This is Day 11 of a month long food stamp challenge. If this is your first visit, please check out this link to see all of the posts and get a better understanding of what is going on.
First, I’d like to set the record straight about the near-demise of this challenge. As was stated earlier, things happened that left us trying to figure out how to save the integrity of the undertaking at all, and because those things were largely health and stress-related, we made the decision at the time to discontinue what we were doing.
John has ongoing flare ups from a previous back injury that has prevented him from sleeping through the night for the majority of this month and I have had issues with stress and my body that left me unable to eat for the better part of two days. We didn’t stop the challenge because we wanted to go back to normal, it was because we weren’t eating at all and that may have been mistaken as a way to skew the results of the challenge itself. For that reason, we have picked up with Day 11 two days later and things will go on as planned, with a finish line that’s two days further away.
Now, to address the question about what our point is with the challenge. We’re not trying to prove that you can live on a food stamp budget. Why should we when people all over the country have been doing it for years? As we stated at the start, we’re doing this as an illustration of how difficult it can be even for people with extensive experience in nutrition, bargain shopping and food preparation to eat a reasonably healthy diet on this type of budget.
The real goal here is to bring people to the table to talk about the issues that surround the topic. Conversation and good hearted debate are food for the soul, and your involvement in this process is what has spurred us on when things were pretty low for us.
Finally, to add a bit of reality to this, I put in excess of 2 hours per day into everything required to make these daily posts, and that’s not something that the average food stamp recipient would do. We do this to bring awareness to a sensitive and very personal topic for many of us, and the many supportive comments we have received are all the proof we need that this is a talk we all need to be having now more than ever.
PURCHASES
| ITEM | SIZE | PRICE | UNIT | PRICE/ UNIT |
| eggs | 4 doz | 3.25 (C, P) | each | .07 |
| tomatoes | 3 pack | 1.09 (P) | each | .36 |
| packaged salad | 18 oz | 3.27 (P) | 4.5 oz portion | .82 |
| apples | 3 lb bag | 2.49 (P) | each | .25 |
| granulated sugar | (2) 4 lb bag | 4.32 (P) | cup | .27 |
| frozen broccoli | 16 oz bag | 1.07 | 4 oz portion | .27 |
| all purpose flour | 5 lb bag | 2.12 | cup | |
| tea bags | 24 count | 1.68 | 2 bags | .14 |
| spaghetti | 16 oz bag | .89 | 4 oz portion | .22 |
| salt | 1 lb box | .48 | ||
| yeast | (2) 3-packs | 1.52 | each | .25 |
| C: Coupon | P: Price Match | R: Reduced | D: Damaged |
NOTE: The 12 oz package of turkey bacon was price matched incorrectly to a 6 oz package at another store and will be returned to the store where it was purchased.
RECEIPTS
MEALS
John finally got the chance to do some baking and made two beautiful loaves of wheat bread. Even with the higher cost of the wheat flour, the price per slice of this homemade bread is 5¢, which is the same as the cost of the plain white bread we purchased previously.
DINNER (previous night) $4.22
homemade “public school” pizza
w/ sausage & red pepper
pitcher of tea: $ .60
BREAKFAST: $.80
coffee
sugar
creamer
toast
LUNCH: $0.00
leftover pizza
DINNER: $1.64
chili (Day 5)
salad
TOTALS
- Consumed Today: 7.26 [+1.74 for the day]
- Consumed To Date (week): 20.96 [+15.04 for the week]
- Consumed To Date (month): 48.09 [+50.91 for the month]
- Spent To Date: 159.59
- Remaining Balance: $119.59
QUESTION OF THE DAY:
If you caught an error on your grocery store receipt that was in your favor, would you report it?
{ 10 comments… read them below or add one }
I’m embarrassed to admit it, but no. I have not reported it when I found an error in my favor. I do try to pay attention at the check out and catch any mistakes as they may happen.
No, I wouldn’t report it. I would keep it.
If it were a person, I would make sure they got their money. But a store? No.
I did, however, stand in line for an extra 15 minutes at WalMart the other day to get my $2 back that they had overcharged me :/ I’m going to hell, I KNOW.
Funny how people not getting the reason for why you were doing this, got them to do THE REASON WHY YOU ARE DOING THIS :)
ps. Recipeforyourfrechbreadfromtheotherdaysayswhaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaat?
“If you caught an error on your grocery store receipt that was in your favor, would you report it?”
Yes, I have had this happen many times (in my favor)……..but it also happens a lot in the store’s favor.
Once I came home and my receipt did not make sense. I was pretty sure the store somehow ripped me off. LOL
After calculating and recalculating……I realized I ripped the store off. I called them up and told them right away. They said there isn’t much they can do, but they appreciate the call and I can bring in the receipt to show them the error if I wanted to.
The difference was $30 (big! and I believe in karma). The manager asked me if I’d want to split the difference……
I’m a couponer and there are some that can give us a bad name……at least they know I’m one of the honest ones.
During checkout, if something seems too low, I ask if they scanned this or that (because I usually already know what my total should be before I checkout)
There have been times when an item was scanned once when I had 2 (I’ve also had this happen the other way around).
One time I told the checker she made a mistake and charged me less on something…..she looked it over and said there was no mistake……she couldn’t find it and so I went home with a better deal………. but I tried….
I do feel a little silly trying to fix every mistake though…..because it usually goes both ways….so I kinda keep a tally. The store ripped me off one time by $2……..I had no time to fix that mistake……but the next time there was an error $1.50 in my favor…..so I called in even ;)
I’m with Molly-i have told the store COUNTLESS times, when they’ve been in error in my favor, but sometimes i think, ok, that makes up for ____ time and either don’t say anything, or don’t go back if i notice it later. Usually if i notice it when it’s occuring, however (and i usually do, because i mostly know ExACTLY how much everything costs, i will tell them. sometimes if they don’t catch that it’s organic, i’ll let them keep the error because A) it pisses me off that they charge so much more for organic, and B) the tag is right on the fruit or vegetable, so it’s not as though i’m trying to hide something–if they don’t want to bother to read it, that’s there problem, not mine!
The bread looks great! so glad you guys are getting some fiber and nutrition with your bread now, not that white crap! ;-)
p.s. i’m scattered, as my daughter was calling on skype as i was trying to comment, but i couldn’t figure out how to type in a reply to her, so she hung up! But anyway, sorry to hear you guys are having health problems. Eat your vegetables!!!!! Stay healthy! ;-)
I’m sure it’s very time consuming to do daily updates……..I know I wouldn’t be able to do it. It it were me….I’d do weekly updates…..
With only 48.09 consumed……..you definitely can afford more fruits and veggies(lots more).
Eat some bananas….they are satisfying and will help with the stress…..
Kudos to you for reembarking ! I will be happy to follow you the rest of the way. I just thought I would let you know that, inspired by your meat grinding experience, I have purchased some very lean pork loin – on special for $2/pound – and decided to grind some and freeze it. I had never ground meat before. (And, as a former vegetarian, I never thought I would). I purchased an old metal grinder from a thrift shop for $1 and I now have the leanest ground pork I have ever seen. The boulettes belges will be great this Christmas. I have decided to go back and buy more of that special to make cubes for fricassees. See, you have even showed this old monkey a few tricks. OK, I am not old, but having provided for a family of six for over ten years – and always on a budget – I am happy to have a new trick up my sleeve ! Thank you.
Oh, and I do want to ask you for your baguette recipe. I have been baking bread for years – both traditional and no-knead methods – and I am still looking for a baguette recipe that will remind me of the ones I used to dip into my chocolat chaud as a child…
Don’t know how I missed that except that my mouse has a scrolling problem and jumps at times. So sorry about your troubles with your health and back problems are terrible. I’ll look for more of your writing in the future. Take care of yourselves and each other. Thanks for all of your posts……….
You didn’t miss it, it went live right after you asked where the other posts were! Great timing, right? We are still publishing daily, we just got derailed for a couple of days. Posts will be up no later than 8am CT the following morning but usually late on the actual day they are recording.
I have to sleep with myself at night so yes I would. Sometimes it’s tempting not to as I am forever finding overcharges on items that are supposedly on sale. =-\