Today's grocery bill was larger than it's been recently, partly because it's Thanksgiving week. We usually host a giant Thanksgiving party and invite lots of friends, and it costs a couple of hundred bucks once you factor in a turkey that hopefully isn't full of junk and hasn't lived a miserable life, plus booze. This year, we decided to host a potluck instead, so that we can save a bit and so that we don't spend days cooking and baking.
This year, we decided that we'll take charge of the desserts. I'm not really a fan of the traditional pumpkin pie or sweet potato pudding, so I'm making two rather different ones. One is a (double recipe of) caramel-bourbon croissant pudding from a Nigella Lawson recipe that I've made several times, at the request of several friends. This is a truly brilliant dessert that always elicits reactions of "Oh my God" from people tasting it for the first time. It's absolutely gorgeous. The other, which is kind of my pièce de résistance, is a gingerbread trifle from last year's holiday edition of Fine Cooking. This is a very high-maintenance recipe, which takes several days of preparation (or hours and hours on a single day). I made it for my family last New Year's Eve, and it was probably the most delicious thing I've ever made. Don't even look at the nutritional information--it's about the unhealthiest thing you'll ever eat.
So this week's food shopping cost a bit more than usual, but it was a lot less than last year when we insisted on making everything ourselves. For the rest of the week, we're going to make do with some pretty simple, small, low-calorie meals to prepare ourselves for the giant calorie fest that is Thanksgiving.
This week's meals: (I already had various staples such as oats, carrots, rice, potatoes, white wine for cooking, etc)
Breakfasts: steel cut oats porridge with plain yogurt and fruit; eggs on toast or in tortillas with salsa
Lunches: peanut butter sandwiches, fruits, carrot sticks, string cheese
Snacks: fruit, and probably some baking (as yet undecided)
Dinners: roast chicken, sandwiches made with roast chicken leftovers, Skinnytaste.com tomato soup, Skinnytaste.com butternut squash soup (both soups made with homemade stock from the chicken bones), sides of broccoli, baked potatoes, rice, etc.
This week's groceries:
Dairy/eggs:
18 eggs 2.55
String cheese 2.48
Mascarpone 3.58
Heavy whipping cream 2.98
1 lb unsalted butter 2.74
1 gallon Organic Valley whole milk 5.96
Nancy's low fat yogurt 2.37
Fruits and vegetables:
3 lbs apples: 3.92
5 lbs oranges: 2.56
3 broccoli crowns: 1.64
Fresh ginger root 1.17
1 lemon 0.38
6 lbs butternut squash 5.82
Bulk:
Ground ginger 0.30
Candied ginger 0.48
2.27 lb flour 0.73
Baking things:
Molasses 2.74
3 lbs sugar 2.67
1 lb brown sugar 1.24
Meat:
1 whole chicken 6.25
Other groceries:
Organic whole wheat bread 2.78
Stash ginger-peach green tea 2.25
Sparkling wine 4.48
Total: 62.07
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