Warning: Boring homemaking blog.
Has anyone else noticed how expensive food is getting? Our grocery bill has been creeping up and up and up, so I decided to try something new. I shop for an entire month instead of just a week.
It's a big job! I hit up Sam's, Sprouts and H-E-B all on one day! I like it because it's already a pain in the butt to shop with a baby and lug everything upstairs, so why not do it once a month instead of once a week? (And, I only bring in the cold stuff and G has to get everything else once he comes home:) I've had several people ask about the logistics of this, so I thought I would share.
First, it takes some serious planning! I have to plan a menu for the entire month and then make a list off of that. That's 90 meals!! There are some repeats, but it's not identical week-to-week. I check the ads before I go and try to plan off of them, but sometimes I have to change the menu mid-shopping (like when roast was $5/lb...I think not!).
We go back to the store once to get milk and eggs and maybe some more fruit or veggies.
As far as produce goes, we eat all the stuff that goes bad quickly at the beginning of the grocery cycle; strawberries, salads, bananas, etc are all eaten right away. Then, we eat oranges, apples, pears, melons, squash and frozen veggies for the back half of the cycle.
I make a lot of some things and freeze portions, which is saving me some serious time and money. For instance, I got those gigantic cans of tomatoes at Sam's this week and made large amounts of Ghana Stew and Chili. We also freeze nearly all of the meat we buy, 5lb bags of shredded cheese, deli meat and juice concentrate.
The verdict? Huge savings and worth all the trouble! I save more than $100/month doing it this way, maybe even $200 (not including the gas and my time going to the store so many extra times) and really, it doesn't take that much longer to actually shop. I also find that I'm more inspired to cook and bake because there are so many more options in the house...aaaand, I feel like a total rock star when I finish my shopping! The only down side is that we barely have room to keep all the food. Currently, there is a case of bottled water, bag of sweet potatoes and 2 bags of apples sitting on the kitchen floor.
I don't mind...too much.
3 comments:
i've been thinking about this since i saw you. jeff and i hate meal planning and grocery shopping, so this is kind of appealing. our big issue right now is storage. we can barely fit one weeks worth in right now and jeff says that i yell at him if he buys more than one paper towel roll at a time because i don't have anywhere to put it. ha! also, the girls go through about a gallon and a half of milk a week, at least.
so i was also telling my neighbor about this and she was wondering where the cost savings comes in. is it mainly from buying in bulk? or from cutting out impulse buys from going to the store less?
I think a lot of the savings comes from buying in bulk (however, I take pen to paper and research to see what really is a savings, big packs at Sam's aren't always). For instance, the shredded cheese we buy 5lbs at a time is about half the price, same with some of the meat we buy at Sam's. The other part is hitting up so many stores. Sprout's often has killer deals on meat and produce, but I can't get EVERYTHING there. I often find meat for around $2/lb which makes it worth the extra trip. I do also cut out some of our impulse buys-or maybe I just impulsively buy things once instead of 4xs! G and I each have a $ amount of "treats" that are our special things (and no, I don't share mine when he goes through his too quickly)and that helps. Cooking a lot at once (again with the bulk thing) allows me to take advantage of a great deal and save some for later. We obviously don't go through milk as fast as y'all do, but we only have to go back once because we buy organic milk and the expiration date is further out. Do y'all do organic? Maybe buy 2 and keep one way in the back of the fridge? The storage part is soooooo tough! We have a huge closet though, so for things like paper towels and toilet paper, I put them there. We also have this bizarre space next to our washer that bottled drinks end up in. It doesn't take me too much longer to plan meals this way and it helps to have some repeats...I make pizza every Friday!
Maybe we will give it a try once we move and have more storage space. Or at least try to get down to once a week, ha. Yeah, we do organic whole milk, I cry anytime I have to pour any out, so expensive!
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