Shopping Update

I totally feel the need to talk to you all tonight about the power of Aldi in my world...

On Sunday afternoon I did a million things with my family (and I ran a bit for me).  Anyway, about 4:00 I realized that I had not made the Aldi run, and I needed to leave for Barbara's house at 5:00.  FEAR NOT my shopping friends.  I pulled it together, jumped in my van (another 15 minutes later), and headed off to Aldi.  Lucky for me it's not too far away, but I did do the following...

look for every item that was on the shopping list that I provided for you
purchase those I needed
record the price of those I did not.
buy the "other food" that my family consumes that is not within this project (list to follow).

I spent $29.71 on food. (spinach, chips, broccoli, chicken, salmon, almonds, lemons, salsa, 2 avocados, taco mix, bacon ... also a new Black Pepper Grinder (1.69), and more minced garlic($1.19)... I had everything else in my frig.

I spent $15.36 on "other food" ... (breakfast sausages, pizzas for Joe & kids to eat for dinner that night while I dined w/ Barbara, pears, fajitas and 5 2-quart bottles of apple juice).

and I pulled back in my driveway at 4:51.  NICE WORK (and thanks Aldi for opening that second checker when I was fourth in line - second with the added checker!).

I did the math - had you bought everything on the list (and not the garlic, black pepper grinder, or extra avocado), you would have spent $57.05.  This week Aldi did not have stone ground mustard, balsamic vineagar, green onion, frozen Asparagus or Chiabatta Bread.  With those things bought at a discount store - not your top brand store, I think you're still below $70...but what will you have left of this at the end of the week!!!  I'm still eating my roasted red peppers from the first purchase, and the black olives in the tacos tonight were left from last week's fish.  And, my onions were still from week one as well!

See, here's where Barbara and I differ ... food in Barbara's refrigerator makes her nervous... open jars and "fallback options" in my refrigerator are comforting to me.  I was raised as a person who stocks and stores and shops in advance (my parents worked until at least 5:30 pm, and the nearest real grocery was about ten miles away) ...Barbara (and my husband) prefer to shop for today when today gets here ... around 5pm.  Great for freshness, poor for time management in my opinion.  I also prefer to have 3 cans of black beans and 6 cans of green beans and 6 cans of tomatoes around ... just in case - and that's just a sampling of my stock.  This blog is HELPING ME OVERCOME MY NEED TO STOCKPILE.  See, before I had to publicly account for my shopping I would have taken that list and probably bought at least one bag of peppers, maybe two or three taco seasoning mixes, more roasted red peppers, even though there is a perfectly good jar in the frig, four more packages of pasta (it's such a great price!) and, well, just because you "might need it", some more cheese.  Now, I stuck to the list ... except my "just in case" came out when I bought two avocados instead of one, and on the personal list 5 bottles of apple juice.  It's a comfort to me to know that I won't run out of my kid's breakfast drink of choice (for 5 weeks).

My only excuse on the avocado is that I am home during the day and I do eat lunch at home with my three year old.  I do need an occasional fresh lunch that's not leftover!

Hope that helps you, it helped me!