Sales of the last week of May through the first week of June didn’t have any produce on sale I need. So I didn’t purchase any vegetables.

By the end of May, I have $40 left in fruit budget and food has $1 left. I moved the remaining funds to the saved enveloped for each category. In May, we spent a total of $202.64 for groceries all combined. It is below our budget of $375 a month. However, in April we spent $587.85 in groceries including $200 for ground beef. Because meat didn’t have that much to pay the beef, we took it out of our saving. Now we didn’t take $95 out for meat in May and June.  We also added $10 from money saved in April from meat budget. That is a total of $200 and we moved that back to our saving. This month, we took $80 out, for fruit in June and $200 for food. My grocery list for June included 2-25lbs rice from Sam’s clubs. I have 2 bags on hand and another one 1/3 used.

From Walmart, my list included 1-101 FL Oz. extra virgin olive oil, 4 unbleached flour, 2 corn meal, 6 roasted peanut, and 6 sweet and sour. I reserved $30 for milk, bread, and French steak roll we usually purchase on sale for sandwich dinners. On Sunday June 2, 2019, we went to Walmart and purchased everything on the list. We only found two flour and might purchase two more later. While at Walmart, I checked the bread sales rack and couldn’t find any French steak roll on sale. On our way there, I saw taco shell on an aisle. So I directed my husband to that aisle thinking of substituting that to roll in the dish I would cook. The taco shell was not planned. The boxes has coupons “buy two at $1.74 each and save $1”. That is 2 boxes for $2.50. I thought having these on hand would help me get dinner on the table soon on night I don’t feel like cooking some part of the meal from scratch. I checked the ingredients and was surprised to see only 3 items. The regular four or corn tortilla has too much of ingredients I prefer to make them myself. However, flour tortilla takes a lot of my time.  As I moved down the aisle to track a corn tortilla back to check out the ingredients, I spotted tostada. I checked the ingredient and they were 3 ingredients as well. It is cheaper than the taco shell.  I purchased 2 bags of those and 6 boxes of taco shell.

 

At Aldi, we purchased 2 gallons of milk and 2 bags of sliced bread. I looked for tostadas and taco shell to compare price and ingredients. We only saw tostadas for $1.44. The difference in ingredient is that Aldi one used canola oil while Walmart one used cottonseed oil. We purchased one. At home I added both taco shell and tostadas to my grocery list spreadsheet. We saw strawberries on sale for $0.99/lb. at Aldi. I reminded my husband that was a good price to purchase enough for me to make pie for the family. At a “pick your own farm” we purchased it for $2.50/lb. two years ago. My husband purchased 20 bags of strawberries for $19.80. We also purchased 2 boxes of heavy cream not knowing how much I would need for pie. I have cream cheese in the freezer and didn’t need to purchase for the pie.

 

At Fresh Thyme store, my husband purchased some fruit on sale in the ad including: 28.29 lbs. of gala apples at $0.88/lb., 5.24 lbs. of Bartlett pears at $ 0.88/lb., 4-6oz of blackberry at $0.59 each, 2- 2lb. clementine at $1.99 each, and 5.49 lb. peaches at $0.88/lb. He spent $35.85 at that grocery store and saved $41.77 from the original prices.

For the first week of June we spent a$78.13 in food budget and $55.65 in fruit budget.

As you can see, my grocery list was to replace items I have low supply of in my pantry. For instance, we purchased 101 FL oz. of extra virgin olive oil in May and ran out of it by the end of May. So we purchased it again. In May I made herbs oil with herbs from my garden and I used quite a bite of oil for that. Also on the list were unbleached flour and corn meal. I like to have 8-5lbs. bag of unbleached flour in my pantry. Every month I purchase enough to have 8 bags on hand at the start of the month. I have 2 unopened bags in the pantry and put 4 bags in the list. But we only found 2 to purchase. I added 4 bags to the list instead of 6 because I have a targeted amount to cost this month in food and adjust the list accordingly. I used flour to make sourdough pizza, eggroll, quesadilla, flour tortilla, sourdough bread, corn bread, biscuit, and cookies. I use cornmeal for porridge and cornbread. I have half bag of cornmeal in the pantry. I cook from my pantry and freezer and shop at the end of the month to replenish my stock in case I low in supplies. However, every week I shop vegetables on sales, prep them and stock up my freezer as vegetables go on sale often in summer. I not only shop vegetables on sales, but I grow some at home as well to be able to save enough to purchase other staples.

 

Fresh Berry Pie

Berry and Cream Pie

After we can back from shopping, I cooked lunch (plain rice with baked meat balls). I made two type of pies: fresh berry pie, and strawberry cream pie. I used 8 lbs. of strawberries, 6oz of blackberries for the pies, and 4 lbs. of strawberries were set for snack to go along with our dinner of sourdough pizza extra cheese in the evening. We used the leftover pie filling (cream cheese and whipped cream) as dip. We have leftover strawberries which I took to work on Monday. On Monday early morning, I rinsed 4 lbs. of strawberries of 6 oz. of blackberry and put in the fridge for the kids’ snack during the day.

School is over and I like to have fruit on hand for their snacks throughout the day. As you can see, out of 20-16 oz. strawberry and 4-6oz of blackberry, we only have 4-16 oz. of strawberry and 1-6oz of blackberry left in the fridge. Strawberry goes moldy quickly therefore, we will eat them before eating other fruit. My alpine strawberry plants started to produce and the kids snack on them in the garden. I have ever bearer and June bearer strawberry plants in full bloom and that would be a good snack options for the kids throughout summer but probably not enough to make fresh berry pie. I made raspberry pie and rhubarb pie last week using frozen raspberries and rhubarb from my freezer in an attempt to free more space for this year’s garden vegetables. The rhubarb was from last year harvest. I planned to use it for rhubarb sauce for pork chop over the winter but didn’t use it.  I made big batches of pies that lasted the whole week.

On Monday, I made egg and wild green salad with the following ingredients including some of the items purchased the day prior and some from the garden: sorrel, dandelion leaves, creeping Charlie leaves, Egyptian onion, wild thyme, apple, pear, and hard boiled eggs. For the dressing I used extra virgin olive oil, raw apple cider with the mother, sugar, salt, and chopped wild thyme. I served tostadas along. We only used one bag of tostadas. I put the remaining salad in three small bowls for our kids’ lunch the next day. I put some tostadas from a second bag in a zip bag for them as well. I served Fresh berry pie as dessert after we ate salad. One of my daughters after her dessert, asked for fresh strawberries and the leftover pie filling as dip. She ate those while reading her book.

As you can see, having a low budget doesn’t necessary mean you cannot feed your family quality food. It just takes some planning.