amitymamaThe Attachment Parenting Community

gabrielbaby

Tips for frugal yet healthy grocery shopping:

the first step is to decide what you will need to have on hand. I like to be well stocked. There are certain items like flour and sugar that you will use a lot of. My pantry always has the following

1. 20 lb bag unbleached flour
2. 10 lb bag whole wheat flour
3. 20 lb bag white rice
4. 10 lb bag brown rice
5. 5 lbs walnuts
6. 2 lbs raisens
7. 2 lbs honey
8. 2lbs dry active yeast
9. 5 lbs baking soda
10. 1/2 gallon maple syrup
11. 6 lb can tom sauce
12. 6 lb can crushed toms
13. 6 lb can vegetable shortning
14. 5 lb bag sugar
15. 5 lb box powdered milk
16. 1 lb wheat germ
17. 1 lb brewers yeast
18. 1 lb sea salt
19. 3 lbs quick oats
20. about 10-20 lbs of various beans
21. a few pounds barley
22. a few pounds millet
23. about 5-10 lbs pasta
24. 5 lbs corn meal
25. 5 lbs masa
26. Gallon sized jar of pickles
27. 1/2 gallon green olives
28. gallon vegetable oil
29. half gallon olive oil
30. countless herbs and spices


I'm sure there is more, but that is what I came up with off the top of my head. When I make a shopping list, I take a mental inventory of what I have and what I need. If I'm getting low on any of these staples, it gets added to the list. It takes a while and some $$ to get your staples in order, but once you do, you will have all the basic ingredients (aside from milk and eggs) to make just about any sort of mix, like cakes, cookies, pancakes, breads, batters, coatings, stuffings fillings, really anything.

The next step is to decide what fruits and veggies your family likes and find the best place to get them. I know a lot of people find organics to be more expensive than conventional produce. It's not always the case tho. I did my shopping today and here is my list. Keep in mind, that we are not a vegetarian family, so the cost would be much lower w/o the meat, but you would likely need to add more veggies or other protein source to you list.

3 lbs red delicious apples, 3.29$ conventional
2 lbs plum tomatoes 1.40$ conventional
2 large green peppers .92 organic
1 bag of celery hearts 1.39 organic (this was .40 cheaper than the conventional)
2 lbs yuca root .46 conventional
2 large plantains .67 conventional
3.5 lbs bananas 1.61 conventional
1 lb button mushrooms 2.99 organic
3 lbs carrots 3.00 organic (conventional was 2.35)
2 limes .34 conventional
2 lbs brussels sprouts 1.81 organic
2 lbs asparagus 1.83 conventional
2 bundles of brocoli 4.78 organic (conventional was 1.90 per bundle)
3 lbs nectarines 2.09 conventional
5 lbs russet potatoes 3.99 organic (the conventional was 3.29)

That's it for the veggies. I didnt buy everything organic obviously, some stuff is price restrictive. Things like carrots, potatoes, onions, anything that grows in the ground, I feel it is important to get organic cause this is where pesticides accumulate. The prices of the things the I bought organic are not much higher than the conventional. This was all purchased at the regular market, Publix.

This next section is meat

8 lbs boneless skinnless chicken breast 16.09
7 lb smoked ham 10.09
1 doz cage free eggs 2.49 (I spluged on these, I need to make mayo)
1 lb seafood mix, (shrimp, octopus, cuttel fish, clams, oysters, squid) to make a Colombian seafood stew for the fam. 3.99
2.5 lb shoulder roast 4.44

TOTAL: 67.67

I should add that I already have some ground beef and salmon filets in the freezer. This food will last up for the next 2-3 weeks. I will have to go out again at some point for more fruit and more veggies. I also will head to costco in a day or so to get the steaks that dh likes. hmm, what else?

Oh! What I do when I get home from the store. First thing is to split everything up into meal sized portions. The chicken gets wrapped in butcher paper in 1 lb packs. The roast gets cut in half and wrapped and frozen. The ham was cut up into slices for sanwiches, and big chunks for soups and small chunks for toppings for pizza and mixing into things like cassaroles.

The veggies get split up and cooked right away. I blanch everything and cool it and freeze it. This way, I dont have to worry about my veggies going bad before we eat them. I even cut up and freeze the green pepper!

Let's see, next are bread and bread like stuff, I buy it all at the Entemenns bakery thrift shop. I get 4-5 loaves of bread, english muffins, bagles, pitas, lots of stuff and I never spend more than 10$ there. I always get enough to last the month. I freeze bread and others til Im ready to use them.

Then there is dairy. now, I'm pretty lucky here, I get WIC and it really does give us enough to make it through the month. So if you dont get WIC and need to buy this stuff with cash, your bill will be higher.


I guess really the key is, if it comes in a box, dont buy it!

kimi

iTrader: 0 / 0%

I love you!!!

Please come stay with me for a month and help me do this!

No, really though, I'm going to try so much harder now. I promise. I'm going to have to get DH to do some chores. He doesn't work and does pretty much nothing around the house. For me to do this he really needs to pick up some slack. To reward him, I think I'll promise to buy and cook some meat. Hmmmm, this might work!

elsie

iTrader: 1 / 100%

Mona- You have GOT to share more on this part. This is my HUGE downfall- i waste soooooo many veggies cos we dont eat them before they get yucky. Please help!

You really cook all the veggies? How exactly do you blanch them? How long does this all take you? How do you thaw them later- while you're cooking them in a recipe, or before? How big is your freezer?

I am so excited! I have got to try this! I stomped around for 1/2 an hour today cos I had to throw away 3 cups of spinach!


Thank you!

__________________
Laura, mama to Abel, age 9!
~my 2 favorite boys~

~@~@~@~@~@~@~@~

matt-n-jakesmom

This is what I need to do. I'm so sick of throwing out veggies because I don't eat them before they go bad. I don't buy a lot of fresh vegetables right now (mainly for that reason!), mainly salad stuff. Can you freeze things like lettuce, tomatoes and cucumbers? Another stupid question -- what is "blanching"? (total cooking novice here!) I've heard of it before but have no idea what it is or how to do it.

I'd love to use more fresh vegetables, but I don't really know what to do with them or how to use them.

Ducky99

Thank you Mona! What an inspiration! I know I can do so much better than I am doing now! Where do you get butcher paper? I was just going to post a question about how to not use freezer bags, what a great idea! Thanks! kate

gabrielbaby

Well, I dont cook everything, but most. And I do it because of your reason, I had too many veggies going bad before we ate them. This way, there is no chance

What I do is was them and then either blanch or steam them and freeze them into dinner sized portions. Tonight I did 1 bunch brocoli, all the asparagus and all the brussels sprouts. I froze the green peppers raw. I also sometime will chop up several onions and freeze them raw. Then just grab a handful out of the jar when they are frozen, they dont really stick together.

The carrots and celery will be fine in the fridge, and potatoes and onions are fine too. I have another bunch of brocoli in the fridge that we will eat this coming week. And there is a head of cabbage in there that I'll use this week too. Gonna make coleslaw with my yummy homemade mayo I have resolved to not buy zucchini any more, it always seems to go bad before i used it all.

If I need a veggie for a recipe, like brocoli, I just toss it in still frozen. If it's for dinner to be eaten alone, I just take it out a few hours ahead of time. And I just have a regular freezer. I'd love to have a nice chest freezer, I'd never need to go shopping! LOL!

gabrielbaby

Blanching means to dip the veggies into boiling water for about 2-3 minutes, and then removing it from the heat and immediatly immersing it into icy water to stop the cooking process. This keeps the veggies fresher tasting. If you freeze raw veggies, in most cases, they get slimey when cooked. Blanching them gets rid of that.

gabrielbaby

You can get butcher paper in the market, look near the foil and plastic wrap. HTH!

kimi

iTrader: 0 / 0%

OK. this is my biggest problem too- throwing away too many veggies. So you are saying you just freeze your veggies in jars? Do they get freezer burn quick? And then you are also saying they don't stick together frozen- or is that just the onions? I went to the farmers market this morning, I couldn't resist anything and came home with 4 grocery bags full!LOL

gabrielbaby

I only freeze what I will use in the weeks ahead, so it doesnt have time to get freezer burn. and you can freeze veggies so that they wont stick togther, once you've cooked them, lay them out flat on a cookie sheet. Put the whole cookie sheet in the freeze until they are frozen solid. Then put them in your container to store them.

kimi

iTrader: 0 / 0%

Ah, OK gotcha- that's how I freeze my cookie dough

Akayasmama

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What a great post! Thanks so much for writing it all out! I never even thought about freezing veggies (Dah!)...what a great way to make sure they get used! Thanks!!!!

__________________


~Amoreena~ artist momma to baby Saige and 2nd grader Akaya!


SageMoonPottery coming soon!

Ducky99

Can you tell us some of the yummy things you cook with this awesome list?