I know the week is well underway, but I’m finally getting you this week’s meal plan and giving an update on the $100 grocery challenge. We didn’t quite make it this week; our total was $162.56. FAIL. After traveling for work, there were two days that I had to grab lunch for myself from the grocery store salad bar and of course, I grabbed extras each time. Our town market had local pork on sale. I just couldn’t resist a delicious, local pork butt for pulled pork. Even on sale, a large cut of meat set us back almost $10. As we’re having it at the end of the week, perhaps we can stretch some leftovers into a second meal to help next week’s budget.
That brings me to my next point in all of this grocery budget work. We were certainly very over my original goal but when I sat down calculated what that actually meant, I felt a little bit better. The amount ($162.56), includes 7 lunches and 7 dinners. We eat breakfast at home too, but to be fair I’m not counting that as it’s mainly eating pantry items we already have. What all of this means is that each meal costs us a total of $11.61 or $3.87 per person. That made me feel a little better.
I still want to actually make the $100 challenge one of these weeks. I’m as type A as it gets. I need to be able to check that box and have the accomplishment. I’m learning what helps and doesn’t help all the time and hopefully one of these weeks will be able to report success!
Moving on to what we ate/are eating this week…
sunday:
pizza bites
Recipe coming soon for these. OMG. They are so good. So much fun to make, easy, versatile, and delicious. We already made them again as a late night snack this week.
monday:
broccoli cheese soup
We tried a new recipe from Oh She Glows. It was good but felt like a lot of work to essentially make two soups. I think if we make it again I want to try just kind of cooking and blending everything together. Not sure if it’ll lose some of the cheesiness that way, but this was just a lot of work. We made it over the weekend so it was fine, but I’m all about finding ways to make things more efficiently. Ollie very much enjoyed this soup and therefore happily inhaled broccoli, celery, and carrots.
tuesday:
sweet and sour chicken
I know I’ve shared this recipe before. It’s just so good. It’s another one that is a little time consuming but we made the sauce on the weekend (with half the sugar) and then just had to cook everything the night of the dinner. I made enough for leftovers for one of us, so definitely double the recipe if you’re looking for leftovers for the whole family.
wednesday:
warm salads
I know this name doesn’t sound very appetizing, but I just don’t have it in me to be really creative right now. We used the leftovers from our maple mustard sheet pan dinner to make warm salads. We heated everything up again and added to mixed greens, cucumber, and topped maple balsamic dressing. Easy, healthy, and delicious.
thursday:
paninis
The really cool thing of learning to make our own bread is all that we can do with it. Paninis are probably my favorite. Erik makes AMAZING paninis. They are so good. We will have turkey, vegan mayo, Daiya provolone cheese, and green apple. I’m honestly not sure what sides we will have. A solid mix of leftovers I bet 🙂
friday:
breakfast for dinner
TBD the exact details of this. We’re letting Ollie pick! My guess is waffles, watermelon, and chicken sausage.
saturday:
BBQ pulled pork
Ollie has been asking for BBQ sauce a lot recently. We’ve made our own before but this time I just bought one from Woodstock Organics. Even so, it won’t actually go in the crockpot. As we’re hoping to use the pork for a few different recipes (and because I cannot handle the really overwhelming BBQ smell staying in the house), we use a very simple recipe when making pulled pork.