Food for thought

So this past weekend was the culmination (big word huh!) of our first monthly eating plan. I had to come up with this plan because we were quickly falling into the rut of not planning out our meals and struggling daily to come up with something to eat. And then we did figure out what we wanted, half the time we didn't have all the ingredients. We were making trips to the store every other day which you know gets expensive. You go in for 2 items and come out with 12 which was quickly adding up and we were spending absurd amounts of money just on food. Not to mention we were going out at least twice a week.

Intervention had to happen quickly. I came up with a plan and it involved making a menu for the month. Well really 21 days or 3 weeks worth with the option to eat out at least twice a week. I had to put that in there because working full time and then coming home to cook and entertain a family is tiring. There are some days when I can't muster the energy to cook a whole meal. It doesn't help that I have spoiled my family rotten so I can't just throw something together from a box or package. We eat mostly everything cooked from scratch. Now I can do this in 30 min with a plan and recipe but I have to have a PLAN.

The plan went well. I usually would take out what meat we were going to have early that morning to thaw. I would come home during lunch to prep if needed. Hubs helped out a couple of times and then there were those days worked in where if I knew I just didn't have it in me, we could order out or pick something up. Too easy!

The actual hard part, planning and shopping. It takes being very meticulous because you have to make sure you have every ingredient on hand and then since I'm being a more frugal shopper these days, I had to look and search for coupons, then compare stores and their sales to make sure I was getting the best deal. My goal: to keep the food budget under $400 for the month. Not an easy task but very doable when I know of ladies online that feed their families of 5 and 6 or more with $40 dollars a week and they are not eating rice and beans daily. I don't have that kind of time to plan that in depth but one day, I would like to try that out just to see if I could do it.

Overall, the plan was a success! Hubs got more meat and seafood because he claimed all we ate was chicken. Which was true but it didn't bother me, lol. We tried out a few new recipes which we really liked and they are now constants in our rotation, and I only ended up having to go to the store twice for a few things that I didn't originally get but I stayed on course and only got what we really needed.