When I decided a week and a half ago to try monthly shopping/meal planning, I didn’t realize Hurricane Sandy was coming, but now that I know I’m SO glad I stocked up last week on food for the whole month.
When people ask me for my #1 grocery money saving tip, I always say the same thing:
Meal Planning.
In fact, I even have a fancy meal planner you can download for free.
But even I get lazy, and the fact that I had to plan meals and shop every week was getting to be a pain. So this month, I did all my shopping last Tuesday. Monday night, I planned out all our meals for the end of October and the Entire month of November, so I would make sure to get everything we would need.
My Wegmans Trip:
Lots of canned goods, frozen veggies, and staples like pasta and rice.
My trip to the Bread Outlet Store:
4 loaves of bread, 3 packs of tortillas, and 4 Boboli pizza crusts for Saturday’s make your own pizza.
20 pounds of chicken breast which I separated into 1-2 lb freezer bags. I cut most up into strips or nugget size so they’ll cook faster.
One week into the plan, it’s working great. I LOVE having a whole docket of meals available and knowing that I have all the ingredients on hand.
What’s on my menu plan? Well, of course all my favorite pantry meals! Shopping from the pantry is a great way to save money on groceries. In fact, I used my own Pantry Staples list as a guide as I was making my shopping list.
So keep an eye out for weekly updates on how this experiment is going. Already, we’re reaping the benefits — no need to brave the crowds at Wegmans this week!
Pin It This post may contain affiliate links, which help support this site.How frequently do you menu plan? If you do a monthly plan, how is it working for you?
The bread outlet store…..where is that? Do you have a favorite area meat market?
I go to the freihoffers store and Palmers in Henrietta
I used to shop & plan monthly and loved it. But now that we are a full-time RV family of 5 traveling the country in our RV theres no way we could do this anymore. I have to shop every 3-5 days due to not enough storage in the fridge/freezer and cupboards (2 small ones and some space under the couch). I still try to menu plan for the month which helps with our grocery budget and the dreaded question of whats for dinner but I really miss having a stocked kitchen.