Budget: Challenge to myself, eating in for 7 days

Budget: Challenge to myself, eating in for 7 days

It happens to all of us.  Our freezer and pantry is full of stuff purchased goodness knows when and forgotten.  Those mystery cans, jars and frozen meats do not entice us so we ignore their quietly growing stacks (yes, I am convinced they  pop out little baby cans while we sleep).

So my challenge is I have to eat what I already have stocked for 7 days. Spend some time in the pantry and freezer, get to know what I actually have.  Throw out or donate what I will never touch and start consuming the rest.

The rules: Food budget: $5 a day food money so I can get fresh veggies or drinks but nothing frozen, canned or otherwise able to last into my next lifetime.  The $5 rolls over each day.  Catfood, litter and cleaning supplies do not count against the $5 daily.

My problem is I’ve gotten out of the habit of cooking for myself.  Mom didn’t like my cooking so we used  to pick up something I knew she would eat.  The local mall had blackened fish that she quite liked.

Mom also grew up poor so she kept filling up the freezer and pantry even though we rarely cooked because she didn’t like to see an inch of empty space there. And now I have a pantry and a freezer crammed with stuff.  Much of it is from when Mom was alive.

I’ll start cooking simple at first — who am I kidding?  I like fast and easy.  Even before, I’d only do more than boil water if I was having people over for lunch or dinner. That stopped when I got a hoarder roommate whose stuff covered the kitchen table.  Then I moved back home to help Mom and she rarely had people over.

Looks at my dining table.  Yeah, that might be a problem.  I moved some shelves but somehow the same amount of stuff didn’t fit in and the overflow ended up on the table since we weren’t using it anyways.  Then we had a flood behind the washer and some books were rescued out of the garage and never made it back.  Now they are sitting on the dining chairs to keep them off the floor.

I bought tall Ikea shelves age ago that I never put together.  I hope all the pieces are still there.  So since I am staying home to eat and I need my dining table, I think this week’s project is to put the shelf together so I have a place to move the books into.

So this week’s challenge:  Eat in for 7 days, food budget $5 a day (rolls over) for fresh veggies/fruits or drinks (lemonade — not what you were thinking).  Can’t buy anything frozen, canned or jarred.  (harder than you think — I live on frozen)

and this week’s project: Put together the Ikea shelves so I can reclaim the dining table and invite friends over.

Do you know what’s in your freezer?  (laughing evilly)

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