As a follow-up to yesterday's post on W.O.W. [and because the local farmers' market season is almost over!], I'm writing today about how I shop using local produce as my base.
So, here's my deal:
On Saturday morning I grab some cash and my favorite blue eco-bag and head down the street to the market. There are two big farm stands; I always go to both. Sometimes there's a meat truck but I don't look too long there because I can't afford to buy their stuff, even though it's probably good quality/organic/amazing/delicious/healthy.
Today I got the following:
Total spent: $12.75
The other day I got these clementines & bananas from the regular grocery store because I haven't found them at the market. If anyone knows a local farmer in NJ or PA who grows bananas in November (or any time of the year!), please be sure to let me know.
After I bring my goodies home, I go through the grocery store flier and plan a week's worth of dinners. I make a shopping list for the store, starting at one end and finishing up on the other end. My grocery bill varies, depending how much beef/chicken/extra snacks I buy, but lately it's been about 60 bucks. That makes me glad because earlier this summer I was spending at least $100 each trip. Not good, not good at all. My current budget goal is to spend $300 a month on groceries. I'll be tracking it this month so we'll see.
1 comment:
I can so relate to your meal planning and food budget posts! I go back and forth with doing a good job planning vs. piling things in the cart and relying on my creativity to make them work. Ha! Have you ever heard of http://www.howdoesshedoit.com/ ? I used it for a while and it was really helpful. You can menu-plan online and it takes all the recipes you choose and puts the ingredients in a shopping list categorized by where you'd find them in the store. I only stopped because I was cooking a big meal every night and then had too many leftovers. I suppose if I just cooked maybe 3 or 4 times it would work better.
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