We had a busy day doing house repairs, so not much time tonight for navel gazing.
Day 3
Breakfast – Me – coffee & left over mashed potatoes. M & L - PB&J. Mr. A ate the girls’ leftovers
Lunch – Me – Vegetable beef curry soup. L – Rejected soup in favor of crackers. M – school lunch. Mr. A – leftover pork & rice.
Dinner – Homemade pizza with onions & turkey pepperoni. (Don’t ask me how they make turkey pepperoni. I do not want to know.) Also, Mr. A ate more left over pork.
Snacks – Because we are rationing basic snacks (fruit, raisins, crackers), I made a 1/2 batch of oatmeal cookies with a very few raisins thrown in. Also, apples, banana and a few raisins. I drank a diet soda and a glass of wine too.
Day 4
Breakfast – Girls each ate steamed buns. Mr. A ate their leftovers. I drank coffee. I broke into my caffeinated stash because L had a rough night last night.
Lunch – Soup for all (from above) which neither girl particularly liked.
Dinner – M went out to dinner with my parents, the lucky duck. Hamburgers, spinach salad, homemade french fries. I didn’t eat my salad because I discovered a huge number of bug eggs under the salad dressing on one leaf and it almost made me throw up. (Actually, they are making me gag a little now just remembering it.) Mr. A admitted he didn’t wash the spinach. BLECH. Perfectly good spinach went into the trash. Or at least I think that is where it went, Mr. A may have eaten it. Food hygiene is not a big deal for him.
Snacks – (which took the place of lunch because the girls only picked at their lunches) Ants on a log which is what we call bananas w/ peanut butter, raisins and chocolate chips. Mr. A earned a dirty look for handing out the precious few chocolate chips at this early date. I am going to have another glass of wine tonight too.
I promise I will not be posting only about the food challenge for the next month, but for these first few days, please humor me.
Yesterday, I started reading Food Matters : A Guide to Conscious Eating. I put it on hold at the library a while ago, but it arrived very conveniently this week. It has given me a lot to think about.
In a comment on the previous post, my old friend Annie Mal said he thought we could save money if we spent less on meat. (Annie is a long-time vegan and he was about due for his annual commentary on our meat, milk and egg eating anyway.) In reality, though, one reason I ended up buying so much meat on that shopping trip (and I did buy a LOT) was because it was so relatively cheap. (We can talk about the farm subsidies & industrial farming that makes it so cheap -even though it isn’t particularly healthy- later.)
For example, I bought a 7lb chicken that was marked down to $6.00. It is a big chicken, so it will provide at least two meals. I bought two packages of hamburger for $1.99 a pound. I already cooked one pack and froze it to add small amounts to pasta sauce or veggie soup later. It will last a LONG time if we only use a handful here and there. The same goes for the lean ground pork, which was also $1.99 a pound. I add a small amount of that to my mapo tofu and homestyle tofu, not to mention when I make steamed buns, jiaozi or sticky rice. That gigantic pork loin (in the front of the grocery photo) cost only $16.00. I split it into 5 smaller pieces, each of which will provide dinner and lunch for the next day (effectively contributing to 10 meals if not more).
For the food challenge, I should also note, I am most concerned about running out of veggies and fruit (not meat). I have already started rationing them out so we will have some left at the end. We usually have 2 veggies or 1 veggie 1 fruit for each dinner, but right now we are down to only one plus a carb.
I am not trying to say we don’t eat a lot of meat. We eat more than we should, but (prior to the food challenge) we were eating vegetarian dinner probably 3 days a week. I was a vegetarian for 10 years, but the truth of the matter is I don’t really LIKE vegetables that much. Believe me, I have tried. When I was a vegetarian, I was actualy more of a carb-etarian, which is not particularly healthy either. With a small amount of meat, I find it much easier to eat the veggies and fruit on my plate. I am trying to not be defensive, though, we have room for improvement. (PLEASE don’t tell me to eat more beans either. I already eat as many beans as I can stand.)
The thing I really like about the Food Matters book, is that it talks about ways to cut back on meat consumption (for environmental AND health reasons) without feeling too preachy or judgmental (*ahem*) . The author, Mark Bittman, suggests a “vegan until 6:00″ approach, which is interesting and something I might consider.
The fact is, I really like how this project is already making us think more about the food we eat. Who knows what I will learn by the end?
Day 2
Breakfast: Oatmeal for the girls. Coffee and a steamed bun for me. I don’t know what Mr. A ate.
Snacks for the girls: Apple, dry cherrios, plain yogurt w/ a spoonful of jam mixed in
Lunch: M- PBJ, banana, milk. I think Mr. A ended up eating out with a coworker, but if not, he ate leftover noodles from the day before. L and I ate turkey sandwiches with leftover turkey from 2 weeks ago (it had been frozen) and the last grape tomatoes.
Dinner: Pork loin, broccoli, rice (M and Mr. A) or mashed potatoes (me and L)
A long time ago, I saw an Oprah episode that featured Maria Shriver. I don’t remember anything from that show except one brief anecdote: When Maria Shriver was young, her mother (Eunice Kennedy Shriver) would serve cereal for dinner once a week. Then, the family would use the money they would have spent on a regular meal as a donation help the hungry. During those meals, the family would discuss how much they have to be thankful for and how they could help the less fortunate.
While our family doesn’t live a particularly extravagant lifestyle, our girls will likely experience relatively privileged childhoods. I think this experiment will be a great opportunity to start teaching them about being thankful for what we have and remembering those who have less.
After some discussion (and a little arm-twisting), Mr. A and I have made a decision: We are going to save all the money we would normally have budgeted for groceries and donate it to the Mid Ohio Food Bank. I am really hopeful that we can stick this out for at least 3-4 weeks, so it should be be several hundred dollars*. It may also make the belt-tightening a bit easier if we are doing it for a good cause.
So anyway, are you curious to know what we ate today?
DAY ONE
Breakfast:
Mr. A ate cereal with milk. He made each girl one slice of toast and one egg. The girls only ate half of their eggs (!!). When I saw the waste of two precious eggs (now we are down to only 52 eggs!) on DAY ONE, I told Mr. A he is going to have to tighten things up and think ahead to 3 weeks from now when we are eggless. I drank my usual coffee with milk. In an effort to preserve coffee, I used only 1/2 the amount of grounds as usual. To really make the most out of that coffee, I kept the pot off the coffee maker until the coffee had steeped for quite a while. That way, it was just as strong as usual.
Snack: L demanded an apple for her snack. I tried to convince her to only eat a few slices, but she is two and really wanted the whole apple. I gave it to her, but not surprisingly she only ate a few bites. I saved it for later. In the afternoon, L ate dry rice crispies and Patti provided snacks at our after-school playdate.
Lunch: Mr. A took leftover noodles from two days ago. M bought her lunch at school. I made hotdog fried rice with a few frozen veggies for L and myself. I also ate L’s leftover old brown apple.
Dinner: I needed to use up some round steak that was in danger of going bad. I used two steaks to make Hungarian Goulash and dumplings. We also had leftover steamed carrots from last night and a small lettuce & spinach salad with some tomatoes that were leftover from last week. The girls and Mr. A also ate rice.
*A quick aside: I would be thrilled if our little project could grow to something bigger than just us. Maybe some readers would like to sponsor us for $0.25, $0.50 or even $1.00 a day and combine it with our donation or donate that money to your local food bank. (If we make it 30 days, $0.25 a day would only be $7.50!) Maybe you could skip just one meal a week and donate that food or the cost of that food. Little donations add up. At our local food bank $1.00 can provide TWO MEALS. If anyone is interested, I can try to figure out how to set something up to track it. No pressure, though!
Ok, this is more of an administrative post. I don’t really expect you to be fascinated by the food we have in our stockpile. But I am going to list it anyway.
The Stockpile: (Groceries we already had)
Fridge: 1/8 gallon milk, 1 big jar pickles, 1 jar salsa, 1/2 tub plain yogurt, 3 tubs curry paste, Hershey’s chocolate, Mangosteen juice, parmesan cheese, leftover noodles, 2 bunches of scallions, 1 daikon, 1 bag spinach, 1 box precooked bacon, green leaf lettuce, dry tofu, 1 mango, 4 round steaks, 1 pkg bologna, Chinese sausage, 6 eggs, 1 roll biscuits, 2 kinds pepperoni, 1pkg hotdogs, a few sticks of butter, peanut butter, yeast, 1/2 bottle wine, random condiments/salad dressings/syrup/spices in the door.
 
Freezer: Hotdogs, 1/2 bag frozen mango, 1/2 bag frozen pineapple, 1 post roast, 1 bag red bean baozi, 3 bags mixed veggies, 1 bag peas, 2 bags cheese,1/2 bag chicken breasts, tatertots,1 small pizza for M’s lunch, 1 small sticky rice thing,1 bag leftover turkey, 3/4 lb already cooked hamburger, bag chicken baozi, 2 pork baozi, banana leaves, one loaf of bread, 1 bag greenbeans, 2 packages of mystery meat (pork & beef maybe??) pork chops.
(I forgot to take a picture of the freezer, but it was about 1/2 full.
Cupboards: 3/4 lb coffee, 2 lbs rice, 3lb brown rice, 2lb fancy brown basmati rice, 5 small onions, 1 bag potatoes, about 20 cans of diet soda, flour, whole wheat flour, sugar, brown sugar, spices, jello, mango pudding mix, 5 cans tuna, 3 cans coconut milk, variety of chinese chili sauces/bean sauces, 1 can preserved vegetable, 2 cans beets, 1 can spinach, 1 large can sweet potatoes, Chicken broth (3 big cans, 3 boxes, 3 reg cans, 1 medium can), Beef broth (2 cans), Turkey broth (2 cans), Tomatoes (2 big cans diced, one big whole, one big can crushed), one small tomato paste, 1 jar salsa, 1 jar pickle chips, 1 can tomato soup, 1 big bottle oyster sauce, 1 can chefboyardee ravioli, 1 small jar red cabbage, 2 cans navy beans, 1 can pinto beans, 1 big pork and beans, 1 box lasagna noodles, 2 pkg rice noodles, 1 pkg ramen noodles, 2 boxes spaghetti, 2 servings Annies mac n cheese, big box chinese noodles, 2 ready made indian packets, 6 jars homemade jam, 1 bag big tapioca balls, lemonade mix, 1 box tuna helper, 1 6pk apple sauce, big can raisins, 3 half filled boxes of cereal, oatmeal, hot chocolate mix, powdered soy drink mix, croutons, various small amounts of snacks (crackers, prunes, etc.), baking supplies (baking powder/soda, salt etc.).
 
 (Sadly empty snack cupboard)
Looking at that list, I can’t believe I really felt like our cupboards were bare. When I made dinner before going to the grocery store, I felt like I was totally scraping the bottom of the barrel. Now that it is all listed, I can see probably 10 decent meals there.
The New Groceries:
Chinese grocery (not pictured because I already put them away, can be seen: 20 lb rice, 4 pkg tofu, 3 lb lean ground pork, 2 bunch scallions.
Regular grocery: 2 gallons milk, 1 lg jar applesauce, 2 jars spaghetti sauce, 1 2ltr Diet Mt. Dew (for Mr. A to take to work), 1 lg can kidney beans, 4 lbs frozen peas, 2 lbs frozen mixed veggies, 7 lbs carrots, 4 dozen eggs, 1 lg oatmeal, 2 bx tuna helper (generic), 1 bx rotini, 1 jar peanut butter, 1 bg goldfish crackers, 5 lb flour, big box cheerios, 1 bg shredded cheese, 1 lg bag macaroni noodles, corn starch, 1 lg chicken, sm pkg skillet steak, 2 large pkg hamburger, 1 enormous pork roast, 1 pkg pudding snacks, saltine crackers, graham crackers, 2 bg spinach, 1 head cabbage, 10 lb apples, 2 lb wt onions, 5 lb potatoes, 4 heads broccoli.
I am a girl who likes a challenge. I like goals. I like creating arbitrary rules for myself and seeing if I can accomplish something. I also really like reading all those “My Life as an Experiment” type books.
Now that I have had three different 2-month shopping hiatuses (?), it doesn’t feel like much of a challenge any more. I need something new. With a little effort, I have convinced Mr. A to go along with me on a project I am going to call the Food Challenge (du duh duh DOM!!!).
The Goal: See how many days we can last with just one weeks’ grocery budget and the food in the fridge/cupboards.
A couple of different threads came together which led to this idea. Last weekend, I read an article about families cutting back on their grocery budgets due to the recession. That article made me think about Peter Menzel’s Hungry Planet (If you haven’t looked at those photos, you should because they are really cool). And then, I read something about the One Dollar Diet project.
I started thinking about all the food we stockpile and never eat. And all the food we throw away because it goes bad before we can eat it. It is shameful, really, when so many people are hungry.
I decided that we are going to challenge ourselves to really make the most of the food we have available. I want to see just how long we can stretch one week’s grocery budget AND the food we already have in our house. That is what we will learn in the Food Challenge.
The Rules:
- The budget: Our usual weekly grocery budget is about $100-$130 dollars (usually $100 at the regular grocery and an average of about $30 every other week at the Chinese grocery or Trader Joe’s). For the Food Challenge, I could spend $130.
- The restrictions: After I spent my $130, the food that is currently in the house is all we can use to cook or eat family meals until we completely run out of usable food or someone has a complete breakdown. Whichever comes first.
- No Meal Planning or Pre-Shopping Research: To keep this project a little more authentic, I decided not to look in my cupboards or plan meals before I went to the store. I just shopped like I usually do, trying to remember what we had available at home. When I got home, I discovered that I purchased duplicates of some things I already had and I also found I had less of some things I thought I had. These normal occurrences for when grocery shopping. I also did not allow myself to read through the $1 diet blog/food cost breakdown or any other stories/blogs about saving money on groceries. I just went with my gut intincts.
- The exceptions (of course there are a few exceptions):
1.) Each Monday, I will buy two gallons of milk. The milk will be mostly for the girls. They love milk and they didn’t volunteer for this project. I will be restricting their snacks to the supplies on hand, but restricting milk seemed to be taking things too far for kids who are only 2 and 6.
2.) We can (sort of) continue our regular eating-out budgets. M gets 1-2 school lunches a week (plus milk when she packs). Mr. A can have his usual $10 a week for lunches at work. L and I usually share $10 for one lunch out during the week, so that can stay too. I haven’t decided if we can also continue to use our usual $50 a week family restaurant budget for the weekends. It would be a cooler experiment if we didn’t eat out at all, but I suspect this might drive us to quit a lot sooner. We really like to eat out. I will debate this issue with Mr. A tomorrow.
3.) There will be a one day moratorium on the Food Challenge for L’s small family birthday party in early April. We can buy ingredients for her cake and snacks for our guests.
So that is it. It is a simple enough concept, but I suspect it is going to be really hard to stick to it after the first week or two. I am very excited to see just how long we can go.
Coming up Tomorrow (Wednesday): The Stockpile and the Groceries that will be available to us for the duration of the project. Also, Day 1 of the challenge.
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