How Did The First Week Go?

Jo-Ellen: I think overall it was a very good week! Usually once a week I eat out but chose not to as it wasn't in my budget. I saved money and calories! I needed to buy extras....as it states in the 30 days on $200; the shopping list contains the food for making the recipes. You are given recipes for 3 healthy meals for 30 days and the cost estimate was approximately $130. The other $70 was to be used to purchase foods to enhance recipes or for alternative items to meet your dietary or other needs. So the extras I bought were coffee, bananas, cutie tangerines, coffee creamer, saltines, almond milk, 2% milk and canola nonstick spray for a total of $19.41. I reviewed next week's recipes and I needed more brown rice and chicken. I buy farm fresh eggs weekly for $3 dozen. Add the $19.41 I spent earlier and combine it to these groceries and I spent $28.57. To date, I have spent $95.44 and have eaten 3 healthy meals each day. I also bought enough fruit to eat 2 servings per day. I plan to boil eggs to eat as a high protein snack that is low calorie and low cost if I'm hungry and planning to workout.

 










Amy:  My first week also went very well.  The thing I noticed most this week is that I don't always have the "left overs" I plan on.  For example, on Friday night I made a home made pizza and planned on us having leftover pizza for lunch on Saturday.  Well, needless to say, the three of us ate the entire pizza on Friday night, so there were no leftovers.  Therefore, on my menu I would have to make two pizzas in order to have leftovers on Saturday.  It's just as easy to cook two pizzas as it is to cook one, so the effort would not change, although the cost will increase as I would need the ingredients for a second pizza.

What I like the most about my menu is the variety it offers.  I don't feel like I am eating the same thing every day and I like the idea of using things up in my pantry and refrigerator so I don't have to throw any food away.  The more challenging part of my menu is that it is very labor intensive.  There is a lot of cooking.  As I mentioned before, that isn't a huge issue for me most of the time, but I have noticed there are some evenings when I really didn't feel like cooking and it would have been nice if all I had to do was heat something up.