November 2011, Week 2: Can I feed a family of 5 for $450/month?

Updating today on spending since the last post on this topic.

I went to the health food store, Dollar General, and the deep-discount grocery store.

Health food store: $42.81
Grassfed Ground beef and beef liver 5.72, 3.63, Namaste GF flour $10.99, 2 dozen eggs 3.35 ea, 5# bag carrots $5.99, 2 half-gallons milk 4.89 ea


Dollar General: $8.74
3 bags Fritos (buy 2 @ $2.95/get 1 free), Cocoa Pebbles $2.50, Trident $1
(Incidently, I printed off and used a $5 off $25 coupon from the Dollar General site--helped trim down household expenses a bit! They seem to offer these on a regular basis.)

Deep Discount Grocery Store: $42.43
This store doesn't label the items on the receipt and I just put stuff away w/o writing it all down. Off the top of my head, we got: 4 boxes granola bars, 3 bags Lenders bagels, 4 bags mini whole wheat bagels, 2 boxes LIFE cereal, 3 jars of organic juice, a pound of butter, 5 8oz bags shredded cheese, box of frozen corn dogs, 3 lbs dried black eyed peas(for hubby to plant next spring), soy sauce, sweet and sour sauce, 1 small can Bush's Baked Beans, 2 lbs brown sugar(Domino), 2 pkg Kraft Singles (though I thought I'd put 3 in my cart, as well as a can of Ready-Whip), mini marshmallows, and a can of International House of Coffee mix.

Last tally: $337.85- $42.81-8.74-42.43= $243.87 left for the month

There are some good loss-leader deals at the local grocery that I might pick up this week, along with Tortilla chips... and I will probably need to get more milk by the end of the week as well.


My dinner menu for the week looks like this:

Monday: Venison Roast(may cut into steaks), mashed potatoes or fries, sauteed cabbage and onions, maybe salad
Tuesday: Ground Beef (or maybe venison from roast above) stir-fry with broccoli, carrots and rice
Wednesday: Sandwiches-nut butter, Fritos, cut up apples or carrots
Thursday: Hamburgers, Coleslaw, Carrot sticks, homemade freezer pickles
Friday: Beef Nachos-seasoned browned ground beef over white corn tortilla chips (that I need to buy still)
Saturday: Pizza?

Snacks: Dried/fresh apples, homemade popcorn, zucchini brownies, granola bars, "cheesy tortillas", pb bagels
Breakfasts: eggs, oatmeal, granola, cereal, "cheesy tortillas", bagels with nut butter
Lunches: leftovers, eggs and sauteed veggies/rice depending on what's in the fridge, nut butter sandwich