March Grocery Buys, a Good Deed and the USDA Official Food Plans

Feb 28 $16.27 Big Y.   Cinnamon Bread, 2 lbs of Stew Beef and 1 pound of Carrots.

Feb 28    $36.59     Shoprite    3 cases 24 pk Poland Spring.   2 bags Utz potato chips, pint Blueberries, Store brand shredded cheese (free after store coupon) 5 count Avocado, Celery Hearts, 5 lbs carrots, 3 apples, 18 pack eggs, 1 Green pepper, 1 Red Pepper, 2.26 lb bananas. and 4 oranges.. And then I had a conflict.  I had so many coupons (doesn't look like I should but I did) that they said I couldn't use my $5 coupon off $50.  So I turned to the woman behind me (older woman, buying paper towels, bread and store brand cereal) and asked her if I could buy her order.  Even adding her items, I still only paid $45.96 and I made her smile.

March 3 $73.65 Produce market Basil plant, Pork roast (had one in the freezer but DH wanted it for dinner this date) 4 deli meats/cheeses, 2 sodas, 2 loaves of bread, pickles and chips.  Must remember to not let DH come to this store.

March 6 $35.70  Shoprite  Lots of deals here. Large cauliflouwer, 2 lbs of turnips, 5 lbs of potatoes, corned beef, 2 lbs of shrimp and a bottom round roast.

March 11 $30.29 Stop and Shop 2 loaves of bread, pound turkey breast, 1/2 lb roast beef, chips and 8 piece fried chicken.  Guess who was with me?  LOL

March 12 $48.37 Stop and Shop Soda Bread (never tasted the one we bought end of February), Sourdough loaf, More Turkey breast, provolone, tortilla, more chips, Low sodium Victoria pasta sauce, 2 Stella Dorro cookies, almost 6 lbs of Italian sausage, 2.5 lbs of red peppers.  If you do not have the stop and shop app you NEED TO GET IT!

March 14 $ 94.65  Shoprite Delivers (again my preferred home service)  6 lbs of frozen salmon portions, 2 lbs of tiliapia, 3 lbs of onions, 10 lbs of potatoes, another corned beef, 2 lbs of bacon, 2 lbs of grassfed ground beef, rye bread, 20 # rice, 1.5 dozen eggs.   This is probably the last haul for the month.

Boxed order 52.98 after Ibotta kickback 16 pk of tortillas, huge container of chopped garlic, 6 cartons of beef broth, jar of McCormick gravy mix (I use this sparingly, should last an entire year), two cans pf Pam cooking spray, 24 ounces of Kraft parmesan cheese, large box of saltines.

Cannot forget that I also received a misfits order which I paid $28.30 for almost 20 lbs of organic (mainly) produce.   I will have another order get billed to me on March 25th.


I earned a $20 visa card from constant contact for doing a survey on how our business uses their products.  I used it to purchase an Amazon gift card and used that (as well as another gc balance)  to purchase coconut oil, avocado oil and  avocado mayo so no out of pocket.

Total spend was $416.80 for the month of March.

Then in discussing with a friend ways to stretch the budget, what does our government really consider a good budget for families?  I have a family of 3 sometimes 4 adults that I feed daily.   One is a very big eater because he forgets he has eaten.  My friend has a family of 3 adults and 2 children.  I remembered that there was a USDA chart.   Here is a direct link if you want to download it yourself.


According to this chart, For my family I have four monthly plans to choose from.  I have chosen to do the chart based on who actually lives in our house.

Liberal Plan $996.60
Moderate Plan $817.40
Low Cost Plan $656.80
Thrifty Plan $504.70

Wow.  I have been beating myself up for spending to much.  Most of the time I am between Low Cost and Thrifty.  Once in a while when we do a huge stockup or DH is with me a few times we inch into Moderate.    I am going to try and keep it at Thrifty or Lower.  

I really wonder how huge families do it. 

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