Jessica, over at
www.lifeasmom.com has recently been blogging about freezer cooking. She posted her February menu and I liked many of the items she posted. I am in New York, but am from Texas, and I LOVE and MISS Mexican food. When I read that her meal plan had mexican food (especially Carnita soft tacos) I was thrilled. So, I decided to tweak her menu to my likings and give it a try. We go grocery shopping one a week an hour and a half a way since I usually have doctors visits (today it was for my glaucoma). However, today, we had an actual baby sitter for all but one child and I decided that we would just go ahead and shop for an entire month (with the exception of milk). I use coupons, shop sales, stock up, and use item I already have in my large freezer. For a family of 7, I only spent $240 today!!! That is a big change for us (as we usually spend between $600-$800 a month for food and misc. item). Before we left for the store, I made a thorough list of 28 meals, lunches, breakfasts, and snacks. One of the things that helps us is that we eat left-overs for lunch and hot cereal from the crock pot (purchased in bulk) for breakfast. I also added extras (items that were an excellent price I stocked up on) to my shopping cart today. This will be a big help for next month when I plan my menu.
I normally do not have a menu plan, so I am very excited to have one this month. Through out this week, I plan on making my baking mixes, chopping my vegetables, marinating my meats, and cooking my meats. It is not my plan to precook my meals, just pre-prepare them so that my time in the kitchen is greatly reduced. As I prepare for my month of meals, I will post some of my recipes.
4 comments:
We had carnitas tonight for the first time and loved them. I was surprised how easy it was to cook the meat in my slow cooker. I really did just add an onion and 1/4 water like she said. Amazing! We'll have yummy bbq sandwhiches tomorrow, too.
Under $300?!? That's amazing! Good job! I am terrible at pre-planning meals. I can make it work for about two weeks and then it falls apart. but it saves us money, so I suppose I must persevere. ;-)
I've never thought of using my crockpot for oatmeal...I must try that since I end up making a lot of extra to go in the bread I make for us. It would also be great to have it slow cook so it's ready to go before the kids get up.
p.s. Your blog is lovely too :-)
Thank you for follow my blog I follow your too, I really like to have big family like you.
Wow! $240...for the month! That is super! I don't usually cook for the freezer either, except that anytime I make something that can be tripled, and then freeze half, I do. Like spaghetti, meatloaves, any casserole, etc. I am trying so hard to shave money off our monthly grocery bill. I think this month I will do even better than last month, because I stocked up on some products in January (on sale) that I can use all this month too.
IEW--I would do one dress-up a week, writing one or two paragraphs a week. Just use some paragraphs from your science or history reading. Children's books are my best resource.
Have a great day!
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