In January I stated that this month I would share with you all the foods I buy and what I pay for them and I would only eat out once a week and not purchase any chips, cookies, candy, crackers, ice cream or soda. We are now halfway through the month so I will update you on how I am doing.
On the positive side I have managed to avoid purchasing any chips, cookies, candy, crackers, or ice cream. I did have lots of chips and cookies when I visited my mom for super bowl weekend though. And I used some of my Register Rewards at Walgreens to get more soda. My rationalization at the time was that I wasn’t spending any money on the soda so it didn’t count as a purchase. That is obviously cheating though.
On the negative side I abandoned the goal of only eating out once a week. I’ve been having restaurant food almost every day. And I have been having soda with those restaurant meals.
Now for a complete rundown on all food purchased so far this month.
- 3/4 gallon skim milk
- 4.89 lbs bananas
- 1 box mac&cheese
- 48 oz vegetable oil
- 1 lb bag mini carrots
- 12 oz salad mix
- 12 oz salsa
- 6 Knorr pasta/rice sides
- 1/2 gallon orange juice
- 750 ml vodka
- 1 frozen pizza
- 2 bags of peanuts and 2 sodas
- 7 Burger King meals
- 1 Hardee’s Meal
- 1 Little Caesars Pepperoni Pizza
- 1 Pizza Street pizza buffet
The total spent on this is $53.65. Some things that kept the cost down are: I had six free meals when I visited my mom, I had a freee $10 Burger King gift card from MyPoints, I received the pizza buffet for free as part of a mystery shop, and I already had some food at the beginning of the month.
Some things that inflated the cost: I didn’t manage to finish either the carrots or the salad mix before they went bad, part of my half-gallon of milk went bad, and the Knorr sides are for my hike so I probably shouldn’t have included them in this month’s food budget.
As you can see there is plenty of room for improvement in my diet. I don’t do very well with eating perishables before they go bad and I am still eating out too much and eating too much junk. I have about as much food in my pantry now as I did at the beginning of the month. I’ll be leaving for my hike at the beginning of March so I want to use up as much food as I can . My plan is to not buy any; more food for the rest of the month except when I’m on vacation in Vegas. I will have another update after the end of the month and let you know how it went.
Some suggestions:
Divide your milk up into smaller containers, leave a little expansion space) and freeze.Milk does freeze well.
Also consider making homemade puddings, recipes that have a cream/milk base.
Cook the carrots if you cannot eat, before going bad. If you sticll cannot eat them..freeze them. Add to a soup/casserole/stew/instant cup a noodle/ recipe.