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A peek at our weekly grocery shopping
Each week I plan on sharing a picture of our cart at each store along with a breakdown on what we bought and what we paid. Thankfully we have zero dietary restrictions or allergies which helps us keep our budget on the low side. We try to stick between $80-90 each week for our family of seven. A lot of times what is on the menu doesn’t directly correlate to what we buy because I like to plan our meals from what we have on hand currently and use our budget to stock up on good buys plus produce and dairy products.
Super honesty right here: I’m spoiled. Micah and I do the grocery shopping together every week. He has Fridays off so we load up the kids and make it a family event. Yes, it’s still chaotic because there are seven of us traipsing through the store – or five when the boys are in school – but at least I have another adult to keep an eye on the wandering children, someone else to keep track of the list with me, someone to help load groceries while the other loads children, and all that other craziness that goes along with shopping that having a second adult means life is so much easier.
Micah is working his crazy schedule this week. That means most days I saw him for an hour in the morning and then he was gone from 9am-3am. And he worked Friday. This meant I had to do the shopping on my own if we wanted to eat before Saturday. Some weeks I can wait a day to go shopping. Not this week. Almost all the fruit was gone, we had no cheese for pizza night, and no flour to make dough. I had to take on Costco with all five if we were going to make it to Saturday. And I did it! I did splurge on two churros for the kids to split (which lasted about three seconds) but overall they did well. They helped me find things, the little guys didn’t pitch a fit about going in the cart, and I stuck to my list! Lots of winning in that story. I saved the rest of the shopping until Saturday when Micah could join us though. People call me brave for raising five kids but it’s a lot easier when I don’t take them out in public 😉
We went a few dollars over budget this week. Sad face. But after countless weeks of staying close to 80 (or under) a week above $90 won’t break us. But now we are stocked up on some major staples like oatmeal, flour, and hot sauce so hopefully those won’t need to be purchased again for a while.
Costco
Flour $6.49
Watermelon $3.99
Oatmeal $7.99
Diced Tomatoes $2.99
Tomato Sauce $2.99
Cholula Hot Sauce $7.99
Sour Cream $3.99
Pickles $5.79
Bananas 2 @ 1.39 = $2.78
Granola Bars $8.69
– 2.70 instant savings = $5.99
Mozzarella Cheese $10.99
Total: $61.98
I forgot to snap a photo in the store so here’s all the apples in our apple bin 😀Hornbachers
Apples 8.92 lb @ 0.99/lb = $8.83
Total: $8.83
Walmart
Flour Tortillas 2 @ 2.18 = $4.36
Potatoes $2.77
Carrots $3.22
Hot Sauce $1.88
Beans 2 @ 1.42 = $2.84
5doz Eggs $5.50
Creamer $4.98 (not pictured – Micah purchased on Friday night)
*submitted receipt to ibotta for any item rebate (-$0.25)
Total: $25.20 after rebates
Grocery Total: $96.01 after rebates
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Menu Plan
I love menu planning and seeing other’s dinner plans! I’m weird like that 😉 As I’ve shared before, being in the kitchen is my happy place so I love finding meals that are new but I also never forget our favorites! These will link to the author’s original recipe unless it’s my own recipe/creation that I don’t have a link for… yet.
If you need some inspiration for how to create menu plans you can read here where I go into detail about how I make a plan for our food week and here to read how I create our grocery list.
I don’t make specific plans for breakfast and lunch but these are the basics I rotate between while throwing in a few other things for special days or weeks when I have the right ingredients.
Breakfasts: Pancakes, Coffee Cake, Egg Sandwiches, Sausage Balls, Eggs (various ways), English Muffins, Banana Bread, Biscuits and Gravy, and various types of muffins.
Lunches: Leftovers, PB&J, Meat and Cheese Wraps, Cheese Quesadillas, and Mac ‘n’ Cheese.
Dinners, however, are always planned for since they tend to take the most ingredients and prep time.
Here’s what’s on our menu this week:
Sunday: Chili – The kids have been BEGGING for chili recently and now that I discovered Costco carries the huge cans of tomato products I can make a giant batch for about $10 and it will feed us for countless meals. I’m talking about 12qts of chili!
Monday: Taco Salad – I made lots of extra taco meat the other week for crunchwraps and stuck it in the freezer for a quick meal later. I love mixing salsa and ranch together for these salads!
Tuesday: Chili Cheese Baked Potatoes – What can I say? Chili poured over fluffy potatoes then topped with cheese and sour cream. Perfection.
Wednesday: Waffles of Insane Greatness – It’s the night before school so we are having a waffle party! Plus eggs and sausage to cut through the sugar 😉
Thursday: Leftovers
Friday: Homemade Pizza and Movie Night – pizza crust recipe here and pizza sauce recipe here.
Saturday: Banzai Burgers – Have you ever tried this at Red Robin? It’s my absolute favorite burger there and since I won’t get my free one for my birthday next week I’m making them at home. Micah will opt out of the pineapple but I’m betting the kids will be on board!
What’s on your menu this week?
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