Hey y’all! Welcome to the series Weekly Eating.
Here is where I’ll talk about the week’s meal plan versus reality, what we ate for the week, and how we did budget-wise. I hope it gives readers a behind-the-scenes look into our life through the lens of food, and it’s also a way to keep us on track with meal planning and grocery budgeting.
Feel free to share your wins and lessons in the comments below!
Gosh, it feels good to be back y’all!
This summer has been a lil crazy, and we haven’t been great about meal planning with being gone or hosting family pretty much every weekend. But that’s ok, sometimes life is like that.
Over the weekend I made a huge ol pork roast and a big batch of ground turkey, because the boy was sad about how long it had been since we had burritos. So… lots of meat in the fridge. He was pleased. I also made a giant crock pot full of black beans which became my best black bean soup and black bean burgers.
While my sister was in town last weekend, we also went shopping and picked up a ginormous box of honey cheerios on sale, because she has discovered that she has a gluten, soy, and corn intolerances. As you can imagine, that significantly limits ones food choices. Turns out cheerios is one cereal that has no HFCS or soy or wheat in it.
And, we also made a batch of macarons! Because almond flour is just fine. And I’ve always wanted to make them! They turned out pretty darn good looking too. I added a few fresh strawberries to the filling and we put cocoa in the batter for some chocolate strawberry flavors going on. Delish.
Oh I also got a big-a$$ watermelon, and turned it into all kinds of goodies! I pickled a big batch of rinds for a Food Swap next week, we ate tons of it fresh, it became a watermelon-feta-mint salad, and several smoothies.
Monday:
Breakfast – Honey cheerios + a banana + soymilk
Lunch – Black bean soup!
Dinner – Enchilada casserole. This used up some small corn tortillas, black and pinto beans, pulled pork, corn, and tomatoes. Topped with pickled jalapenos, cheddar, guac, and salsa. SO DANG GOOD.
Snack – a macaron
Tuesday:
Breakfast – same cereal, bc I’m boring!
Lunch – leftover enchilada and a salad that happened to match the skirt I was wearing that day, haha
Dinner – portobello stir fry
Wednesday:
Breakfast – smoothie with watermelon, pineapple, frozen blueberries, blueberry kefir, and greens
Lunch – leftover stir fry, and a Greek salad
Dinner – Leftovers! We are going out of town again for the weekend, so I’m busy using up or freezing all the perishables
Thursday:
Breakfast – smoothie with watermelon, pineapple, frozen blueberries, blueberry kefir, and amla powder
Lunch – uhhh it was a bit of a crazy day, so I didn’t get a lunch per se. I did sneak a maple bacon donut that was brought in to work. #noregrets
Snack – a cranberry yogurt
Dinner –we were tired of all the leftovers, so we decided on a spontaneous date night to AYCE sushi at RocknRolls!!
Friday:
Breakfast – I finally successfully used up all the watermelon, so today’s smoothie was frozen blueberries and cherries, pineapple and flaxseed powder
Lunch – Black beans & rice
Dinner – whatever we can scrounge up before heading to the airport. Everything else will get frozen while we’re gone.
The Weekend
We had a death in the family, so we are out of town for the weekend. It will definitely be interesting seeing how expensive and wasteful traveling is. I am going to try to plan ahead and pack at least some nuts or trail mix to take so I don’t give into temptation to buy things at the airport.
Y’all are in for something BIG on Monday, so stay tuned!
Food Total: $5.92
All the major expenses happened last week or earlier, so I’m not counting them for this week. When we return though I’ll have to do a stock up trip. If you really want me to fess up, that pic at the top was an ALDI stock up last week that cost us $68.79.
The only things purchased were on a whim, a stop-in at Walmart on my way to work. I desperately needed Ibuprofen (one to keep in my car) and some cold sore medication (BOO cold sores, the worst) and while there I grabbed some bananas and avocados.
Luckily, I remembered to grab one of my reusable canvas bags from the car! So no plastic bag, yay!
Lessons Learned
So, the boy actually eat way less meat than I think he does. Especially now as I am borderline vegetarian and am not very helpful in eating it. And I think… that… I may have actually burnt him out on burritoes! I did not know that was possible. But he said he actually got tired of the ground turkey and pork (I guess that’s what happens when that is all there is to eat for lunch and dinner for a week straight…)
did you see my post on money saving tips for burritos? ostrich burrito?
I did not but I’m intrigued by an ostrich burrito…
Amla powder packs in a huge antioxidant punch! That’s my kind of smoothie!
Agreed! It’s super bitter, but smoothies mask the flavor perfectly. Do you think putting it in something like pancake batter and cooking it would decrease the antioxidants at all?