$40 Challenge Plan

Alright, so I have challenged myself to spend only $40 on groceries for the next two weeks. This is a huge challenge for me, especially considering that I easily spend that on our produce alone... But it's fun to do something different.

So, I looked in my freezer, which is pretty well stocked right now. This has not always been true for us in past years, a couple years ago there is no way I would have been able to do this challenge. Today when I looked out there I had some leftover creamy chicken tomato soup, and 3 freezer meals ready to go! Right off the bat I had four dinners, 9 more to go (we're having Easter with the family so that's one meal I don't have to plan). I inventoried mainly my meat, because if I don't have to buy meat then I can pull this off.

This is my menu that I came up with...
Creamy Chicken Tomato Soup;     leftovers
Honey Rosemary Chicken;            freezer meal
Orange Teryaki Chicken;                already marinading
Hawaiian Chicken;                          freezer meal;                      green bell pepper
Chicken Divan
Homemade Mac & Cheese
Almond Crusted Tilapia                                                              1/2 cup almonds
Crockpot Sweet Garlic Chicken                                                  lemon lime soda
Buffalo Chicken Spaghetti Squash                                              spaghetti squash
Carnitas Tamale Pie                                                                      pepper jack cheese
Slow Cooker Buffalo Chicken Sandwiches                               bottle of Franks buffalo wing sauce
Fiesta Nacho Chicken Bake                                                         can tomatoes with green chilies
Slow Cooker Pork Chops                                                            potatoes

I picked really simple recipes that also happen to be ones that we love! When I go shopping I usually try to buy a little extra of the things that we use all the time, which builds up my pantry stock slowly. Then if I want to splurge, on some steak or something, I can with still being able to make meals we love the rest of the week. And I also have a very creative husband who cooks me amazing food probably more often than I cook for him... I'm super spoiled, I know. He has this ability to look around and see what we have and make it, where I'm the recipe queen that if I don't have a plan and my recipes I end up not cooking! I can always pull boring stuff out of thin air, but that doesn't interest my husband who can pull amazing stuff out of thin air!

Then the other real challenge about my $40 for two weeks is lunches and breakfast. The kids mostly eat cereal or eggs, we have enough cereal to make it through. If I buy milk & let them have it only on their cereal I think I can stretch a gallon for a week. I'll buy two loaves of bread and that will have to do, I do have some chili that is a lunch favorite for the boys (thank God for thermoses). So if I buy a big thing of eggs that will work for breakfasts & if I hard boil some they're a favorite snack too. I have maybe a day or two worth of apples sitting on the counter and half a bag of frozen Costco blueberries, so once the apples are gone they can snack on those. They also have been warped from the time they were babies and love frozen mixed veggies, so they have those for snacks & in lunches. I can throw side dishes together with the other stuff we have hanging around the pantry and freezer. I made my grocery list for the next two weeks and priced out what everything normally costs and I come in just under $40, by my guess it will be $36. Now I just need to tuck my little lady in for her nap and once she wakes up we can venture out to Winco. Although Winco may wait till tomorrow and we could have a little cobb salad for dinner tonight, yep that sounds way better!