I have entered the All You Magazine Grocery Challenge contest, and today is the first official day of the competition. All You is challenging entrants to spend no more than $25 per person per week on groceries for one month, and the frugal champion will win some awesome prizes.
The rule for this contest is that any food you buy – be it groceries or eating out – will count towards your weekly total. 10 finalists will be chosen and asked to submit recipts for all of their food purchases during the contest period. You can also utilize stockpiled food, barter, and utilize home-grown foods. Household supplies such as cleaning items, toiletries, etc, do not count towards the weekly total.
I’m excited to begin the challenge, and it couldn’t have come at a better time! I’m sure you’ve probably noticed that I haven’t done much shopping lately. Life has been especially hectic recently, so I have been eating from my stockpile and also eating out a lot. I have a habit of turning to fast food when I’m stressed out – I’m sure many of you can relate. When you’ve had a crazy day, cruising through the drive-thru for a Big Mac sounds a lot better than cooking! This doesn’t help my budget or my waistline, so this contest is a perfect motivator to cut out the fast food.
Since I will be using stockpiled ingredients in some of our meals, I went through the house today and snapped photos of all my stockpiled food, to give you an idea of what I already have on hand:
Beans & soup
Bottled water
Lots of frosting!
Canned Goods
Baking supplies, Capri Sun, chocolate, tons of granola & protein bars, fruit snacks, lots of meat marinade, plenty of salad dressing, Crystal Lite, peanuts
More peanuts
Lots of rice and popcorn
Tons of pasta & pasta sauce, noodles, Rice-a-Roni, salsa, cooking oils, peanut butter, maple syrup, corn muffin mixes, etc.
Oatmeal, cereal, potatoes, Hamburger Helper, applesauce, tea, baking soda
Inside my freezer – a few pre-made frozen meals, berries, some meat, etc.
