As promised, I will be posting pictures of the Hoosier family grocery trips throughout 2010. It’s hard to describe how we buy in bulk and use the stock up principle when purchasing groceries. So rather than try to describe it, I will show you over the next year what our grocery shopping trips include. By the end of a year it should be much more obvious how we really eat.
At the beginning of January, we have lots of pastas and sauces in the pantry. We also have cooking oils, rice, flour, and sugars well stocked. In the freezer there is a lot of meat, a few gallons of milk, lots of veggies, and two kinds of cheese. Based on what we had and what we were running low on, here’s the picture of my January shopping trip:
All of these groceries cost approximately $190. As you can see, we stocked up on several items (possibly for the whole year!) and purchased quite a bit of produce. Produce usually makes up 25% of the money spent each month – we love our fresh produce! We will eat the grapes and salads first, then the apples and carrots, and as the month draws to a close we will pull from our storage of canned and frozen produce.
I have a random question pertaining to food. If I remember right, lunch meat contains MSG. Do you totally stay away from lunch meat, or are there brands that do not contain MSG? What about lunch meat purchased freshly cut from the deli counter? I assume those still contain MSG also… Just curious what you know about it! Thanks!
I do not know much about lunch meat. I do know that many pre-packaged meats do include MSG. I can eat a little bit of MSG and be okay, it’s when I eat it in a few meals that it really starts to bother me. Thus, I eat very few lunch meat sandwiches now. I have been taking the journey to MSG living quite slow as it’s overwhelming to go cold turkey – thus, I have simply reduced how much lunch meat I eat instead of finding an alternative. Finding MSG free lunch meat is approaching the top of my list of ways to change and adapt our food purchases. If I find some that I can recommend I will be sure to post it!
I just found your blog via Kitchen Stewardship, and am exploring! Hope you don’t mind a question on an old post… Am I understanding correctly that you freeze milk? That would be so handy..
I’m glad that you found me!
Yes, we do freeze our milk. A few days before we need a new gallon, we pull it from the freezer and put it in the fridge to thaw. We have never had a problem with this system; it works great!!
How long will it keep in the fridge after thawing (provided it’s not drunk of course)? Freezing could be a solution to our inconsistent milk usage – either we run out, or I’m tossing it out…
It has about the same lifetime in the fridge as it would have before being frozen. We usually try to use it all or drink it all with in 7-9 days.
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