As I mentioned last week, we’re trying out the 5-Ingredient Meal Plan Box right now. We just finished up week 3 and we’re really loving it (see what we ate this week when you scroll down to the bottom of the post).
The ingredients for the recipes are a little more than I would typically spend (because I usually base our menus upon what I have on hand and what’s on sale) but I’m having fun getting creative to see if I can work them into our grocery budget.
By the way, in full transparency, the meal plan box is expensive and I probably would have never purchased it had Laurie not given me one when she and I met up recently. That said, I see the value in them now that I’ve used one for a week! (Laurie said you could use code MONEYSAVINGMOM to save 15% off if you were thinking of possibly purchasing it.)
I did my grocery shopping at Aldi last week. The deals weren’t that great at Kroger and I wanted to see if I could buy everything we needed for the week at Aldi and stay under $100. We were right under $100 for everything!!
I bought two bags of apples because this was such a good deal on Pink Lady apples!
And I bought two cantaloupe as this was one of the best prices I’ve seen in awhile!
We love mandarins — and they were just $2.69 for 3 pounds so I bought two bags!
I didn’t buy this deal because I had found another deal at Kroger a few months ago that was even better and I stocked up on enough pumpkin to likely last for a year! But check your Aldi store to see if they have this markdown!
I was SO excited about this! There was an employee that was at the meat section putting red clearance stickers on the meat!! That was a first for me and you better believe I scooped up these two pounds of ground beef at half price!
I got everything we needed for dinners plus snacks and lunches. We still have a lot of oatmeal packets and cereal from recent sales, so we used that for breakfasts this past week.
All totaled, it was just under $100 for all of this — including the laundry soap. Yay!
What We Ate
Here’s what we ate this week:
Breakfasts: Cereal, oatmeal, eggs, pumpkin bread (all purchased on sales from previous weeks)
Lunches: Salad, toast, string cheese, fruit, ham & cheese sandwiches (I had bought that on sale the week before), PB&J sandwiches (stocked up on sandwich supplies with sales recently), muffins, cookies, PB crackers, hard boiled eggs, yogurt
Dinners: Slow Cooker Chicken & Dressing, Spaghetti, Taco Crescent Casserole, Chicken Diego, Dinner Out, Fend For Yourself/Leftovers, Jalapeno Popper Chicken
Charlotte W says
We finally got an Aldi’s in my area. It opened about 3 weeks ago. The lower prices on many items was amazing. My jaw dropped a few times as I was walking through the store.
The new store over bought milk so to get rid of this extra milk, they had to price it at $1 a gallon. My husband was there at the moment it dropped. Just glad we were able to see these kinds of prices.
Crystal Paine says
Woohoo!! $1 milk is amazing!!
Brandy says
Thank you for the information. I just purchased the complete set on PDF it was $60 something but after using your code it came down to $58 and I don’t have to wait for anything to be shipped to me. 👏👏👏
Crystal Paine says
YAY!!! I hope you love it!
Tina Corley says
I recently purchased this same meal plan box and I am loving it! I live in an area where there are no good grocery deals and this helps me stay on track and organized. I actually end up saving money and with the handy grocery list cards, I don’t forget anything!
Crystal Paine says
That makes me so happy to hear! YAY!
Barbara says
Great job! There are lots of times I can make these recipes from items I have on hand and I also reuse some of the items I do buy like red wine vinegar, spices, sauces… so they aren’t a one time buy and use item! Keep up the good work!
Jordan says
That’s such a good point to remember when buying certain ingredients! -Jordan, MSM Team