Really? Does Your Grocery Bill Look Like This?

So the USDA has a posting as to the average costs of eating meals at home.  You can click here to see what the USDA considers to be average spending on groceries.  I'd be fascinated to know how your grocery spending looks next to their totals!  (The June reports show a yearly average)

Freezer Friday: September Batch Cooking

I'm not sure about where everyone else lives, but it has been hot here this week!  I love batch cooking: it saves me time and money in the long run.  I had laid out my September batch cooking plan on Monday and got to work.

After shopping, getting elbow deep in food stuffs, and recognizing that it was hot, the plan got tweaked a little (soufflé can wait  until Monday when it's cooler!) and some things made it to the freezer that were bonus items (more cheap green and red peppers).  Here is what has made it to my freezer and the pantry for the coming month(s):

Freezer:

2 Ranch Bean Kits (modified Cowboy Beans)

1 Bean kit for 3 Bean Chili

1-9x13 and 2-8x8 pans of Grilled Chicken Enchiladas (Recipe to come)

4-8x8 Lasagnas

6 Grilled Chicken Breast Packets (thaw, heat & chop for salads, fajitas, pasta etc)

8 containers (2 & 4  cup) of Beans - Black, Pinto and Northern

2# Ground Beef to be used for Taco meat later

6  Pepper Bombs each of Red and Green peppers

I still have plans (and 10 pounds of potatoes) to make mashed potatos as well - just didn't get to it yet.

Pantry


Instant Oatmeal packets

3 Biscuit kits

3 Cornbread kits

After all that work, I even remembered to mark off my freezer list so I know what's actually in there!

Special thanks to my local grocery stores who had lean ground beef $1.99/lb and boneless/skinless chicken breasts at $1.69/lb this week!  Also due to some great sales, I've  got my pantry stocked on cereal and pasta as well.  The hope is that all I will have to buy for the rest of the month is milk, eggs and fresh produce.  I'm also hoping to spend a little less time on meal prep and squeeze in some more regular exercise.

Save Money & Have a Fun Summer Too!

The sun is out, the kids are out of school and the temperatures are rising.  Summer is here and there are dozens of pitfalls waiting to empty your wallet.  With a little planning and creativity, you can save money this summer and still get the best that our warm season has to offer.

It’s been a long day of work and the kids are tired.  It’s hot outside and temperatures are even hotter inside.  The trap is set.  Nobody feels like cooking and yet everyone is hungry.  Instead of getting caught in the “let’s just go out” trap, plan ahead.  A package of hot dogs or hamburgers with matching buns can make a quick outdoor meal.  Set up the sprinkler and let the kids run off their energy while you cook.  Add carrot-sticks and chips and a picnic blanket.  Dinner is ready and your wallet has been rescued.

Everyone deserves a summer vacation, right?  You’ve worked hard and everyone wants a break.  The trap is set.  The “we deserve a big vacation” trap that usually entices more greenbacks from your wallet than you ever planned.  You are right.  You do work hard, and you do deserve a break.  Just because funds are tight doesn’t mean that you have to right off your vacation plans just yet.  You can vacation closer to home, planning picnic type meals to avoid eating out and pre-book your nights at budget motels- preferably with pools.  Plan your days for local activities and your evenings for pool time.

Another option is a staycation.  Stay at home, but set up the tent and camp in the back yard or visit the local state park, lake or beach.  You can plan activities that are different from your normal outings and plan a special treat for each day.  This can save in meals and lodging if planned and that amount can be saved, or spent on outings or take-out to relieve the stress of meals.

The summer is also a wonderful time to utilize the natural resources around you to lower your energy bills.  Put up a clothes line to save on electricity and/or gas.  Open your windows on cool nights to naturally cool down your home, and keep your thermostat set warmer during the day when you’re not home. Plant a small garden to save on produce at the supermarket.

The possibilities for saving money this summer are endless.  With a little creativity and planning you can make your pennies go a long way.

This article was originally written and published for Helium.com.  Click here to see my other articles.

Eat from the Pantry Challenge Wrap-Up

So back at the beginning of the month, I took on the Eat From the Pantry Challenge. This is the first time I've taken part of this type of challenge and I have to say, it was a great experience.  For me, having my goals in mind as I was making decisions regarding our groceries throughout the month was a huge challenge.  It helped me to make decisions against impulse items and against purchases of things I would normally stock, but that we really didn't need right now. I set four specific goals and here's how it worked out.  Check back tomorrow for my February Kitchen Goals!

Goal #1: Shave $50 off the Grocery spending for the month.

Success! At the end of the month, we were under budget on groceries by $51.48

Goal #2 - Only 3 grocery stops after the big shopping at the beginning of the month.

I ended up with 4 grocery stops including a quick stop for milk and a quick grocery store stop for snacks while we were out for an unexpected chunk of errands.

Goal #3 - Batch Cooking once a week.

Success! The first couple weeks it was replenishing my baked goods in the freezer, then the Corned Beef & Cabbage stew, Minestrone, Marinara & Lasagnas.

Goal #4 - Split extra grocery money between our local Food Pantry and Summer Produce Fund

Done and Done

Savings Tracker

I am a numbers person and I like to save money.  When I was trying to explain my delight in saving money to HandyMan, he had a hard time wrapping his head around it.  He's also somewhat convinced that I have a pointy hat and magic wand stashed to get some of the deals that I get.  Finally he narrowed it down to the equivalent of opening his paycheck and thinking "Sweet! Money!"  I do the same thing for money that doesn't have to come out of our accounts for things we need (or want).  I like tracking our budget to see where we're on track and where we need to make changes.  I love to see the little line at the bottom of a receipt showing how much I saved because I used the [stupid] store loyalty card or coupons I went out of my way to print.

So imagine the pitter-pat dance my heart did when I stumbled upon The Coupon Project: Savings Tracker!  I know - I'm such a geek!  But, if you want to have an idea of how much you're saving throughout the year using discounts and coupons, check it out.  It is a great excel sheet that's easy to use.  Take a couple minutes and enter the information from your receipts and it will calculate it out for you.

2010 Goals

I'm really not one for new year's resolutions.  They've struck me too rigid and better markers for where I'm not meeting my own expectations.  Then I get discouraged, then the resolutions fade and are forgotten, usually before it's time to even turn the page on the calendar in the kitchen.

The beginning of the new year does encourage me to examine my life, my business and the life of my family and recognize areas that I would like to/need to change.  Here are a few things that I will be working on this year (some with the help and involvement of HandyMan) as a blogger, a business owner, a wife & mom and just for me.  What are you working on this year?

ThrivingMama

1.  Work on changing out our chemically based cleaners for more natural alternatives.  I'm currently working on make your own dishwasher soap :)

2.  Work to keep the grocery bill under budget through Monthly Menus and batch cooking.

3.  Continue to find ways to make favorite recipes healthier for us by hiding vegetables and whole grains.

Business Goals:

1. Craft Fairs: I have five craft fairs that I attended as a vendor in 2009.  I am hoping to add 3 more to my 2010 schedule including the Owego Strawberry Festival, and two others.  I'm currently researching for fairs in the Cortland and Delhi NY areas -if anyone knows of anything, please let me know!

2.  WebSite: I was a slacker on my website last year-and I've only linked it so that you can skim it over and truly appreciate the make-over that is coming.  It is my goal to update the site monthly and to have the make-over done by January 25th.  Stay tuned for more info on that!

Family Goals

1. Friday Night Family Nights - I had begun to notice that when we were all home, life was a game of shuffle GBaby back and forth so we could each get stuff done, and very little time away from the meal table was being spent together-all three of us.  So, we are instituting Friday Family nights.  This will mean that we cook dinner together, do bath and play time together with GBaby and once she goes to bed, HandyMan and I will have our own time together to watch a movie, talk about the week, etc.

2.  Work Down Debt-We are on track to pay off HandyMan's student loans this year. The next stop is our mortgage.  We really don't have any idea how much we'll be able to put towards the mortgage principle, but plan to put the excess from our frugal lifestyle towards paying off our home.  When I did the numbers and realized that by paying an additional $50 a month to our mortgage, we'd save $2,075 in interest over the life of the loan, it put the return on investment in black and white.

Personal Goals

1.  RAFT the Inbox - HandyMan has this knack for keeping his e-mail inbox empty.  I've always been amazed and just this last week he spilled the secret.  With every message that comes in you do one of four things as soon as you open it: Reply-Act-File-Trash, RAFT.  I'm a bit hesitant to admit that when I started RAFTing my inbox there were over 650 messages, some read, some not.  It is my goal to have my inbox cleaned out before we leave for vacation in February.  With a bit of work, I've managed to get it down to 550 messages already ;)

2.  Begin exercising again, for real.  The last year since GBaby entered my world, I've called her my workout routine, and she does require me to be on the go a lot.  But now she's heading for walking which means those upper body mommy muscles won't be used quite as much, and I'd kind of like to keep them in shape.  So, I plan to start exercising again and HandyMan has agreed to continue the "AM Shift" before he has to go to work so that I can do this.

Eat From the Pantry Challenge

In my area of rural living, I love online community.  Often I stumble up on great online 'activities' that throw me in the same cyberspace as a ton of other folks all taking on the same challenge or goals.  In my skimming of blogs today, one such event:  the Eat From the Pantry Challenge.  The goals of this challenge are to plan meals for the month of January based on what is already in the pantry and freezer, to limit the number of trips to the store and to only buy fresh items like dairy and produce. It also allows you the freedom to make up your own rules so that the challenge works best for your family.

I've already done my grocery list and menu for January and had taken into consideration much of the contents of my freezer and pantry, so I'm jumping on board with this challenge.  Here are the goals I've personalized for us:

1.  Shave $50 (1/4) off our January grocery bill.

2.  Only 3 "odds & ends" stops after the Big Grocery Run at the beginning of the month.

3.  Maintain one Batch Cooking project a week.

4.  Extra money in the grocery budget at the end of the month gets split 50/50 between our local Food Pantry and the Summer Produce Fund.

I'll be linking up my progress here as the month goes on.  Looking to empty your pantry and freezer or get your grocery budget under control this year,  consider a monthly menu or  joining this challenge and see how much a little time and planning can save your pocketbooks.

Monthly Menu - Success!

In the beginning of December, I challenged myself to set a monthly menu and stick to it as a method to keeping the grocery bill under budget.  I'm happy to say that I was able to keep on menu and managed to come in slightly under budget for the month.  Given the extra baking and holiday feasting, I think that this is a pretty notable accomplishment!  If you're wanting to get your grocery bill slimmed down this new year, consider menu planning and batch cooking - with a little energy up front you can save yourself some time and money in the end.

So, since it worked in December, why not try again in January?  I sat down and sketched out a menu for the month, and made the grocery lists.  I've found that one of the biggest time-savers of this method is the shopping - I can plan out the month, buy all the major stuff at the beginning of the month and then it's just the perishables and a few random things here and there for the rest of the month.  So much less time spent making list and shopping!  I also went a step farther and planned out my carry-over ingredients (like browned hamburger) to save time assembling meals.

So, here's what's cookin' in January:

-Breakfast Breads (time to restock the freezer!)

-Caldo de Res (Mexican beef soup)

-Burritos

-Spanish Rice Cassarole

-Ham & Cheese Souffles

-Eggs Benedict

-Marinara/Pasta

-Lasagna

And mixed in from the freezer: Shepherd's Pie, Turkey Barley Soup, Hot Beef Sandwiches, Green Potato Soup and Stuffed Peppers

December Menu Challenge

I'm a pretty organized person, but I see friends posting month long menus and start making excuses as to why that won't work for us:  "Our schedule is too hectic and changes too much."  "Well, I'll just use my meals out of the freezer",  "I'm staying on budget: and just plain "why bother".

I'm beginning to see a lack of discipline in my life and realized that meal planning is one more of my areas of responsibilities where I'm lacking discipline.  Now I'm not just feeding HandyMan and myself but also GBaby.  Good nutrition is important and when I'm making meals on a whim, we're not always getting all our food groups.

Last week my friend Sarah at Simple Pleasures blogged about how she went about making up her monthly menu.  She and her husband are grad students with classes and jobs.  Surely they have a pretty nutty schedule, right?  She can do this, I can at least give it an honest try. (Thanks for the kick in the right direction Sarah!)

I sat down with a calendar for December and our calendar as well as my list of meals in the freezer and a mental list of what's in the pantry.  My main goal is to cut down the grocery bill and use what we have.  Given our schedule, I usually cook on Monday, Wednesday and Friday evenings and the somewhere in the week we run out of leftovers and I pull in another meal.  So I filled in those days and then made a separate list of 6 ready to go meals to pull from.  I also added a list of breakfast items that are stock in the fridge and freezer so I have a ready-list for breakfast too.

We'll see how it works out.  Any veteran menu planners out there have any tips for me?

How to Plan Meals on a Budget

Planning meals to keep your grocery line on budget can be quite the challenge, but there are a few basic principles that can help you succeed.  Here are a few ideas that include shopping sales, skipping convenience foods and batch cooking.

It is easy to dream of meal plans and saving money on the food that gets put on our dinner table but realistically, it takes discipline and a bit of work on the front end.  With the dicipline and work, in the long run, you will save money and your family will eat healthier food. Read more.

Freezer Friday: Pepper Bombs

In the summer I'm able to get green peppers for about $0.35 each.  Since this is pennies next to what we would have to spend in the winter for fresh peppers, I like to stock up and stash them in the freezer.  My process for freezing peppers is used with the intent of cooking with these peppers later.  They'll end up in spaghetti sauce, soups, chili, casseroles - you name it.

Simply wash your peppers.

Cut the seeds and core out of the pepper.  Then chop or slice the peppers as you want them for your future cooking.  (HandyMan is chopping SO fast...ok, fine -it's just a blurry picture)



I put one pepper worth of chopped pieces in the center of a piece of plastic wrap and

then close the plastic wrap up around the pepper pieces.  Voila!   Pepper bomb.



Put multiple pepper packets in a large freezer zip-top bag and you're ready to go.  When your winter recipes call for one chopped green pepper and dollar signs register in your head, remember your freezer stash and enjoy!

For more information on freezing green peppers, click here.  Did you get anything stashed in your freezer this week?

Family Cooking On A Budget: Tips & Tricks

Cooking healthy foods for your families does not have to strap you for cash, but it often does require a bit more planning. First, in order to shop on a budget, one must set a budget. Once you've established what your allowance is for groceries, the key is to know what you're shopping for and when you need to buy it. With plans in place to answer these two questions, you can regularly keep your grocery budget under control.

There are two basic thoughts of creating a shopping list.  There are those who shop to fill the fridge and cupboard with no regard for what they plan on cooking and those who shop for what they plan on cooking in the coming week(s).  It is the second shopper who will spend less.  If you create your shopping list based on a general menu, then you will have all that you need to create a set schema of meals.  Flexibility is also important, especially for the proteins that fill your meals.  Often meats hog up the largest portion of the grocery bill.  If you get to the store planning on purchasing beef but find that chicken is on sale for half the price, purchase the chicken and adjust the protein in your menu.  So make your list and stick to it – unless you can save some money substituting for on items that are already on your list.

The second way to save money on your groceries is to shop less often.  What?  That’s right, if you usually shop every week, try shopping for the majority of your items once every two weeks and on the off week only buy the perishables you need to restock.  The key to this is that you are limiting your exposure to impulse items that tend to sneak into the basket. (Yes, back to making the list and sticking to it.)

If the end of the budget period is approaching and your allowance is running low, look in the pantry, fridge and freezer and get creative with what you have on hand.  Often, with a little creativity there are dozens of meals just sitting in the kitchen, that don’t require minimal, if any, additional ingredients.  Those meals taste so much better because you know you’re upholding the integrity of your budget.

Lastly, never never never go to the grocery store hungry!  If you must go into the store to do a lot of shopping and you are hungry, it’s often worth purchasing a piece of fruit as a snack before you start shopping.  You end up with a healthy snack and your brain can better make the decisions as to what goes into the shopping cart, not your stomach.

Click here to see this artical in its published form at Helium.com.