I’m documenting what I’m buying each week and how much everything costs. This post covers the last week of May. I’m going to switch over to tracking monthly, with weekly check-ins.
My New 2025 Shopping Rules
I went into detail on what my new shopping rules will be in this post, but in short, my initial goal is to keep purchases for food and household goods to $150 per week with 2 caveats.
We make most of our meat and seafood purchases from Butcher Box throughout the year. We also make sporadic larger bulk purchases from Azure Standard to save money over what we can buy in the grocery store. I currently contribute $350 per month in a separate fund for these purchases.
With all of that out of the way, here’s what we bought this week.
What We Bought: The Last Week of May
As I talked about in my last post, we have adjusted our budget since our son moved back home. For weekly spending, I’m targeting $190 per week with a total monthly spend (not counting our $350 to the sinking fund for Azure Standard and Butcher Box purchases) of $763.
But first, an observation. While at the grocery store, I was looking at sales on certain ice creams. In the before times, my favorite ice cream, VanLeeuwan honeycomb, used to be pricey at $5.99/pint. Now? $8.29. FOR A PINT OF ICE CREAM. That is objectively crazy. I’m not spending that.
Food
Ralphs ($38.60 Spent)
What we bought:
This week I bought my groceries from Ralphs. In my first trip we got:
- Chex cereal ($3.15)
- Ronzoni pasta ($1.93) – this was actually marked down to $0.87, but it scanned the original price. 😦
- Cottage Cheese x 2 ($3.29 each)
- Cannon yogurt 4 pack ($0.99) – this was marked down to $1.99, but a $1 digital coupon applied
- 4 limes ($2.00)
- Tomato medley ($5.00)
- Organic Girl Salad ($2.14)
- Cucumbers ($2.99)
- Bananas ($1.37)
- Rice crackers x 5 ($2.49 each) (on major sale)
Ralphs ($93.20 spent)
What we bought:
- Buttermilk ($3.99)
- Ice cream x 4 ($2.99 each) – on major sale with coupons
- Chobani yogurt x 5 ($0.99 each)
- Spaghetti x 2 ($1.99 each)
- Veggie tray ($3.69)
- Asparagus ($3.87)
- Cucumber ($1.99)
- Avocado x 2 ($4.98)
- Watermelon ($11.09)
- Milk ($4.99)
- Gluten free bread ($6.79)
- Cubed pancetta x 3 ($3.15 each)
- Shredded parmesan ($7.99)
- Mozzarella pearls ($5.99)
- Brie ($3.62)
- Brie ($2.87)
Buy Nothing Group ($0)
Someone in my Buy Nothing group didn’t like the flavor of these chips, so we got these for free.
Secret Shopping ($0)
I have started doing some secret shopping. One of these trips was to Raising Cane’s. I purchased a $15 gift card, which will be reimbursed. I got 6 sides of Cane’s sauce (my daughter’s request), a gallon of sweet tea, and $4.22 in cash change.
Week 7 Totals
That brings my last week of May total to $131.80.
What’s your grocery strategy right now? Are you cutting back, swapping brands, or just crying in the produce aisle? Drop a comment below—I’d love to hear how you’re surviving this mess!
What We Ate
I didn’t take pictures of everything, but here’s mostly what we had:
- Sour cream chicken enchiladas
- Cajun sausage, shrimp, rice and vegetables
- Homemade pho
- Pasta salad with chicken
- Spaghetti carbonara
Since I had purchased pancetta, I made spaghetti carbonara. I used this recipe (but I added Italian seasoning blend and a hand full of shredded mozzarella). It was SO GOOD. Definitely a splurge recipe.
What did you eat this week?
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Frugal Forward 
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