Grocery Update & What We Ate: Week 19, 2018

14 Monday May 2018

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Grocery Spending

We didn’t get too off track this week, even with a trip to the fancy meat store for Mother’s Day steaks.

I spent $41.27 at Wegman’s on Wednesday, mostly basic restocking.

On Sunday, yes Mother’s Day, I went to Stop & Shop. It was empty! I spent $33.87 on things for the BBQ and to get us through the beginning part of the week.

DH also picked up $144.73 in steaks.

Thus we ended the week at $219.87, more than half of which was steak.

Our weeks of relatively boring, quick meals continue.

Monday:
Early: Chicken nuggets, green beans
Late: Homemade pizza

Tuesday:
Early: Scrambled eggs, bacon
Late: Take-out Indian

Wednesday:
Pork tenderloin, pan fried potatoes, tossed salad

Thursday:
Early: Beef roast, rice, green beans
Late: Leftovers

Friday:
Early: Chicken nuggets, applesauce
Late: Homemade pizza

Saturday:
Early: Pancakes
Late: Out

Sunday:
Steaks, baked potato, baked beans, tossed/spinach salad

April 2018 Grocery Review

07 Monday May 2018

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Grocery Spending

This felt like a light month, but one never really knows until one runs the numbers.

April TOTAL: $664.14

Stop & Shop: $227.89
Wegman’s: $244.91
BJs: $158.38
Other: $32.94
- Local: $0
- Star Market/Shaw’s: $32.94
- Trader Joe’s: $0
- Target: $0
- Other: $0

And it was an exceptionally low month!

There were some bigger spends this week (which will go into next month’s total), but no so much as to totally throw off the month.

On Monday, I spent the $32.94 at Shaw’s that you saw in April’s spend. Somehow I missed taking a picture. I got four boxes of oatmeal, one can of corn (free with McDonald’s game coupon), two packages of shredded cheese, and six pizza dough balls.

On Wednesday, I stopped at both Target and BJ’s. I spent $69.43 at Target. Juice, almond butter bars, and Life cereal were all on sale.

Then I spent 109.99 at BJ’s. It probably should have been more, but on the way in to Target I forgot my list (and coupons) for the day. That didn’t cause me many issues at Target, but I definitely didn’t remember everything on the BJ’s list.

I spent $19.96 at a different Shaw’s on Thursday. This stop would not have been necessary if the first one had had enough pizza supplies or the tomato sauce (free with coupon). I didn’t get as many pizza dough balls as I intended here either as they were all completely thawed. Plus, Kraft seems to have changed their cheese packaging so I bought one to see if it was still their previous “pizza cheese” mix; the description makes me think so.

Finally, on Saturday I did a big shop – $196.81 – at Wegman’s. The weather was beautiful so we decided to grill. I had been planning for a big shop there Sunday morning, but went Saturday afternoon instead. This will cover most of our meals for the week and then some.

But, the “baseball season diet” continues. It’s not so much that it’s terrible, but that it is boring.

Monday:
Early: Chicken nuggets, carrot sticks
Late: Homemade pizza

Tuesday:
Early: Hot dogs, applesauce
Late: Tuna noodle casserole

Wednesday:
Take out pizza

Thursday:
Early: Leftovers
Late: Chinese take-out

Friday:
Early: Pancakes
Late: Homemade pizza

Saturday:
Hamburgers, baked beans, chips, strawberries

Sunday:
Chicken & garlic with fresh herbs, wild rice with mushrooms, green beans

Grocery Update & What We Ate – Week 17, 2018

30 Monday Apr 2018

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Grocery Spending

This was not a bad shopping week at all. I only made two stops and stayed under plan despite buying six very nice steaks for our first BBQ of the season. It will be interesting to see the numbers for the month next week.

I spent $66.21 at Wegman’s on Monday. This was largely a restocking visit.

On Friday I spent $144.37, including steaks for the Saturday BBQ. This was more for specific meals. There are steaks, potatoes, and salad for the BBQ; hot dogs and buns for the inevitable quick dinner; pizza dough; and broccoli to go with dumplings Friday night. I used a rain check for the shredded cheese, which is basically only in stock when it is not on sale. The English muffins were buy 1, get 2 free which is the one time I will buy them.

We only managed to eat together twice this week. On Monday everyone ate the same thing, but not at the same time.

Monday:
Shepard’s pie, green beans

Tuesday:
Early: Chicken nuggets, spinach salad
Late: Homemade pizza

Wednesday:
Early: Pancakes
Late: Indian take-out

Thursday:
Early: Chicken nuggets, carrot sticks
Late: Take-out pizza (This was a last minute rain-induced change so no dough was thawed.)

Friday:
Early: Dumplings, rice, broccoli
Late: Homemade pizza

Saturday:
Steaks, baked beans, baked potatoes, tossed salad

Sunday:
Chicken & garlic with fresh herbs, french bread, spinach/tossed salad

Grocery Update & What We Ate – Week 16, 2018

23 Monday Apr 2018

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It was a VERY light week. And, yet we’re not eating out either.

On Tuesday, I spent $55.44 at Wegman’s. Some of this is definitely vacation week supplies. The ground beef will cover three meals, at some point. I’m using a pound this week, and then I’ll freeze two two-pound chunks for future use.

On Wednesday, I spent $21.41 at Stop & Shop. Chicken nuggets were on sale, making them a better deal than BJ’s. Happily, Stop & Shop has started carrying our preferred pizza dough relatively reliably so I don’t have to make the extra trip to Shaw’s as often. For better or worse, hot dogs are a staple of baseball/soccer season.

On Friday, I made a very small – $12.67 – visit to Stop & Shop, largely for bottled water which was on sale this week. We don’t use a ton, but I do need to keep some around during warmer weather.

That brought me to $89.52 for the week!

The split meals are really starting to intrude on our lives. I’m trying a new strategy this year of cooking some things that don’t have to be eaten right away so some nights we can eat the same thing even if we don’t eat at exactly the same time. An example this week was the chicken pot pie. The younger set doesn’t like the crust so I served their’s early without crust. Meanwhile I put a second pie in the oven to cook the crust and three of us ate that about an hour later.

Monday:
Lemon chicken, wild rice with mushrooms, spinach salad

Tuesday:
Early: Chicken nuggets, brocolli
Late: Homemade pizza

Wednesday:
Pot roast, mashed potatoes, carrots

Thursday:
Early: Chicken nuggets, green beans
Late: Stuffed peppers, egg bread

Friday:
Early: Hot dogs, carrot sticks
Late: Homemade pizza

Saturday:
Chicken pot pie, green beans

Sunday:
Tacos, corn

Grocery Update & What We Ate – Week 15, 2018

16 Monday Apr 2018

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Despite a late week trip to BJ’s, I managed to stay almost on track. With the low earlier part of the month there should be plenty of cushion to make it up.

On Monday I spent $49.44 at Stop & Shop, mostly for items on sale. The juice was not on sale, but I used my raincheck from the sale a few weeks ago.

I spent $54.08 at Wegman’s on Wednesday. This was largely a restocking trip and was intended as the only other stop of the week. But …

… the bad weather on Sunday cancelled all the baseball. So in anticipation of that we went back to Wegman’s on Friday for fish tacos ingredients. I used that trip as an opportunity to grab some items for a few more nice dinners. Our schedule has us busy at dinner most nights this coming week, but the weather might dictate otherwise.

On Sunday, we spent $158.38 at BJ’s bringing the total for the week to $331.08.

With all the activities come lots of split dinners.

Monday:
Early: Chicken nuggets, grapes
Late: Homemade pizza

Tuesday:
Lasagna, spinach salad

Wednesday:
Early: Macaroni & cheese, brocolli
Late: Welsh rarebit

Thursday:
Early: Hot dogs, applesauce
Late: Tuna noodle casserole

Friday:
Early: Chicken nuggets, carrot sticks
Late: OUT

Saturday:
Early: Pancakes
Late: Homemade pizza

Sunday:
Fish tacos

Grocery Update & What We Ate – Week 14, 2018

09 Monday Apr 2018

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After a very high week, we’re back to a relatively light spending one. I’d prefer this level out, but overall monthly spending has been ok.

I spent $63.09 at Stop & Shop on Monday. This would have been higher, but they were out of juice. Dole fruit cups were on sale. I only had a manufacturer’s coupon for two so I was hoping that the register would spit out a coupon for more – which it did!

So, I went back to Stop & Shop on Thursday to catch the end of the sale. Still no juice, but I got a rain check. I got three packs of fruit cups this time because that was the number on the second coupon. I spent $21.18, including the post-Easter sale candy.

Finally, I spent $74.82 at Wegman’s on Friday. I wanted to make sure we had enough milk to get through the weekend. I also took the time to grab a few items that I won’t necessarily use right away, but that we usually have on hand and need restocking.

That brought me to $159.19 for the week.

You can see the transition to spring sports (only soccer is really underway right now) in the menu.

Monday:
Early: Chicken nuggets, green beans
Late: Homemade pizza

Tuesday:
Spaghetti & meatballs, spinach salad

Wednesday:
Steak, baked potatoes, Brussels sprouts

Thursday:
Early: Hot dogs, carrot sticks
Late: Chinese take-out

Friday:
Early: Chicken nuggets, broccoli
Late: Homemade pizza

Saturday:
Spaghetti & meatballs, spinach salad

Sunday:
Chili, cornbread

March 2018 Grocery Review

02 Monday Apr 2018

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Grocery Spending

It has been an up and down month with rather high and rather low spending weeks, nothing in between. We’ll see how that worked out!

This week was high.

On Monday, I spent $46.00 at Shaw’s (left) and $37.56 at Stop & Shop (right).

On Wednesday, I went to BJ’s for the second time this month because my coupons were going to start expiring. I spent $296.59.

Finally, I spent $96.64 at Wegman’s on Saturday bringing the week to a total of $476.79. And that closed out the month.

Let’s see if we’re making up for the light spending in February.

March TOTAL: $1,127.49

Stop & Shop: $144.43
Wegman’s: $439.52
BJs: $460.47
Other: $83.07
- Local: $13.97
- Star Market/Shaw’s: $46.00
- Trader Joe’s: $0
- Target: $23.10
- Other: $0

That is high, but seems very reasonable for a month with two significant trips to BJ’s.

This is the last week before spring sports kick in. And, yet, it is a bit of a mess because we had activities push from the various snow days into this week. Glad to get them done before soccer/baseball season really kicks off though.

Monday:
Homemade fried dumplings, rice, broccoli stir-fry

Tuesday:
Early: Hot dogs, spinach salad
Late: Homemade pizza

Wednesday:
Chicken noodle soup, homemade bread

Thursday:
Early: Chicken nuggets, green beans
Middle (yes, even worse than usual): pizza at an event
Late: Indian take-out

Friday:
Early: Kentucky Fried Chicken
Late: Homemade pizza

Saturday:
Shepard’s pie, green beans

Sunday:
Grilled tri-tip, baked beans, homemade bread, cole slaw, carrot sticks

Grocery Update & What We Ate – Week 12, 2018

26 Monday Mar 2018

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Grocery Spending

After a rather large amount of grocery shopping last week, this past week was very light.

I spent $27.26 at Wegman’s on Wednesday.

Then on Saturday I spent $13.97 on broccoli crowns, green beans, and raspberries at the farm stand. That’s $41.23 for the entire week!

This coming week I’ll be at BJ’s again plus stops at Stop & Shop and Shaw’s (at least) so I expect things to be back on the higher end.

Our meals came out pretty normal, despite the low budget, as there was plenty in the house from previous weeks.

Monday:
Chicken pot pie

Tuesday:
Early: Chicken nuggets, broccoli
Late: French onion soup, Caesar salad

Wednesday:
Tacos, corn

Thursday:
Early: Hot dogs, carrot sticks
Late: Homemade pizza

Friday:
Early: Boxed macaroni & cheese, broccoli
Late: Homemade macaroni & cheese

Saturday:
Spaghetti & meatballs

Sunday:
Coq au vin, homemade bread

Fall 2017 Pantry Challenge – March 2018 Update

22 Thursday Mar 2018

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pantry challenge

I thought I should post a pantry update to go with last week’s freezer update. To be clear, these things aren’t going bad, but they’ve been around for a while and I’d like to use them up before we switch over to summer foods.

As background, my goal is to eat down these things consciously so they don’t just sit there taking up space.

Recipes:

1 jar of pesto, 1 package of sea salt, 1 package of sugar in the raw – These came in gift boxes. We can use all of them, it just needs to be conscious planning. I used about a third of the pesto with steak. It’s still in the fridge.
~~0.5 bag of marshmallows~~, 1.5 boxes of graham crackers – Probably waiting for next summer’s smores season.
3 pecan pumpkin quick bread mixes – We like this. I just need to remember to make them.
~~2 single serve cups of pineapple tid-bits~~ I made two pineapple upside down cakes.

I’ll eat them eventually:

5 2 single serve packages of plain oatmeal – I need to finish them off.
Dates, whole & chopped – Progress has been made, but some are still there.
2 single serve brownie mixes – These came from a Friday Freebie coupon. There were four in the box and I had one. It was ok. I will eventually eat the rest, but they’re not tasty enough to actually spend money on.

Kids snacks:

~~Ritz crackers~~ – Sent these in as school snacks.
6 pk chicken ramen – I bought these as snacks for the oldest. I need to introduce them to him, but he hasn’t been snacking as much as one might think for his size/age.
Whole almonds, whole cashews – The boys used to snack on these, but they haven’t recently. I cook with cashews occasionally so I’ll just need to plan to use these up. Not sure yet what to do with the almonds.
Coconut oil, dried apple rings – I had planned to make granola with these, but haven’t. Maybe I will actually get around to that.

I don’t feel like I need to add more to the list at this point. There are a few perishables that we need to consciously eat through:

~~1.5 packages~~ 1 package of English muffins – I rarely buy these. But, did bite when it was buy 1, get 2 free. I realize I could freeze them if necessary.
50 lbs of Russet potatoes – These were under 20¢/pound last week plus I had a few on hand already. Again, I know they can be stored for a long time, but I don’t have a properly temperature-controlled space for long-term. That being said, we usually eat 3-4 pounds of potatoes with a meal so it should not be a problem to use them. Mindfulness really.
6 lbs of yellow onions – I was almost out and these were buy 1 get one free. So, more that I would normally buy, but its winter and lots of soups/stews/etc. call for onions so we should be able to use them up too.

On the one hand I didn’t make as much progress as on the freezers. On the other hand, we don’t actually need to. I may touch on the pantry in the final freezer post, but I think we’ve made good progress here.

Grocery Update & What We Ate – Week 11, 2018

19 Monday Mar 2018

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Grocery Spending

This was a big week – many stops and big dollars. It did include my (roughly) monthly trip to BJ’s, but I still hope things will level out.

In advance of the latest Nor’Easter I went to Target, BJ’s, and Wegman’s on Monday. I spent $23.10 at Target on juice and raisins.

Since there is no need to refrigerate this, and BJ’s and Target are close together but not particularly close to me, I went directly to BJ’s where I spent $163.88. Frankly, for BJ’s that’s not that bad.

I went home, put this all away, and ate lunch. Then after the preschool pick-up we went over to Wegman’s and spent another $39.44.

I’m glad I got all this in because Tuesday and Wednesday were indeed snow days.

On Thursday I spent another $36.51 at Wegman’s. My primary goal had been to replenish the eggs and coffee, but I got items for the weekend dinners also.