Going Organic on $200 a week! WTH!?

Okay, I have a confession to make.  I go organic when there is a sale.  I have never made the intentional effort to go completely organic.  When people use economics as the reason not to eat more healthily, I guffaw!  Puhleeezzze!  It costs less than buying all that processed and fast food.  So I didn't really consider how going organic was going to change the way I buy groceries.  This is my first week in and I see my approach to meal planning and shopping already changing.
First, organic does go bad faster.  Which is fine and even comforting.  How can I trust chicken that lasts for two weeks?  There must be something in it.....like ammonia! (which I found to be a true statement upon further investigation) So I can only buy what I need and go shopping twice a week.  Okay I can handle that.  That usually happens anyway, even to the most prepared of us. I also only buy what I need because it is a little more expensive.  Americans throw away 40% of their food anyway.  What if we bought only what we needed and actually ate what we bought?  Now there is a new concept.  Our grocery bill would be the same or less.  We would be healthier and it would be better for the environment.  Sounds like a win/win to me.
So after taking a survey of what I already had in stock, I planned our week's menu; Curry Squash with rice, Chicken  breast with sweet potato salad and greens, and pasta with Cauliflower and pancetta. Then of course bread, which I make, fruit for snacks and lunches, eggs, milk, almond milk, coconut milk to make yogurt, and organic Mac and cheese for when I feel lazy.  (Okay, sometimes there is prepared food in my house.  Sue me.) I only planned for 3 full meals. If anyone complains in my house about eating leftovers, they can just suck it!
I went shopping last night and spent $158 for the week.  I didn't go to PCC which kind of made it harder for me.  They didn't have any organic sweetened condensed milk for my coffee.  But I didn't give in.  I am going to use my organic cane sugar instead.  And resisting the sales was a little hard for me.  But I stuck to my list and got out of there for under my $200 weekly budget.  I left myself a little wiggle room for later on in the week.  (PCC has organic sweetened condensed milk, which I will be getting.  Hello!  Don't mess with my morning coffee routine.) My refrigerator is a little empty but I know I will use all that food.  I even got myself a little treat of coconut water! I saved a little money and bought frozen organic squash.  Who wants to slice and cube a fresh butternut squash anyway.
We will see how I do this week and if my minimalist approach is going to work and feed a family of five.  I do know that when there is nothing else to munch on, my girls will slice up a red bell pepper and think they hit the jack pot of snacks.  I am also trying to use up all the stuff in the pantry.  I want an empty pantry by the end of this month.  I think it is possible to eat all organic on a budget.  We just have to be more conscientious about the choices we make.  If it costs a lot, it makes it a little more painful to be wasteful.  If I will spend over $4 for a latte, why wouldn't I spend that much on some apples that would last me a few days.  Speaking of which, organic Fuji apples are only $1.49 per pound at Metropolitan Market and they are crispy yummy!


Recipe of the week

Bread machine bread

1 cup milk with 2 tbsp vinegar (let it sit for 10 min.)
3 cups unbleached all purpose flour
3 tbsp sugar
3 tbsp oil
2 1/2 tsp yeast
1 tsp salt

Put all ingredients in bread maker and select white bread option.  Perfection every time.

Back to the Basics, Step 2

I recently met a woman who told me she has no canned food in her house and that she makes everything from scratch, including her coconut milk.  That astounded me.  I consider myself a fairly back to the basics kind of girl.  I bake our bread.  I don't have processed food in the house.  I try to make everything from scratch.  But I do buy tortillas, canned beans and tomatoes and jam.  And being that we are on a fairly tight budget..front porch rotted, was not expecting that expense......I buy organic sometimes, but am not consistent about it.
Looking at her life and how she prepares food for her family seemed overwhelming to me.  Another friend of mine and fellow blogger, http://growandresist.com/ Meg Brown's life seems so busy and so unattainable, it wears me out to read her posts.  She grows her food.  She has chickens and her own business.  She is a mom and she makes everything.   Then I started thinking about people who always make prepared foods and have packaged snacks in their house.  My life style may seem a little overwhelming to them, even though it is actually very simple. I began thinking that maybe the key to success to simplifying life, eating and cooking healthy is baby steps.
Back to the basics, Step 1 is using natural skin, hair, and cleaning products.  Steam cleaning is my favorite activity in the world!  Step 1 is also not buying prepared foods.  No more Marie Calender.  No more Stouffers.  (Notice that I know the brand names.  Marie Calender Pot Pies...yum!) No more frozen pizza.  Buy nothing with high fructose corn syrup, hydrogenated oils, or any ingredient that you don't know.  Make meals from scratch. It takes just as much time to make a chocolate cake from scratch as it does from the box.  We have just been duped into thinking a box cake takes less time.  All natural bread can still have high fructose corn syrup in it.  I don't know how, but it does.  So read the labels.   My kids get a sandwich and a piece of fruit, maybe string cheese for lunch.  They can drink water.  Juice is a waste of money.  And what nutritional value do those fish crackers have anyway?  They get 15 minutes to eat.  Give them what they need to be nourished and be done.  And if they don't like it.....tough.  And so I have a little more time to make all that food, my kids clean up their own stuff and as soon as they get home from school, one does the dishes, the other the laundry.  They have been doing that since they were five.  Get it done.  Do it simply.  Do it naturally.  That is my basic philosophy for Step One.
Then I started thinking, what if I took it a step further?  I am mad that my chicken is soaked in ammonia rather than the company taking simple steps to make sure the chickens are healthy.  I am mad that instead of giving cows a diet of grass for just a week that would eliminate most illnesses, they are pumped full of antibiotics and walk around with a hole on their side so we can have access to their stomachs.  It seems ludacris to me.  So I decided to stick it to the man and go entirely organic.  If I am making everything from scratch, then my ingredients need to be actually good for my family. That is my Back to the Basics, step 2.  Going organic....for everything including my make up. My skin care is already taken care of.
After my first trip to PCC, I began realizing that this going organic on a budget was going to take a bit of adjusting.  $7.99 for a pound of grapes!!!  Guess who didn't buy grapes.  My weekly budget for everything is $200.  For the entire month of March, I am going organic on a budget.  My strategy so far is buy only at PCC or the farmer's market.  I do this not because Safeway doesn't have good deals on organic, but because I am a weak person and if I see strawberries for sale for $2.99, I want to buy them.  If I see that there is a manager's special on pot roast, I am going to buy it.  I am a sucker for a deal.  So I need to eliminate the temptations.  Also, PCC takes great care in the selection of what they decide to sell.  They take out the ethical guess work for me and each one of my 3 kids gets a free piece of fruit.  They go shopping with me!
I am also buying what is on sale.  They have mangoes 2 for $4 right now.  Yummy!  And until I get this shopping organic thing under my belt, I am going to make very simple meals.  The meals that seem to cost the most is dinner so I am going to shake it up a bit and eat like a queen for breakfast, a princess for lunch, and a pauper for dinner.  It is worth a shot.  Who wants to watch this month's adventure unfold.  Remember last year's $100 a week for groceries?  That was fun!

Zoe and Selah with fresh coconut for a snack.

recipe of the post

1 can organic tropical fruit
coconut
sweetened condensed milk
pecans

spoon fruit into bowls. Sprinkle with coconut (organic) and pecan pieces (organic) and drizzle with (organic) sweetened condensed milk.  It make a nice little dessert or snack.