On Saturdays, I share my menu plan for the upcoming week along with a photo of my groceries and a tally of my spending. My goal is to spend $100/week for our food, toiletries, and cleaning products. I’m currently in the midst of trying to buy more local, sustainably-produced food while sticking to my budget. Can it be done? I don’t know, but I’m going to try, and I’ll share what I learn as I go along.
Zee Food
I am really rockin’ this skip-the-grocery-shopping thing lately.
I bought quite a few groceries last week when we took Mr. FG with us, and I just have not ended up needing to make another trip to the store yet.
I did, however, place an order with Quail Cove, the place where we buy our grain. I got 50 pounds of organic hard red wheat to grind into flour and 1.25 pounds of raw honey for a little over $50.
I also bought a dozen eggs from my local blog reader for $3.
So, my total expenses for this week are $53.
My fridge is getting to be pretty empty (delightfully so from a food waste perspective!), so I’ll have to drag myself to the store soon.
Zee Plan
Since Mr. FG works second shift, we eat our dinner meal at noon during the week, and at night on the weekends. And our lunch meal happens at night during the week and at noon on the weekends.
We do eat breakfast in the morning, though, all week long!
Breakfast options are homemade yogurt, granola, scrambled eggs, oatmeal, fruit, and cereal.
Lunches will be comprised of sandwiches made with whole wheat bread, homemade yogurt, yogurt smoothies, cottage cheese, fruit, raw veggies, nuts, cheese, and leftovers as necessary.
Here’s the dinner meal plan:
Saturday
- Takeout date night for Mr. FG and me, something easy for the kids
Sunday
- French Toast
- Orange Julius
- local sausage
Monday
- Grilled Chicken Sandwiches
- potato cubes
- orange slices
- steamed broccoli
Tuesday
- Fajitas, made with local beef and chicken, plus onions and red peppers
- chips and salsa
- fruit salad
Wednesday
Thursday
- Shrimp Viennese
- French Bread
- green salad
Friday
- Pizza. I think there’s been a request for the deep dish variety. This works out nicely because I hate the pictures on that post (the sun went down!) and I’ll make sure to take some better photos this time.
By the way, I have a goal update post that I want to share, so I’m going to just publish that tomorrow.
Samantha
Monday 12th of March 2012
I am going to try your Orange Julius recipe, but add a handful of baby spinach. I thought my kids might like a green drink with St. Patrick's day coming up. Thank you for your menu plan. You have inspired me to do the same and because of you I feel a lot better during the week when it's time to make dinner. Take care.
Heather :) :) :)
Saturday 10th of March 2012
The local sausage sounds really good. I like to buy these organic sausages from my local store...Love and hugs from the ocean shores of California, Heather :)
Susanna
Saturday 10th of March 2012
do your kids always like what you fix? I'm curious because as a kid I'd never have touched that shrimp dish(my dad either LOL!) and I remember a few meals the rest of the family liked (or enough that it was fixed) and I really didn't like. We generally weren't allowed to fix a sandwich or anything - pretty much ate it or ate the parts we liked. I don't recall starving but variety wasn't a big thing with us - I think my dad took the same sandwich to work for over 40 years. The past 10 - 15 yrs I finally joined my mom with beans and veggies (My dad would hardly touch anything but the occasional pinto bean until the day he died and a few green beans made it to his mouth) I dont' have kids but my friend keeps offering stuff to her 4 yr old hoping he'll eventually like stuff - surprisingly both of them hate guacamole and her hubby hates sour cream but little dude likes both and is almost always willing to try a bit of something when they eat out. so do you try to stick with tried and true favorites or if the kids (or hubby!) aren't crazy about a meal what do you do?
Kristen
Saturday 10th of March 2012
Not always...but like your childhood home, we have an "eat it or leave it" policy around here. And though the kids have all gone through a phase around ages 3-5 where they left dinner sometimes, they've pretty much all grown out of it. I can't remember the last time where the older three left a meal on their plates, although Zoe occasionally chooses to do that still.
I'm a HUGE fan of the eat it or leave it policy...it's gotten even my pickiest eater (Joshua) to eat a variety of foods.
Kellie
Saturday 10th of March 2012
Ha, weird. I wrote my menu yesterday and it's very similar. Swap out Thursday for cajun alfredo fish and you have my menu ;)
Kristen
Saturday 10th of March 2012
Great minds think alike. ;)
SandyH
Saturday 10th of March 2012
Oh I really enjoyed this post, your food photography is really good....this is one of my goals, to take decent food pictures. I'm not even a blogger but I cater occasionally and would love to master this. I need a better camera to start with!!
Kristen
Saturday 10th of March 2012
Thank you! Next to people, food is my favorite thing to photograph.