Grocery Shopping for No Spend Challenge - Pantry Challenge

Well, we picked up the basics from the store that included some fresh vegetables (carrots, lettuce, potatoes, bell peppers, garlic and cabbage, frozen berries and dairy (milk and sour cream). I didn't get everything on my list, but Number One Husband picked out a few things that weren't on the list. We broke the first rule of shopping, DO NOT GO HUNGRY!

This is one of Number One Husband's picks that helped jack up our bill. 
At least it was a healthy choice. Dave's Killer Bread is a real treat for us.

We ended up spending a whopping $80 bucks, but for the most part it will see us through the first month of the challenge and part of the second month. We could have spent a little less if we had stuck to our list. In all fairness, we should have shopped over two weeks ago. This also impacted what we had to spend. Dave's Killer Bread was over $6 for 8 buns. Ouch!

The vegetables available were not great quality vegetables. In fact, I spent a lot of time picking through the offerings. Some were in such poor shape that I didn't purchase any of them. I just decided to do without. 

I have started hearing about shortages and higher prices popping up here and there, so I decided to check on a few things to see if it was true or not. I must say that there were higher prices especially in the meat department. Canned fruits and vegetables also had sizable increases. 

As far as shortages, there were limited supplies on the shelves in many areas and there were items missing altogether. We will all have to learn to make do again until the situations causing these issues are resolved. If we refuse to buy low quality produce maybe there will be a change in the greedy corporations' policies. 

The store that we went to has a small long term food storage section on the end of and isle. The shelves were pretty bare. I buy tomato powder from this section, and they only had two bags left. I use the tomato powder in addition to chicken bouillon. I like the combo, but what is available at stores has MSG included in the ingredients and that does not work for us, so I found a solution with better ingredients.

Pantry Meals - Baked Oatmeal

We will need to pick up milk in a couple of weeks for yogurt and kefir and maybe some fresh produce if they have anything decent available. Other than that, hopefully nothing else will come up. One of our old hens laid an egg this morning. I hope the others follow suit. 

I'm in the process of using up what is in the pantry, however since we just completed this challenge about 6 months ago there are not a lot of lost items that have been shoved behind newer purchases. This fact will impact our grocery bill unless I missed somethings the first time around. I enjoy a good challenge! Happy hunting to everyone in the midst of a pantry challenge...

Mrs. Smith

Grocery Haul - It's Been a Hot Minute

It has been at least six months since I have done any major shopping at Sam's Club or Azure Standard or anywhere for that matter. It was definitely time to place an order at both places. We picked up our order from Sam's Club after my appointment on Friday in the city. 

There were a few things that we could only get if we had them shipped, so I have placed an order to be delivered along with a modest Azure Standard order that I will pick up. I had to go inside the store to pick up a few things that I wanted to hand pick myself. The store was packed. I think that some people we panic buying. It sure looked like it anyway. The line to get to the eggs was deep. I was in and out in short order because I knew what I wanted and where it was. I maneuvered through the store and around shoppers with ease. 

I did notice that there are less options available, again. Mayonnaise was one of those items that I had to order. What store doesn't carry Kraft Real Mayo? They only had brown beans in 12-pound package, and I wanted black beans. They are carrying smaller packages with less options these days. This seems to be the new trend. If stores like Sam's are not going to carry large bulk items, what is the point? 

I also noticed that they were low on most meats, eggs and milk. Milk was definitely not bargain at all. I didn't peruse the whole store because I just wanted to get out of there asap! Bread flour was another item that I had to have shipped along with the black beans and mayo. I haven't been able to buy bread flour at Sam's for several years now. At least I can have it shipped.  

When I tried to put peanut butter in my cart, the only option I had was to have it shipped. I was certain that that couldn't be, and I was right. I was certainly wrong about the mayo. The store had plenty of peanut butter and it was on sale for $2.00 off. I bought two. I think all in all that I went over my budget by $10 and this was one of the reasons why. Dang sales!

It was also time to buy meat. Ugh! Beef has really shot up in price, so Number One Husband decided that we would purchase a whole beef chuck roll and hand trim it into the cuts we need. This made the price $5.98 a pound for premium cuts of chuck. I also purchased a 10-pound roll of ground chuck at $4.38 a pound and a boneless leg of lamb for $4.98 a pound.  

Hand trimming a chuck beef roll coming soon.

I ran into the Walmart that was next door, also packed, to pick up cabbage, bell peppers, Romas, and celery. I was only able to find four Roma tomatoes that were decent enough out of the miniscule amount that they had to offer. They only had three heads of cabbage that were well formed out of the seven heads available. I really needed four, one for soups and stews and three for preserving. The bell peppers were okay, and the celery was good at a great price of .96 cents. 

Fermenting whole cabbage heads coming soon!

We topped off the tank and headed back into the mountains. It was good to get home, but then I needed to get everything put away before the Sabbath started. Getting an almost 23-pound chuck roll and a 10-pound roll of ground chuck to fit in the refrigerator along with everything else was no easy task. 

Until we process the meat, the fridge is just going to be bursting at the seams. I cooked up the rest of our old eggs from the refrigerator and fed them to the chickens. They were getting dried out, so I made the hens and the raven very happy this morning. 

I started the process of organizing the freezers this morning. This time of the year I am able to use our antique propane and kerosene refrigerators that we have in the shop as freezers. They give us additional freezer space in the winter months without using any fuel. I carried out extra items from the inside freezer to our makeshift winter freezers this morning to make room for 38 pounds of meat. This should give us enough freezer space inside the house for the chuck roll and the ground chuck. 

Once the meat is processed, I will finish up re-organizing the fridge and the freezers. It's a good thing that we are not picking up our Azure Standard order for a week or so. I should have plenty of time to process our first haul. 

Happy Day!

Mrs. Smith 

Tips To Reduce Your Grocery Bills - Make Your Own And Save....

This stuff is awesome! It wasn't on our list, but we just had to try it out. I ordered a couple more. It is a limited time offering, so I wanted to have an extra bottle or two.

Don't Be Afraid To Use Spices to make your foods more flavorful!

We went into the city yesterday. Ugh! Number One figured out that the differences in gas prices between city and town was so great that it was worth it. There is also no tax on food in the city unlike the closest town that takes advantage of its citizens by charging city taxes on food. So, we also did a little grocery shopping while we were there. 

No Tax On Groceries

And I do mean a "little" shopping although the price tag did not reflect it. It was crazy! Items that we purchase quarterly, like chocolate chips, have increased by $3 bucks a package. We saw a lot of price increases like this. Most items have doubled or worse over the last three years or so. 

Beating Inflation

Make Your Own Baked Goods...

Oh my, meat prices are rising again! There were also shortages in the meat section, and we were unable to find certain cheaper cuts of meat that we grind make to sausage. After searching two stores, we ended up purchasing a more expensive alternative. It was still less expensive than purchasing the pre-made stuff by far. I can make sausage for about $1.30 a pound compared to $5 a pound for the store-bought stuff.

Did you know that you are paying the same price per pound for the packaging that you are paying for the meat itself?
Do not buy the
15% added water, salt and other ingredient chicken. It is not worth it.  

We also make most of our lunchmeats and sausages.
We season meat the way we like it then we grill or bake it. Lunchmeat is so expensive, but we can make chicken lunchmeat for as little as $3 a pound. It also does not include all the nitrates and other unhealthy ingredients.

Slice it up and make a grand sandwich. 

I bagged up and froze the extra meat this morning. I portioned it out to fit our needs. 

Follow Your List! It cost us an extra $15 bucks because I did not follow this rule.

I am pretty focused on the task at hand and our list when shopping. I want to get in and out as fast as possible, so I did not check out too many sections in the stores we visited. What I did see sent chills right up my spine. What if the prices continue to serge? What if they never go back down? What if? You can fill in the blank ...

Make Your Own Breakfast Sandwiches and Cereals...

Make You Own Salads - Don't buy pre-packaged!

These are just a few examples on how to save money on your grocery bills. Share your tips in the comment section with us. 

Thanks,

Mrs. Smith

Employee Shortages... Walgreens... Shortages... Virus... Inflation...

My doctor called in some prescriptions for me last Wednesday to Walgreens. They were not filled until yesterday. It took seven days to get my prescriptions filled . I started to wonder what was going on , so I tried calling Walgreens a couple of times and I was told that the pharmacy was closed and was given no other information by the automated voice on the other end of the phone.

I finally received notice via text that my prescriptions were ready for pick up yesterday. I really needed to pick them up before our next snowstorm came through, so Number One called to make sure that the drive-thru would be open. He was told that it was open by a call center employee. We didn't think that it would be a good idea to go into a pharmacy under the circumstances. When I got there the drive-thru was closed and I was forced to go inside. Luckily,  I was able to get in and out in record time. 

Apparently, Walgreens closed last Tuesday without notice according to the news story due to employee shortages. The story continued by saying that you could go to another Walgreens to pick up prescriptions, but that wasn't the case. A pharmacist at the closed Walgreens has to okay the transfer and since they weren't there to okay it people were not able to get their prescriptions transferred by any means. 

This is a potentially deadly scenario for many people who rely on drugs to stabilize or prevent fatal events like heart attacks or strokes. I'm sure people had to call their doctor to get another prescription called in to another pharmacy to prevent such tragedies from occurring. 

Some industries like banking are regulated and are not allowed to be closed over three days. Is money more important than life saving drugs? I'm afraid that we are going to see more disruptions like this in the near future. 

I did notice that McDonalds had their lobby open when I drove by. Last time it was closed. I'm not even sure if the drive-thru was open since there were no cars lined up.  

I wanted to also share my last grocery order pick-up. I couldn't get most of my order filled at Sam's, so I opted for a smaller grocery store. When I picked up my order there was no chicken, so I masked up and went inside. They had three whole chickens and two packs of drumsticks. That's it. I wanted split chicken breasts. I noticed that they had a large area of marked down meats. I guess people are not buying meat due to the higher prices. They did have three packs of split chicken breasts marked down, so I was able to get them. They were enormous. Turkey sized breasts. I froze them as soon as I got home until I am ready to use them. We like them grilled, but we are under a fire ban. I'm not sure what I will do with them other than stretch them as far as I can across several meals. 

I also could not get our turkey breakfast sausage and the turkey links were up $4 a package. Now, lets due the math. There are 12 small links in each package divide that by $5.99 that equals .50 a link. I think that it is a 6 oz package. That's about $15 a pound. Ouch! They proudly profess a new lower price on the sign. I guess that they cannot do the math or think that we won't. 

I was able to find onions and potatoes for a decent price. They substituted smaller bags of potatoes for the larger bags. I read a news article last week that stated that we would start to see shortages in produce in the coming weeks. 

Since we are seeing a massive increase in virus cases I can only assume that we will start seeing factories shut their doors once again leading to more shortages at the grocery store. There is absolutely nothing we can do about this situation except take every precaution to stay safe. 

I am deeply saddened by the pain and suffering that people are having to endure. I pray that you all will be safe, healthy and comforted in the days to come. I don't think that there is one person that has not experience the loss of a friend or family member during this global pandemic. 

Mrs. Smith