5 Lessons Learned:
Bomb Shelter Before
1. It is not humanly possible for me to feed my family for $25 a week unless I resort to cooking ramen noodles and off-brand macaroni and cheese for dinner. With my Pantry Challenge budget, I could barely keep us in milk and produce. $50 a week would’ve been more doable–and still challenging.
2. Left to my own devices with an empty refrigerator and nothing good to eat, I will bake up some kind of delicious homemade bread, cake, muffin, or cookie and eat way, way too much of it.
Bomb Shelter After
3. There are little luxuries I need to feel healthy every day, like a good whole-grain cereal, fresh fruit, and pre-washed salad greens. Without these anchors in my day, my eating gets derailed and I feel gross.
4. Extended meal planning is my new best friend. At the beginning of the month, I made a list of 28 possible dinners using the items we already had. As the weeks went by, I checked off meals we’d eaten and mapped out the next week. This was something I’d never done, but extremely helpful–and hopefully it will help prevent me from overbuying in the future.
5. We can get by on less. I’ve been packing a water bottle in Henry’s lunchbox instead of a 100% juice box or a pricey Horizon milk box. He hasn’t complained about it yet, so I plan to continue. He doesn’t need the juice and drinks plenty of (less expensive) milk at home. Also, we don’t need five different boxes of cereal in circulation at one time. And if I don’t buy chips for Joel, he’ll eventually eat those 3-month-old pretzels no one else will touch.
And now, the numbers:
- My goal was to spend $100 for the month of February.
- I ended up spending nearly twice that amount: $198.95.
- Compared to what we usually spend on food every month, it was still a success. In the past four months, I averaged $634 a month at the grocery store–so we saved an impressive $435. (And in January, we somehow spent an obscene $850 on food, which is what prompted me to embark on this experiment when I did.)
If this Pantry Challenge inspired you to cut costs or clean out your cupboards, please share in the Comments section!
Jen says
Yes, but how much is it going to cost to restock the pantry? Vince always asks me to skip the weekly trip to the grocery and make do with what we have. When I do this, I feel like it catches up to us in the next month. Just wodering if you plan on building supplies back up to “pre-challenge” levels.
I am a huge fan of the meal planning. I usually do 7-10 meals but maybe I should expand to 28. We also have a list of 50 of our family favorites broken down by category(beef, chicken, pork, pasta, veggie) and I try to rotate these staples!
Sally says
I like your idea of doing the list of “family favorites”! I’m going to do that as well.
I’ll restock as things go on sale–that’s what I hadn’t been doing and why I’d been spending too much. I’d just been buying ingredients when there was a new recipe I wanted to try instead of waiting for sales and coupons.
Meal Plan Mom (Brenda) says
I just found your site via Food with Kid Appeal and it looks great! Meal planning is definitely key to saving $$ on your weekly grocery trip. I think keeping your monthly bill under $200 is terrific! Keeping a list of “go-to” meals that you know are inexpensive to prepare is another great way to keep your budget in check. Good luck!
Sally says
Hi Brenda–thanks for your comment. I really enjoyed checking out your site and look forward to learning from you!
LeAnne Ruzzamenti says
Sally – We, too, spend a LOT on groceries every month, but I have done it because of what you outline in #2 and #3 – I feel like you need a lot of good, fresh food to keep everyone making the best choices. Did you find the same applied to your husband and kids? Meal planning definitely helps cut down on the costs and keep everyone directed to the best nutrient-rich options!
Sally says
Thanks for reading, LeAnne! I was giving all the produce to my kids and not saving any for myself–so they were eating the usual amount, it was just me who was getting gypped! 🙂 It’s nice to have my regular stash of fruits and vegetables so I don’t feel like I have to skimp on myself. Going into this experiment, I thought frozen vegetables would pick up the slack and help me save money, but I found that I just don’t like frozen veggies. I’m looking forward to spring and summer when fresh produce will be more plentiful and hopefully cheaper!
Barbara Blaskowsky says
Wow Sally – you’re my hero! Way to stick it out the whole month! Your blog motivated me to start clipping coupons again – which I used to do, then got too lazy – but today I managed to get 2 canisters of Lysol wipes and a small bottle of Dawn detergent for $1.81 (It’s a game for me to try to get the most stuff for the least amount of $$) I usually create our meals on the fly depending on what’s on sale on the grocery store, but meal planning is on my ‘to do’ list. Thanks for the inspiration!!
Sally says
Thanks Barb! I tend to get lazy about coupons occasionally too–hence the $850 food bill in January! Couponing is definitely a “game”, and I swear I get an endorphin-rush when I get a good deal. Joel thinks I’m nuts. Thanks for reading my blog!
Erin says
Loved following your experiment! I have often thought about trying to eat based on what we already have in the pantry. I also completely agree that if I don’t get my fresh fruit and veggies during the day, I feel gross.
Sally says
Thanks for reading, Erin! Glad you liked the Pantry Challenge experiment. I just read through your blog a bit and enjoyed hearing your take on balancing motherhood and exercise. That is definitely a journey with ups and downs!
Dana @ Budget Dietitian says
Whoo hoo! You are done! I loved reading your post-pantry lessons.
Happy RD day!
Sally says
Thanks Dana! Same to you. 🙂
Jessie says
I see I’m over a year late here, but I just came to your website (via Lisa at 100 Days of Real Food).
This month we decided to get back on budget at our house. That meant getting our grocery bill under control. We did pretty good, but last week we hit out budget for groceries. My husband asked me to stop at the store for something and I said no. We had no more grocery money so we had to eat what we have. I now realize that I have more than enough to cover my family for the last two weeks of the month and more! We have a freezer outside that we almost never touch. I found some shrimp, frozen chicken breast, etc. When we ran out of sandwich bread, I made my own with the flour and whatnot that we already had.
I think next month I’ll lower our grocery budget and attempt to use more of what we have!