What I Spent, What We Ate | Aldi, and a little more Aldi
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What I Spent
I made two trips to Aldi this week, and that was it! I started with a $32 trip that is unpictured.
And then I made a $113 trip, which is pictured below.
It included a bit of non-virtuous buying from Aldi's Halloween clearance section. 😉
So, I'm starting off November with a $145 week.
What We Ate
Monday
Some friends came over to our house early and we ordered pizza together before the Halloween parade.
Tuesday
I made a pot of tortellini soup.
I toasted some leftover dinner rolls and spread them with garlic butter, and we also had a green salad.
Wednesday
I'd planned to make Shrimp Viennese, but I ended up babysitting two nieces and a nephew that evening, and instead opted to make quesadillas (finger food always seems easier with small people!)
Thursday
We had pork cutlet cuban sandwiches with some fresh fruit.
Friday
No surprise...I'm planning to make pizza.
And for those of you keeping track at home, I did make deep dish pizza last week, and I decided I was too scared to try using a Yukon Gold potato in the crust. So I popped into the store and bought a Russet potato. 😉
And the pizza was delicious.
This week has been reasonably good. It may well be remembered as the chicken drumstick week as the local shop had them at a $1.70 a kilo. I bought some and mum bought some. There was no room in the freezer so we ate the lot. I forgot to keep totals but the spend has been around $100 Aus.
1. Corned beef and vegetables
2. Soy sauce chicken and rice.
3. Sandwiches from the beef.
4. Tandoori chicken and rice and vegetables.
5. Fake KFC (this copycat recipe did not work well(
6. Chicken noodle soup.
I haven't been shopping yet, but I will this weekend. Last weekend turned out to be a bit more expensive than I thought, but I still did okay.
What did we have this week?
We had smoked ham steaks from a local farm -- nice and smoky, but no salt at all, and I like my ham a little salty. We had roasted sweet potatoes and beets, and English peas (what do they call English peas in England?)
We also had it all again another night, but I jazzed the ham up with some pineapple and a spoonful of brown sugar. It was better that way.
We had shrimp with homemade cole slaw and my husband's request of cottage cheese with fruit.
We had BLT sandwiches with soup
Tonight we are having stew; since a cool front is supposedly coming through later today. We'll see, but stew is good anyway.
And I was treated to some free Japanese persimmons by my farm delivery guy. They were soft and ripe. We just mashed them up and added a little thick farm fresh cream in a bowl as dessert -- it was so simple but so luxurious tasting.
In England we call them peas!! 🙂
We always called them Sunday peas growing up!
This week we were very, very good with our food goals! Everything that we ate was on our menu and planned, so we didn’t have extraneous food costs. Yeehaw!
This week we ate:
Monday: We had family over for Halloween, so we all ordered pizza. My SIL was nice enough to pay for the pizza, so it was a free meal for us, so that was great
. ïŠ
Tuesday: Homemade buffalo wings with carrots, celery, and chips. I had mine with apple slices on the side, since the chips were a little much for me.
Wednesday: Beef pho. I let this one cook on low all day, and the broth was amazingly fragrant by the time I got home. We got the recipe from Mr. Tako Escapes, and it’s truly the best homemade pho recipe I’ve ever had.
Thursday: We were planning on corn dogs, but we ended up having extra pho, so we just had that again and saved the frozen corn dogs for next week.
Friday: Mr. Picky Pincher started a new schedule at work where he gets out at 11:30 (lucky duck!!). So he’s in charge of Friday dinners from now on. This week he chose to make Salisbury steak with mashed potatoes and salad.
This week was good. I spend on average $400 to $500 a week (this includes eating out). I'm amazed on how low your grocery bills are. I bought about $50 worth of candy for Halloween. I passed out about 600 pieces. LOL.. so I our food budget was a lot higher this week. Here's what we ate:
Sunday: Slow Cooker whole chicken with scalloped potatoes & steamed carrots. I then, made chicken broth with the bones and stuff.
Monday: Tequila Lime Turkey Chili with rice and the fixings. (ATK recipe)
Tuesday: Leftover chili
Wednesday: Creamed Chicken with noodles & steamed carrots (WW recipe)
Thursday: Slow Cooker chicken tacos with black beans with side of refried beans (Skinnytaste recipe)
Friday: Eating out (we have a band thing tonight for school so part of the fundraiser involves buying a meal)
Saturday: Salmon with asparagus and some sort of side dish (I haven't decided yet).
Have a great week!
Do you mind sharing what area you live in? We spend 125 a week here for a family if five. (West Michigan)
I live in California. This week we didn't go out but I was doing average for the whole year which I just did in quicken. Some of that includes eating out while on vacation as well. I feed 4 to 5 basically all adults. But to be fair I'm including the kid in college in my budget. She lives in the dorms and pays about $400 a month to eat on campus. My typical week. I spend about $60 a week at the farmer's market. My organic beef is about $20 per pound. Eggs are $7.50 per dozen. This week I also bought two boxes of apples that was $40. I also bought our turkey for Thanksgiving for $4.29 a pound. Then, I bought a apple pie for Thanksgiving from Apple hill for $30. It adds up fast here. P.S. I buy pretty much organic or local only. We don't have an Aldi's here. We have trader joes but their produce is horrible. I do buy a few snacks and stuff there but it mostly processed food at our trader joes.
I'm guessing you eat out several meals a week? Also, keep in mind that all our grocery budgets will vary depending upon how many people are in the household :-).
Not really. We eat out once a week but we do eat out a lot on vacation. This week was a fundraiser for band at school. It was $50 per adult and $30 for the kid. So right there it is $130.
Also, realize I have a typo in my post. So embarrassing. I meant to say $200 to $300 per week. Ugh... I'm not sure how I typed $400 to $500. We are about $1000 a month but that includes feeding my college student at $400 per month
I've made your deep dish pizza recipe using a yukon gold potato, and it turned out very well. Love your recipes, by the way.
I don't remember what my family ate this week. I started working three months ago, and only make dinner twice a week on my days off. I really miss it.
The two dinners I made were ribs, mashed potatoes, and corn; and chicken pot pie soup.
My husband does the cooking since my medical condition doesn't allow me to, and helps with absolutely swamped this week so the eats were easy!
Monday – veggie omelettes, fruit
Tuesday – soup from the freezer
Wednesday – I was at a business event and the chicken Marcella was delicious
Thursday – we both had meetings that ran late so we met up for Mexican
Friday – I'll have leftovers from last night. my husband will have pot roast. In years past I would've had a nice pot roast and veggies in the fridge for him during his insanely busy season. He cooked it himself this time but insists that my shopping for the meat, veggies, etc. really helped him out. #Sweetie
This week's total came in at $96.69! I'm happy with that!
Sunday the hubby & i went on a small road trip to a brewery and the girls stayed with my parents/family & had dinner there. Hubby & i had Taco Bell.
Monday was Halloween & i wasn't feeling well; once my headache subsided, i grilled some hotdogs served with homemade macaroni salad that I made Sunday evening in anticipation of Monday night.
Tuesday we had grilled chicken tenderloins with rice & fresh fried green beans.
Wednesday was spaghetti & meatballs with a tossed salad.
Thursday hubby grilled up some homemade cheeseburgers with seasoned potato wedges.
Tonight is going to be a quick soup & salad night as oldest daughter has a school project to work on with classmates.
I haven't decided on Saturday's dinner yet, but it will be something from the freezer.
Did you hear about the couple who loves Aldi so much that they had their engagement photo session there? =)
http://www.al.com/living/index.ssf/2016/10/this_couple_loves_aldi_so_much.html#0
Yes! So great.
Monday - No idea, completely forgot, we did eat!
Tuesday - Leftovers
Wednesday - Chicken legs baked, rice, green beans, fruit
Thursday - Dinner out, family in town
Friday - Grilled turkey and cheese sandwiches, salad, fruit
Do I spy Lisey as Belle? So sweet!
Yep! She was so popular in that costume...people kept stopping her and asking her for a photo, just like they do with the princesses at Disney. 😉
I was just going to say that both Lisey and Zoe look adorable! 🙂
Thank you!
Monday - (splurge birthday dinner for my husband) filet mignon, baked potatoes, sautéed green beans and homemade birthday cake
Tuesday- leftover sloppy Joes from Sunday birthday party, raw veggies and dip
Wed - barbecued teriyaki salmon, quinoa, salad
Thursday - Shepherd's pie, salad
Friday - leftover Shepherd's pie, steamed broccoli
Saturday - chicken and brown rice casserole, salad
The recipe link for the tortellini soup did not work. It kept taking me to a survey.
Could you re-post?
Thanks
Oh my, that's odd! It's working for me. Try this: https://www.thefrugalgirl.com/2010/01/tortellini-soup/
Why didn't you want to use the Yukon Gold in the pizza?
Well, they're waxier than Russets, so I wasn't sure that they'd work properly.
I did use one last night, though, and the pizza wasn't noticeably different. Yay!
Question here: do you do food planning before or after you shop? I find that if I try to go to Aldi with a list, it doesn't seem to work out, and I end up going somewhere else to shop. You seem to have a rather wide list of things you make, so I was just curious.
I also don't like their quality of meat (maybe that's my store?, but I also grew up next to a butcher, so I may be spoiled). I don't remember if I bought meat from Aldi when I lived in Germany. And I've been extra hesitant since the horse meat thing. Do you find it to be sufficient? Any recommendations?
Yep, I plan before I go to the store, and I usually plan on picking up a few things at another grocery store. I've been shopping at Aldi long enough that I know what stuff isn't available there and can plan for that.
I've been trying to stick to a budget of $450 a month for two of us. This amount includes chicken I have to buy each week for the dog who has tummy issues. We have an additional $150 available per month for eating out, which we limit to once or twice per weekend (usually one meal with a beer and another quick meal like tacos or breakfast somewhere). This week I spent about $90: $60 at Aldi and $30 on groceries at Target. On top of that my husband spent $20 on beer.
Mon: home-made leek, potato, and kale soup and cheese roll (lunch at work); salmon, bread, and broccoli (dinner)
Tues: same lunch as Mon; frozen pizza, green beans stir fried with shrimp (dinner)
Wed: can't remember lunch but I know I brought it from home; stirfry with lots of veggies and tofu and Harris Teeter's Tikka Masala sauce, brown rice, and a little nan bread (dinner)
Thurs: left over stirfry (lunch); veggie burgers, home-made sweet potato fries, and steamed broccoli (dinner)
Fri: free lunch at work; ate out (dinner)--about $35.
Last weekend I made your deep dish pizza crust. My family was speechless. It was INCREDIBLE. My husband said that I should never make any other crust but this one. Thank you for all your recipes. I have made many over the years and have my favorites but this one might be at the top. Thanks again.
Yay!! I'm so glad it turned out well for you.
I was sick much of the weekend, so there were a lot of quick-n-easy from the freezer. I remember:
- Burgers, carrots, tomatoes, canned mandarin oranges.
- Dumplings, carrots, tomatoes, don't remember the fruit.
- Pork chops (they were so thick I cut them in half, as a result I'm getting another meal from them), applesauce made by a friend, broccoli.
- Taco night (veg built-in), oranges.
- Breakfast for dinner, at a diner I haven't been to in a long time. Now I know why.
- Moroccan-influenced meal (had a houseguest, and several mutual friends over): Moroccan turkey meatballs, North African roasted carrots, pearl couscous/pilaf style, spinach and strawberry salad. Then three desserts: the Pumpkin Pieless I'd planned; Apple Pie, inspired by local bruised apples at half price; and Stale Brownie Pudding because I thought I had enough guests to try it out; all with whipped cream.