Grocery Shopping This Week.....Weis, Surplus Outlet & Bread Outlet

Here are the best deals this past grocery shopping week.

Since we were in that town to take Hubs out for Father's Day last weekend, we hit the  Amish owned Surplus Outlet.

You never know what you are going to find and what price you will find something at.  Most of the items are dented or damaged packaging and out of the "use by" dates so you have to check each item carefully. That being said, I have never had to throw anything I bought there out due to it being spoiled.

Here is what I picked up last week there.....

Ken's Greek and Caesar salad dressing for .20¢ a bottle.

Panko crumbs for .50¢ a box.

Stove Top for .50¢ a box.

Velveeta Skillet dinners for $1.19 a box.

Jiffy corn bread mix for 3/$1.

The Skillet dinners are for College Boy to take back to school.  As he will be in an apartment with a kitchen this is something he just needs to add ground beef to, to have something approaching a home cooked meal. lol

College Boy's favorite flavor of coffee for $1.99 bag.

Massive jar of Spanish olives for $2.49(ShopRite brand).

No Sugar Added Vlasic B&B pickles for $1.29 a jar.

Contadina pizza sauce for .39¢ a can.

Massive bag of raisin bran for $2.99(Malt O'Meal brand $2 cheaper than Walmart price).

I love those no sugar added sweet pickles but the only place around here I can get them is at a Weis South of here(where I don't go very often).....and NEVER for $1.29 a jar!(At least $2.19 a jar at that Weis on sale.)  Needless to say I bought all that no added sugar variety they had on the shelf. 8-)

Bottles of Heinz caramelized onion & bacon flavor Ketchup for .50¢

Sometimes you can find different flavors of staple items if they are new, change packaging or are not popular with the grocery shopping general public.

I'll probably end up shipping these off with College Boy back to school in August as this is something he will love.  8-)

I also got a 42 oz. bag of frozen Hanover brand cauliflower, 3 large Enchilda TV Dinners, milk, 67 oz. jar of Prego sauce, flour, 2 jars of mandarin oranges, Totinos pizza rolls, Mtn. Dew, Little Debbie cakes, crispy M&M's(previous 4 things for CB), large jar of mustard seeds, Hubs got 3 packs of gum, and the family bought assorted lunch meats and cheese(about 2 lb. total)for sandwiches.

$70.82 OOP for all.

Loosely figured reg. retail would have been $136.20.

Then I did a Weis(PMITA)Markets shop on Wednesday.......

T-Bone Steaks for $5.98 lb.
3 lbs. of Smoke Sausage $8-$3 off Instant Discount Sticker
2 packages of Beef Sausage on sale $2.50-$1/1 IPQ
2 packages of Scrapple $3.49-$2 off Instant Discount Stickers
1 fresh made Mashed Potatoes $2.99-$2 off Instant Discount Sticker
2 bags of 8 oz. shredded Mozz. Cheese on sale $1.77 each.

8 boxes of GM cereals on sale $1.97(must buy at least 3)- .50¢/1 IPQs for each box that doubled to $1 off=.97¢ per box.
Again the Lucky Charms will go back to college with CB.

I also found this clearance Deal on large boxes of Kleenex facial tissues with the lotion in them.
Reg. $2.79 for half price of $1.39.  I used a .75¢/3 IPQ that doubled to $1 so these were $1.06 each.
I'll go back Friday evening to pick up 3 or 6 more if there are any left as CB goes through these lotion ones in the Winter at a rapid clip.

I also picked up some boxes of dried pasta for .67¢ each.  A good stock-up price but I don't need that much as I already have a good quantity and we've been eating less pasta lately.  But I did need some for my killer Macaroni Salad as it is Summer now. ;-)

I picked up this Lysol bathroom cleaner for CB too, on sale and using a doubled Q it was $1.50.

The clear bottle is a Weis brand daily shower spray which was $1.67 on sale.  I'll park that in the kids' bathroom and see if I can get them to spritz the shower/tub after using it so the cleaning of said shower/tub isn't such a chore(which they have to do, not me).  8-)

Rounding out this trip was a bag of salad mix(50% off sticker plus used a .50¢/1 Weis Q so $1.24 OOP), a box of mini croissants for 50% off, 2 boxes of dog biscuits for 50% off on clearance and a watermelon on sale.

$61.84 OOP

$126.27 reg. retail and a savings rate of 51%.

I also hit the Bread/Bakery Outlet again this month as College Boy is on a grilled cheese binge and between CB, Hubs and Daughter making lunch time sandwiches, bread is disappearing at an alarming rate in the house!  $11 OOP spent on 5 packages of assorted types of rolls/buns, 4 loaves of bread and 2 boxes of chocolate donut holes.  All this would have cost me $40.80, or a bit less if on sale, at the grocery store so I am good with paying $11 or $1 per item at the Bread Outlet.

Have I ever mentioned how much I "heart" my Bread Outlet? 8-)))

So with my Rite-Aid trip this is all the grocery/drug store/outlet shopping that's gone on around Chez Sluggy.

Almost at month's end and I've busted my $260 food budget.  Still under $400 though so it's all good.

Sluggy

Grocery Store Hijinx & Finding the Budget Sweet Spot

Well I actually spent $160.21 this week in two trips--1 for $104.15 and 1 for $56.06.
I split the $104.15 trip as some items were bought for our July 4th cook-out(and I didn't want to wait until July's food budget kicked in)so I put $52.75 in the June budget, which put us $10+ over for the month.
So $51.40 of that $104.15 trip went onto July's spending.
Then I went back to Weis(PMITA)Markets on Thursday to pick-up a "few" things and use 2 coupons I forgot to take earlier in the week on that other trip.
Oops. ;-)

But really how could I say no to 2 bags of coffee for $1.75 a bag, salad dressing for $1 a bottle, 5 packs of OM bacon for $3 after sale and $3 off stickers, 2 boxes of turkey sausage bkfst patties for $1 after sale and $2 off stickers, 4 bags of shredded cheese on clearance for 1/2 price, 2 loaves of PF bread/2 canisters of lemonade mix/2 packs of snack crackers(for BF's lunches) for $6.49 total(it was a Buy 6/Sale $3 Deal + I had $3 in Qs to use), 1 Hummus dip for $1(after sale and Qs)?
A 58% savings rate for that trip alone so yes, I'll spend extra now to save later.

The $104.15 trip was a 48% savings rate as well so not too shabby.

This means I have already spent $107.46 of my $450 food budget for July.
And it's just July first.
meh.

As for the rest of July I am NOT going to push off any monies spent in July onto August, like I did with some of June's spending onto July.
Good, bad or ugly, my July total will be what it will be.

As for being stressed out over food overspending.....
I am not stressed right now.  I am still trying to find our new normal food budget.  IF we need to spend $500 or $600 a month now, so be it.

What would stress me out more now is to have more food waste.  We've got more of that than I am comfortable with right now.

But again, still honing in on that sweet spot of the new normal for us so I'll be working on keeping all the leftovers being consumed and not throwing them out when they go off.

Daughter and BF don't seem to like leftovers from what I can tell.
Yes it would be easy to just tell them eat it or go hungry but to put into practice?.....not so much.

 Maybe the plan going forward is to keep my amounts cooked for meals tight/smaller and try to avoid leftovers unless it's something I can repurpose into a new dish that we will all eat OR over cook some foods for planned-overs.

We do have a dog here now so an instant garbage disposal for leftovers(if it's not vegetables).  Yes, that will help with making sure everything gets eaten before it goes bad BUT I really don't want to be buying food and cooking it to ultimately feed to the dog because the humans here didn't eat it.

So much to work on and consider.

Sluggy