I’m really having fun sharing these weekly recaps with you! There are so many subtle decisions that are made throughout the week that really impact how I navigate my food intake and grocery budget. I feel like they’re the final piece of the puzzle to help many of you see the big picture of what I’m doing and that will hopefully inspire or help you to do the same.
This past week was a bit chaotic. I was out of town for most of the first day of my “week” (Wednesday), and I had to go pick up my groceries on the way back into town. I didn’t have time to cook anything that evening, but luckily a friend of mine decided to take me out to a belated birthday meal (so nice!). Because my planning and execution of the weekly menu was not as much of a priority this week, I ended up straying way off plan. Two entire recipes that I planned for didn’t get made, but luckily those ingredients are shelf/refrigerator stable, so I can save them away for a future week.
Anyway, let’s take a look at what happens when I don’t stick to plan…
What I Bought
So maybe I should start with what I planned to cook: Slow Cooker Italian Chicken and Peppers (check), Garlic Parmesan Polenta (check), Braised Red Cabbage (didn’t make), and Sloppy Joes Plus (didn’t make). I already had everything on hand for the sloppy joes (freezer and pantry), except the lentils and bell pepper, so all of that can just stay put until I get the craving for them again. The cabbage is really sturdy, so it’s just as good this week as it was last week when I bought it. I reworked it into the plan this week.
I only had to stock up on a couple staples this week: milk, butter, tortillas, garlic, and cornmeal. Then, as I was taking the photo above, I realized that I accidentally bought cornmeal MIX instead of plain cornmeal. Cornmeal mix has flour, baking powder, and some other stuff in it, so it definitely wouldn’t work for polenta. :( So, I had to stop by the store later that night and get a bag of cornmeal instead ($3.29, I lost the receipt). Ooops.
So, once again, I came in well below my $30 budget! I stood there in the store for a moment asking myself what I could stock up on or if I wanted to splurge on something like yogurt, but in the end, I just left. I had everything I needed and I feel pretty stocked up on goods right now, so I just “saved” the extra five bucks or so. Why spend $30 if I can do it in $25? So, that felt like a big win this week.
It’s crazy how short my list was this week, but all of my planned recipes were incredibly simple and as I said, my pantry feels really well stocked at the moment. As mentioned, I had to take back the cornmeal mix and buy the plain cornmeal, which was $3.29 instead of $2.50 for the mix. Small adjustment.
I was really disappointed in my melon this week. I was really looking forward to it because I had been craving melon, but from the very day that I cut into it, the flavor was just off. It was not sweet and almost tasted sour. I wish I had cut into it before taking the cornmeal mix back!
What I Ate
This Slow Cooker Italian Chicken and Peppers was my main meal this week. It was SO easy and so delicious that I ate it all week and never got sick of it. I ate it over polenta and I ate it alone straight out of a bowl. I realized after the fact that it would have been AWESOME in a roll with some melted mozzarella. Oh well, I can always make it again!
I ate the saucy slow cooked chicken spooned over these fried Garlic Parmesan Polenta cakes. This stuff was really easy to make and made the perfect savory/starchy base for the marinara drenched chicken and peppers. The freshly cooked polenta, which is roughly the same texture as mashed potatoes, only takes a few minutes to make, so I know I’ll be making it a lot in the future to go along with other dishes.
Ooohhhh this Eggs Florentine Breakfast Pizza! This was my favorite recipe this week (okay, maybe tied with the slow cooker chicken) and it was totally a last minute decision. I was craving pizza and just went rummaging through my fridge, freezer, and pantry for anything that could be considered a pizza topping. I ended up with eggs, spinach, and white sauce (butter, four, and milk). It’s so simple, yet SO amazing!
I also made it into a new video, so you can see just how FAST and EASY making fresh pizza crust is. You can watch it here:
I never made the planned braised red cabbage because I just kind of got busy and ran out of time (and wanted that pizza more!). I didn’t make the Sloppy Joes Plus because I felt that I already had enough food for the week and if I did take the time to make it, it would have gone to waste. Luckily, most of those ingredients (all but the green pepper) are shelf/freezer stable, so they’ll be there waiting for a rainy day.
I “ate out” twice this week. The first time was on the day that I went grocery shopping, which was perfect because I was out of town all day and couldn’t cook up anything new. A friend of mine offered to take me out to a belated birthday dinner and I obliged, since I would have been eating something out of my freezer that night anyway. That and the leftovers took care of two meals for the week. A couple days later my boyfriend brought home a pizza (he knows the way to my heart!) and that also covered two meals worth of food for me. So, two meals “out” this week, but both were treats from other people.
Leftovers
I didn’t finish all of the yucky melon, but I tried to eat as much of it as I could. It only got worse after day one, so a good portion of it went in the garbage. I had the one leftover green bell pepper that I bought for the Sloppy Joes, which I should have eaten as snack (sliced up), but I kind of forgot it was in there. By the end of the week it was kind of soft and discolored, so I wrote that one off as a loss.
I had no chicken and peppers left, but if I did it could have easily been frozen. I don’t think the polenta would have frozen well, but it costs next to nothing, so if there had been a small amount leftover it wouldn’t have been the end of the world. Luckily, it was all gobbled up!
The breakfast pizza? Yeah, that was gone in like 24 hours. …I had help, though.
Final Thoughts
It’s okay to change your plans mid-week, but it’s probably not a good habit to get into. Luckily I was able to do it this week without having to go buy more ingredients or throw away a lot of unused items, so it worked out alright. I think I’ll be taking into consideration my work schedule and what I can realistically make with the time given when planning my menu in the future!
Till next time!
I discovered your blog a while back and honestly have started stopping by more and more since your weekly recap posts. As a recent law school grads (unfortunately with a lot of student loans), I really enjoy your recipes and your ability to show that it is possible to eat well and healthy on a budget.
Thank you for sharing this! Last week my grocery bill was out of control so I decided I needed slash it big time! Your blog totally inspired me. I got your chicken and peppers in my crockpot as we speak :-) peppers were on sale and chicken in the freezer! Talk about a no brainer. I have a bag of polenta too calling my name in my pantry.. I’m proud to say I cut my grocery bill this week by over 60%!!! Thanks :)
Wow, that’s amazing!! Congratulations!
The breakfast pizza you made looks absolutely delicious and it is going on my to-make list! I really enjoy your posts! Keep them coming!
Just watched you on Food Networks Snapchat! I was so excited to see you. Congrats!
Thank you! :D
Love the recipe for the Italian Chicken and Peppers! Will definitely be making that into sandwiches!
I find the hardest part of meal planning is the schedule.
When am I going shopping?
When does the chicken expire?
What appointments are we dealing with during the day?
What activities are we dealing with at night?
How much cook-top to table work does this recipe need?
How much can be done ahead of time?
Our lives are complicated between work and kids (5 of them!), so this kind of mental leg work is imperative – and hard for me to explain to other people. It isn’t just “pick recipes, buy ingredients, cook food.”
Exactly! Unless all you have to do all day is prepare meals, it can be super tough. AND everybody has unique hurdles. Kudos to you for juggling all of that and five kids! I grew up in a house with five kids and I know just how chaotic that can be. :)
I am loving the weekly recaps!
Your main page no longer shows any tantalizing food pictures :( I still think your website is my happy place and I REALLY appreciate the weekly recaps. A setback for me will make me avoid cooking for weeks.
I love love bell peppers, but they are $4 a pop where I live. The lowest I’ve ever seen them on sale for is $2.50, wtf. I have to use frozen and that’s gross is in anything but stews (BTW your italian chicken looks amazing, must try).
We’re in the process of uploading the new design. It will show the photos soon! :)
I love these kinds of posts. We are struggling to get our family food budget in check and this shows how from your grocery receipt to the dishes! I’ve been enjoying your site for a while now and find it inspiring. Though we live in a different area of the country, one of the most expensive, this still is totally doable!!! Thank you!!
Gah, I got a bum melon this week too. I bought a halved canteloupe – which should have been my clue, I guess – and it tasted kinda weird. Not really sweet, not really sour. The texture was perfect for the way I like my cantaloupe, but the flavor was so questionable that I just ended up pitching it.
Your longer term project highlights the benefit of building a pantry. It’s way easier to eat on a budget if you have useful ingredients already stockpiled. For instance, there is no way I can use up a big bag of flour in a week, and a lb of butter is going to last me 2-4 weeks at least. But this time of year is a terrific time to stock up on basics like flour, sugar and butter, which can be frozen for a couple of months (at my local supermarket, 4 lbs of flour and sugar are on sale for $.97, 1lb butter for $2.47 ). That little jar of poultry seasoning may seem like a luxury, but you can probably find ways to use it for at least a year. Close to New Year’s you will find dried beans, particularly black eyed peas, on special.
Yes, I am boring and eat the same things week after week, plus I walk past a grocery store on my way home everyday, so I don’t really menu plan or do a big weekly shop, but I have been tracking what I spend, and I am coming in mostly under $30, even with having to stock up on staples when they are on sale. I make a point to keep a very well stocked pantry and frig/freezer.
Great guide! It’s great that you managed to have an extra $5 leftover.
The melon sounds so sad. Sometimes, if I get underripe melon, I treat it as a vegetable and put it in salads. Slightly crunchy cantaloupe pairs pretty well with tomato and cucumber.
Also, there’s a small typo: “(butter, four, and milk).” It should say “flour” instead of “four.”
Thanks for catching that! ;)
As usual, love these posts. Thanks for much for sharing!
I love your weekly recaps! Thank you Beth for doing this and keep up the good work ! It’s somewhat reassuring to know that I’m not the only one who can’t stick to the plan :D
I’ve started cooking on a budget a month ago in order to get out of debt, and I still have trouble planning my meals and executing them. But reading your post I realized that it’s ok, what matters it’s to keep going. Coincidentally I also bought a red cabbage, and I was planning on making an Asian chopped salad with it but I never got to it. I’m looking forward to see what you do with the cabbage next week :)
I plan my menus out for a week using a simple Excel spreadsheet. I plan only lunch and dinner because I eat the same thing for breakfast most of the time. On my menu plan, I note any activities that I have planned on each day, and this is very helpful in planning something quick and easy on busy days.
I can’t even tell you how inspiring it is to see how well you eat on ~$30 a week. Your videos are incredible, too. Wonderful addition to the site! I basically wrote off bread and pizza dough as too complicated to make myself, but you have proven me wrong two weeks in a row!
I am really enjoying your recent posts. When you show how you used the recipes you made for the week, and what you have eaten from the freezer, it makes sense how you are stretching your food dollar. I like that you went off plan, filled a craving for pizza, but with ingredients on hand and in budget. Many of us carefully plan menus, but something will throw us off and too often we will ignore our budget when that happens. I especially like when you outline in detail what else you ate for meals and snacks, because it shows the little extras and fruits/vegetables and how you fit them in. I know keeping track and adding them to your post is extra work and maybe unnecessary, but it gives me a more complete picture. And I know I feel happier when I add a little honey to my cereal, butter a muffin or drink an alternative to water because condiments and beverages make meals enjoyable and staying within budget and eating healthfully doesn’t mean giving everything up. Also, I know you know this, but still will say that a few weeks under budget allows me the extra money for either an excellent sale or to indulge in frozen berries and yogurt to have with homemade granola or in a smoothie or a block of Parmesan cheese which lasts and even just a little makes pasta better.
Still almost solely reference this site for new dinner ideas. I’m loving the addition of the videos!! It makes your already well instructed recipes 100% fool proof! I was Leary about making my own dough/pizza, but seeing it done makes it seem doable!
Trust me, if I can do it – YOU CAN!
My only advice is to lightly grease your hands with oil – dough won’t stick to them and it makes it easier to deal with the dough as you learn.
I think its refreshing to hear about how you toss food sometimes even while eating on a budget. I’m also on a budget, and I hate to waste food, so I always feel guilty when I have to throw away some produce or toss some leftovers I didn’t get to. But its nice to remember that it happens to the best of us.