can I feed six on $100 a week?

I’m challenging myself to see if I can keep my grocery bills to an average of $100 a week during November.  I’m not going to limit myself to $100 a calendar week but do want to limit it to $400 for the month. Does that make sense?  In other words, I might spend $125 this week and $75 next week.  I’ll include toilet paper and anything else I might buy at the grocery store.

I have no idea if I can do this or not, but I’m going to try. Thankfully, my whole family gobbled up the beans and rice with tortilla chips and cheese we had last night (cheap cheap cheap.)

Do you want to start your own grocery challenge and do it along with me?

I’m not starting with an empty freezer or pantry so I do have a few things on hand.  Everyone’s family is different in food preferences and needs. We have a family of six, one girl whose appetite is modest compared to her older brothers who both eat more than me and their dad.  Most notably, I have a 3 year old son who is allergic to many foods.  I mainly cook and bake from scratch (but you will see me popping a few Freschetta pizzas in the oven on occasion or opening a can of prego when I need something quick.)  We do not eat canned veggies or fruits.  Frozen, yes, when fresh isn’t cost effective. I avoid high fructose corn syrup which is in most packaged foods (not that I have completely eliminated it yet–see above prego:)

I also shop at Whole Foods, Good Foods and occasionally at Aldis.  How I wish I had a Trader Joe’s close!  What I buy the most at Aldis is dairy. $1.49 gallon milk and pound of butter, for example.

finding my deals

I discovered about a year ago that my Kroger store marks down meat and produce a little bit before noon on Tuesdays and Thursday so that’s when I plan to shop.  I try to buy chicken for no more than 99 cents a pound. Maybe that doesn’t sound very low, but it is when you realize that I MUST read labels very carefully and only buy chicken with retained water and not chicken that is enhanced with a natural chicken broth.  The little J is allergic to pork and it seems he’s allergic to beef too. I haven’t tried any organic, free range beef for him, but I have experimented here and there and read labels very carefully to make sure what I buy is just beef with no “enhancements.”  Sometimes he reacts and sometimes he doesn’t.

I used to shop at Meijer’s every week. But they seemed to raise their prices, stopped carrying two of my favorite items and changed their check policy; all of which caused me to start shopping around:)  But what I absolutely love about Meijers is their clearance rack in the back of the store by the milk and I usually stop there on my way home from kroger. Sometimes, there is nothing. Other times, I’ll see an item that I stock up on.  This happened a couple weeks ago when I bought hemp dream for 53 cents a quart. I must have bought more than a dozen; actually, I bought all they had in original.  I left the vanilla sitting on the rack since J is allergic to vanilla.  I know. Who’s allergic  to vanilla?   Their mark down said 90% off; no wonder it didn’t sell at full price. I had never bought the hemp milk before because it is pricier than rice or oat (J can’t have dairy.)  I’m thrilled that my little J does not like to drink it because then I have it for making his pancakes and muffins.

I’ll post my shopping trips and our menus of what we actually ate. Stay tuned til tomorrow when I tell you what  I bought at Aldis and Good Foods today.

my menus

Sunday breakfast: oatmeal sweetened with molasses, rice syrup and raisins

Sunday lunch: cooked a whole chicken and used about half the meat in a cream sauce made with rice milk and thickened with tapioca flour.  Added probably about 2 lbs of carrots ( I had bought 15 lbs at a deep discount at Kroger last week and speaking of carrots, Todd picked a couple pounds from our garden today) and some leftover peas.  Served all this over mashed potatoes. Leftover communion bread. (saved the rest of the chicken and plus made 2 qts of stock for later.)

Sunday dinner: previously mentioned beans and rice, etc with homemade donuts for dessert.   Before the little J came along with his long list of allergies, I would’ve put the salsa in the crockpot and corn too with everything else, but now I have to keep tomatoes separate and didn’t do corn. I also have some rice “cheese” for the top of his beans.

Monday breakfast: kids cold cereal and leftover donuts,  J leftover oatmeal, me a granola bar.  Todd made his own sausage and eggs and coffee.

Monday lunch: shepherd’s pie which consisted of  bag of frozen beans, small can of tomato paste, can of evaporated milk, shredded cheese, spices, leftover cubed steak and then on top of that leftover mashed potatoes with an egg in it. Caleb especially liked this.  homemade spelt bread toasted with parmesan.

snacks throughout the day: apples, bananas, grapes. note about the apples: I bought three 3 pound bags of apples today at Aldi for $1.19 each. Wow.  But, they have a waxy coating (most do)  I tried to wash it off really well, but J’s little face broke all out so I went to Good Food and got him his own bag of apples which no one else is allowed to touch. 3lbs for $3.99 which actually isn’t too bad a price at all for organic apples.

Monday dinner:  Todd packed his own dinner and I don’t know what he took.  The kids and I had pb&J on spelt bread, and cheese roll-ups with sour cream, J ate a couple chicken hot dogs and several of the dessert bars I made especially for him yesterday (which is the healthiest thing in the house probably, lol.)