The Grocery List

Not my grocery list although....

I was talking to one of wine sales reps today, he's a fairly young guy with a wife and new beautiful baby girl.  Somehow we got on the topic of grocery shopping and he mentioned that since he's in the stores all the time he just picks up what they need and feel like for the day.  The other lady working with me changing out the wine programs (taking down what was on sale, finding homes for it, putting out the new sale wines and carefully going through the million sale signs) and I immediately broke into rashes.  It's not that we don't like to go to the grocery store (well at least I don't mind, I will not speak for her) its just that you spend so much more money shopping that way!

Now don't get me wrong, in my previous life I cannot even imagine how much I spent at the grocery store on food that probably got thrown out later.  I guess there are two wastes of money there, firstly the obscene amount of money I spent on food and secondly how much got thrown out.

I know that food shopping is not the same around the world and think I am fortunate to live in a place that has so much but along with that goes so much waste.  I often wonder what it is like to shop for food around the world.  Are there really all those markets they show on the travel shows?  Do people shop for the day or do they stockpile like we (or I) do here?

I think I have mentioned before that there is a note pad on the fridge here and we write down what is running low or what we need.  On my shopping day I take the list down and organize the things by store adding the things that we will need during the next couple of weeks before I go again.  We both try to not make any trips in between but sometimes you just have to for milk and stuff like that.  This week is my shopping week and to be honest there is still plenty to eat even though we are running low on sugar (I have some coffee with my sugar in the mornings) and we are out of ice cream. 

How do you do your food shopping?  There are folks from all over the world that read this blog and I would love to learn some of your tricks and the differnces so please share!

My Food Budget

Today is my day off from work and payday so that means one thing...food shopping.  Now I work retail and absolutely hate shopping with a passion.  I suspect it has to do with so many hours spent in a store.  Even when I do go shopping, people come up to me and ask me for assistance.  I guess I just look comfortable in my surroundings.  Usually I will take them to what ever they are looking for, customer service is what it is all about after all.  The one type of shopping I don't mind (other than going to Costco to try out all the samples) is grocery shopping.  There is some genetic defect in me that requires that there is always plenty of food in the house (hence the absolutely stuffed freezer and the flying duck).  Grocery shopping is a challenge to me, I need to get the most healthy food I can for the least amount of money (ice cream exempted from this rule).  The same applies to those other things that need to be bought like laundry detergent, paper towels, shampoo...you get the picture.  I have my usual round of stores that I frequent and the normal things I always must have in the house. 

I had stopped couponing for a while but then Ash commented about how bad she was at using coupons and it got me to thinking...even though I don't buy processed foods (other than condiments) there were still coupons out there for me so I started clipping coupons again last week.  Harris Teeter is having super double coupons this week and I was able to save $6.60 with just 4 coupons.  Everything I bought with the coupons was still less expensive than the store brand so I truly felt good about this.  Thanks Ash for the gentle reminder.

So, back to the budget.  I am only feeding the two of us and the budget does not include Bear's dog food.  We rarely eat out and we bring lunch.  Processed foods are fairly minimal.  I try to spend between $150 to $200 a month on food and essentials for the house.  When I look at those numbers they look fairly large but than I think about how much I used to spend in my previous life.  I also keep J's dollar a day budget in mind.

Today I spent...
$20.17 at Piggly Wiggly for fresh veggies and one really cheap bottle of wine
$63.55 at Harris Teeter for an amazing amount of stuff including a pound of both Wild Caught Argentinian     Pink Shrimp and Sashimi grade tuna
And
$12.13 at Doschers for chicken breasts and 2 rib eye steaks

This is more than enough food and snacks to last us the next two weeks.

I met the nicest lady while waiting in line at the deli counter at Harris Teeter.  We were talking about cooking and I gave her the blog info.  She has promised to look me up here and post a wonderful recipe she told me about for Talapia.  We are both not very patiently waiting for it to go back on sale. 

Each day I am amazed by all of you that read this blog.  Here I sit in Charleston, cooking and trying to save money and there you all are.  How many of you find me just boggles my mind.  Since I am new at this I am addicted to checking my blog stats. For those that don't blog, that's the information that tells me where in the world you are, what you looked at and sort of how you found me.  You are from here in the US, Canada, Guatemala (that's the daughter), The UK, Germany, Australia, Poland and today a new addition, Italy.  Some of you I know, most of you I don't.  The Internet is an amazing thing, bringing people together from all across the world.  I hope you are cooking and saving along with me!  Thank You!

 

Ice Cream Excitement!

This is my grocery shopping week.  On the refridgerator there is a note pad that we jot down things I need to pick up on the next round.   They are either things about to run out or things that are completely gone.  Right now on the list are pancake syrup and Ivory Soap.  The syrup is gone, the soap is dangerously close.  This certainly makes the list writing easier but best of all it helps avoid a conspiracy.  You see when the girls were much younger we ran out of ketchup.  Now for a lot of people that would not be a problem but, the ketchup did not make the list and we didn't buy any that grocery shopping round.  Dinner came along and we were having something that ketchup would go with, alas there was no ketchup.  Drama insued, E was not happy and asked in a very serious voice "Is this a ketchup consipiracy?".  I don't think I will ever forget her asking that question and even today when we run out of something it pops in my mind.  I have tried to explain it to my husband (he was not even a blip on my radar at that time in my life) but I think it is one of those you have to be there moments!

So back to grocery shopping preperation!  Tomorrow morning I will take the ads that come in the paper and start strategizing.  I shop at usually 3 grocery stores and a wonderful small place called The Vegetable Bin.  We are blessed to live in a place that gives you many "fooding"options.  I know not all are as fortunate as we are and many have to drive a long distance to even get a gallon of milk. 

To be honest, I pretty much buy the same things week in and week out so that part of the list is easy.  Chicken, eggs and milk are always on the list and whom ever has the best deal on them gets my hard earned dollar.  Sometimes I will not buy something if it is more than I planned on paying for it,  unless it is a necessity. Where the list gets exciting is the deals the stores have. Many stores have the buy one get one free deals.  I refuse to shop at a store that makes me buy two of something, I just can't do it if it is something I don't need two of.  We have very limited storage space and do I really need two boxes of Ritz Crackers?   The planning gets exciting with the Harris Teeter ad, they offer buy two get three free deals.  At first I thought "what's the catch?", now I know there is none.  My first get 3 free special was bacon.  I think I paid $8 for 5 pounds of a snazzy brand name bacon.  Imagine the husbands surprise when he opened the freezer and found all that bacon.  He no longer asks why we have so much of something...he knows it was on some smoking deal!

I recently hired a wonderful young lady as a part time cashier who is a Customer Service Supervisor at my local Harris Teeter.  She is one of those people you interview and you think to yourself, what is she doing here and how quickly can I hire her?  So she now works for us a few days a week and is a joy to work with.  I saw her yesterday and she told me my all time favorite deal starts tomorrow, it is the buy 2 get 3 free HT Premium Ice Cream deal.  I know I said I have limited storage space but I can somehow make room in my overcrowded freezer for 5 containers of ice cream. We get enough of an assortment of flavors that the two of us are happy! You need to be careful here when you open the freezer door though as something could fall out and break your toe.  When Michael and I were first dating that almost happened to him when a frozen duck came careening out of the freezer and onto the floor next to his foot.  For some reason he has been very cautious since then.