Weekly Menu and Shopping Plan to Save Money and Frugal Grocery Haul 5-17

Due to Mother's day and two birthdays our grocery budget was blown so here is my Weekly Menu and Shopping Plan to Save Money and Frugal Grocery Haul 5-17.

 See how I did with a plan to spend between $50 - $70 for a family of six for the week.

Frugal Challenge - How to Stockpile When You Have Very Little Money

                             How to Stockpile When You Have Very Little Money. Stocking a pantry when you don't have extra money is easy if you follow a few steps and work at it slowly.
Recently when I posted about this topic I received a few comments and e-mails like the one below.

Do you have any advice for people who cannot afford to purchase that much food at a time.... I would love to do this, have even tried to follow this, but I cannot afford to start.... 

Here was my answer:
I was in the same boat when I started a couple of years ago. Then I really focused on what I could get for almost free or even free with coupons. I just made it a priority to look up the deals on couponmom.com and then make stops at the stores when I was out. Even if you just buy doubles of something when they are cheap you are money ahead. Coupon using does take time and I don't do it as much now but if I have a really money tight week or two I will spend the time to clip and match the deals so I can bring home more for my money when I shop. Good luck.

Really it can be overwhelming to begin a grocery stockpile but it is a wonderful asset to a household for a few reasons:

1. You always have ingredients on the shelf to pull a home cooked dinner together. It may just be spaghetti but knowing you have the sauce and noodles is wonderful.

2. Say your car breaks down and you face a huge repair bill, it is nice to be able to prepare meals from your pantry and not spend money at the grocery store for a week or two. You may need need to pick up some milk and fresh produce but to skip all the other isles can save you a lot money until you recoup the cost of that transmission.

3. Say your kids invite a few extra friends like mine do all the time. We have an open dinner table policy. I love that I can head to the freezer to make some garlic bread or open up a couple cans of veggies to help stretch the meal. 

If you don't have any extra grocery money to start buying extras then use coupons to stretch that grocery budget. You can follow lots of deal sites to help let you know where the freebies and real cheap buys are for the week. If I know I am going to Target or Walmart during the week I will take a few minutes to look and see what coupon match ups there are. Almost every week you can find a few items for free or pennies when you match the deal with the coupon. Start doing this once a week and you will start stashing away extras of odd items here and there but after a while you will see that you have two and three cans of this and bags of that or bottles of shampoo. Just continue doing this and when you find you are not buying the items you already have at what would have been full price you can then use those few extra dollars to stock up on the deals for that week at the grocery store or to buy some markdown meats and breads for the freezer.

Frugal Challenge Update and Stretching My Grocery Dollars

Well, I wanted to finish doing my taxes, or at least get them ready for the tax guy, but I am glad to say I am done. They will be dropped off tomorrow and I am relieved to have this job completed.

Having been sick last week, I did not get around to my regular deal hunting and coupon runs but there is always this week. The upside is I didn't spend as much as I didn't go to the grocery store and we were forced to eat out of the pantry and freezer. It is nice to have food stockpiled for just these types of needs.

I wanted to share some of my grocery budget stretchers. I used to easily spend up to $200 a week on food and toiletries for six people and four animals. I have now almost cut this in half. Some weeks are still closer to $150  but that is still a savings of $200 per month. While sick last week, I had to fill a prescription and knew I had a coupon for a $25 gift card to Albertsons for a new prescription. The meds cost me .99 and I rec'd the gift card so I made $24.01 to shop with. Look for coupons like this to markets, drugstores and Target. I am sure there are others but these are the ones I have used.

Another way I stretch my food dollars is to try and use absolutely everything up. I HATE to waste food. I will freeze almost anything to keep it from spoiling. Some examples of what you can freeze are cottage cheese that when thawed, is great to use in lasagna in place of ricotta cheese.

 I freeze cheese too, and once thawed I just grate it and use it for things where it will be melted. You can't tell any difference. Same with cream cheese and sour cream. Before they spoil, I will freeze and just use them in my mashed potatoes the next time I make them.

Fruit is another thing I will freeze when it is getting old. Bananas freeze easily in their peels and I just thaw and use in muffins or bread. Berries and grapes can be frozen and added to smoothies.

 Bread can be made into bread crumbs when it is getting old and stale. One thing we do is have French toast once a week. I use up all the old bread and heels that no one uses for sandwiches. The kids have always ate the heels this way so they are not picky. This post is getting sort of wordy so I will share my other ideas next time.