Friday, January 18, 2008

Eat from the pantry...for a month




In visiting frugal blogs, and getting my feet wet in the whole couponing arena, I have acquire an "ahem" rather FULL pantry. And living in a <700>

Since we've also had some unexpected expenses lately (see post on "what not to do in a rental car) I thought I would try something different for our grocery shopping. We are going to declare February "eat from the pantry MONTH"! I didn't mention before, but our tiny freezer is also crammed full, so full its difficult to shut sometimes! So....I think this will be a very good thing:)


Here are my own self-imposed guidelines for the month:

1) no grocery shopping except in these cases: we need milk or have company coming and cannot complete a basic company-friendly recipe without an ingredient, OR something is free or super close to free with a coupon. A really good deal doesn't cut it


2) I will stock up on fruits and veggies before the month begins, in a storable form ( frozen veggies, or things that don't spoil quickly like apples, onions, carrots, etc.)


3) household items will be bought(en?) at a place other than the grocery store to lower temptation


I will update at least once a month on meals etc. , and how we're faring! Oh, and to give you background on our family...its just me and the hubby and a 31/2 month old baby:)


Visit Crystal at Biblical Womanhood for more Frugal Friday ideas!

6 comments:

Laura said...

I look forward to reading your follow up post. I have a full pantry and freezer, so I'm sure we could go at least a month without buying anything but milk and eggs (oh and maybe some produce). Hope it goes well for you!

Sarah said...

I should do this with you . . . my pantry and freezer are full! At least I'll be inspired to start cleaning out and eating what we already have!

Best of luck!

Melissa said...

Good luck! I look forward to your updates!

Many Blessings,
Melissa

Vickie said...

I hope this works out well for you. Essentially that is what we did for about three weeks over the Christmas break. I finally went to the store last weekend. My three strapping teenage boys were very excited and have eaten us out of house and home this week. Seriously, one of those HUGE cans of cashews from Sam's....GONE....three days! Gosh, who knew that a 15, 16, and 19 year old boys could eat so much! ;)

I want to try and stock up and do the same thing a couple months out of the year. It is easier in the summer to do this for our family.
Blessings,
Vickie@PursuingSimplicity

Kim said...

I did a freezer/pantry inventory recently and came up with 29 meat meals and probably 10 more meatless ones.

I'm only picking up the essentials for the next month or so.

Now to keep my DH out of the stores - he came home with 3 pks of toilet paper - he thought they were a good price - $2 more each than the 4 pks we bought last week! At least we won't run out any time soon :)

Kelly said...

What a great idea! I don't think I could go that long without fresh produce though. Maybe once we get our freezer stocked up, I could aim for a modified version of this - no groceries other than milk, eggs, bread and produce.