Free Food for 30 Days
Friday, September 12, 2008
Tara Gidus, MS, RD, CSSD, LD/N
The United States Department of Agriculture (USDA) is predicting that food prices are going to rise 5-6% again this year, making it the largest annual increase since 1990. That is also on top of increasing prices for the past few years.
The USDA predicts 5.5% increase in produce, meat, poultry, and fish. The foods hardest hit will be oil (forecast 13%), cereal and bread (9.5%), and eggs (14%).
Are you looking for a way to get free food?
Start shopping....at home in your own pantry! You will find some interesting food (that you forgot about) and the price is right (free!). My husband Stephen and I are in the middle of a 30 Day Challenge to not buy anything at the grocery store except for milk and fresh produce. Everything else we eat (meat, side dishes, frozen/canned vegetables, sauces, etc.) needs to come from existing stores in our pantry and freezer. We are calling it "Operation Pantry Cleanout."
So now when I am deciding what to cook for the week, I look in the pantry and freezer and take inventory. I put together a meal with foods that otherwise might have continued to sit in the pantry for another year. Since my freezer and pantry were embarrassingly full (and I still couldn't seem to find something to cook for dinner!), this challenge may last longer than a month. We are excited to see how much less we spend on groceries this month compared to past months.
And I have already warned Stephen that he had better start getting a taste for beans because I see some soups and casseroles with beans on the horizon. I love beans and have a lot of cans in the pantry! Click here for more tips on cleaning out your pantry.
Let me know what you think of this idea and how full YOUR pantry is!
Photo courtesy of blog.americanfeast.com
4 Comments:
At Mon Sep 15, 06:16:00 AM 2008,
Anonymous said…
I have thought about this very idea for a long time now as I too have stuff in the pantry that I think "yeah, I need to use that some day"...well, I think I may just do the same thing...as my freezer and pantry are pretty stuffed too (what a blessing that is). So thanks for the kick start! Please keep us posted on how it goes for you!
At Sun Sep 21, 06:24:00 PM 2008,
Jean said…
bhWhat a great idea! Now and then I try for a week to use up some of those lurking items, but there are still lots of oldies but goodies in the freezer and pantry. Hmmm. the freezer has a few ounces of ham, a cup of corn and some shredded cheese. Add potato and onion. Farmer's hash it will be for dinner. This can work.
At Sun Sep 21, 08:23:00 PM 2008,
Nikemom said…
We did it for 3 months. We only purchased milk, eggs, bread and fresh fruit/veggies. It was an awesome challenge and it felt great going through the cupboards and being creative.
At Tue Oct 28, 01:58:00 AM 2008,
zenevieva said…
I was right out of college, had no money besides for rent and beer money, and finally off a meal plan. I learned that canned goods that we'd had for months were an amazing food source. i came up with some pretty great meals from the cans my roommates had bought or had been given and decided they didn't like.
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