I was going to try to hold my food expenditures down to $25 ... when I look at the list of things I need, I am not sure I will make it. I'll do my best. My husband is a vegetarian and eats cereal every day for breakfast, which means soy milk. We'd been getting it for $1 a carton at Dollar Tree, but the last week they haven't had it, so I will probably have to break down and buy Silk or Eighth Continent in the dairy case at the market for $3 a half gallon. (Or more). He uses a lot of soy milk! CVS and Rite Aid have Post Shredded Wheat and Kashi cereals on sale this week, so I will attempt to get them before they are all out. And then there's the list of produce. We eat a lot of fresh produce. I've already spent $3 for two pints of fresh blueberries, so that would mean I have to get everything for $21.
Anyway, tonight I plan to make a vegetable medley out of veggies I already have in the fridge, including mushrooms, zucchini and summer squash, and an onion. I'll serve that over brown rice, and will give hubby a veggie burger and some bread too. I still have onions, some broccoli, a green pepper, and possibly some other items in my fridge. I know I have some organic baby spinach I have been working on - I have had a spinach salad for my work lunches for a week now, and I put some in my breakfast omelets. I have run out of eggbeaters. <sigh> This is not going to be quite as easy as I'd thought.
I made my husband's lunches for a few days...kidney bean and brown rice salad, which he supplements with Kashi bars and fresh fruit. He eats bananas as if they were going out of style. Yes, he's very healthy!
I'm going shopping tonight and will post tomorrow on how I do.
Mayness...I have been making large batches of rice and freezing it for years but I never realized you could run it under cold water first before you freeze it. What a great idea, then it won't be gluey right? Do you pat the water off with a paper towel, let it drain off in a colandar?
Yeah, it really helps keep it from getting mushy/sticky. I do it in a colander so the water can drain off. I can't remember where I read that idea, but now I do it every time!
I know the last thing I should do is suggest that you put MORE stuff in your freezer but you could cook some dried beans and freeze them for quick and easy use later. At least then you're more likely to use them up, right? I never plan ahead enough to cook dried beans for specific recipes, but I usually have a couple varieties cooked up and waiting in the freezer.
Well, I did miserably with my shopping. The soy milk alone was $9 for three cartons. I bought cereal that was on sale, rice that was on sale, and a lot of produce. I spent <gasp!> $100 when I was only going to spend $25. I wonder if I can make this food last two weeks.
I made some rice yesterday and ran cold water over it, WOW! What a difference that makes. I'm going to use that method every time I make it, I'll just zap it hot again when we're using it for a meal. The 4 cups of frozen apples I thawed out yesterday was made into a pie as requested by DH. I actually thawed out another 4 cup package so the pie would be heaping with apples. If you don't eat the crust, it's pretty calorie friendly. So now I'm down to 2 packages of apples. I'm making a chicken greek salad for tonight using up some frozen chicken breast and some homemade Greek dressing. I stopped buying soy milk a few months ago because it's gotten so expensive. Unlike most of you, we're retired and living on social security so we shop smartly. We've used dry powdered skim milk for years and years and love it. But then I always put vanilla and a tad shake of Stevia in it to make it taste good. That's a huge savings right there if you can get your kids/hubby to drink it. Have a good one!
I admire you for attempting to budget while doing this challenge, Thinfor5, but for me, I'm going to confine myself to the idea of using it up, rather than reducing my spending on food. I know myself well, and one reason I've probably not used up certain things is because the dish they'd be used to make is time-consuming or requires an ingredient that I don't usually have on hand, perhaps because it is a little expensive.
Yesterday, I used up the last of a plastic sleeve of FiberOne cereal. I don't usually have milk in the house, so I'd been using it gradually, as a topping or a mix-in for yogurt. Which tells me that I need to buy less FiberOne. It's really weird how this cereal is contained in two long cylindrical sleeves. I had the second one all balled up in my cabinet with a rubber band around it, which made it look less appetizing than the orange box did.
Okay, so you all have ruined my excuse for buying Trader Joe's frozen brown rice. Now I'll have to start freezing brown rice -- an excellent idea that will help me use up all the dried bagged brown rice that I've bought & eye from time to time, then reject when I get home from work & the gym at 8 PM & want to eat promptly.
Hubby will not drink dairy milk...he's a vegetarian and tries to use as little dairy in his diet as he can.
Many of us need to cut back our expenses in this economy...since I have food coming out the yingyang I have to discipline myself at the market to avoid buying those yummy looking fruits and veggies that look so tempting under the nice bright lights.
Have you looked at making your own soy milk if you use lots? I see Chinese ladies buying mass quantities from the bulk bin at Whole Foods, and I have seen makers on line for pretty cheap.
A soymilk maker might be just the thing down the road a-ways after we have redone our kitchen. Presently there is just no place to keep one...my husband would have a conniption if I were to bring one more appliance into the house, LOL!
I pulled out a frozen loaf of french bread yesterday, we ate 1/2 of it last night and we'll finish it off tonight with some grilled turkey tenderloins. We have lots of garden lettuce, radishes, etc. coming now in the garden so I probably won't get many canned vegetables used up. My main concern is getting last years garden vegies use up.
I used up a bag of frozen last year's tomatoes and a bag of frozen chopped sweet peppers, various canned goods including three cans of beans, and a box of barley in the making of the chili. I also threw in some TVP because I ran short on the barley, and the TVP soaked up some of the excess juice. Good stuff, and it made enough for at least two more meals.
I made potato soup, which used up some low-fat cream cheese approaching its expiration date, and the last of the homemade chicken stock I had in the freezer. (Un)fortunately I have a whole bag of frozen chicken scraps waiting to make more. I also added about half a bag of frozen corn.
Tonight I'm cooking a huge batch of taco filling (ground beef and black beans from my freezer, and TVP and taco seasoning, maybe a small can of tomato sauce for the sake of using it) and we'll have some tonight (either as actual tacos or a salad) and save the rest.
We're having elk roast in the crock pot tonight. I froze a zillion garlic cloves from last years garden crop, I used a bunch of those up on top of the roast. I also thawed out an 8 oz. container of strawberry/rhubarb sauce to put over fresh strawberries. I used sugar free jello with the rhubarb so it's really low calore. We'll eat the last package of beets too!
This seems like a great exercise. However, I am not really very kitchen savvy. My DH cooks most of the time, but I am VERY intrigued by the idea of so much freezing. For example, how do you freeze garlic? Do you do something fancy with it? And dried beans....you cook them and just put them into individual servings? That sounds like a great idea. Strawberry/rhubarb sauce...how do you make it? How do you freeze tomatos? Does anyone know where to buy brown rice in bulk? We go through a lot of brown rice!
Seriously, I know this wasn't the point of this challenge, but pointers would be greatly appreciated!
To freeze tomatoes..."blanch" them by dropping them in boiling water. The skins will split; run cold water over the blanched tomatoes and remove the split skins. Then drain well, pack in ziploc freezer bags, label, and push as much air out of them before sealing. I got another bag out of the freezer this morning, which I plan to use in a fresh vegetable and pasta dish, which will use up a zucchini, green pepper, and yellow summer squash. I have a partial package of baby portobellos to use up too, so I may toss those in for good measure. Realist, I'd get myself a good basic cookbook and read it cover to cover. I used to have "The Complete Step by Step Cookbook," which gave loads of good information, but may be out of print, since I got it back in the 1980s.
I try to eat fish or some form of seafood on Fridays. Rather than buying fresh fish today, I'm going to try a variant on a Mark Bittman recipe, with chickpeas, tuna and roasted red peppers, some chopped Vidalia & some other stuff. That will get some cans out of my pantry.
Turns out that I have a lot of ground beef in the freezer. I'm trying to think of what to make with it that would be good during the humid weather we're supposed to have. Chili doesn't appeal as much as it ought to.
Starting my challenge in earnest today
but you could cook some dried beans and freeze them for quick and easy use later. At least then you're more likely to use them up, right? 
I never plan ahead enough to cook dried beans for specific recipes, but I usually have a couple varieties cooked up and waiting in the freezer.
