Goal 1 - not needed this week; semester starts a week from today. Doing holiday style non-planning where we decide each night what we feel like cooking. Will plan for next week, probably this weekend, since our schedules could still change up to about Thursdayish.
Goal 2 - have started tracking; $57.12 on people groceries.
This seems like a good place to note that December grocery spending was $589.30.
I need a little motivation for meal planning so I’m in!
goals:
meal planned yesterday and picked up my groceries this morning. so far so good!
I got given an expired (but fine) block of vegan feta and managed to successfully turn it into a meal based on a TikTok recipe?
Thought I would share my links for grocery coupon apps here
Fetch: get lower amounts (a dollar at MOST per receipt) but you don’t have to add “deals” like you do on Ibotta. I get about $12 a year with this app for scanning grocery receipts. But you can only cash out in gift cards. My referral link:
Come save money on Fetch with me! Sign up w/ code K2C74 & get 2,000 pts: https://referral.fetch.com/vvv3/referraltext?code=K2C74.
And this one which takes more work because you have to “add@ deals prior to Scanning receipts but I get about $145 a year in cash back from this in cash. Just use my referral code ‘jhkdnqm’ at registration for $10. Sign up at → https://ibotta.onelink.me/iUfE/1005cd3f?friend_code=jhkdnqm
I did my goal of looking at the receipt. So far I have learned that cauliflower is shockingly expensive.
Ok YES, thank you! When the hell did that happen?!
Some of the vegetables have been turned into my soup for the week. One daikon and some turnips remain. We also apparently had some salad greens, but my husband polished those off.
I did have to toss a satsuma with a big brown spot. 
OK, so, meal planning and batch cooking:
This week I have made a big batch of gumbo. 1 jar of that into the freezer, possibly 2. Unfortunately this stuff may be responsible for the extreme fartiness followed by acid reflux that I had yesterday? Ugh.
I also roasted mushrooms, peppers, and onions in a chili marinade, for burritos. This should last me a few days. And I made rice.
Maybe I’ll do some dried beans in the instant pot today while I’m working. I have red, black, and white. Unsure what to make with them though.
This week’s meal plan: I had things at home to make teriyaki chicken for dinner last night and the leftovers will be lunch today. I ran to the store after my appointment without a meal plan yet but was able to think fast and grabbed ingredients to make Pollo Guisado for lunches, Jambalaya for dinner tonight/tomorrow, and brussels sprouts to put with ham from the freezer and mashed potatoes for Friday night dinner. That is enough to get us through the week. $53.37 in groceries for this first week.
Late to join but I’m here now!
My main goal is actually to spend MORE on groceries. Since moving abroad we have just been picking up ingredients bit by bit and still don’t have a very well-stocked pantry so my cooking has been pretty limited and uninspired. I want to get back to making more creative meals and to have the ingredients around to make more of the recipes I used to cook a lot, even if it means spending like, $10 on imported peanut butter or whatever. Then at the end of the month I can at least see if our grocery bill got too out of hand with those splurges and cut back.
Caveat: still traveling this week so none of this will be happening until we’re back on the 7th.
Goals:
It’s only Wednesday and we have like $20 to spare in the grocery budget but I think we’re good for the rest of the week, aside from some milk.
Wasn’t planning on starting snackuary for 2 more days but I went grocery shopping hungry last night 
.
$200 between prepared/ treats (dumplings, pizza, salad bags, freeze dried fruit on great sale! , chippys… ) and some stocking up (canned salmon and sardines, nondairy milks, eggs, a new to me GF pasta) and snacks (yogurt, fruit, 
, ).
I did unf*ck some of my kitchen so hopefully will manage some easy batch cooking on the weekend!
I am about to have my kitchen, fridge, freezer, and pantry back.
My recollection is the freezer is kinda stuffed. I think some meal planning will be in order. Plus bring legumes back into lunch rotation.
I feel like I should quantify the meal planning/batch cooking goal?
Like, batch cook 2 times per week? I likely won’t make that this week though. I batch cooked once and the rest of my week is shot except MAYBE Saturday evening?
But maybe I can catch up later in the month.
What if I did: batch cook 2 times a week, with 2 portions going into the freezer each time? That seems reasonable.
In other news,
WE NOW HAVE ALDI HERE.
It opened today. I can’t wait to go and see if it’s still cheaper than everywhere else.
I wish I had the freezer space to batch cook. When we get around to remodeling the kitchen a bigger fridge/freezer is high on my list.
OMG congratulations on this exciting addition to your life.
I cannot wait. Though I can’t guarantee I will be able to rein in my spending on my first trip!
You should give yourself some freebie money the first time! Just to try stuff 
