It's Not Cheap!

One of my main goals with this blog is to keep myself accountable with how much this is costing.  There is absolutely no way that switching to all organic unprocessed food is going to be cheaper than eating non organic processed crap.  But, I think there is probably a way to do it more frugally; and there is probably a grey area, there are some things that may not need to be organic.  So, here is my first grocery store accountability post.  I bought groceries today for 2 dinner that I estimate will last us 3-4 nights total with leftovers.  I also had to buy some essentials milk, wine, and peanut butter cups.  Unfortunately, the I had to go to two different grocery stores to get all of this food, because the cheaper of the two stores does not carry organic chicken.  Here is the haul:

Not much.  These are the ingredients for crockpot chicken and dumplings, and salmon with a white wine Dijon sauce.

The grand total: $89.07 

If we subtract the milk, one bottle of wine, cheese, and the peanut butter cups that brings us to $16/dinner if this last us 4 nights, $20/dinner if it only lasts 3 nights which is more likely.  It is still cheaper than eating at a sit down restaurant, but that is a lot of money people.  I would say culprit number one in this situation is the chicken.  A bag of organic free range chicken breasts here goes for $22, and it only contains 4-5 chicken breasts.  This is simply not sustainable for most families.  Really, meat and seafood in general are what drives up the grocery bill it seems when buying organic.  Since meat and seafood are two things I am absolutely not willing to buy if they are not free range/organic/grass fed etc, we are going to have to start looking for some vegetarian meal options.

So, there we go, moment of truth, buying organic is expensive.  It may be time for Mrs. B to start clipping some coupons!  Thank goodness we are saving money on my homemade cleaners!

Super Lazy Dinner

One of the hardest things about switching to organic unprocessed foods is that cooking dinner takes a lot longer.  We are currently moving into a new home and time is at a premium around here.  I love cooking, but I simply do not have time to spend 60 minutes making dinner right now, especially since Monkey has taken to hanging onto my leg and screaming the whole time I cook.  Dinnertime is fun at the B household!  So last night I really phoned it in and we had penne with meat sauce, and it was really not all that expensive.  Plus it definitely made enough for two nights.  Any meal that makes leftovers gets an A+ from me.

Here are the players from last night.  1lb of organic ground beef, some organic whole wheat penne (we eat penne because it easy for little fingers to pick up), organic jarred pasta sauce, and some spinach that only had a couple of days left before it turned.

I simply browned up the ground beef in my cast iron skillet, chopped up the spinach and wilted it in with the beef, and added the sauce.  You probably did not need me to walk you through that step by step!  Super easy week night meal, and every ingredient was natural and organic.  Plus, the sauce was on sale for $2.99.  Organic sauce can run up to $8/jar in our local stores!   So I guess my lazy night sort of shows that going organic does not have to be super expensive.  This is a way to work it into anyone's budget.