Ironically, after struggling with it for days, I never did make much of a weekly menu. At least, not nearly as well as Jen does! I have to admit her "I'm not making a menu" menu is more organized than my "This year I'm getting organized" menu. I did, however, manage to go grocery shopping last week. Somehow, miraculously, I bought enough real food to feed us for the past 8 days, and (gasp!) there's still food left! And, sit down for this, I was under budget. I hate to hit you when I'm sure you're already reeling on the floor, but the final kicker is that I did all this at Publix. Not Sam's Club, not Dollar General or WalMart, but Publix.
I think I've figured out the three main reasons for my success, although obviously the stars lined up and the Gods of Groceries were in my corner. Still, I was greatly aided by the fact that my family eats anything I put in front of them. Well, sort of. Our kids are little, so we try to balance new things with familiar ones, and we give them their favorites for lunch and snacks. They make smart, healthy choices, so why not? How did we raise such great eaters? That's a whole other story, but they are, and it makes my job easier. Dinner is also made easier by the fact that I can cook. In fact, I enjoy it. Sure, it's a pain in the butt if I'm rushed or the kids are whining or the dog is underfoot, wiggling his eyebrows at me (what? your dog doesn't wiggle his eyebrows?), but when push comes to shove I have solid, basic cooking skills and I can throw stuff together and make a meal. The first two factors allowed me to do the third: I shopped the perimeter of the grocery store. That's where all the real food is anyway, and ultimately, that's my goal here, right? To eat real, local, sustainable food and make the world a better place?
I bought seasonal vegetables in their whole forms for the most part. I'm not sure where the global supply of shallots comes from, but I can't cook without them, so they made it into my cart too. I also didn't pay attention to the organic section. That word is so used & abused right now, I only trust it when I meet the farmer. Still, I bought real food, with minimal if any processing, and very little packaging, all of which helps to minimize the carbon footprint of the food chain.
I bought dried beans, which are cheap and simple, and a few family staples, like bacon. When I find a locally raised, pasture fed & finished, naturally smoked, preservative free bacon source, I'll be sure to let you know. I finished the long (2 hour) shopping trip in the meat department, buying Publix "Greenwise" products or natural cuts. The selection was pretty limited, I have to say, but it's a start.
What I didn't buy were processed convenience foods. No Lunchables, no frozen dinners, no meal-in-a-box things. I didn't even buy baby carrots - I bought a big bag of whole carrots, and I've been cutting them in different ways for different uses as we need them. That was the whole mission of this shopping trip I think, to trade a little time and effort for better food. I think it's worked. In the past week, we've had at least 3 vegetarian dinners - rare for us, but there were no complaints. The food has tasted great, probably because of the minimal processing, and we've tried new recipes throughout the week. The kids have tried a ton of new foods, and just last night my husband was shocked to learn how much he loves beets, which he'd never had before. (Ever??) So he and our son learned to love them together.
The main drawback to all this has been the amount of time and effort it requires of me, personally. The shopping will take less time when I learn better what I'm looking for, since I read every label this past trip. But the food preparation is still time consuming. I would caution anyone considering making these changes to allow plenty of time for the first few weeks. The less stressed out you are, the better choices you'll make. I confess, there was one night (only one!) that I was pushed to frozen pizza. Sigh. But by my reckoning, that's 7 nights better than average. Considering the new year is less than two weeks old, I'm pretty happy with that.
No comments:
Post a Comment