I accepted the "Made with Love" challenge to not order out for 30 days and to budget for food more carefully. We were not perfect (and our 30 days is not quite over but drawing close) but we did better than I expected.
We have eaten out once. An order of take out pizza was a necessity one night. I suppose I could have served cold cereal but I can not bring myself to do that and that was all there was time and energy for. My wife had been canning tomatos all day and I have had big changes at work that have caused me to be later coming home sometimes. That was one of those days.
I used gift cards for Dunkin Donuts and my senior boss bought me lunch one day. I have not bought lunch at work on my own since I accepted the challenge.
We have made a lot more muffins and quick breads for breakfast or snacking and that is a good thing. We do cook a lot and never use mixes but this falls off a bit in the summer with the heat and humidity. It becomes easier to p ick up a "ready made" when it is hazy hot and humid.
My wife and I have begun planning a menu every Friday and using our freezer and pantry first. I shop on Saturdays and that way we can buy what we specifically need not what grabs our eye because of personal likes or an attractive display.
I am so glad I took this challenge as it really helped to make me work at looking more thoughtfully at this facet of our budget. In general, because we do not consume meat, my budget for a family of 6 and pets is far less than most of my friends with smaller families. But putting a big old magnifying glass on this showed that there are ways to pinch some pennies and perhaps even live more healthfully!
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So glad that went well. We have been doing the "menu" thing for about a year and that has worked incredibly well both on the "eating out" front and on the saving money side. I think it also takes the stress out of dinner planning when things get out of hand with someone's behaviors. We also eat out less than once/week including take-out which for us is great and makes eating out a real treat. One thing that does help us cheat is that we have a couple of "ready made" foods in the freezer for those days that we would order pizza and that has made all the difference. That said, I have been known to resort to cereal, oatmeal or peanut butter for dinner. At least, they get a choice. :-)
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