The Final Outcome-Eating from the Pantry

My week without shopping is finally complete.  For some reason this has probably been the most challenging time I've had doing this.  Probably because I've actually said it out loud and had to stick to it.  Who knows.  I am happy to say that we did it.  

I did learn a few things during this time.  First of all...I just love fresh baked bread and so does the family.  In the few days that we had no store bought bread I made a loaf a day for a couple of days and we ate it up so quickly.  I now know my bread machine pretty well and feel confident enough to adventure out and make some unique breads.  In the five years that I've had this bread machine it has been used about 5 times, three of which were last week.  So my wish to make bread more often is a go.

Another thing I learned is it's important to be sure the family (husband) is on the same page with you when it comes to budgeting and eating out of the pantry.  I think he understands now why I would not buy the hot sauce, but at the time it was a bit difficult.  

Finally, the internet has so many ideas for using leftovers and getting ideas on what to cook with what you have.  My favorite site is All Recipes.  You can just key the ingredients you want and you will get a list.  You can also chose healthier options if you chose to.  

During the kids nap yesterday I ventured out to do all of my grocery shopping.  I had to go to a few stores to get the best deals and I still spent more than I wanted, but it's done.  As I mentioned before we are trying to stick to a $160 per month budget and yesterday alone I spent over $100.  The good thing is I have all of our meat for the month which is the costly thing to buy.   Since I only have $60 left to work with we will be eating out of the pantry again this month when the money runs out.  

Some of the deals to take note of are the whole chickens at Smart and Final-.76 per pound.  Pork Roast at FoodMaxx-.89 per pound.  This only came in a huge 18lbs bag but they gave me an additional $2.00 off for buying this quantity.  It was a bit of work to cut up all that meat and put it into bags, I think it is worth it.  I normally do not like the meat at FoodMaxx, but since I plan to crock pot it, I don't think it matters.  The crock pot can make any meat taste yummy.

So my plan for this week is: 

Monday-Butter Chicken, basmati rice, naan and lentils.

Tuesday-Chicken tacos, rice and beans

Wednesday-Green Bean Casserole and salad

Thursday-Leftovers

Friday-Pulled Pork sandwiches with salad or veggie of some sort.

Saturday-Matt's family traditional meal of bread(usually zweibach, but I need to work on this), meat, cheese, jam, honey, peanut butter or whatever you want on your bread.

Sunday-Veggie minestrone soup

My plans probably will change but this is what I have so far.