What do you eat in a week?
Photo from Google Images
I wanted to take a picture of what our grocery haul looks like, but I kept forgetting about it. Curiosity Killer beat me to the punch and posted her one week grocery expenditure for a family of two in Hong Kong.
Since today was grocery day (and I remembered to take a photo for you), here it is! We just got the essentials this time. Today we got baby spinach for $5/ 2 packages. We usually get Clementines, cantaloupe, kiwis, bananas, berries, etc. I wanted strawberries and pineapple, but they were expensive this week. We've got raspberries from our farm in our freezer. We need to top up our calcium and vitamin D intake (hence all the dairy products and the vit-D fortified orange juice). As for meat, it was just salmon, tuna, etc. I married a beef farmer, so we have beef in the freezer throughout the year and don't need to buy much in the way of meat. I was going to get chicken, but couldn't believe how expensive it was. Maybe next week. Gosh! I must sound super cheap, right?? Hubby says I'm "frugal". I wasn't always this way...especially when I lived in the city.
*Note: This is for when it's just Hubby and myself. When we have students, our groceries double or even triple!*
Canada: The Hubby & C Family of two- on an island somewhere in the province of Ontario
Food Expenditure for one week: $63.87 CAD or $64.87 US
Favourite foods: Baked butternut squash with greens, fresh fruit salad, baked salmon with dill, Clementines, cheese lasagna, cream of broccoli soup and baby spinach/mixed greens salad with homemade Balsamic vinaigrette.
Germany : The Melander family of Bargteheide
Food expenditure for one week : 375.39 Euros or $500.07
Favorite foods : fried potatoes with onions, bacon and herring, fried noodles with eggs and cheese, pizza, vanilla pudding
United States : The Revis family of North Carolina
Food expenditure for one week : $341.98
Favorite foods : spaghetti, potatoes, sesame chicken
Japan : The Ukita family of Kodaira City
Food expenditure for one week : 37,699 Yen or $317.25
Favorite foods : sashimi, fruit, cake, potato chips
Italy : The Manzo family of Sicily
Food expenditure for one week : 214.36 Euros or $260.11
Favorite foods: fish, pasta with ragu, hot dogs, frozen fish sticks
Great Britain : The Bainton family of Cllingbourne Ducis
Food expenditure for one week : 155.54 British Pounds or $253.15
Favorite foods : avocado, mayonnaise sandwich, prawn cocktail, chocolate fudge cake with cream
Kuwait : The Al Haggan family of Kuwait City
Food expenditure for one wee k : 63.63 dinar or $221.45
Family recipe : Chicken biryani with basmati rice
Mexico : The Casales family of Cuernavaca
Food expenditure for one week : 1,862.78 Mexican Pesos or $189.09
Favorite foods : pizza, crab, pasta, chicken
China : The Dong family of Beijing
Food expenditure for one week : 1,233.76 Yuan or $155.06
Favorite foods: fried shredded pork with sweet and sour sauce
Poland : The Sobczynscy family of Konstancin-Jeziorna
Food expenditure for one week : 582.48 Zlotys or $151.27
Family recipe : Pig’s knuckles with carrots, celery and parsnips
United States : The Caven family of California
Food expenditure for one week : $159.18
Favoit foods : beef stew, berry yogurt sundae, clam chowder, ice cream
Egypt : The Ahmed family of Cairo
Food expenditure for one week : 387.85 Egyptian Pounds or $68.53
Family recipe : Okra and mutton
Mongolia : The Batsuuri family of Ulaanbaatar
Food expenditure for one week : 41,985.85 togrogs or $40.02
Family recipe : Mutton dumplings
Ecuador : The Ayme family of Tingo
Food expenditure for one week : $31.55
Family ripe : Potato soup with cabbage
Bhutan : The Namgay family of Shingkhey Village
Food expenditure for one week : 224.93 ngultrum or $5.03
Family recipe: Mushroom, cheese and pork
Chad : The Aboubakar family of Breidjing Camp
Food expenditure for one week : 685 CFA Francs or $1.23
Favorite foods : soup with fresh mutton
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City girl moves to the country, falls in love, and marries a farmer. She tries to incorporate her city ways with her new country lifestyle and blogs to keep in touch with friends, family & students who live far, far away :) Can this city girl go country? Watch as she learns all sorts of exciting things about life on the farm and in a small rural community. *UPDATE* We are now parents! Our baby girl was born on Nov. 11, 2008 (at 28 weeks gestation- 12 weeks premature, but she's quite the trooper)!!!
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20 comments:
I'm such a bad wife! I had to buy Hubby's cracked wheat bread because I didn't have time to bake bread! Though we usually buy seasonal and local produce, it's hard to do so in the winter here. In the summer, our produce comes from our garden. Oh, those of you from the Island will note the Farquhar's Milk! When we buy dairy, we try to always support Farquhar's :)
wow i can't believe how little you spend on groceries. We spend about $150-200 per week and that is just 2 adults and one baby...and i hardly call what we buy luxery items!!
Dina:
Most of our meat comes from the farm, as well as a lot of the produce (which I harvest late summer and then freeze). Rice, potatoes and pasta are relatively cheap and we don't buy them every week. It usually lasts us a while. We do spend over $100 when we buy meat and the odd treat like Sun Chips, tortilla chips & salsa, frozen yogourt or ice cream, etc. Oh, and when we need toilet paper, dish soap, laundry detergent, etc...that's when our bill gets steep!
This week's groceries was for the necessities. Lots of fruits, veggies, yogourt, milk, cheese, and salmon, tuna. I skipped buying chicken this week because it was expensive and we've got a freezer full of beef in our basement.
My Mom spends about $150-$200/week and it's just her and my Dad in their house. The reason she always spends more than I do is because she started buying a lot of ready-made stuff. She buys a lot of Pepsi & diet Pepsi...and she and my Dad have started eating a lot of cookies, danishes and potato chips. I keep telling her that junk food is really expensive.
She is always amazed at how little I spend each week. We sometimes go grocery shopping together and she laughs when she sees my grocery cart having mostly only fruits, veggies, some meat and dairy. Her cart is usually filled to the brim with stuff! She never used to buy convenience foods, but now she buys stuff like Pogos and chicken nuggets. She also buys the most expensive things around!
I'll occasionally splurge and buy a wheel of Brie or a wheel of Camembert cheese. As for the other stuff, I find if I don't have them in the house, we are not tempted to eat them. I know if there's chocolate in the house, it's hard to not eat it! LOL! The same goes with sweets. If we want cookies, I have the ingredients to make them. Most of the time, it's too much of an effort to bake a cake or pie or make cookies, so we don't bother. If we really want them, then I bake them.
One time in the summer (when my students had already returned to their country), I spent $38 on groceries for a week! My Mom grabbed my receipt because she couldn't believe it! LOL! Even the cashier was laughing!
I can see how you spend so little on food with all the raw vegies and fruits you buy and the meat is what makes the grocery bill so expensive as well as the conveinience foods. we spend about $130-150 and sometimes $200 or more a week with two adults, two young kids and a baby. You know me i need to get convenience food with three kids in the house ! remember the Tater tot pie recipe i gave you? That comes in handy!
I posted about this a long time ago .. glad to see that you find this interesting too. Yes "What the world eats" and very clear from the american table that mostly we buy things (sadly)
What a neat post for your blog. I espically liked to see the food with the different ethnic families and their foods (with prices). The Mexico family reminded me of mine (all the pop in the background). I am the pop drinker which is my choice of drink besides coffee (straight up, black). I should drink more water, but I don't. My last grocery bill was 100.00which probably 15.00 was pop and 6.00 for 2 bags kettle chips, thai flavored and 12 clif bars that totaled 15.00 bucks (which aren't cheap) but were on sale (yay). I wanna take a picture of my grocery day. Problem is, I grocery shop sporatically, so to get the big picture of what I buy really wouldn't happen cause I might meat shop one day (from the butcher), then get 'filler foods" from Cub Grocery (ketchup, chips, pasta, pop, milk, etc)., then get paper/cleaning products from the club stores (bulk papertowls, large bag of rice, etc). Super post.
C - you're SO NOT a bad wife. I can't believe you'll say that! LOL
And Dina - I know groceries are expensive in Toronto... luckily it's quite affordable in Hong Kong... now RENT is another matter...
just dropped in to check out your blog, lol. :)
wow--you eat healthy. And wow--at the bottom? 2 dollars on food? I don't think I have food in my house. Just Diet Pepsi Max and chocolate.
Chris you know me- I've got a few frozen Lean Cuisines and Delicio pizzasin my freezer! It's just the two of us and I don't have time to shop let alone cook. We order out or eat out 4 or 5 times a week. We can order just about anything and have it delivered. Obviously I didn't take photos but our food consumption so far this week has been MON-ordered 2 Swiss Chalet classic quarter chicken dinners, TUE-The fan favourite at Pizza Pizza for $25.99 (pls tx and delivery too) and WED-Chinese food from across the street. They had a special 3 dishes for 7.99 + 1.99 for drink. I had General Tao chicken, chow mien, sweet and sour pork and they give you an egg roll or your choice of hot & sour soup or wonton soup. Valentine's Day i think we're going to Spring Rolls. May be I'll cook on the weekend if I have time! It does make for some expensive dining to order out and eat out all the time but we really don't have time to shop sr cook.
I still say that guy from Sicily looks suspiciously like my cousin Luigi.
You are one helluva good eater! An inspiration.
By the way, my dad went to his doctor, and didn't get a pamphlet or diet restrictions or anything. Was told he could he whatever he wanted except shrimp and lobster.
Idiots. So thanks again, I'm makin' squash and following your link. Did I mention he was worse than ever after he left the doctor's office?
Hot Mommy:
I remember my Mom spending $200 or more on groceries when both my brothers and I were still living at home. It's not cheap to feed a family! Especially when you have two growing boys in the house!
Nabeel:
Yes, you are so right. I tried to decide whether it was cheaper or not to grow most of my own produce, but you can get most things for way cheaper in the store, which is really sad! The farmer does so much work, yet gets paid next to nothing for it. Take for example, canned corn. The farmer has to do all the work to grow it and harvest it, then it gets taken to the cannery. The companies make $$, the stores make some $$, but the farmer gets a tiny fraction of that. It's really sad.
Even though it takes a lot of time and energy to grow our own stuff, and it's not exactly cheaper to grow your own, I still like to do it because I know what just what I'm eating and what's not going into it.
Anyway, it's a topic that I'll leave for a post someday. LOL!
Christine:
Yes, it was interesting to see what people in other countries eat :) Although, this week's groceries for us was a bit skewed. That's just what we bought this week. We also purchase cereal for Hubby and other things. When we have guests, we also buy pop and chips. Sometimes there's chocolate on the list for those times when I just crave it! Sometimes I just want some of that stuff!
Now you're making me hungry! LOL! I LOVE kettle chips! Those are so good! I had to Google Clif Bars and those look good!
CK:
Thanks :) My mother-in-law makes EVERYTHING from scratch. She makes her own bread, biscuits, yogourt, mayonnaise, jams, pickles, relishes, canned fruits, chocolate pudding, mustard, pies (and pie crusts). Me? I was a city girl! I used to make homemade stuff too, but not to this extent. I used to buy everything already made or from a box! I've been learning a lot living on the Island. I now make 95% of our meals from scratch. Married life for me is so much different from when I was single! I didn't used to cook all my meals (I'd buy my lunch sometimes or I was too busy and order my supper from a restaurant)...and I didn't used to clean! LOL! I think I only learned how to do my own laundry when I was in university! LOL! We had two live-in nannies (they cooked, cleaned, looked after us kids) when we were growing up and when we didn't have them, my mom did everything! LOL!
Jodi:
Hi! We do eat pretty healthy, but we also get the occasional treat here and there. I sometimes buy tortilla chips and salsa or Sun Chips. Lately, I've been very concerned about what we're eating. Hubby is wanting to preserve his figure (LOL) and diabetes runs in my family and I don't want to get it. Basically, I'm trying not to buy lots of processed stuff and if there are ingredients in my food that I can't pronounce, then I don't want to eat it! LOL! Paranoid? Maybe :) I wasn't always this way though.
Bottom line, we do eat pretty healthy, but need to work on portion sizes. We tend to go for seconds sometimes.
T:
Yes, I used to be like you when I lived in the city. When I lived on York Mills, we lived right across all these restaurants. There was Pizza Pizza, a Chinese restaurant, a Caribbean restaurant, a Greek restaurant and a few stores like Shoppers' Drugmart, Food Basics, and a convenience store and dry cleaner. Everything was so close that it was just too easy for me to come home after work and say "Mehhhhh, I don't feel like cooking. Let's just order in". When you're tired and ready-made food is so accessible, it's just so easy to not have to cook. At least it was for us. Sometimes a few of the other couples in the building would ask us to go across the street to the pub. Pub grub isn't the healthiest for you, but we did it because of the social interaction. In a way, I am kind of glad I live somewhere that doesn't have all that stuff so accessible. I'm forced to eat healthier and I'm forced to make my own food.
Oh, here's something I sometimes cheat on! Occasionally I'll buy one of those taco kits from the grocery store! That's a quick meal. I don't do it often because of the ingredients in the powdered seasonings, but every now and then, it's good! Compliments brand is half the price of the Old El Paso brand.
Jeanna:
Really???? Your dad has gout and they told him the only things he couldn't eat were shrimp and lobster? That sounds a bit wacky! Is he going to follow his doc's words or is he going to take other precautionary steps so that his gout doesn't flare up? My grandfather (he passed away a few years ago) had gout and was miserable when he had to change his diet. Everything in moderation, I guess.
Yeah, we do eat well, but I sort of feel like one of those people who quit smoking and become the worst anti-smokers. I think I drive my Mom nuts when I say, "I can't believe you're eating that" as she munches on Chicharon (fried pork rinds). I know it's none of my business and I try not to say anything. It's not my place and I don't push my beliefs on others. We don't eat healthy all the time, but we eat healthier more than unhealthy. That sounds weird. It's hard, but I'm really trying. Hubs and I like a lot of fruits and veggies, so that helps. He never grew up with pop or anything ready-made or "just add water", so it's easier for him. Hubby has a sweet tooth though. He likes his desserts. He was used to getting fresh pies, cakes, etc all the time. I love baking, but now do it only on occasion because if it's there, we'll eat it. If you have your cake, you have to eat it too! How silly would it be not to? LOL!
Wow that is so interesting! That one family had a whole lotta stuff! (Second one down.) Wow!
Happy Valentines!
Wow!, You and CK did great with your two post on this.
I'm glad I read where your mom and dad spend $150-$200 a week. Now I don't feel so bad.
I probably spend over $100 a week just eating out, not counting what I buy for the home or the dogs!
Uncivil:
Yeah, that kinda bummed me out. Growing up, my mom and dad ALWAYS cooked wholesome, homemade meals for us kids. Now that it's just the two of them, they do the convenience thing and watch TV together while they eat! They've turned into teenagers!!!! I'd go over and they'd be sitting there with their pop and chips, telling me to "Shhhhhhhhh!!!" because they're in the middle of a good movie! LOL!
Lisa Marie:
Happy Valentine's to you too! Those were some gorgeous flowers you got!!! :)
Wow - that was an absolutely fascinating post. I loved it - thanks!