Groceries

I love grocery shopping! I love making menus and lists and then 'planning' out how I'm going to complete the task. I especially love going by myself, but today Colton and his 'friend' Uncle Casey got to join me. (I call Uncle Casey Colton's friend because it was like having two children with me!)

So, this month I made it my goal to make a month long menu, stick to it and see how much I could save by buying store brands over some name brands. I decided store brands for many things would make no difference to my cooking as I tend to use a lot of 'extra' spices anyways. I ended up making a menu that consisted of 16 dinners from September 29th - October 24th. I left some nights out due to our strange schedules (work, hockey, volleyball and bowling) and also left some nights as leftover nights...

So here are my meals I came up with for the month:
Lasagna (And an extra pan for Casey to take to work for the guys - they love it!)
Grilled Chicken and Ceasar Salad
Chicken Enchiladas (Limberlost Style)
Homemade Macaroni and Cheese
Potato Kielbasa Bake (Rachael Ray)
Chicken Alfredo (Kraft Food and Family)
Salisbury Steak and Smashed Redskin Potatoes
Goulash (Freeze leftovers!)
Country Ribs with Cheesy Potatos and Corn
Chili
Scalloped Potato and Ham
Shredded BBQ Pork Sandwiches with Macaroni Salad
Chicken and Dumplings (Jessica Simpson via Rachael Ray)
White Chicken Lasagna
Chicken Noodle Hold the Soup (Rachael Ray)

Armed with my list, I set out to Wal-Mart. I know many people don't like Wal-Mart, but I find it to have the best overall deals without having to scour the weekly circulars. Also, I have found their store brands to actually taste the best... I did great, I stuck to my list and only bought a few things that were not on my list...Grand total for all ingredients (and I mean ALL, it's been awhile since I've actually grocery shopped!) $199!! Whoo Hoo! I'm so excited - by buying store brands, I saved almost half on each item! Good luck and happy grocery shopping!