MPM: A New Challenge

I'm going to avoid grocery shopping for a while. My fridge and freezer are full, so I want to see how long I can go without buying more. That doesn't mean I'll wait 'til the cupboards are bare, just until I can't make another nutritious meal without shopping. I used to do this sort of thing before we lived in Israel, but I haven't done it since. It's about time.

As I was reading other blogs this past week, several posts stood out to me encouraging me in this direction. Jamerrill at Holy Spirit-Led Homeschooling had a post about once-a-month grocery shopping. On the one hand, I don't think we have the space for that in our home--we live in an apartment, have just one fridge and small freezer (no deep freeze), and have very little pantry space. On the other hand, I don't know how much we eat in the course of a month--a week, yes, but a month, no. I should know these things. Moreover, I bet we could go two weeks between shopping trips if I were careful. Since the stores with the best prices are about thirty minutes away, we only shop at them once or twice a month and do most of our grocery shopping at the more expensive local stores. If I could avoid shopping at the local stores, it really would save us money.

The other issue is food waste. Spendwise Moms recently had a post on the topic of avoiding food waste. I do try to get the most out of our groceries, but sometimes things do go bad. I want to see if I can avoid wasting any food for the next few weeks to help me go longer before I need to shop.

That said, I know I'll need to do some shopping over the course of this month. I'll need milk in a week or so, eggs in about two weeks, and I will run out of produce at some point. I will also need more cream for making baby food. Next week, I will post how I've done in terms of avoiding food waste and whether I need to buy anything.

DH and I are also trying to get back into healthy eating habits and lose a little weight. To that end we are trying to avoid eating between meals. I allow one snack between lunch and dinner, because that is the most difficult part of the day for us. Snacks consist of crackers and sardines, fruit, or the baked goods I make on Fridays.

Here's this week's menu. As always, I have a regular breakfast menu, try to have one new recipe in the week, have one vegetarian meal for the week, and alternate between two homemade soups for lunch.

• Sunday: Oatmeal pudding with apples and raisins, Prepackaged burritos and fruit, Turkey enchiladas with stuffed poblano peppers
• Monday: Eggs and toast, Turkey and vegetable soup, Beef with radishes on rice
• Tuesday: French toast, Broccoli potato soup, Spaghetti
• Wednesday: Rice, Turkey and vegetable, Enchiladas and stuffed peppers
• Thursday: Eggs and homefries, Broccoli potato, Beef with radishes on rice
• Friday: Pancakes, Turkey and vegetable, Tuna casserole and braised celery
• Saturday: Pumpkin coffeecake, Broccoli potato, Beef with radishes on rice

Menu notes:

• The new recipes for this week are the enchiladas and beef with radishes (from one of my cookbooks).
  
• Both soups are made with the stock from our Thanksgiving turkey carcass, and the enchiladas use leftover meat from the turkey.
  
• Spaghetti is my vegetarian meal for the week.
  
• The enchiladas, potato broccoli soup, beef with radishes, and coffeecake will all contribute to clearing out my freezer

And of course, all this is in the name of better home management and menu planning, which you can read more about at Org Junkie.