It might be day one, but it feels like day four! This past week, I found myself visiting different stores to check out their pricing, product quality, sales, and special offers. I mentally recorded what I would buy at Dierberg's, Schnucks, Global Foods, or Aldi. I then printed a weekly blank menu to record what we would be eating every day.
My 12 year old boy is vegetarian, my husband is lactose intolerant and gluten free. My 15 year old daughter and I are allergic to mushrooms. On any given day, we have choices at the dining room table and often cater to everyone.
If we are going to do this though, less choices will mean more food.
So here we go! Every day we will be starting our morning with oatmeal and applesauce from Aldi, and ripe banana from Schnucks (came in a bag. 14 for $1.59). It will be one of our staples.
Lunch will be peanut butter and jelly sandwich (or tortilla for my husband :) ), possibly left over from the day before (I am eating our leftover chili tomorrow!), carrots and celery sticks, a choice of apple or ripe banana. Not bad!
I divided up a large bag of pretzels into small bags. We can have one for snack every day (not my gluten free husband :( ). We cooked 12 hard boiled eggs. We each get 3 this week and choose when we want to eat them. 12 eggs are $1.59 at Aldi and came in a carton (none of the pink Styrofoam!) We called it our treat!
For lunch today, because we were home, we diced and sauteed russet potatoes and each had an omelet made with two eggs.
Though we had two meals, we had to portion them and we all felt unsatisfied! We had food on our mind most of the day.
Tonight, I cooked brown rice and we made vegetarian chili and some cheese with it. It was more filling and I think we are all feeling better.
So what did we learn today?
My husband said that he was definitely more aware of his food, and staying in the moment while he is eating very slowly.
My daughter ate very slowly too because she "did not want the food to be gone".
My son reflected while making his lunch for tomorrow that it was hard to make food that he was not allowed to eat right away.
As for myself, there was a moment yesterday when I was shopping, I forgot that I was making the "choice" to do this for a week and I found myself very anxious about not being able to provide nutritious food for my family.
We have spent $93.89 so far. It should last us until Friday.
Our best finds:
At Global Foods:
a 2 lbs bag of carrots for $1.39. I cleaned them and cut them into carrot sticks
a 3 lbs bag of vegetables for $1.99 (It includes carrots, cauliflower and broccoli)
At Dierberg's:
The Perdu chicken is $.99/lbs until the 28th.
A 2lbs bag of sharp cheddar is $6.99
At Aldi:
Eggs
Oat Bran Bread: $1.29
We did make one compromise: we are allowed to drink our herbal tea, though it was not included in our purchase (we did buy our coffee for the week with the SNAP money). An argument was made t that tea is medicinal!
Can You Imagine What Hunger Feels Like?
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From Jan. 26-Feb. 1, 2014, members, staff and clergy of Congregation Shaare Emeth will take the SNAP Challenge and try to live on the average food budget of a Missouri SNAP recipient – just $29.25 per week or less than $1.40 per meal. SNAP stands for Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program (formerly known as Food Stamps). Why are we doing this? To raise awareness about the struggles faced by millions of food-insecure households, to experience first-hand how difficult it is to afford nutritious foods, and to renew our commitment to do what we can to put an end to hunger.Please join us by attending one of our hunger events, following our blog as we document our experiences (subscribe by email in the box on the right, subscribe to the blog feed, or check back daily), joining as SNAP Challenge participant and blog author, or participating in an alternate way. Let's all learn a little more about what it's like to live solely on food stamps.
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