Smarter, Cheaper & Healthier

Kevin and I have recently decided to dedicate ourselves to improving our eating and spending habits. There are many reasons why we have decided we needed to change, but a few of the major reasons include:

• clearly seeing how much we were spending eating out each month and concluding that we were eating ourselves into debt
• continuously throwing away food from the refrigerator before we could eat it
• realizing that the pounds aren't going to melt themselves off anytime soon.
• becoming educated on the amount of preservatives, pesticides, bad fats and processed foods we were ingesting into our bodies with our previous way of eating
• realizing that we were sacrificing our health for convenience

While researching different ways to stretch our grocery dollar with healthier, natural foods, I came across this hand-dandy list that I thought I would share. We won't be purchasing everything on this list, but there are certainly some things I can substitute into our weekly menus.

"Here are healthy, nourishing foods you can always find at a good, low price. No matter what store. No matter what season. No matter if you donʼt clip coupons . . .

• eggs
• bananas
• carrots
• corn
• broccoli
• lettuce
• cabbage
• celery
• potatoes
• sweet potatoes
• onions
• canned vegetables
• canned tuna
• peanut butter
• oatmeal
• whole grain bread
• flour
• corn meal
• quinoa
• brown rice
• beans
• lentils
• pasta
• spaghetti sauce
• sunflower seeds
• popcorn (not microwaved)
• string cheese
• yogurt

- information collected from smallnotebook.org"

I am also cooking with fresh vegetables from my garden (and the Farmer's Market for things I didn't grow) and I have concluded that I will definitely be adding to my garden next year. This year's selection was drastically reduced by a few pesky deer (and probably a rabbit or two), and I figure if I double what I plant for next year I have a better likelihood of having something to harvest from each type of crop. Also, I would like a better selection of vegetables for next year. This year's garden included sugar snap peas (completely eaten by the deer/rabbits), corn, zucchini, summer squash, decorative fall gourds, green beans (which suffered greatly from the critters), wax beans (completely eaten), romaine lettuce (eaten), leaf lettuce (also eaten), cucumbers, red onions, yellow onions, better boy tomatoes (scalped by the deer), cherry tomatoes (scalped), early girl tomatoes (scalped), carrots, green bell peppers, purple bell peppers, red bell peppers, yellow bell peppers, sweet banana peppers, pumpkins, basil and chives. Now this may seem like a lot, but so far only the zucchini and squash have really been successful. Typically by this time we should be eating a ton of sugar snap peas, fresh green & wax beans, tomatoes, cucumbers and peppers in addition to the squash. Oh well, better luck next year. I am really hoping that next year's crop will significantly help the budget by providing more produce for our family to eat fresh and to use in our menu. With food prices constantly rising, every little bit I can do at home helps. I also know that all of this food was 100% organically raised, no pesticides or chemicals used here!