just wasn't eaten as a thing in my area.  And forget many of the things my kids know: quinoa, couscous, kale...it was really Betty Crocker-inspired meals.

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I looked through several weeks of the menus.  Produce one week was one bag of Lima beans and a bag of peppers.  Another week there was 5 apples, 4 very damaged looking pears (ok for cooking maybe) 12 capsicum, 8 potatoes.  Another week there was a reasonable amount of produce - about the nutritional requirement for a family of five for a week though not much over for the freezer.  There are so many meals on the menus that have fruit but no vegetables and even then I don't get where all the fruit is coming from.  5 apples and 4 pears is one day worth of fruit for a family of five. 

Either there's another source of produce that's not mentioned or the kids aren't getting adequate nutrition!!!

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My DS13 bought a tube of polenta and a pack of sausages on Sunday to cook his lunch yesterday and DS12 wanted to have the same thing.

The 1lb tube of polenta cost $3.99 at Safeway which is down the street from us and my kids used half a tube each to fry polenta slices. So just the polenta cost $2 per kid. 

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2 hours ago, mommyoffive said:

 

This is such an interesting thought.  

Does stocking your pantry save you money or cost you

Do you eat better foods not having a stocked up pantry?  

I'm sure the answer to this varies widely but for me stocking up saves money.  But my grocery shopping list and my menu plan often have very little in common.  See almost every category of food is so fully stocked that I can go several weeks without even have to think about grocery shopping if I don't want to.  Meats (I've got most of my half of beef in the freezer, a good chunk of my half of pig, 1 turkey, 2-3 hams, an additional 30 pounds of bacon that I bought in addition to the half pig, shrimp, whole chicken, chicken thighs, and boneless skinless chicken breasts), starches (I've got potatoes, quinoa, white and brown rice, barley, pasta in 4-6 different shapes, hard and soft wheat berries to make any kind of baked good), veggies (there is always at least 4 kinds of frozen veggies in the freezer plus now we are starting to get fresh from the garden), fruits (I've got cherries, blueberries, peaches, strawberries, black raspberries, red raspberries and rhubarb in the freezer, plus canned applesauce, plus gallons of dried apples, mixed dried fruit, buckets full of homemade fruit rollups).  Eggs were 78 cents for 18 so I bought 12 cartons (so 18 dozen total).  They keep well past the date so no rush to use them up.  So the only things I HAVE to buy regularly are milk and fresh produce but if I don't make it to the store it's not a big deal because we have plenty and I'm good at improvising.  So my shopping is picking up whatever happens to be on sale but the menu planning is based on what is already in the house (which always leaves me plenty of options).  I don't really buy snack/convenience foods so there is nothing that we will go through faster because it's on hand because we have everything on hand.

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39 minutes ago, happysmileylady said:

5 apples and 4 pears is almost a week’s worth of fruit for us.  The reason is that DS5 and DD7 won’t touch produce.  As in hide in a corner and cry during therapy because a green bean was placed on the table. DD7 now eats bananas, and loves pizza so I can sneak some things in that way.  But I am still food chaining DS5 into that.  

Today, they each had a peanut butter sandwich on a cinnamon raisin English muffin for breakfast.  They picked out the raisins and only ate half each. DD7 then had a banana and they each had a glass of milk. 

For lunch, they each had a quesadilla.  I snuck in some diced onion and mostly got away with it. DS5 had a small helping of Cheerios, dry, and another cup of milk.  DD7 had another banana and milk. 

For dinner, each kid had 5 chicken nuggets, and more milk.  Somewhere between lunch and dinner, DD7 had 2 more bananas.  DS5 had some crackers and peanut butter.  

The lack of fruits and veggies in this menu is completely typical of these two.  I try to squeeze in what I can by making fruit breads for sandwiches, mixing some shredded cuke or carrot into pancakes or quesadillas, and we recently had a breakthrough with homemade tomato soup.  

BUT. 

I know my kids are getting adequate nutrition because the blood tests have said so (yeah it’s fun to do blood tests with a kid with limited verbal abilities.). 

I am constantly worried about my younger kids getting adequate nutrition because they eat so few fruits and veggies.  I do therapy and food chaining specifically because of that. 

But there are lots of ways to be adequately nourished.  

You’re going to be miffed at me for pointing this out but the whole reason you are food chaining and doing a lot of hard work with your kids is because such a limited diet is not healthy over the long haul. Blood tests do not show all nutritional deficiencies because the body works very hard at maintaining equilibrium in the bloodstream. (I have a child who is prone to nutritional deficiencies due to celiac disease).   Some of us have to work within the confines of a limited diet but I don’t choose it as optimal  

 

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50 minutes ago, happysmileylady said:

5 apples and 4 pears is almost a week’s worth of fruit for us.  The reason is that DS5 and DD7 won’t touch produce.  As in hide in a corner and cry during therapy because a green bean was placed on the table. DD7 now eats bananas, and loves pizza so I can sneak some things in that way.  But I am still food chaining DS5 into that.  

Today, they each had a peanut butter sandwich on a cinnamon raisin English muffin for breakfast.  They picked out the raisins and only ate half each. DD7 then had a banana and they each had a glass of milk. 

For lunch, they each had a quesadilla.  I snuck in some diced onion and mostly got away with it. DS5 had a small helping of Cheerios, dry, and another cup of milk.  DD7 had another banana and milk. 

For dinner, each kid had 5 chicken nuggets, and more milk.  Somewhere between lunch and dinner, DD7 had 2 more bananas.  DS5 had some crackers and peanut butter.  

The lack of fruits and veggies in this menu is completely typical of these two.  I try to squeeze in what I can by making fruit breads for sandwiches, mixing some shredded cuke or carrot into pancakes or quesadillas, and we recently had a breakthrough with homemade tomato soup.  

BUT. 

I know my kids are getting adequate nutrition because the blood tests have said so (yeah it’s fun to do blood tests with a kid with limited verbal abilities.). 

I am constantly worried about my younger kids getting adequate nutrition because they eat so few fruits and veggies.  I do therapy and food chaining specifically because of that. 

But there are lots of ways to be adequately nourished.  

You keep coming around to this point, but that's pathological eating.

Your kids are in feeding therapy to overcome their pathological eating because people aren't supposed to eat that way.

Look, we've paid for YEARS of therapy and I get what you're saying, but that's not normal.  She is presenting her blog to the public as a normal way of eating. It's not.

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I went back and read several weeks of post as well. She has three kids in three different schools. Odds are they are eating their lunches there.  It also appears that she isn't counting any meals out.  

If she wanted legitimacy in her blog, she would show each and every meal and price out each component....something more like what budget bytes does.

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9 minutes ago, prairiewindmomma said:

I went back and read several weeks of post as well. She has three kids in three different schools. Odds are they are eating their lunches there.  It also appears that she isn't counting any meals out.  

If she wanted legitimacy in her blog, she would show each and every meal and price out each component....something more like what budget bytes does.

Oh I thought she listed ham sandwiches for lunches.  but yeah, breaking out each meal is so helpful. Imean, tonight dh and I had pinto beans and cornbread. But tomorrow night will be chicken fajitas and salad. The two meals cost wildly different amounts. 

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1 hour ago, prairiewindmomma said:

You keep coming around to this point, but that's pathological eating.

Your kids are in feeding therapy to overcome their pathological eating because people aren't supposed to eat that way.

Look, we've paid for YEARS of therapy and I get what you're saying, but that's not normal.  She is presenting her blog to the public as a normal way of eating. It's not.

+1

Also this blogger doesn’t appear to have children with feeding issues. If she did, she couldn’t count on them eating like that either. 

ONE green veggie a week is absurd.  

Another thing is: even if the kids won’t eat it, the adults still need fruit and veggies. I am no stranger to sensory related restricted eating. Three of the kids who live here have dealt with it and one to an extreme degree, though that one is getting a lot more flexible now.  They would eat fruit but mostly a few select kinds.  Very few veggies.  

My husband and I still (mostly) modeled good eating habits with 5-10 servings of fruits and veggies a day for several reasons:

-our health.  Kids can eat things adults trying to stave off cardiac and type 2 can’t.  I function better and feel better when I am eating lots of veggies and some amount of fruit.  

-modeling that consuming a wide range of fruits and veggies is normal and safe to our autistic sons.  This helped them increase their familiarity, continue to try things (even if it was licking a piece of lettuce, no joke).

-we like fruits and vegetables.  They taste good.  

So even if my kids won’t touch something that doesn’t mean I won’t buy it or eat it myself.  

I know there are adults who choose not to eat vegetables or fruits, but those adults are in fact making a less healthful choice for themselves.  That's a personal prerogative but don't pass it off as healthy or wise in the long run.  

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77.54 at the grocery store this evening.  Some clearance, mostly sales, a few "splurges"

Brown sugar, baking soda, 40 ounces of chocolate chips, two pounds of butter and eggs 

Cheese, taco shells, onions, salsa verde, cilantro to be combined with leftovers BBQ salad from last night and beans in the pantry for taco Tuesday.  Oh, and tortillas.  I love homemade but as a homeschooling working and autism caregiving mom with a large household, if weeknight dinner is facilitated by a $2 bag of tortillas, I'm good with that.  

Hamburger BOGO, 1 package for tonight and 1 for later

2 pounds of salmon filets on a killer deal.  That's enough for 1 dinner plus one extra portion.  

Cherries, broccoli, onions, garlic and a jalepeno pepper.  

Seltzer

Everything except for the hamburger and the baking soda will be gone by Saturday.  We are making 4 batches of cookies for a school event though.  Without the butter and chocolate for that, we would be looking at about $20ish less.  

 

 

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2 hours ago, happysmileylady said:

5 apples and 4 pears is almost a week’s worth of fruit for us.  The reason is that DS5 and DD7 won’t touch produce.  As in hide in a corner and cry during therapy because a green bean was placed on the table. DD7 now eats bananas, and loves pizza so I can sneak some things in that way.  But I am still food chaining DS5 into that.  

Today, they each had a peanut butter sandwich on a cinnamon raisin English muffin for breakfast.  They picked out the raisins and only ate half each. DD7 then had a banana and they each had a glass of milk. 

For lunch, they each had a quesadilla.  I snuck in some diced onion and mostly got away with it. DS5 had a small helping of Cheerios, dry, and another cup of milk.  DD7 had another banana and milk. 

For dinner, each kid had 5 chicken nuggets, and more milk.  Somewhere between lunch and dinner, DD7 had 2 more bananas.  DS5 had some crackers and peanut butter.  

The lack of fruits and veggies in this menu is completely typical of these two.  I try to squeeze in what I can by making fruit breads for sandwiches, mixing some shredded cuke or carrot into pancakes or quesadillas, and we recently had a breakthrough with homemade tomato soup.  

BUT. 

I know my kids are getting adequate nutrition because the blood tests have said so (yeah it’s fun to do blood tests with a kid with limited verbal abilities.). 

I am constantly worried about my younger kids getting adequate nutrition because they eat so few fruits and veggies.  I do therapy and food chaining specifically because of that. 

But there are lots of ways to be adequately nourished.  

I hear you.   My oldest refused anything but apples and porridge for so long! If it helps he now eats pretty healthily.  It's such a nightmare when you are in it!

however you aren't restricting to those foods to save money.  You are presumably spending money on therapy to fix the problem. 

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On a related note, I compulsively weighed items on my produce run this afternoon because of this thread....

7 lbs of bananas (3 bunches)

6 lbs of apples (15 medium galas)

3 lbs of strawberries

8 oz of blueberries

6 red peppers

broccoli slaw

green onions

cilantro

I did not buy greens like spinach and romaine again or root veg this week because I have some leftovers I need to use up. But, I bought just under 20# of fruit and veg this week and I will use up another 10ish pounds of potatoes, onions, carrots, zucchini and greens on top of that. 30# of produce and I am still not hitting that 6-8 servings a day that our doctors recommend.

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2 minutes ago, happysmileylady said:

 

What is also true is that my kids are not unhealthy in spite of that. 

 

I think what you mean is “my kids’ blood serum levels reflect numbers within the test norms”. Really look at Jean’s post. Her point about the body working hard to maintain equilibrium is very profound. There are a number of us on the board, I think, who have or have family members who have some medical stories on that point. You usually just see the aftermath of those issues beginning midlife.  That’s kind of my point of this thread—she’s is not providing adequate nutrition. Nutrition is more than macros and handing out a multivitamin or hoping that overall health + genes can compensate.

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Happy smiley lady—I get the kid throwing up on just the smell of a food. BTDT. Kudos to you and yours. I am trying to keep pathological eating points separate, and if I am failing, I am sorry because I have had some of those big feelings about my kids and their eating. FWIW, one now eats almost everything and the other eats enough to be ok in life.

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20 minutes ago, happysmileylady said:

My point is that we cannot judge a child as being malaourished based on the amount of fruits and vegetables they consume.  

But we absolutely CAN critique a meal plan for not containing adequate calories and healthy options for typical dietary needs.  My son wasn't going to die from his restricted eating (in part because we used early non-coercive methods to figure out what healthy foods he would eat).  He was not malnourished though gaining weight was a goal and his doctor advised vitamins to make up for the deficits in his diet.  He is, however, better nourished now that he will eat things like spinach and beans and green beans.  

She is spending a little more than 1/2 per person per day that you are.  Your budget and my budget are a lot closer to each other than you are to less than $2 per person per day.  

It's unrealistic, unsustainable and probably not even all that true.  

To be very clear.  My comments are about this blogger's needlessly low budget.  I am not saying your kids are malnourished. Clearly, they are not.  With restricted eating (I try not to say picky), we all do the best we can when we can and do whatever it takes to get the calories in.  Kids are resilient.  They will be ok for awhile provided they are getting enough calories more or less.  But like others have said, we wouldn't do feeding therapy and see feeding specialists and stalk Ellyn Satter if we weren't working towards a larger and more varied diet.  

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14 hours ago, happysmileylady said:

5 apples and 4 pears is almost a week’s worth of fruit for us.  The reason is that DS5 and DD7 won’t touch produce.  As in hide in a corner and cry during therapy because a green bean was placed on the table. DD7 now eats bananas, and loves pizza so I can sneak some things in that way.  But I am still food chaining DS5 into that.  

Today, they each had a peanut butter sandwich on a cinnamon raisin English muffin for breakfast.  They picked out the raisins and only ate half each. DD7 then had a banana and they each had a glass of milk. 

For lunch, they each had a quesadilla.  I snuck in some diced onion and mostly got away with it. DS5 had a small helping of Cheerios, dry, and another cup of milk.  DD7 had another banana and milk. 

For dinner, each kid had 5 chicken nuggets, and more milk.  Somewhere between lunch and dinner, DD7 had 2 more bananas.  DS5 had some crackers and peanut butter.  

The lack of fruits and veggies in this menu is completely typical of these two.  I try to squeeze in what I can by making fruit breads for sandwiches, mixing some shredded cuke or carrot into pancakes or quesadillas, and we recently had a breakthrough with homemade tomato soup.  

BUT. 

I know my kids are getting adequate nutrition because the blood tests have said so (yeah it’s fun to do blood tests with a kid with limited verbal abilities.). 

I am constantly worried about my younger kids getting adequate nutrition because they eat so few fruits and veggies.  I do therapy and food chaining specifically because of that. 

But there are lots of ways to be adequately nourished.  

Meanwhile, you might like the works of Missy Chase Lapine and Jessica Seinfeld, if there are any foods beyond pizza they're eating that are complex enough to hide some things (or I think JS even has suggestions for pizza sauce).

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17 hours ago, mommyoffive said:

This is such an interesting thought.  Does stocking your pantry save you money or cost you? Do you eat better foods not having a stocked up pantry?  

Stocked pantry saves me and means we eat better. And saves me time.

I don't meal plan. I go to the store and buy whatever fruits and vegetables look good, are in season, are on sale. I buy what dairy and meat we usually eat. The stocked pantry means that I have the shelf stable goods on hand to cook meals, without having to do a last  minute grocery run because I am missing one ingredient. It means that I can decide spur of the moment whether the produce and fresh ingredients will become Thai curry, Indian curry, Italian, or whatever.  I don't use recipes; a full pantry means I have material to improvise with.

I have learned to only stock up things that I know we eat and eat on a regular basis. After a few instances of buying "interesting" processed foods and then throwing them out, I know to resist the impulse.

 

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44 minutes ago, regentrude said:

Stocked pantry saves me and means we eat better. And saves me time.

I don't meal plan. I go to the store and buy whatever fruits and vegetables look good, are in season, are on sale. I buy what dairy and meat we usually eat. The stocked pantry means that I have the shelf stable goods on hand to cook meals, without having to do a last  minute grocery run because I am missing one ingredient. It means that I can decide spur of the moment whether the produce and fresh ingredients will become Thai curry, Indian curry, Italian, or whatever.  I don't use recipes; a full pantry means I have material to improvise with.

I have learned to only stock up things that I know we eat and eat on a regular basis. After a few instances of buying "interesting" processed foods and then throwing them out, I know to resist the impulse.

 

This exactly! Years ago, someone gave me a cookbook of 30 minutes main courses. In the introduction, there was a list of pantry items to keep on hand to be able to make the recipes. Experienced cooks know what they cook most often and buy the items to support that when they go on sale. Or they know where to find those pantry items at the highest quality/lowest price value point. Then it’s just a matter of meat and produce to make your meals. 

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18 hours ago, HomeAgain said:

Ended up on a grocery run today. $83.20 for a few days' worth and dh's snacks.  Dinner tonight/lunch tomorrow was sesame beef lo mein:

$9.71 for the skirt steak to grill and shred  (I had ground beef, but tomorrow is taco night and I'll be too rushed to do shedded meat)
$2.50 for the noodles (made fresh and trucked to the store)
$2.75 for the bok choy to supplement what I had in my garden
$1.00 for two limes

That's, what, $16 for a total of two meals for four people?  $8 a meal, or just about $2 a serving to make a wok full of food.  But.....

In addition....
the mint and cilantro came from my garden
the soy sauce, sesame oil, sesame seeds, garlic, and chili paste came from the pantry
the cabbage, carrots, and peppers I threw in were leftovers in the fridge.

So, yeah, I'm not sure I could do under and eat as healthy or as much variety as we do.  However, I do remember having a really healthy diet as a kid and my parents were very frugal about food.  But I lived in the middle of farms and had access to gardens and "seconds" - produce that was bruised or otherwise unsalable so my mom would buy it up by the flat and can or dry it.  We had a healthy diet, but I didn't try rice until...late jr. high?  It just wasn't eaten as a thing in my area.  And forget many of the things my kids know: quinoa, couscous, kale...it was really Betty Crocker-inspired meals.

4

 

$2/person/MEAL is more or less doable for us.  That’s a budget of $14 for a dinner and we have a number of things I can do for that price.  Some meals are more but $15 to less than $20 for dinner is kind of my target unless there’s something special going on.  Obviously, someone might be eating a bit more than 1/7 of the meal and someone else a bit less than 1/7 but it averages out ok and no one is going to bed hungry.  When I price my meals, I do factor in the cost of the things from my pantry even if it's an estimate.  Some things I know that I pay an average price for.  So that butter from the freezer may have been the $1.5 or the $2.50 deal but I tend to cost all my butter usage around 50 cents a stick since my buy price is $2 a pound.  That's the general rule unless I paid more for a specific need  (say $3.50 a pound) because I ran out of what I have stocked up on sale.    

Last night’s dinner worked out:

Taco shells - 1/2 of a package, ~80cents

Torillas - 1/2 of a package, ~$1

Cilanto, diced onions, spices and green salsa - let’s round this up to $1.50 The leftover onion is going to lunch today, the leftover cilantro is going to a chicken dish tomorrow and 90% of the 1.69 cent bottle of green salsa is in the fridge for future use.  $1.50 is overstating it a bit.  

Hamburger: $6 worth of meat.  

Cheese: we consumed 1/2 of a package so $1.25

Refried beans: $1 

plus we had leftover BBQ salad fixings from a meal train meal the night before (lettuce, peppers, avocado, olives) which I used to round out the meal.  The veggies in that would be several dollars worth but I didn’t have to buy them.  

Then we also ate $4 worth of fresh cherries.  

That comes to $15.50 but we benefited from the freebies. If we didn’t have the freebies, I could have swapped canned applesauce or a cheaper fruit out for the delicious cherries and spent the cherry money on lettuce, a pepper and an avocado.  

Breakfast and lunch are less for us, unless we have a special breakfast on a weekend.  We eat a lot of oatmeal rounded out with nuts, fruit and such for breakfast.  

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4 minutes ago, Jean in Newcastle said:

I agree with your math and have a similar budget but didn't this blog have $2/person/ DAY?  Or did I get that mixed up? 

 

I was responding to a poster who was posting about 2 dinners of hers averaging to $2/person.  Per meal it works fine but most people do eat more than once a day. The math per meal does help illustrate how these really low round figures don’t work.  $70/a week sounds great and if people don’t know how much cooking from scratch costs, it can sound appealing.  But when you break it down to the by meal and by day amounts, it’s easier to see how 67 cents per person per meal doesn’t allow for much produce or really any meat.  

I think I have beat the dead horse several times over that I don’t think $2/person/day is doable for a healthy long term diet.  I mean, I *can* stay alive on $2/day worth of oatmeal, ramen, soup and legumes with minimal veggies and even less fruit but it’s not sustainable or healthy long term.   I *have* stayed alive as a child on toast and spaghetti.  Which again, is why I don’t understand why anyone would make this an aspiration.  

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On the question of stocked pantries......

Several years ago, I had a problem with properly stocking a pantry.  I kept a full pantry, but I was trying to eat more ambitiously than our family realistically ate.  I would try a number of recipes with expensive 1-time ingredients, and then end up either never making the meal, or tossing out stuff after a failed meal. I now keep a realistically stocked pantry. My menu, for the most part, uses all of the same shared ingredients, and i have some realistic last-minute meals that I can make when I'm short on time and I haven't made it to the store for fresh ingredients.  We only have emergency take-out rarely now, and before it was at least one meal a week.  My pantry is now based on budget-minded healthy meals.  I do have some overlap--I do keep both dry black beans and canned beans. The canned beans are a backup for when I fail to get my meal prep done properly. My budget breaks down to about $5.50/person/day. It only works because there are 6 of us and I'm able to bulk buy and do a lot of scratch cooking.

When we were in temporary housing this winter and I had almost NO pantry space and only a small refrigerator with overhead freezer, I spent about $350 more a month.  I had to buy smaller portions of everything and I had to buy at non-sale prices.  As an example, chicken is about $3.50lb at my store (it will float up to $4.50/lb and down to $1.99 on brief flash sales).  We go through about 10 lbs of chicken a week because it's nearly the only meat we eat. If I bought Zaycon in bulk, that would work out to $10.  If I buy at my local store, that's $35.  Over the course of a month, that's $100, on just chicken.  Eggs are another area where I can save a lot. Eggs are $7ish at Costco for 5 dozen...about $1.40/dozen.  They average $3/dozen at my local store. We go through 10 dozen a week.  I save $26/week by shopping at Costco for eggs alone.  Dry pantry items don't fluctuate as much in price, but if I am eating at home, I am saving money.  Eating out runs $40-70 for 6 people in my HCOL town for even a basic meal like Chipotle.  

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I am late to this thread but we used to have a budget of $250 a month including toiletries.  We were completely broke but didn't actually qualify for services.  It was miserable and gross and I gained a ton of weight since 80% of our diet was starch.  I can't imagine choosing that as a lifestyle.  

Nowadays we are much freer we don't budget groceries we only have 4 simple categories because that is what works for: recurring charges/bills, spending, long term savings (retirement) short term savings (presents, travel, projects)  I just buy what we need a still have a good handle on stock up prices and buy meat and non-perishables in bulk when the prices are good.  I "waste" money on convenience food to make our life easier like p3 packs for my gymnast to take so I don't have to worry about remembering to portion it out and she doesn't have to remember to bring home containers and it is so worth it.

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On 6/4/2018 at 11:51 PM, Tsuga said:

Our grocery budget this week for 6 people:

$120 for two Blue Apron dinners which will feed 6 people each (we usually just add extra pasta/bread/whatever if needed, there is more than enough meat)

$100 on restocking snacks from Trader Joes (including, but not limited to, trail mix, dried fruits, samosas, mac-n-cheese balls, fruits like apples and cherries, and garlic fries)

$80 worth of pantry/ standby items including cereal, bagels, pasta, ravioli, whole wheat flour and white flour, individually packed applesauces I know we're practically Rockafellers out here.

$20 of eggs, milk, half and half, whipping cream from the local delivery place.

Drugs: Coffee ($10 / lb), wine 3 bottles $25 with tax ?

Then we went out for ice cream after the band concert even though we have food here. So about $320 for six people, per my initial estimate, but school lunches and eating out (particularly not teens eating out) are not included in that, nor are drugs like coffee and wine.

The awful part is that tonight for dinner we had poutine and that was it. I realize it's snack food but we had two sports practices, a music lesson and a concert. So yeah. It's not like spending more money gets you more health. To me, health requires time. But last night it was all about the lean chicken and broccoli, I promise.

Last night for dinner I made cheesy potatoes, not much different than poutine. It's not junk food, it's just not "good for you food" lol.

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Okay, I have to share this story because I think I mentioned somewhere upthread that we were doing our grocery shopping on a specific day last week (Thursday) because the store had a special - spend $200, get enough gas points to save $1/gallon on gas for the next fill up.  Right after I planned that, the teen got a job at the grocery store and was scheduled to start Friday. 
Dh and I planned and strategized how to maximize our dollars since that was a larger trip than we usually do (usually $80-$130).  I gathered coupons and made a list of higher priced items to stock up on.  We dropped off the 8yo at camp and headed out with our bags.

Mistake 1: we didn't like the quality of the meat that was out so we didn't get any except some sausages.  We usually go to the other grocery store for meat, anyway, because the butcher is good about listening to what we want.
Mistake 2: I misread a 3 in my tally for a 5, making our total $20 off when we got to the register.


And it didn't help that a few of the things on our list were on sale for half off - instead of paying $9 for a large container of grains, it was on sale for $4.50.  We ended up wandering around the grocery store wondering what else we could put in our cart.

So I thought we spent $214 after coupons/pre-tax, but the register total was $194.  Oops!  Grabbed a few packs of batteries and watched the total bounce over that $200 line finally.  And then.......IT TOOK $20 OFF!

Remember my kid got a job at the store?  He hadn't started work yet, but he had gone in to finish the paperwork.  They took his address and matched it to savings card holders, and when we went to ring out it gave us the employee discount.   The associate helping us started laughing as we grabbed things from the checkout line to throw on the belt.  Each time we thought we were fine, it would take a percentage off again.

In total, our carefully planned trip ended up netting several things we wouldn't/don't usually buy - like a stash of candy bars. ?  So I have no idea if it was actually a good trip or not.  On the other hand, we satisfied our pantry and dry goods needs for the next few months, and between the $1 off/gallon and the gas points already on our card, dh paid $1.40/gallon to fill up his truck yesterday. ? 

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4 minutes ago, HomeAgain said:

Okay, I have to share this story because I think I mentioned somewhere upthread that we were doing our grocery shopping on a specific day last week (Thursday) because the store had a special - spend $200, get enough gas points to save $1/gallon on gas for the next fill up.  Right after I planned that, the teen got a job at the grocery store and was scheduled to start Friday. 
Dh and I planned and strategized how to maximize our dollars since that was a larger trip than we usually do (usually $80-$130).  I gathered coupons and made a list of higher priced items to stock up on.  We dropped off the 8yo at camp and headed out with our bags.

Mistake 1: we didn't like the quality of the meat that was out so we didn't get any except some sausages.  We usually go to the other grocery store for meat, anyway, because the butcher is good about listening to what we want.
Mistake 2: I misread a 3 in my tally for a 5, making our total $20 off when we got to the register.


And it didn't help that a few of the things on our list were on sale for half off - instead of paying $9 for a large container of grains, it was on sale for $4.50.  We ended up wandering around the grocery store wondering what else we could put in our cart.

So I thought we spent $214 after coupons/pre-tax, but the register total was $194.  Oops!  Grabbed a few packs of batteries and watched the total bounce over that $200 line finally.  And then.......IT TOOK $20 OFF!

Remember my kid got a job at the store?  He hadn't started work yet, but he had gone in to finish the paperwork.  They took his address and matched it to savings card holders, and when we went to ring out it gave us the employee discount.   The associate helping us started laughing as we grabbed things from the checkout line to throw on the belt.  Each time we thought we were fine, it would take a percentage off again.

In total, our carefully planned trip ended up netting several things we wouldn't/don't usually buy - like a stash of candy bars. ?  So I have no idea if it was actually a good trip or not.  On the other hand, we satisfied our pantry and dry goods needs for the next few months, and between the $1 off/gallon and the gas points already on our card, dh paid $1.40/gallon to fill up his truck yesterday. ? 

 

Too funny.  

Now I want my kids to get a job at a grocery store so I can get a discount.   I am surprised they let you do the deal with him being an employee.  

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3 minutes ago, mommyoffive said:

 

Too funny.  

Now I want my kids to get a job at a grocery store so I can get a discount.   I am surprised they let you do the deal with him being an employee.  


Well, I will say that after a week he is liking the job. ?
The deals they run are open to anyone, even the employees.  It's a smaller store chain that's really good about treating their people well.

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