Wednesday, January 13, 2016

Thirteen - The PantRy Raid

Brian is an adjunct professor,  and if you know anything about that, they don't make a ton of money. His classes end in December so he only gets a small check in the beginning of January.  What does that have to do with anything you say?

Well, let me tell you. This month we need to save money. We have to work preschool  into the budget too.

And that's where the PantRy  Raid comes in.  I'm in this cooking group, and many of us decided that this is the month to eat a bunch of stuff we already have,  and set a small weekly grocery budget. Normally we spend way too much, but we decided upon $75/week. At first, I thought there was not a chance in hell this was going to work but we are doing really well!! The new week starts on Saturday.... we have a pretty well stocked frig,  and $5 left in the budget. We've been shopping more often, but only for fresh fruits,  veggies, milk, eggs, and bread. We are actually finding ways to use everything up and waste a lot less. I find myself eating the leftovers from the kids plates instead of making my own lunch and getting creative with the random crap hiding on the shelves and in the back of the freezer.  To be fair, there hasn't been anything fancy like steak or roast,  but I've been more satisfied than I thought with the food we do have. I've had to plan ahead, and just make it work,  or find alternative ingredients.  Today, I used leftover hotdogs from lunch at Sam's club yesterday as a pork element in some home made baked beans. I used pinto beans  (which I thought I hated) and they turned out awesome actually.

If you haven't done something  like this, I highly recommend  it. It's given me a lot of perspective on what it must feel like to struggle with food and providing for your family.

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