[ grocery ] :: the week in review

Wow! It's been a long time since I posted one of these. We went to so many parties and dinners that we barely bought any groceries unless we were entertaining at home. Note: we spent about $50 on champagne and "take 'n bake" pizza for New Year's Eve. I'm categorizing that in our "Entertainment" budget, so I'm not including it here.

My first trip of the week was to Kroger to pick up some veggies, vinegar, and Herbal Essences shampoo and conditioner that were on sale ($0.89 per bottle!). Grocery: $15.16. Retail: ~$26.95. Personal Care: $6.34. Retail: $17.94. I just realized that Kroger overcharged me ~$3 on my manager's special items...note to self: pay more attention at check out!



Our next trip was to Aldi...I got a new food dehydrator (woot!) so I stocked up on lots of fresh produce to store long-term. I didn't take a picture, because I ended up buying lunch meat, milk, eggs, a 3 pound hummus tray, and a ton of fruit. By a ton, I mean 5 lbs bananas, 5 lbs grapefruit, 9 lbs apples, 8 lbs pears, 3 lbs cantaloupe, 6 pints of blackberies, and 4 pints of blueberries. Chicken was on sale for $1.49/lb so I bought about 11 pounds for lunches, dinners, and the freezer. Grocery: $57.19. I estimate I bought about $120 worth of groceries if I had gone to Publix or Kroger.

Finally - Publix. The Hubs and I both went separately since he had to pick up a few last-minute things before New Year's eve. Not pictured: cotton balls and cinnamon sticks. Grocery: $11.12. Retail: $19.45. Medicine: $0.99. Retail: $5.29. Personal Care: $1.89. Retail: $2.19.


Here's the damage:
Personal Care: $8.23
Health:$0.99
Grocery: $83.47 

Yes, that's a whole lot in groceries, but I estimate we'll freeze ~6 pounds of chicken, and make a gallon-bag of dried banana chips, 2 quarts of home-canned grapefruit sections (and candied grapefruit peels and grapefruit-vanilla syrup), apple chutney, jelly, and apple chips, 6 quarts of pickled pears and canned pears in syrup, dried cantaloupe and 4 pints of cantaloupe jam, 2 pints of blackberry gastrique (sauce), and maybe some blueberry syrup. Don't worry, I'll be posting recipes of everything. To sum it up: we are going to have a lot of canned and preserved fruits!

- Maggie White