Rising Food Prices

This article was on Yahoo News. 4 Rising Food Costs That Will Hurt Your Wallet

I was suprised to see that milk wasn't on list, but maybe they are considering that to go under beef.

The "sweets" don't really bother me so much as I mostly bake my own. The upside for me is maybe they will reduce the amount of items that contain high fructose corn syrup.

Always watch the register

1) We had pizza night. I had a great coupon for "buy a large get a medium for free".

2) Lesson learned. I will admit, I never watch my items being rung up at the register. I do look at my receipt when I get home. I was excited when I went to HyVee to get a Pork Shoulder, it was on sale for $1.99/ lb. Gotta love an unexpected savings! Well, when I got home I realized they rung me up at the full price of $2.99/lb. Ugh! Well, don't worry, I made a phone call and made sure I would get my money back. So my sweet husband went back to HyVee to get my $3.50 and to get my roll of hamburger, while the girls were at their dance class. Ugh! part deux. The rolls of hamburger we all gone! But thanks to my hubby, I got a rain check. So I still get my 5 lbs of beef. (Please note: I didn't spend extra gas to get my savings. He went to the HyVee next to their dance studio and I will cash in my raincheck tomorrow when I do my regular grocery shopping.)

Feeling the Price Change

I updated the prices on my spreadsheet tonight. It hurt. Almost everything that I updated went up 10¢-20¢! This makes an already very tight budget, tighter. 

HyVee Ground Beef $1.79/lb

Our local HyVee is having a One Day Sale on September 1st. You can get 80% ground beef for $1.79/lb. It is sold in a 5lb roll for $8.95.

I paid $2.79/lb at Aldi's last week for 80% Ground Beef.



You can check your local ad here.

Shopping Trip Month 2 - Week 1

Total Spent $135.43
Left to Spend $164.57

I spent A LOT this week. I did have my son's birthday party to buy for, but a budget is a budget and if you only have $300 to spend then that must include feeding others.

The upside is I did get a huge 10lb bag of leg quarters for 3.90! That is 39¢ / lb!

Somethings that I am doing this month to reduce cost is to buy less "snacks" and make more. I am going to bake. I love to bake and can bake things a lot cheaper myself. Breads, cookies, muffins, oh my!

Today I made a huge bowl popcorn & raisins with cinnamon & sugar. I made 3 bags for today and later in the week. That mix averages 3¢ per cup.


I love this from gomestic.com. "Extend times between grocery shopping as much as possible. If you go every week, make it ten days, then twelve days. Push it as far as you can. Each day you don't buy food reduces your overall expense."

I am also going to try to reduce the amount of milk used by drinking more water. This is my biggest expense. We eat a lot of yogurt and cheese, so I am sure we get more than enough calcium in our diets. Two meals with milk, one with water.

End of Month / 4 Weeks

Tonight I end my first set of 4 week.

My end of the month spending is $368.62
I spent $68.62 more than my allotted budget.

One thing that really hurt the budget was the eating out. I need to stick to packing meals for trips and eating out cheap if necessary.
Another thing I am going to watch this month is wasting of milk. I have made myself aware this week of the amount of milk that goes down the drain.

Here's to month # 2!

Why I love freezer meals and Menu-Week 4

This menu will only be three days long. Today through Wednesday. I will not be going to the grocery store this week (unless I run out of milk). This week will end my 4 weeks.
Since I am not going to the store, I will using what I have in my house. This is why I love freezer meals. Whether you just don't feel like going to the store, you are too busy, or have run out of grocery money; you will still have good food to eat.

Monday-

Lunch:
home- beans, rice, and meat burritos, peas, apple/banana yogurt
school- caramel rice cake, blueberry greek yogurt, black olives, apple slices

Dinner:
Spaghetti, dinner rolls, peaches


Tuesday-

Lunch:
home- fishsticks, carrots, pears
school- graham crackers with pb & cinnamon, mash up, apple banana yogurt

Dinner:
Balsamic Roasted Chicken Thighs, brown rice ( I am going to try this recipe), garden green beans, apple slices

Wednesday-

Lunch:
home- pb&j, green beans, peaches
school- pb&j, peaches, pretzels

Dinner:
Salisbury Steak, mashed potatoes, pears

Tuesday Meals

Lunch-
Home- Cheese, Apples, Toast
School- Wheat Crackers, tuna, black olives, fruit strip, applesauce.

The fruit strips that we are have are Fit & Active from Aldi. We love them.
I have also found these little containers to work very well for us.  The Glad mini round containers are the perfect helping size for my girls. They are dishwasher safe and can be used over and over. I can buy applesauce, olives, tuna, yogurt, etc in the big containers that I have always bought them in and save money.

Convenience sizes are almost always more expensive.
For example: Great Value (Walmart brand) Natural Applesauce no sugar added {ingredients are apples, water, absorbic acid( to maintain color)}.
46 oz jar = $1.68 = 4¢ per ounce
6-4oz containers = 24 oz total = $1.50 = 6¢ per ounce
2¢ may not seem like a lot, but if you take that times all the single serving food purchased, it can really add up.

Dinner-
Taco Tuesday!  Hard and soft shell tacos with meat, lettuce, cheese, and tomatoes; Beans and rice; Tortilla chips with refried beans; Corn; and Mandarin oranges.

Monday Meals

The weekdays meals are going to be a bit different now. I am going to add what I send in my girls' lunch boxes. This will be a challenge for myself to find healthy foods for my picky eater to eat.

Lunch:
At home- turkey sandwich, carrots, strawberries

School- pb & j, mash up, greek yogurt with honey (their favorite way to eat yogurt), and a zucchini cookie

My downfall to pb & j is that it really isn't that healthy. I buy Jif Natural (because it tastes better, I think) and Fit & Active Strawberry Fruit Spread from Aldi. It does have 8g of sugar, but no high fructose corn syrup and no dye.  I am not sure how much sugar is too much. I have searched and searched and it seems nobody (in cyber world) really knows. It always just says  "eat in moderation".  Smuckers strawberry jelly has 12 g of sugar and Welch's has 13g of sugar, so I think 8g is doing pretty good.
As far as peanut butter, I figure unless the only ingredient is peanuts then it probably isn't that great. Jif Natural  contains 90% peanuts. The other 10% not so great. So after reading this I learned about Krema peanut butter. It has 100% peanuts !  Now how much is this 100% peanuts peanut butter going to cost me and where do I find it. I spend $3.18 for a 28 oz jar of Jif Natural. The Krema is $3.59 for 16 oz. This may not seem like a big deal to some, but we eat a lot of peanut butter. That is 11¢ per oz vs 22¢ per oz! So now I have to make the decision of whether the cost is worth the healthier product. Some would say "yes, absolutely!" but I have to watch my budget.  As far as where to find it, there is no location finder on the website, but some of the comments on the snack girl blog said they found it at Walmart. Maybe I will give it a whirl. I let you know how it turns out.


Dinner- Breakfast for Dinner!!!! Waffles, Ham steak, eggs, and apples.

I make my waffles from scratch and I (almost) always have those ingredients on hand. The ham steak was in my freezer from an earlier meal.

Here is the recipe for the waffles. I always do the buttermilk recipe. I use butter instead of oil. A quick and easy way to make buttermilk is to put 1Tbs lemon juice into a measuring cup and add milk till it is at one cup. The total amount of liquid is one cup.

Shopping Trip Week 3

As you may notice this week does not have a menu.

I didn't do a menu this week. The only menu item will be Taco Tuesday because I would be in big trouble with my kids if we missed that.

This week will be more eating things that we have. So instead of a menu this week. I will post what we have daily.

I did do a bit of grocery shopping for Taco Tuesday, milk, fresh produce, and to supplement some meals I have in mind.

Total Spent: 66.10

Month One Continues- Week 2- Tentative $

So I have decided to keep going with Month 1. I am going to see how far over my $300 I end up going. I will use this as a learning lesson as to what I need to do next month to lesson my spending.




Total = 40.35

Week 2 - Tentative $

Shopping template week 2. You can click on each tab to see the different stores.

Nothing Like a Trip to Kill the Budget

On our little trip we took this past weekend it costed us. Costed us $70.25 in food.

Here are the reasons why:

-Dinner. Note to self, no matter how late you are running, pack dinner. Spending $24.81 at McDonalds just isn't worth it. Although I know that there are cheaper ways of eating at McDonalds and we usually do that, but well. Long trip, running late, lack of motivation.
How we eat cheap at McDonalds if interested: For our family we could have gotten 1 McDouble, 3 apple dippers, 2 McChickens, 2 small fries, a ten piece nugget, and waters for about $14. That would have fed us just fine and is normally what we get. The kids share the 10 piece nugget.

-I forgot to pack my ingredients. I chose to make an oriental salad for a class reunion because I had those ingredients on hand. I didn't have to buy anything. Well, I realized 2 hours away from home that I forgot the ingredients. Talk about a "darn it" moment. So here I go to Walmart. $17.32 later I walk out with my ingredients, cereal (because we don't eat sugar cereal and wanted to make sure we didn't have to), and some other items that you see scratched off because they aren't food. Yet another reason why I should never go to Walmart unplanned.

So almost an entire weeks budget on barely anything.

Mash Ups and School Lunches

I have a daughter who refuses vegetables and if we can get her to eat them it consists of one green bean or one spoonful of peas. Thank goodness for spaghetti sauce because the tomato in it is the only vegetable that she gets a good amount of.

A couple months ago I found these. Mash Ups. My kids LOVE them. I love that they love them. I love that they contain a fruit, a vegetable, no sugar, no high fructose corn syrup, and no dye. What I don't love is the price. $4.49 a box. That is 1.12 per pouch. A sucker punch to the food budget.

I bought some today. And here is my receipt.

I am going to put them in their school lunches.

Which leads me to my next topic...

I have been struggling with the decision to pack my girls' lunches or have them eat school lunch.
Lunch cost at our school is $1.90 per meal. For us that comes to $76 a month and they don't even really use it. For example: Last year Breanna would come home and I would ask her what she ate for lunch. Crackers, cheese, and milk. WHAT!!! I am pretty sure I can get her crackers, cheese and milk for a whole lot less than $1.90. And did I mention a half pint of milk is .50, that comes to $8 per gallon. Would you pay $8 for a gallon of milk?

So this year, new plan. I will take the extra time to pack them a nutritious lunch that I know they will eat. The hard part is figuring out what to pack. A hot lunch at home is so much easier than a cold lunch to take to school. I will take any suggestions. Abigail will eat most anything, but Breanna, miss picky. No raw veggies and no meat. I would rather her not have PB & J everyday. So the search is on for healthy, cold foods that my daughters will consume.

So an added trial to my $300 a month budget is school lunch. I'll let you know how it all works for me. And seriously on the ideas for lunches will be greatly appreciated. Just keep in mind we are shooting for healthy here.

chocolate chip zucchini cookies (because we all need a little something sweet now and then)

I made chocolate chip zucchini cookies and they were so good. I got the recipe from here, but altered it a bit. Note: these are more of a soft cookie than a hard cookie.
I used butter instead of margarine, unbleached vs bleached flour, and chocolate chips instead of raisins.

These versus Chips Ahoy turn out to be a much better value and are healthier in most areas. They also, in my families opinion, taste better. This is a cheap cookie that can be  made and frozen. I tripled the recipe and froze 2 portions. I do this because it is so much easier to buy a package of cookies than to have to get all the ingredients out and bake them from scratch. So I baked a whole bunch and when I want cookies, I will take how many I want/need out, defrost, and enjoy.

Cost:

Chocolate Chip Zucchini Cookies- Total= $1.83
                                                      per cookie=.05
Chips Ahoy- Total= $3.69
                     per cookie= .28

Huge difference! 67% savings!

Nutrition per serving (because I am suppose to be frugal and healthy):

Chocolate Chip Zucchini Cookies-
     89.6 calories
     3.84g fat
       - 2.94g saturated fat
     13.34g carbs
     .5g fiber
     1.24g protein
     70mg sodium

Chips Ahoy-
     160 calories
     8g fat
      - 2.5g saturated fat
     21g carbs
     1g fiber
     2g protein
     105mg sodium


    
    *Acknowledgement
        For my bff who stood up twice, stubbed her toe, and consumed chocolate chips just so I could know how many servings I used in this recipe. Thanks, Brie!

Shopping Trip Week 1

I was very proud of myself this week. I managed to stick to my list except for flour and lunch meat. I wanted to make cookies and bread and wouldn't have had enough flour to do all that. I added the lunch meat simply because I forgot and didn't want my poor husband to starve as this is what he eats for lunch.
I spent a bit more than I had hoped, so I will have to adjust my menu and budget the next weeks.

Grand Total: $86.30
Left to spend:213.70

Milk was .20 cheaper! Big deal when you buy on average 18 gallons a month.

The poly bags on the Walmart receipt is popcorn. This is such a great snack or munchie. It is high in fiber, so cheap (at .05 per serving), and can easily be altered. Our favorite toppings are kosher salt, parmesan cheese, and cinnamon & sugar. I am excited to try to make chocolate popcorn. I will have to omit the peanuts since Warren can't have them yet. Not quite healthy, but a great frugal dessert.
What's you favorite popcorn flavor?

In case you are wondering why in the world I have two Walmart receipts. I made a mistake that I had never done before. I left an entire bag on the turn style. Oops. Luckily, Walmart believed me and let me have my items back for free. Lesson learned.

If there is anything on the receipts that you are curious what it is feel free to ask.

Week 1- tentative $

These are my templates for this weeks grocery shopping trip.
I do have a few items that I need to get that aren't on here.

My total not including the items not in the spreadsheet is $63.17
I am hoping to keep my grand total under $75 for the week.

Let the fun begin!

I have decided that I am going to attempt to feed my family of five for $300 or less a month. I currently spend between $400 and $500 a month. This month I spent $473. My food budget will include eating out and food from the store. According to The US Census Bureau in 2009 (published in 2011) the average cost to feed a family of five are as follows:
Thrifty plan-$557.76
Low Plan- $708
Moderate Plan-$876.96
High Plan- $1237.44

This challenge for me started when I read an article that talked about two families who must feed their families for under $300 because that is all they have due to hard times and at times they have to actually miss meals. It also stated in the article that poverty stricken people tend to be overweight because it is cheaper to buy processed convenience foods and eat at McDonalds than buying healthier food. I in all honestly would like to prove this wrong. I want to think that $300 can feed a family. That if we budget, meal plan, and stick to a list and shop at the right places it can be done.

Our family has some dietary guidelines that we follow that may make this a little more difficult (or could end up proving my point even more). We do not buy anything that has food dye in it. So there are things that we buy at the HyVee health market that costs a bit more than a different brand at Aldi. We also eat a lot of fresh produce, this as most know can be expensive. I try to not by things with high fructose corn syrup which if you read labels is in so much. And I buy greek yogurt because of the protein due to Breanna refusing all meat.

I have been doing some reading to try to find some tips.
--I am an impulse shopper. I can go in with a list that should cost $27 and end up walking out with $63 worth of stuff (I did this last week). So I really liked this idea.
Identify weekly, biweekly, and monthly needs.
This is how I  will split mine up:
     Weekly-fresh produce
     Bi Weekly-anything that can be frozen (milk, cheese, butter, meat, etc) and anything that keeps well in    
     the 
     fridge (eggs, yogurt, etc)
     Monthly- all non perishables (cereal, noodles, canned goods, etc)
This will keep me out of the stores as much as possible to avoid those darn "gotta have it" purchases. When I walk in to get fresh produce, I go straight to the produce section and straight to the register. I may need blinders for those pesky items they put at the register.
--I am going to organize my pantry, fridge and freezers (yes we have two) so I am not buying things that I already have and making sure I don't assume we have something when we don't.
--I am going to start feezing desserts so when those sugar munchies hit I won't be so temtped to run to Caseys and get a cupcake.

Somethings that I already do to cut costs is:
--Waste nothing. We do not throw aways leftovers, we eat them. Any bananas that turn brown get mashed and put into the freezer for banana bread and the heels of bread also gets frozen for bread crumbs. I never purchase bread crumbs. I am hoping to find more ways to not waste.
--My BFF (as Jim calls her, LOL) and I share a garden. This does/will help greatly with the costs of veggies.
--I also make freezer meals. When I make a meal that can be frozen I double or triple the recipe (or quadruple for pancakes and waffles). We eat one and freeze the others. This helps for those times when you either don't feel like cooking or don't have time to cook and might end up going out to eat or ordering a pizza.
--Jim has is making me a great excel spreadsheet with the price of the things that I buy so I know what I am going to spend before I walk in to the grocery store (thank goodness for a tech savvy husband). I will share that when it is complete.

What I plan to put on here is my menu for the month, recipes, maybe even a picture if the meal looks really yummy, my grocery list and how much I spent. So I guess if you want I can pretty much do your food planning for you assuming that you like to eat what we eat.

My next step is to make my monthly menu and figure up what I need for my three lists. And I am sure a whole lot of adjusting to make it under $300.