Aliens in the Apple

Grocery Challenge: week 2

Franci 18 Oct 2010 Food Frugal fun Grocery challenge

In some ways, week 2 was a lot easier than week 1. I only bought what I needed, but it seemed that I needed more than $25 worth of stuff a week. You’re probably all thinking “I knew she couldn’t do it!”. I’m still going to try. :-) The thing that’s the killer is the fresh stuff — fruit, vegetables and milk. And I’m not really willing to cut that out of our diet for the sake of an experiment! At the same time, I’m going to try to use some meals I have in the freezer already over the next 2 weeks to see if I can still reach this $100 goal.

I’m getting into the swing of this buying-only-what-I-need business. That’s not to say I’m not longingly looking at the pack of cookies on sale for only 2 bucks! (even though I have however many other packs at home), but I’m starting to reason with myself in a more sane way, I hope.

I’m also happy to report that when you buy less, you waste less. I’ve had no rotten food or produce that’s needed to go in the rubbish. Yay for that!

Here’s what I spent during the second week of the challenge:

fresh fruit and vegies — $17.40
gallon of milk — $3.39
raisins — $2.59
frozen vegies — $2.19
dozen eggs — $0.99
apple sauce for Esther — $2.69
fish — $2.15
1/2 gallon milk — $1.99
yoghurt — $2.00
peanut butter — $1.99

Total: $36.39.

Oh dear. That leaves $29.71 for the next 2 weeks. I’m positive that it will mostly be spent on fruit, veg and milk!

Here’s what we’re eating for week 3 of the challenge:

Monday:

Spicy Kumera soup with toasties

Tuesday:

Home made pizza with salad

Wednesday:

Chicken pasta bake and green salad

Thursday:

5-Minute South-west Layered Salad

Friday:

Spaghetti Bolognaise with garlic bread and salad

Saturday:

Chinese take-out. Yay!

Sunday:

Sandwiches or left-overs for dinner.

Comments (6)

Liana Havelaar 18 Oct 2010 at 3:57pm

You definitely need the $7 boxes of produce I get from Raeward Fresh for your grocery challenge! Okay, a little bit of wastage, but I figure that’s okay for under $1 per kg of fruit and veg. Sounds like you’re having fun. :-)

Franci 18 Oct 2010 at 4:04pm

Oh man, that would help! I guess I should have added that I’m not shopping any place different than usual — just my (small) local supermarket, which doesn’t exactly have cheap prices. So I won’t be surprised if I go a little over. But I hope not. :-)

Rick 18 Oct 2010 at 9:02pm

should we expect you to be inviting yourself over for dinner a few times in the next 2 weeks? =)

Franci 18 Oct 2010 at 10:00pm

We’re open to invitations! :-)

Anna Miretti 20 Oct 2010 at 7:23pm

you could eat chinese a different night, since that night you;ll be coming to my place to have Italian by an Italian. :) I hope you come hungry!

Franci 20 Oct 2010 at 7:28pm

Yeah, I reckon we’ll do Chinese on Friday. We’ve also done pizza two nights in a row (home-made) — we’re all a bit under the weather (again!? still?) so it’s working out better than expected. I might just make this $100 challenge! Maybe.