WIS, WWA | Almost no shopping
What I Spent
This week, I spent:
- $23 at Safeway
And that's it. I have been quite absent from the grocery stores this week!
What We Ate
Someone asked recently if I ever make a meal just because I have a picture of it and the answer is no.
In fact, I don't think that has ever occurred to me! I always am trying to remember to take a picture of my food each night, but sometimes I forget, and in those cases, I am grateful for an appropriate photo from my media files. 😉
Saturday
Zoe was at work, so I was just cooking for me. I sauteed some onions, tomatoes, and jalapenos, added some shrimp, then added a good splash of half and half to make a sauce. And I put all of that on top of some mashed potatoes. 10/10!
And no recipe needed.
Sunday
I made some bourbon chicken and broccoli with rice.
Monday
I made a pan of baked ham sandwiches, and we had some fruit on the side.
Tuesday
We had a leftover night; Zoe ate sandwiches and I ate the bourbon chicken leftovers.
Wednesday
I had clinical paperwork to do Wednesday night and Zoe had an exam to study for, so we had an easy dinner of frozen pizza.
Thursday
I brineraded some chicken tenderloins and pan sauteed them.
And I made some croutons, cut up some veggies, and we had chicken salads for dinner.
I also got out some of the English muffin bread from the freezer and we had that toasted with our salads.
Friday
I have a late simulation lab today and Zoe works until early evening, so it might be a takeout night for us!
My husband was away for the week, so our meals looked very different from the usual when there are two adults in the house.
Twice, because of kid commitments, we ate at Subway which happens so rarely it felt like a lovely treat. I had coupons, so it was quite economical ($20 - including tax and a tip - fed 4 people!)
We had company last night so had pulled pork sandwiches and veggies. But most other evenings were either leftovers or simple things like toast. I'm ready to eat more "normal" home-cooked food next week! I'm feeling chili vibes in this fall air...
WIS: 150 @Aldi.
WWA:
Fri: salad and focaccia.
Sat: sliced cucumbers, hotdogs on brioche buns with melted cheddar cheese on top.
Sun: salad, the last of the leftover eggplant cubes with pasta sauce, bagels with cream cheese and smoked salmon.
Mon: salad and pasta carbonara.
Tue: salad and nachos.
Wed: tacos with leftover tofu and black beans filling, diced tomatoes, mixed greens and shredded mozzarella cheese.
Thu: apples and honey, challah and apple butter, pasta alla norma to use up some eggplants.
Tonight: salad and focaccia.
Have a great weekend, everyone!
Saturday: Cheeseburgers on homemade buns, oven fries, pickles. I am aware that pickles are just barely a vegetable, but they're homemade refrigerator pickles, so I count it. 🙂
Sunday: Michaelmas, a.k.a. the feast of Saint Michael and All Angels. It's traditional to serve a goose for this, but geese are pretty hard to come by, so we had to make do with a chicken. It was an enormous chicken--over 7 pounds--so I'm thinking it wasn't so far off the size of a medieval goose. We also had baked potatoes and cucumbers with salt and vinegar, and our traditional St. Michael cake. The tradition is that St. Michael triumphed in the battle between the angels by piercing Lucifer with a sword and throwing him into Hell. So for several years now, I've made a devil's food cake and let my children stab it with toothpicks before they eat it. They love this, unsurprisingly. I never make frosting for this cake, instead just serving it with whipped cream.
Monday: Leftover chicken, rice, and gravy, plus more cucumbers.
Tuesday: Chicken and vegetable soup made with the chicken carcass, biscuits, oatmeal-raisin cookies
Wednesday: Enchilada casserole, cucumbers with salt and vinegar. I made the casserole with bull meat. I am SO CLOSE to finishing that meat, a mere four years after we butchered that bull. Ahem.
Thursday: I had only about half a pound of ground beef hanging around, so I used that in a baked pasta dish with the roasted tomato sauce I had made a few days earlier, and lots of asadero cheese (our substitute for mozzarella). This is what the children had, along with cucumbers and ranch dip and chocolate chip cookies. My husband had some of that, the last of the enchilada casserole, and a bowl of chicken soup. I just had soup.
Tonight: Husband and eldest will be gone elk hunting, so I think the children at home will have grilled cheese or tuna melts, and I'll finish the soup.
@kristin@going country, I admire your account of your Michaelmas feast. You probably won't be surprised to hear that Jane Austen mentioned eating roast goose on Old Michaelmas (Oct. 11) 1813, to "secure a good Sale of my 2d Edition" of Sense and Sensibility. And I know that DH would have enjoyed taking part in your children's tradition of stabbing the devil's food cake--as well as eating the cake itself!
@kristin@going country, Kristen, your meals always sound so delicious!
I bet they taste delicious, as well
☺️
@A. Marie, I can't remember where I first got the idea of stabbing the devil's food cake as a way of liturgical celebration for St. Michael's feast day--somewhere online--but at the time my three boys were 8,6, and 4, so it was the perfect tradition for us. There are few things more thrilling to little boys--or big boys--than permission to stab. 🙂 Feel free to adopt the tradition next year in honor of your husband (and St. Michael). 🙂
@Kim from Philadelphia, Thank you! I think they are, but I am admittedly biased.
I am really looking forward to a cheaper grocery trip next week! I've been averaging $80 ish, which seems like a lot for one human. This week at my house:
Monday - Chicken Salad with romaine, chickpeas, bell pepper, purple onion, grape tomatoes
Tuesday - Crockpot Pork Stew made with mini potatoes and green beans
Wednesday - I had a salad topped with some beef fajita meat from the freezer and an overnight cabin visit in the Texas Hill Country
Thursday - I ended up eating a freezer meal of Butter Chicken instead of the leftover stew I had planned (I wasn't feeling soup!)
Friday - Chicken Tacos with rotisserie chicken, lettuce, tomatoes, salsa, cheese
Saturday and Sunday - kitchen closed, but I have meals in the freezer to take to work
**Your shrimp dinner is hands down my favorite from your week!**
I would eat that shrimp meal again and again! And I prob will recreate it next time Zoe is out at dinner time.
WIS: $13 at the Regional Market, $10 at Wegmans, $15 at Ollie's, and $53.50 at Price Chopper.
WIA: Nothing too spectacular (the usual chicken drums and whatnot)--certainly nothing as inventive as Kristen's shrimp, veg, and mash!
@Oh, I forgot this one: On Friday, I roasted one of the Reduced for Quick Sale chickens I bought at Tops on Thursday--and on Saturday, I combined the reserved juices from the chicken with a container of my previously frozen chicken stock to make a chicken noodle soup with fresh dill from the garden. (Some of my summer-sown dill seeds are already coming up.) The Bestest Neighbors, my next-door neighbor, and I all ate it heartily.
I spent about $142, but a lot of that was restocking things I lost when my fridge died. I saved everything in the freezer by putting it in my big freezer, but many items from the fridge had to go. Once I restocked eggs/milk/condiments/cheese/lunch meats/veggies...it added up. I also bought cat food and litter this week.
I didn't keep track of what we ate, but from memory it was some roast I found in the freezer with a baked potato and collard greens, chicken tenders with onion rings and green beans, lasagna with salad, fried pork cutlet with sweet potato and peas...and I'm not even sure the other nights. It was a crazy week and included way more canned veggies than I care for because of the lack of fridge.
This may be an odd question, but have you ever made the bourbon chicken using an alternative for the bourbon? Neither my husband or I drink, so I’d hate to buy bourbon to try a recipe.
I haven’t! I don’t drink either so I just bought a small bottle of bourbon and I keep it here just for the recipe.
@JenRR, they sell a bourbon extract. I haven't used it, but I have used the rum extract (it's used in Watkins 5 flavor bundt cake). I would guess the bourbon extract would work pretty well, although a small bottle of bourbon would probably cost the same.
WWS - This was my beginning of the month stock up at Costco. I spent $224 on food items. I spent $42 at Whole Foods mostly on Tuesday Deals. This did include some extras like 3 months worth of coffee. (Dockworker’s strike)
WWA - I have been preoccupied this week and put very little effort into cooking. I know we ate, but I can’t remember what and when exactly. We had roast chicken and rice one night. I also made a roast beef with roast veggies. None of it was particularly memorable. I’ll do better next week.
Enjoy your weekend!
I spent a fair amount of money this week because my in-laws arrive tonight and I wanted to get all of the menu planning and as much grocery shopping done beforehand as I could. (They're staying for a week and a half.) I still have some of the $900 in grocery gift cards that I won in August and it has been SO NICE to grocery shop with zero stress about staying in budget. I still shop the sales and shop frugally, but I haven't worried about the total at all. Ahhhhhh. 🙂
This week we ate...
Saturday: The 5 of us were in 3 different places. My 8yo son and I were the only ones at home and he wanted spaghetti. Easy!
Sunday: Beef short ribs, corn casserole, and summer squash
Monday: Southwest chicken alfredo
Tuesday: Chicken fajitas and a discounted fruit tray from Meijer (it was an impulse buy and even at 75% off, I'm still not sure that it was a great value, which means that I will probably never ever buy one at full price.)
Wednesday: Ham, sweet potatoes, and peas
Thursday: A new-to-us recipe of sheet pan ham and cheese hashbrowns (a winner!), broccoli, and green grapes
Friday: One-pan smoked sausage and potatoes. I will rummage through the fridge to see what we will have with it. I haven't done great with food waste in the last week, so I'm trying to take the time to use what we have.
I remember your $900 in gift cards. What a great way to use them!
What I spent: $42 at Kroger
What I ate:
Friday - creamy pasta salad
Saturday - enchilada casserole
Sunday and Monday - ditto
Tuesday - breakfast for dinner, hashbrown casserole and a banana nut muffin
Wednesday - I wasn't feeling well and had canned chicken soup with crackers.
Thursday - enchilada casserole from the freezer
Today - I've used up all my frozen leftovers at this point, so I'll find something quick and easy to make, maybe some rice with canned beans or a quick pasta bowl
Re: JenRR's question about the bourbon - you could buy one of the miniature bottles. It takes very little bourbon for this recipe. Or do like Kristen says she does and just keep a small bottle around - it's not like it will go bad. My non-drinking mother-in-law always had bourbon in a cupboard for her Lane cake recipe.
What I ate... well, I did the best I could. I did buy a few things on my way back home from evacuation, just to be absolutely sure I had enough stuff. Maybe 10 bucks there.
Leftover "naked" Publix wings and salad that I brought back from evacuation in a cooler.
Peanut butter and jelly on bread plus an apple. I had put my opened homemade jelly in the cooler - it's a lot nicer to have peanut butter and jelly than just peanut butter on bread. My daughter uses honey with hers but mine had crystallized.
Generator time; I could use the refrigerator, but the stove and microwave draw too much power and my cheap-oh camp stove failed, so tuna salad with chopped veggies and fruit in it.
Power was back! I had pulled pork from the freezer with baked tiny potatoes, which needed using up, and broccoli.
Pulled pork again, with fresh fried okra and part of a huge baked sweet potato, baked in a wrap in the microwave.
Tilapia filets, fried, and the rest of the broccoli, topped with cheese that I'd kept cool in the cooler. Part of the sweet potato.
Some chuck eye pieces from the freezer with a frozen veggie mix and the last of the potato.
@JD,
I always make sure that I have peanut butter and jelly on hand when doing hurricane prep. I could live off of PBJ for several days.
Or peanut butter and honey!
Yep, the bourbon lasts for eons. I've had my bottle for several years I think. Ha.
I'm so glad you have power again!!
@JD, I'm glad you're back in your home and have power. My western NC relatives are alive, thank God, and in their homes but have no idea when they will have power again. Gas line waits are an hour and a half long.
@Bee, I'd have some individual mayo packets as I like PBMs. Face it, I like PB just fine, eat a spoonful for a mid-morning snack a few times a week.
Saturday - my husband was out of town for the weekend at a memorial and the kids and I got home late from my parents house so I threw a teenage mutant ninja turtles frozen cheese pizza in the oven (the crust is patterned like a turtle shell but otherwise it seemed to be a pretty standard cheese pizza)
Sunday - spaghetti and meatballs with Trader Joe’s veggie meatballs for me, salad and steamed broccoli and carrots on the side
Monday - broccoli, chicken sausage and orzo skillet
Tuesday - I thought last week would be our last beach picnic night but we had even better weather this week so we went again. September and October due tend to be our “summer” months here, June-august tend to be more cold and foggy. We had sandwiches and fruits and veggies on the beach.
Wednesday - brineraded chicken for husband and kids, zucchini fries and a honey nut squash with hummus for me, pearl cous cous for everyone, steamed carrots and
Thursday - salad night with chicken on my husbands and a cut up quinoa burger on mine, kids had breaded chicken breast (fancier version of chicken nuggets) and raw cut veggies, crescent rolls
Friday - I’m going Glamping (it’s a tent but large and with a wooden platform floor and beds with sheets, all cooking is still done outside over a fire or camp stove) this weekend to celebrate my friends 40th birthday! I think we are just planning a snacky dinner for tonight.
We stocked up on meat at Costco, so spent more than usual:
$250 - Costco
$29 - regular grocery store
$27 - Trader Joes
Just over $300 for the week. We are feeding two adults and a teen boy.
We ate:
-Panko shrimp & cauliflower gnocchi with fresh tomatoes & parmesan on top
-Pizza the night of the debate (we hosted DS17's class for the debate watching party)
-Cold pizza another night, not by choice, but because we had no power. I had an apple with mine, in a nod to health
-DH grilled chicken & made rice. We had that 2x.
We must have eaten another night, but I can't remember. Tonight we will have the grilled chicken over salad.
@Hawaii Planner, I'd add "and the occasional friend or three" of your son. So consider some of your spending as a potential plus one for meals/snacks.
@Selena, it's true! We definitely feed his friends as well.
WIS: $74, which was $70 @Aldi, $4 @ Walmart market for one people food item while buying cat food.
WWA: I cooked a pan of pineapple-rosemary chicken for DH. I ate lots of vegetarian casserole and several vegan burgers. Pulled a bag of gluten-free flatbread out of the freezer for DH. Last night I had a stuffy head and ate Progresso pasta and bean soup heated up in the tall Starbucks mug bought at Goodwill. It perfectly holds one can of soup: dinner in 2 minutes! Honestly, if it was not for the sodium, I could live off pasta and bean soup.
@Ruby, pineapple-rosemary chicken?? Oooh, could you share the recipe?
@A. Marie, there's not really a recipe. I drained and reserved the juice off a big can of pineapple slices. Chopped most of the slices into chunks and scattered the over a pan of chicken. Salt and pepper the chicken to taste. Add some dried thyme if you like.
Pour the juice into a saucepan and add about a tablespoon of brown sugar, a little squeeze of ginger from a tube, and a cornstarch-water slurry. Stir and cook until you have a kind of pineapple gravy. Chop us some fresh rosemary, stir into the pineapple "gravy" and then spread it over the chicken. Bake at 375 F until the chicken is done and has some nice browned bits. If you like spicy foods, you can add some red chili flakes when you season the chicken.
I think this was maybe a 20 oz can of pineapple and I chopped up the last few pieces to add to oatmeal. It was totally a "use what you have" kind of meal and made a big pan of chicken.
I am getting into the kitchen a bit more these days but am still not entirely steady, so we continued with quick simple meals this week (DH is pitching-in but is generally disinterested in cooking other than bbq). WWA:
Saturday - baked (pre-made) chicken skewers, buns, Greek village salad
Sunday - bbq steak and potatoes, brocolli
Monday - leftovers
Tuesday - pasta with lemon cream sauce and shrimp
Wednesday - cabbage roll soup and baguette from the freezer
Thursday - air fryer drumsticks, oven fries
Friday - black bean quesadillas?
Wishing everyone a happy weekend
@kristen - You eat a lot of mashed potatoes (fellow potato lover here). I assume you do instant? Or do you tend to make a pot of them to have for the week for quick meals?
I've actually never made instant potatoes! I usually just make a small batch of fresh mashed potatoes for myself and eat them over a few days. I like them for breakfast topped with fried eggs; so good!
I peel the potatoes, cut them into pretty small chunks, and boil them while I'm prepping the rest of the meal. Then I mash them with eyeballed amounts of butter, salt, pepper, and half and half.
Friday - Fettuccine Alfredo
Saturday - Take out pizza
Sunday - use up food to clean out the refrigerator and kitchen - Pesto crostini, dragon fruit, corn on the cob, french fries, peanut butter toast...I'm sure there was more
Monday - Taquitos and guac
Tuesday - Homemade pizzas (I picked up a bag of King Arthur pizza flour from Costco - it was a great price - and just followed the instructions on the bag. It came out great!)
Wednesday - take out burritos/tacos
Thursday - Mapo Tofu, rice, and potstickers
Tonight is either eggplant parmesan and texas toast OR one pot enchiladas. We'll see what everyone wants.
I took a good long look at all the food in this house that was NOT being eaten, and said to myself SELF THIS IS RIDICULOUS!! Here you are buying snacks from the vending machine at work for lunch and hitting McDonalds/Wendys/etc almost every morning for breakfast. I decided to eat down the freezers *have 3 freezers, 2 small ones and a larger one* the refrigerator and the pantry over the month of October (and maybe beyond). I'm hoping for minimal spending this month, at least for food, and so far I'm on my fourth day of taking frozen dinners to work for lunch, and eating frozen whatever LOL for breakfast (so far, Lean Cuisine herb roasted chicken has done double duty as a work lunch AND breakfast, Michelina's Wheels and Cheese [lunch], Red Baron mini pizzas [breakfast] and Michelina's Pop'n Chicken [lunch last night at work]). Never again with the Pop'n Chicken, taste and texture similar to cardboard!! The fact that I'm saving money helps too ($1.59 for a small bag of chips? I could buy a big bag and split them into baggies!!)
@Suellen Roley, good for you on eating down your freezer surplus. I've finally gotten mine to a manageable amount and it's no longer stressful to open the freezer. Yeah!
Love your shrimp meal, sometimes the best meals are the recipe-less ones that just get thrown together based on what's on hand!
We had:
- Yassa (Onion sauce) over rice
- Curry beans with pita bread
- chick peas over rice
-Sandwiches
- Build your own pasta salad
And that's all I can remember
$12.73 @ Costco, $14 @ Scratch and Dent, $37 @ Grocery Outlet
Sunday - Mezze platter. Kibbeh, kafta, labneh, and tabbouleh.Warak Enab, Fattoush, Knafeh, Baklava and grilled fruit. Instead of Bulgar we used Quinoa and rice. We made GF and regular pita bread and GF Knafeh. We served 23 people.
M- Green salad w/ leftover skewers from Sunday
T - Grilled moose steaks, green salad w/apples and blue cheese vinaigrette
W - Leftover Steak Salad w/fresh GF sourdough bread, banana pudding
Th - Fresh Salmon, coleslaw, baked sweet potato & green beans
F - picked last of the tomatoes, peppers, basil and very large sweet onions (they do not keep well) and will make several batches of "yard sauce" basically oven roasted veggies, pureed and froze in quart containers. We use this frozen sauce first before cooking with the home canned sauces. Today I will be teaching my cousin's SIL. He loves canning, dehydrating and freezing foods for his young family. His wife works 6 days a week, he's a nurse and works overnight weekend shifts. I love teaching these skills! We have turned our 1 acre garden into a family community garden. Each family gets 4 - 4x16 raised beds, we share the orchard, berries, grapes and in ground garden space (corn, potatoes, squashes and bush beans).
S - Minestrone, rustic GF bread mini loaves, apple salad
Sun - work - The family dinner is Italian Wedding Soup, salad bar, Italian Sprinkle cookies
Yesterday, burritos with chicken and salsa made with the last of the garden tomatoes.
Wednesday, steaks with truffle butter, air fryer fries, and brocc.
Tuesday, orange chicken with brocc and rice.
Monday, I have no idea.
Tonight, Swedish meatballs with the probably last of the season dill.
This weekend, if I'm not too tired after wrangling two puppies to the Blessing of the Animals ("Please don't piddle in God's house, Jasper") chicken tagine with olives. Because the local gourmet food purveyor by the church has preserved lemons.
I spent $45 at the farmer’s market last weekend- everything looked so good and I was clearly craving veg. Some of that was cabbage, onions, and potatoes that will last us awhile. I could not resist the fresh Brussels sprouts. And my husband spent $50 at the store on dairy products, some snack foods he likes, and a few staples.
What we ate:
My husband made beef stew- his maiden voyage with the Instant Pot. No disasters and tasty stew!
I made Korean beef tacos (also instant pot) with Asian slaw and sriracha sour cream.
One night we had GF pasta with all the random veg bits from the fridge and one chicken breast sautéed up together and topped with homemade pesto from the freezer.
We had one dinner with family to which we contributed roasted Brussels sprouts, and appetizers.
And the rest was leftovers- salmon and potato salad plus the above dishes. And i think my hubs had a frozen pizza the night i worked late, and finished it off for lunches.
I do love those prowl the fridge and freezer put together meals- they are satisfying even if they don’t taste great, and sometimes they turn out amazing!
$466 at Kroger, or thereabouts. We are spending a bit less on fruit, since I am not eating much of it right now. I get the guys apples, clementines, and occasionally bananas. Blueberries are always on hand for yogurt.
That shrimp looks so good!
Saturday/Sunday: homemade pizzas--we were so blessed to get our power back on Friday night after just six hours.
Monday: Um. *scurries to fridge to look at weekly menu* Chicken shawarma, rice, roasted cauliflower with carrots and red onions. Also pizza leftovers for whoever wanted them.
Tuesday: ham and bean soup, first of the season. Navy beans>Great Northern beans.
Wednesday: Mexican night
Thursday: DH cooked a bunch of burgers and made mac and cheese.
Tonight we had leftovers, as DH is fasting and we had...a lot of burgers. I did stop on the way home from taking DS#3 out to get some pics for his class, and we grabbed some chips.
Saturday - can't remember. Likely steak and salmon with a side dish
Sunday - usual dine out Mexican
Monday - leftover grilled burger from the freezer w/cheese (no bun), fried up some leftover potatoes. Just me for dinner.
Tuesday - leftover Mexican with some added diced red pepper, mushrooms, and onions. Better half made himself a pizza
Wednesday - grilled burgers, potatoes (boiled) in the oven with onions
Thursday - lemon peppercorn grilled chicken, fried leftover potatoes, sauteed red peppers and onions.
Friday - salmon for better half, steak for me, wild rice
@Kristen - I thought I'd seen those pancakes before lol...
I've been reading your blog for 15+ years and have never made your bourbon chicken recipe -- until last night! I was catching up on your blog last week when I was doing meal planning and decided to put it on the menu. It was a HUGE hit, including with my 6 year old daughter and 1 year old niece... that never happens!!! Thank you so much for all you share. 🙂
Yay I'm so glad!