Sunday, August 20, 2017

First Grocery Shop For September?

Yes September. I have blown August's budget clear out of the water, so I need to "take a cash advance" on September's allotment. I still have lots of meat in the freezer, but my fresh veggies are getting low, and the ones I have...well, I am not supposed to eat those. I froze the last 5 cauliflower I bought and I still have some of those left, but I needed avocado, broccoli, zucchini, mushrooms....stuff like that.
Non-food items cost $84.89
 My first stop was Staples where I needed to buy more toner (black and colour) cartridges. My printer finally gave up on me last night because I ran completely out of toner. The package of Post-its I didn't have to buy but I have been looking for the full adhesive post-its. You cannot buy these at the Dollar Store. When I found them, I felt I should grab them. I need them to make "masks" for my stamping. There are 4 pads in the pkg. for $4.92   The ink cartridges cost $70.20, and 13% tax brought the total to almost $85

Produce cost me $27.62

My best deals here were probably the 3 bags of broccoli for $5, 3 cartons of cremini mushrooms for $5, and the four avocados for $1.97
Dairy cost $22.90  Not pictured here is another dozen eggs for $1.97
Meat cost $37.24 when you add in the cost of two trays of lean ground hamburger. They are not pictured here because I had already divvied them up into one pound freezer bags. The split package of pastrami was on sale for $4.49 The frozen chicken fillets cost $1.88 a pound and the lean ground beef was $2.88 a pound. I paid $3.79 for the kielbasa and $6.49 for four salmon fillets. The only pantry item I bought was a box of Stevia (100 packets) for $4.49  There were no taxable items, so my groceries cost me $92.15
Starting with today's shopping, I need to keep track of all my food receipts until the end of September. I don't know how much more or less my food budget will be for the new diet. August was kind of a wash because I was buying groceries for my company including the kids, plus I was buying ingredients to follow the new diet. Anything I bought for my company that I wasn't allowed to have, I have since given away to my son and his fiancee. From now on, I should be restricting my food categories to just produce, meat and dairy.

4 comments:

  1. Well, September is only some 10 days away, isn't it? So, it should be fine to "borrow" from the September budget for the rest of August. These things have a way of balancing out over the long run :) You did very well with all your grocery shopping. Excellent prices all around.

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    1. I think I do well with food prices but then I seem to compare our prices to yours, and my "bargains" don't live up to yours. But I should be proud of what I can accomplish by finding the best prices available. So thank you.

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    2. Your ground beef price was a lot less than what ground beef is selling for, over here ($5.99/lb, for 85% lean, per this week's ads; $4.99/lb. for 80% lean at another store); salmon fillets are $8.99/lb., smoked sausage 10-14 oz. is $2-$2.50 depending on brand; frozen boneless chicken breasts or tenders, 2.5-3 lb bags for $7.99 with store card or $6.99 with store card and $1 off digital coupon, cabbage $.49/lb. The ethnic store (which has the cheapest prices has broccoli on sale for $.49/lb. and celery for 3/$1.00. I might go tomorrow and buy one bunch of celery to cut up and freeze (only like it in soups, etc. or mixed with ground beef) and some broccoli. Prices are good till tomorrow.

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    3. I feel better about it now. I guess I can just keep doing what I do, and buy up when the price is right.

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