It’s day one of my “No (low) Spend” challenge month so I thought that I would get the ball rolling! I plan on giving myself a personal challenge everyday & will be posting about it to see if anyone wants to join in! 
Today’s Challenges:
1. Food inventory
2. Menu Planning & ideas
3. Organize & Declutter Linen Closets (pics to come!)
4. Get my first photo up for my Project 365! *check!*
I took an inventory of whats in my freezer & pantry so I can start building a menu plan for the month! With $21.00/day for the 6 of us, it’s not going to go very far some days I’m sure! So building meal plans starting with whats sitting in our freezer & pantry will be the way to stretch our budget this month!
Here’s what we have on hand:
- 30 lbs of flour
- 2 blocks of butter
- Sugar, salt, spices, etc…
- 4 pkgs frozen fruit
- 1 can cherry pie filling
- 1 pkg breakfast sausage
- 1 pkg Oktoberfest sausage
- 1 1/2 bags of fries
- 1/2 pkg. perogies
- 1 pkg hash browns
- 2 pie crusts
- 4 bags organic fair trade coffee beans
- 2 turkeys
- 10 cans of assorted “lunch” foods (alpha-ghetti type stuff the kids like)
- 5 cans CHUNKY soup (hubby’s)
- 10 cans spaghetti sauce
- 5 pkgs Lipton “sidekicks”
- 4 cans of soup
- 1 can beans
- 1 cake mix
- 2 boxes of breakfast strudels
- 2 pkgs cheese slices
- 1 block of cheese
- 2 whole chickens
- 4 pkgs of ch. breast
- 1 large steak
- 1 beef roast
- 2 boxes of chicken breast strips/nuggets (gross yes, but my 17 yr. old loves them)
- 1 1/2 pkgs of meatballs
- 4 pkgs of gr.beef
- 1 pkg. chicken breast (sliders) burgers
- 1 pkg. beef (sliders) burgers
- 2 pkgs ribs
- Kraft dinner (again, 17 & 8 yr old loves this.. Nobody else will touch it!)
Assorted open boxes of crackers, cereal, etc…
And a fridge full of leftover food from Christmas & our “regular” foods that are always in the fridge from eggs, to cheese, to milk, fruits, veggies, etc…
And I have a box full of assorted organic free range meats that I eat, (the kids as well sometimes) that will see us throughout the month. Hubby & I have drastically different eating habits as you may have gathered…
Menu planning seems to be my arch-nemesis so I really need to step it up, plan our meals, and stick to it! I really hate trying to think up meal plans as I seem to plan the same things over & over again…
Here’s what this week looks like:
Sunday: Baked Nachos (meat, veggies, cheese)
Monday: Spaghetti & Meatballs with broc/cauliflower
Tuesday: Soup & grilled cheese
Wednesday: Roasted Chicken, potatoes, veggies, gravy.
Thursday: Chicken Strips & Fries
Friday: Breakfast for dinner for kids, egg salad sandwiches for hubby
Saturday: ??
I’d like to come up with as many ideas as possible from our freezer & pantry inventory… Anyone have any suggestions & ideas for me?
Anyways, this will get us through the week and it’s mostly from what we already have on hand. I have $84.00 to last us until Thursday when hubby gets paid again. I decided to “top us up” from the $70.00 with an extra $14.00 as I should have planned a bit better as my original goal was to have $21.00/day throughout January and I’m thinking that’s going to be quite the stretch somedays!
I’m hoping to have as many “no-spend” days this month as possible. Today should be one if we don’t run out of milk. I have 2 loaves of fresh bread rising & waiting to be baked, dinner is planned, and I’m not going anywhere today as there’s no Church service this Sunday. So home I’ll be enjoying the day with my hubby & children while counting my many blessings for the upcoming New Year! 
Well, i’ll be back tonight with an update of how my day went, progress on my daily goals, & my final spending balance!
Starting balance: $21.00
What’s Day One of your No (low) Spend Challenge looking like? Do you have any self-challenges for today?
Wow! That’s a lot to work with!
If I was working with that list, I’d buy some rice and pasta and some grains and fresh produce. With all that protein, you can definitely get through the month!
What are the leftovers from Christmas? I’d try to incorporate them into something else or freeze what you can’t use up now.
Meal ideas using ingredients you already have:
*chicken pot pie
*homemade pizza
*roast and veggies in the crockpot…super easy and tasty
*sloppy joes…you can make the buns using some of that flour you have!
Do you have to plan breakfasts/lunches as well?
@ Amy, we have pasta but hubby won’t eat rice.. I have a bag of organic brown rice that I eat…
I’ll keep buying as we run out.
@ Stephanie, great ideas, thanks! I don’t plan breakfasts & lunches.. We just “wing it”. I do bake all our breads, buns, etc… well, 98% of the time anyways.
Carla I will be cheering you on from the sidelines!! I don’t think I could honestly join in. I NEED my Tim Hortons on the way to work today. That would be a frill. A very necessary frill, but indeed a frill
I am going to try to increase the savings account though…so I will be taking notes from you…my fiscal hero.
You’re doing great! My goals for today are to get caught up on the 2011 wrap up (numbers, blog posts, close out the books on our budgets, etc) & plan for 2012. It’s a lot of work to end the year! And, I’m taking my oldest son to see Alvin & the Chimpmunks. Maybe I can catch a nap?
Awesome list! The menu looks pretty yummy too for cleaning out your pantry
Good luck! I will be trying to impose a no frivolous spend month as well. Hopefully it will continue on for a few months!
Looking pretty good! You have that Oktoberfest Sausage, I suggest getting a couple cans of beef broth, and a can of tomatoes, add your can of beans and any veggies you have on hand to make soup (you can find a recipe for it on my site or at Schneiders.com). Then make some bread/buns to go with. My kids LOVE it. The pie crusts can be used to make quiche and add a salad to that.
Good luck!
What great ideas everyone has! Maybe I should post my pantry items for instant ideas…:)!
It looks like you have a FABULOUS menu for this week! I’m definitely going to institute the grilled cheese/soup night. That should help with my budget. I have to save some cash for my trip to NYC this coming weekend, and I’m hoping to use some food money…
Time to go look at the pantry…
So many options with a full freezer!! I’m thinking Chicken&dumplins from leftover roasted chicken, chicken fajitia’s, Chicken noddle soup, not much chicken needed for that just make the broth from the carcus. Roast beef, hum pot roast, leftovers, beef and noodles, beef stew, Veg beef soup, beef fajitia’s. Hubby might go hungry with my suggestions! HA Can’t wait to get the freezers and pantries cleaned out around here
You have lots of great food to work with. I think you should cook up one of the turkeys, and you could have a turkey dinner, turkey sandwiches, etc…. Today is my first day of the no-low spend challenge. I had already planned ahead of time to go out to dinner with friends, so I put the money aside for that prior. Other than that, it will be a no spend day. I also made my meal plan for the week with what I have on hand in my pantry, etc…
-Chicken tacos, rice, beans, mango smoothies
-Cheese ravioli with pesto with green beans-GREEN food night
-Pizza on a premade crust, salad, smoothie
-Whole wheat pasta with marinara sauce, green beans
-Velvetta mac n cheese (yes, my kid loves it, too and we have it maybe once every two weeks), smoothie with banana, spinach, strawberries, blueberries
-Breakfast for dinner, which my little one would be happy with a big bowl of oatmeal and a smoothie, pancakes for me to go with the smoothie
-I usually leave some money aside to go out to dinner one day a week, and I am trying to decide if I will do this or not. I think we will just eat in and continue on with our no spending for meals out.
Happy New Year
B
Happy New Year Carla!
I find Pinterst helps me alot with meal planning. I will see something that triggers an idea often. I just did a search of ” meal ideas” and “meal planning” for you in case it helps come up with some ideas.
http://pinterest.com/search/?q=Meal+ideas
http://pinterest.com/search/?q=Meal+planning
I made 9 dozen perogies last week with leftover potatoes from Christmas based on this Pin.
http://pinterest.com/pin/47147127318772332/
Try typing in an ingredient to search. You might be surprised at the ideas or recipes you will find. The reason I like Pinterest is because everyone is doing the work of blog hopping for you and bringing it to one place for you to see it all in a nice simple way. I see things and find things I would never have otherwise.
Question???? Do you all usually grocery shop based on what you will be cooking for each meal during the week, or just make a list of items you usually use? I think I would be more successful if I shopped based on what I have planned for each meal.
Oh my goodness, you keep 10x more food stocked up than I do. I was going to say that I can’t be a full participant in the challenge because we did stock up (although I was planning to do that before I heard of the challenge!) but even stocked up, my supplies pale next to yours. 30 lbs. of flour?
Oh well, I know the challenge is not a contest. I am looking forward to simply shopping less than I normally do thanks to having supplies on hand that I typically have to run out to the store for (and I hate dashing to the store because one item is needed.)
Looks like a solid plan!
I like the 365 day photo challenge. Maybe I’ll jump on board with that!
Wow I wish my pantry looked like that at the end of a month LOL My cupboards are pretty bare usually at end month however I am working on getting a stocked pantry!
With all that flour you can easily make homemade pasta rather than buying it!
Also you can make homemade tortilla shells and use that steak or beef roast combined with some seasonings and veggies to make some sorty of fajitas or use the chicken if ya like too!
You have wonderful ingredients for a variety of dishes!
No spend here. I was just perusing the freezer and pantry myself and said “you need to start eating up the canned soup and fruit cocktail” I still need to figure out a menu for the week, it helps DH with prep since he is home all day but could care less what he eats so that decision falls to me.
You’d have to buy a couple things, but I love this easy peanut chicken recipe:
http://www.kraftcanada.com/en/recipes/creamy-peanut-pad-thai-112524.aspx
I usually use regular wheat linguini instead of the rice noodles because they are more versatile. You could probably use whatever pasta you want though : )
Good idea to do a food inventory, I’ll do one tomorrow!
A no spend day for me..yay!!
I’m thinking I might try the 365 blog too. I wonder if I could just do a page on my existing blog instead of starting another new blog. I took a picture of today already… All of us playing a game board… CADOO.
When I travel I like to treat myself to a Starbuck’s Soy Latte…I have a registered card so my soy is free. Today was a travel day…headed back from my brother’s in Ottawa…therefore, hubbie and I treated ourselves to a coffee and then, ordered sushi upon our arrival home at supper hour. Oops…will have to start my no extra spending tomorrow. Not feeling too bad as we never eat out or order out on a regular basis.