Photo: SXC

I do want to let you know that if you have a Mars grocery store near you, you should keep a close eye on their produce clearance cart. I get tons of limes, pears, apples and bananas that are just ready to eat off my local cart if I stop in Sunday or Monday. I’m talking about pounds of stuff for a few dollars. I also get cheap rolls there – $1.69 for fresh baked, incredibly soft blunt rolls.)

Target deals to keep an eye out for are clearanced popcorn (Pop Secret was on clearance if you have coupons.) and holiday Oreos in a blue package with snowflakes on it.

How did you do this week?

Here you can Save on Back-to-School Groceries

Photo: Vangelis Thomaidis/SXC

What did I get?
Gallon of milk 3.60
Ton of tea from Amazon 16.00
Dinner out $7
Trip to Martin’s $22.65

• 2 bags of chips (Buy 1, Get 1 Free)
• Paper towels (I try to use rags when possible, but I haven’t been able to cut them out completely.)
• Macaroni salad
• 7 Banquet frozen meals (Only $2 total after instant savings. I had a coupon off 6, so I only spent 80 cents total on them. Look hard at the fat and calorie content. Most of them are pretty high in both, but there were a few that weren’t too terrible.)
• 2 Dr. Oetker pizzas (Best pizza in the world. I like the spinach pizza the best.)
• Foot long Italian sub

Free food – The really nice farmer my brother helps out when he can gave us a ton of yams fresh from the ground last week, my mom gave me some apples because the packing house was overly generous with her box of seconds and my sister stopped in at the bread outlet and gave me a bag of bagels, which I used instead of a bag I had in the freezer.

My total for two weeks was $49.25 and I actually got a break because of the three convenience meals. (Eating out, subs and mac. salad and pizzas.) We got to use up a lot of stuff that needed to be rotated out  of the pantry and had a lot of fun with new recipes, like pepperoni pizza bread in the breadmaker and veggie filled tortillas. (We’re going to try the pizza bread again sometime, but with more cheese. The oregano completely overpowered the cheese.)

Now, if you are going to try this challenge, you do need to have a stockpile to start with or you’ll end up being really frustrated and overwhelmed. You may also want to completely avoid the convenience stuff. The pizzas were only $2 each because I had coupons from last week’s Sunday paper, but the sub meal was $11 and the meal out was $7. That’s about a third of the money right there. If I wouldn’t have already had enough fruit and veggies to use, I wouldn’t have been able to afford to do the meal out.

I think I’m going to try the challenge again soon without convenience meals to see if I can really build the stockpile, at the same time. I’m not going to do it next week, though. I’m going to need to stock up on bread and meat, so I’ll be doing a $50 trip on Sunday.

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So, here it is folks – a whole table of groceries for $51.78. (Since my sister called and asked me to pick up the $2 cantalope to add to her fruit salad, I’m actually under budget. I spent $49.22 on my groceries.)

The thing is, I didn’t just buy groceries for my house. I also bought three types of cheese and two bags of organic chips for Easter brunch. The blueberry Wenslydale cheese alone was $7. (But if you’ve ever tried it, you’ll understand why I bought it for Easter brunch. Oh, is it good!) Without the Easter food, I would have been about $15 more under budget.

So, how did I manage to buy organic products, fresh produce and meat and some special things for Easter brunch without blowing the budget? Well, I used coupons. That’s right. Coupons for organic products. They do exist! I emailed a few companies that had products I like and got some very nice coupons in return. I also kept an eye out for the rare organic product coupons in the paper.

Then, to really make the most of my trip, I looked for reduced items. That Nature’s Promise bread? 99 cents a loaf. And the produce? Almost all reduced to $1 a pack. I tossed the fresh sweet potato fries in the freezer and will have the salad for dinner, so I’m not worried about anything going bad. The meat was on sale instead of reduced, but if you go shopping on the days when meat is typically reduced in your grocery store, you can really save there, too. (Don’t know when markdowns are typically made? Ask your butcher.)

I hope hearing about this trip encourages some of you who haven’t been couponing to start looking for coupons for healthy products.

How did your shopping trip turn out this week?

I only used a few coupons because I didn’t have the sale paper to match things up with ahead of time and I forgot to go online to view the ad. Why would a store not send its ad out to nearby customers? Weird, huh? Anyway, I just basically picked up all their loss leaders and bought some produce. (Note to self. Go across the street to Mars to buy produce next time. I could have probably saved 50% on the produce costs.)

4 64 ounce containers of apple juice
1 gallon of milk
2 bags of ravioli
2 bags of fries
1 box of mini waffles
18 eggs
Mozzarella block
2 packs bacon
2 packs soft tortillas
2 packs cream cheese
Sour cream
Apples
Carrots
Broccoli
Tomatoes (I can’t wait til I’m picking my own produce again!)
2 loaves of bread
8 pack Bounty (I have really reduced my use of paper towels by using cloths I made from old flannel sheets, but there are some things I still use them for.)
2 packs of Fruit Chillers (I love these things. The kids call them ice cream and consider them dessert. I’m going to try to make my own during strawberry season this year.)
Marshmallows (They’ve been begging to make Rice Krispie Treats.)
5 packs Raman noodles
Teddy Grahams
Pasta

Not my best trip, but not bad for no planning. Some day, I will be organized again and will be able to buy this much for $25.

Doesn’t it make you feel good to know someone can buy groceries for around $50 even if they’re completely disorganized and unprepared?