January Pantry Challenge

I said at the beginning of the month that I was going to attempt to use food from my pantry and freezer with very little grocery shopping.  I did okay, but kind of failed.  I've had 2 produce deliveries this month, which are $35 each, and we've bought groceries a few times - but it was mostly all produce/stock up stuff that I actually needed or wouldn't find a better deal later on.

Our first shopping trip was to Whole Foods because Lo wanted Hopslam and they usually have it.  I wanted to pick up some extra produce because I was going to do some juicing.  Plus I had some coupons for things that we would normally buy, so it only made sense to get them now. The total was $82.98, but $23 of that was beer that he picked out.  I also bought 3 loaves of Rudi's Gluten-Free Bread that were on sale for $4.39 to keep in the freezer for when I really need/want bread.  Other than a bunch of produce, I got tea, bulk brown rice, bulk cumin and thyme, lentils, larabars, and San J Thai Peanut Sauce.  Everything other than the produce, beer, and bulk items had coupons.

Over the weekend I sent Lo to Giant Eagle because we were out of eggs.  I checked the weekly ads and also had him buy clementines that were on sale for $3.99 for 5 lbs (he actually bought the 3 lb. bag for $3.99, but oh well), shredded cheese 4/$10, Giant Eagle freezer bags 2/$5, and boneless skinless chicken breast $1.99/lb (about 3 lbs) - it was probably about $26. 

On Monday before volleyball, I stopped at Kroger to get some sale items.  I bought secret turkey pepperoni (I have to hide it from him) ($2.99), shredded cheese ($2), cottage cheese x3 ($1.25 ea.),12 oz. organic salad mix (reduced to $1.79), pineapple x2 ($1 each), grapes ($1.66), orange pepper ($1.67), and red pepper ($1.61), for a total of $17.47

On Tuesday after hot yoga, I went to Trader Joes because we needed more eggs/egg whites.  I bought 1/2 gal of milk ($1.99), smoky peach salsa ($2.29), marinara ($1.79), pizza sauce ($1.99), tomato paste (.89), egg whites liquid x2 ($1.99), eggs ($1.69), shaved parmesan romano blend ($2.49), crumbled gorgonzola ($3.29), greek yogurt ($2.99), and bananas ($1.52), for a total of $24.91.

So in the end, I still spent about $130 at the grocery store, plus $70 in produce delivery, but we replenished our veggie/fruit/dairy/gf bread stock, so I really should need to do very little shopping in February other than some produce.  The only problem is that I looked ahead at the Giant Eagle ad for next week and they have lots of stuff on sale at lower prices than I can usually get them, so I will probably plan to go next week.  I added up the list that I made for that ad, and it's about $130 on it's own!  I need to go back through and cut down what I plan to get.  I also plan to put my produce deliveries on hold and instead buy the items that I would have ordered at the grocery store and see how the costs compare.