Grocery shop prep for a New Year

Every week we go through the same routine, there is nothing to eat!  What do we want to eat?  What do we buy?  How come no one ate any of that?  And where did all the (insert this week's yummiest item) go?  And we start again...
When I sit down to make a grocery list, as I may have said before...I try to start at home..
Step #1:What is in the freezer?  What is in the cupboard?  What is in the fridge? (that maybe shouldn't be anymore....)
~For example, there is a big chicken in the freezer, some pork chops and potatoes, carrots and onions in the bins, and lots of frozen veggies.  Dried pasta, and brown rice.  Oh and leftover chili in the freezer (from New year's eve).  If it weren't for the missing cheese, yogurt and bananas, I could likely forgo a trip to the grocery store until at least Wednesday evening. 
Step #2: What is in the flyer?
~I tend to go back and forth between two grocery stores.  Quality Foods is nice and close to home, a small store that isn't too busy...But the big draw for me is that it is right beside the skating rink (a place I go to once in awhile!)...so there tends to be the place where I go if we have run out of something that cannot wait.  Thrifty Foods used to be my favourite grocery store...Beautiful produce, great fish counter, they usually have the harder to find items and great sales (which make up for the slightly higher prices)...However, the great sales are not so great anymore and the slightly higher prices have gotten a lot higher in recent months.  Take hot chocolate for example: I don't buy a number of the ready made ones (one, I have a problem with some of their business practices and some of the others use cellulose in their hot chocolate, not so keen on the kids having wood pulp with their breakfast in the morning), but I like to have some instant stuff on hand for when I am not making my own, so I buy Murchie's Hot chocolate as it has only what I would be putting in my own.  Thrifty foods price: 9.99...Regular price at Quality foods, 8.99, on sale for $7.49.  Still expensive, but at least I am not paying for half a container of wood pulp.  Cereal is another area where the prices are quite a bit higher than other places...So, for Cereal, if Costco doesn't have it, we don't eat it. 
The one area where Quality foods doesn't hold up to Thrifty's is in their bulk section.  I can get organic dried beans if I want, or regular dried beans, and they are all from the US or Canada.  I can also get bulk Quinoa, and Quinoa flakes (which are great for cookies!)...
So what I do, is I shop the flyers...and compare.  This week's winner?  Thrifty Foods, with $1.00/lb for Gala apples and 7.99 for a 5 lb bag of California clementines (Q.foods has them too, 2.99 for a 2 lb bag, so same price), and $2.00 a box for Nature Valley Granola bars (we go through the roasted almond ones and the Oats-n-honey ones like crazy...oh and the Chocolate ones.  In their bakery section, Thrify's has a 900g (2 lb) loaf of whole wheat-low sodium sandwich bread for $3.69.  And when you go through bread like we do in our house, that is a great price. 
Over at The Poorganic Life she has a great list of tips to getting the processed stuff out of your grocery order and staying on budget.  Here is the link for this week's flyer over at
Thrifty foods
Quality foods
And some great templates for getting started on a New Year's grocery list.
Grocery list template from Not QuiteSuzie Homemaker
Grocery list from Your Printable Daily Planner

Happy Packing!

Kim

Ginger Spice Cookies

   Given that we are on spring break (still!), I got to take my kiddos with me to the grocery store this afternoon.  After a morning of picking up fir cones, raking the yard and sorting the bottles and cans to go to the return-it depot, of course, they were "over the moon" to be heading to the grocery store with Mum.  Er, well, not so much.  However, I offered that they could share the money from returning the bottles and cans...Half of the money was going to the Sunday school World Water Day fundraiser for Japan (All the Sunday school classses at our Church are collecting water bottles and the money raised is going to the Red Cross to help people in Japan), and then they could share the other half.  But that I would only be giving it to them once we had finished the grocery shopping. 
   My dear daughter always wants to push the buggy when she comes shopping, so she headed off in front of us to grab one.  Once inside, I handed the list to my son and told him to tell us where to start.  He asked for a pen to cross things off, and then gave me a big grin.  (to make a long story short, it was a reasonably painless trip, although it took us almost an hour and a half to get the groceries done!)  And they were both very impressed when "they" figured out how much cheaper it was to buy the big big box of goldfish crackers for $6.99, rather than to buy 6 and a half small bags for $2.99 each....I am surprised no one asked if they could keep the difference!   My son's eyes got very big and round when he watched the total come up on the screen.  "That is a lot of money," he whispered to no one in particular.  "Aw, Mummy, we forgot to buy cookies!" was my daughter's comment as the grocery bags went into the buggy ("Would you like help to your car?" the young girl at the cash asked me with a smile..."No thanks" I smiled back, but I sure like knowing that you ask, and that is why I keep coming back!).  My son looked at his sister and said, "Mum is going to make Ginger cookies when we get home instead."

And here they are!

Ginger Spice Cookies 

(original recipe from Chatelaine Magazine, December 2006 however, this is my version)  This recipe easily doubles and is great to make the night before and then chill overnight in the fridge, before baking.

Preheat oven to 350 F.  Makes 36 cookies
Line two cookie sheets with parchment (you can use oil and spray or coat if you don't use parchment)
1 cup (250ml) all purpose flour
1 cup (250ml) whole wheat or fine grind spelt flour
2 tsp (10ml) baking soda
1 tsp each (5ml each) cinnamon, and ginger
1/2tsp (2ml) nutmeg
1/4tsp (1ml) salt
1 egg
3/4 cup (175ml) canola oil (or for softer cookies, use 1/2 cup oil and 1/4 cup applesauce)
1/4 cup (55ml) molasses
1 cup (250ml) brown sugar (no packed)
1/4 cup (55ml) granulated sugar

Arrange racks in top 1/3 and bottom 1/3 of the oven.


In medium bowl, whisk flours, baking soda, cinnamon, ginger, nutmeg and salt.  In a  large bowl of a standing mixer, combine egg, oil and molasses.  Beat on medium until well combined.  Add brown sugar and beat until fluffy, if using applesauce, add now and beat until fluffy.  Gradually add flour mixture and beat on medium-low until well combined.  At this point, if you are making ahead, cover the bowl with plastic wrap or a clean tea towel and place in fridge until ready to use.  Allow to warm up 10 minutes or so before baking.
Place granulated sugar in a small bowl or on a saucer.  Using a small food scoop or tea spoon, scoop off a small amount and roll between hands to make a ball.  Roll ball in sugar and then place on parchment.  Continue with remaining dough, placing balls at least 4 cm apart on cookie sheets.
Bake on two racks, switching sheets halfway through baking (around 4 minutes).  Continue baking until edges are set and cookies begin to crack, 7-10 minutes.  Remove cookie sheets to cooling racks, and allow cookies to cool 6-7 minutes on sheets (they will be easier to remove), then remove to racks and allow to cool completely.  Store in covered container 5-7 days.  Freeze for up to 1 month.

My son was very pleased to see these come out of the oven!  My suggestion with these cookies is to make a double batch, and freeze half right away, so there will be some for lunches! 
At bedtime tonight, my son gave me back his half of the bottle money.  "I think it should all go to the water fundraiser, "he whispered, "Haruka might need water where she is and I don't want her to be thirsty."
Yes, he is my honey.

Happy Packing!

The litterless lunch

   So, you have raided your pantry, consulted with all the likely suspects, created a menu that everyone thinks they will eat (or not!  But that is the way it goes...), and made your list.  Now, you are off to the grocery store.  But wait!  Before you start through those doors...Are you ready?  Sure, of course you are.  But are you really ready...If you bring your children with you when you shop, then you know what I am talking about..."Oh please, can you buy?"..."But everyone else gets them!"..."Pleeeeease!"
   Grrrr...it is enough to make me turn around right there, without a single item.  Yes, we have done it, left a full grocery cart in front of customer service....I always apologize to the cashier working at the customer service desk and ask where is a good place to leave the buggy, since "we" won't be staying to finish our shop.  They smile apologetically and  are more than gracious as I leave, dragging two screaming children out to the car.  But I digress, as that no longer happens, because my children truly understand when I say, "Should we just leave now?", it means that we just might!
   Fortunately, both my children had the same grade one teacher ( she is a wonderful woman, who has three just-grown boys, and really "gets" kids), and therefore, both learned from her what a "litter less" lunch is.  "It means that our yogurt should be in one of those Tupperware containers, you know, the ones with the coloured lids?  And we should bring a regular kitchen spoon, not a plastic one."  And we are not allowed to bring our sandwiches in baggies (what is a "baggy", Mum?), we should get a container that you wash afterwards.  Madame says that there are lots of them at Value Village, can we go?"...And a water bottle that we can refill at the water fountain in the classroom, not juice boxes, and you remember, we aren't allowed to bring pop, right, Mum?"...(Pssst, she doesn't let us drink pop, except when Mr and Mrs Krall come over, she isn't gonna put it in our lunch!)...And I smile and open the container drawer in the kitchen, "Why don't you see what we have in here first, before we go all the way to Value Village?"  And it is incredible what they find...All those things the teacher mentioned, including a Spider man sandwich box ("Oh yeah!  I forgot about this one!"),  a couple of Lunchbots, a Tiffin, some Tupperware yogurt containers and about a half dozen water bottles...
   So, armed with the wisdom of "Madame", my seven year old and I head to the grocery store, and as we enter the produce section, she instantly spies the mini packs of "baby-cut" carrots.  "You know, Mum, this is creating a lot of garbage.  We can make the same snack at home if you buy the big big bag of carrots and then peel them and cut them up and put them into a container."...Really?  Sounds good.  She hovers over the small (and I mean tiny!!) container of raspberries, mesmerized for a moment.  Then she recovers and says, "It's not raspberry season, so we shouldn't buy these.  Besides, they probably came from...from Hawaii or something"...Oh, okay.  "What about apples?"  I ask.  "Apples are an excellent snack, so are bananas.  Really healthy and they have their own wrappers!"  She pauses, wrinkling her brow in thought, "And we have a compost bucket in our class, so I don't have to bring the core home.  Compost is good for the garden, you know.  You could put your coffee grounds in too."
...Our shopping trip continues up and down each aisle, each one creating similar conversation.  How the big box of crackers is better than buying those little cheese and cracker things, references to homemade soups and big containers of yogurt ("But you'll have to buy two, because Daddy likes blueberry and I like vanilla.")
We are just about to the checkout, when she spies me passing the aisle with the pop and chips.  "Mummy!  You're forgetting something...."  She is giving me that, I'm-smarter-than-you-are look, and points down the aisle.
   "What?"  I ask.
   "Mr. and Mrs. Krall are coming for dinner tonight, and you promised-"  "Yes, you can have ginger ale".  I roll my eyes and she gleefully grabs a big bottle of ginger ale.  "Thank you!"

Not all our shopping trips are as peaceful as this one, but it is good to know that those conversations hold enough meaning for her to repeat them at home.  And giving them that sort of knowledge makes it easier when you say "no" to things like those pre-packaged lunches or cute little packages of cookies.  All of a sudden, you are empowering them to make a difference and do something good for the Earth, which feels better to children than just thinking their Mum or Dad or Grandma is being mean and doesn't want to buy "fun" stuff for thier lunches.  Of course, right now, we are having the fight about how she's been using the same lunch bag forever!

Happy Packing!


A great place to find Litterless lunch packing items :www.noplastics.ca

Was that really the best price?

Ah, another impending trip to the grocery store.  It involves the usual chores of checking the fridge, the pantry, the freezer and the opinions of other household members (the cat's request was that Grandma and Grandpa's dog be removed from the house and returned to wherever she came from...apparently, he wants to go back to eating on the floor and hanging out in the big play room during daycare time...In a few days, Emmy, it will all be back to normal, and you can run away from the lego cars to your heart's content...In the meantime, go back to enjoying your newfound Cat-tertainment of the fish swimming in the aquarium)...But I digress...
   When it comes to packing lunches, in our house, we try and take a "litterless" approach whenever possible.  Sandwich boxes (I like the Lunchbots stainless steel ones), thermoses, containers for yogurt and cookies, carrot sticks and dip, water bottles.  You know the drill.  We have some great sandwich containers: beyond the stainless steel Lunchbots, we also have Tupperware sandwich boxes, and some snackTAXI's.  They are great when you need to take your lunch, but don't want to carry around the bulky box afterwards.  They are fabric velcro closing snack or sandwich bags (2 sizes), that have a nylon easy-to-clean lining.  All great gear for saving on garbage creation and for saving money.  Saving money, because we all know that it is cheaper to make your own snacks and pack them than it is to let someone else pack them and sell them to you prewrapped and then boxed up in groups of  5 or 6 or 24!  However, while I stand firm on the pre-packaged "Lunchables" or lean cuisine type meals, I do give in and stock (both for their enjoyment and my sanity) cheese strings or Babybels, applesauce, granola bars and small yogurts (the deal being that the yogurt and applesauce containers have to only be used for lunches and that the empty containers come home to be washed and used for daycare paints, glue or other craft helper uses).
    So, I did a little homework this week and investigated where you get the best value for your dollar (and your nutrition) when buying the standard lunchbox fillers.  The yogurt was the easy one:  watch for the sales, as long as you have a few different brands that your family will eat, and aim not to pay more than 0.50 per serving.  Most yogurts are the same, when you compare similar fat contents.That and the sugar content, those are the decisions that you have to make for your family.  The ideal being about 2% mf (for younger children or teens who are maintaining a healthy weight, go 1% or no fat for adults), and the lower the sugar the better, staying away from artificial stuff.  Best is creating your own: plain yogurt and adding your own fresh or frozen fruit, and using honey or maple syrup as your sweetener (if you brought back a bottle of vanilla extract from your last trip to Mexico, add that too!  Mmmmm!).  Bottom line, the less ingredients in your yogurt, the better, both health-wise and taste-wise.  However, if your family will only eat somebody's 2% fruity yogurt, go for it and feel good that they are eating yogurt.  Yogurt (plain or fruit filled) will give your loved one a serving of dairy (and for your kids, that means you are only looking for one or two more servings to meet the RDA).
   Granola bars is another one: we buy Nature Valley crunchy ones or the Kashi chewy ones (altho these are probably the most expensive if you go regular price).  Comparing sizes and prices and nutrition values, Kashi gives you the best bang for your buck.  The key?  The same as the yogurt: the fewer ingredients on the list, the better.  And the Kashi ones had no added palm oil, and I could pronounce and recognize everything on the ingredient list.  However, regular price around here, they go for 4.99 a box (so 6 bars), when you compare with other store brands, you can get the same number of bars for half the price.  The Nature Valley crunchy bars (the ones in the green package containing 2 bars), sell at reg price around here for 3.99 a box, but regularly go on sale for 2 for 5.00 or even 1.99 a box.  They too have a reasonable ingredient list (pronounceable and recognizeable), and average about 4g of fat per bar (so 8 per package).  My suggestion?  Buy what your kids will eat (because it's no deal if it goes in the garbage), but stay away from long ingredient lists (and I won't mention the one big name that I left off of here, that tends to be a big seller because they advertise that they have "Peanut Free" bars...they are filled with puffed rice and all kinds of other ingredients...their bars are smaller than both the other brands I mentioned earlier and when you compare same size servings, they have more fat and sugar, and less fibre).
   The third and last item I compared was Applesauce...Unsweetened (albeit they make a variety of mixed flavours like berry apple and peach apple etc)...Motts, Presidents choice and Compliments (owned by Sobeys) were the three brands of applesauce cups I compared, all unsweetened, and all offered similar nutritional information.  The big thing for me was that as far as I could tell, both Presidents Choice and Compliments are really Leahy (available some places as Applesnax).  Mott's is a US company that began in New York State as a Cider company.  It has been through a variety of changes over the 100 plus years of existance and is now owned by Cadbury-Schweppes out of England.  See their website for more info http://motts.com/ 
Leahy is a Canadian company, based in Franklin, Quebec.  Growing up in the Chateauguay Valley, Franklin was (and still is) "Apple Country", and therefore close to my heart.   Leahy offers both organic and regular unsweetened apple products (both of which are available as Compliments and Presidents Choice across Canada), and are made with Canadian apples.  Price-wise, both of the store brands are slightly less expensive than the name brand, altho Motts is the one available at Costco. Both of the store brands are availabe in larger jars (700ml) and if you go to Zellers, you can find Applesnax (Leahy) in both organic and regular unsweetened varieties in the large jars.
So, while Motts may be the name brand on the shelves, in this case my heart is with the store brands, and my daughter's taste buds are too. 
To read more about Leahy, http://applesnax.com/EN-CA/index.html
The Leahy company is also Apple Boost another interesting concept:
http://www.appleboost.com/index.php

Now, to get back to that grocery list!  But first, take Grandma and Grandpa's doggy for a walk!
Happy Packing!

Under pressure!

Okay, so it is Sunday afternoon, and I am heading home from Victoria after being away since Thursday, and I have no idea what might be in the fridge.  All I know is that I just want to get home and not have to go out again.  Three days of volunteering at Skate Canada Nationals was fantastic!  But I am exhausted, and there is a week of lunches and dinners (and crazy activity schedules!) ahead of us...I can't help wondering if my dear hubby has made a trip to Costco while I was away...
As I said, I have no idea what might be left in the fridge and when I called home, no one picked up, so I am on my own as far as groceries go, and what to buy.  So, I take a chance that there is milk at home and stop in at one of the big farmer's markets just outside of Duncan.  We are very fortunate here on the Island, or certainly the central island, to have such great farmer's markets.  Typically, my husband stops at Russell's, which is on his way home from work.  Today, I choose to stop at the other big one, which is just south of Duncan and called The red rooster (or the Red barn, at this point I cannot remember...if someone can help me with the correct name, please do!).  I head in WITHOUT a list!  Typically, not a good idea, however, today I am in a time crunch too, so I am using a mental list that goes something like: "Bananas, apples, salad, stir fry, and lunches."  I come away with bread, cheese, two heads of lettuce, a bunch of celery (the only surplus purchase, it turns out), two bags of apples (these days, who can resist 0.39c/lb for apples!), bananas, green onion, mushrooms (including portabellos as a treat because they were local), broccoli, a 5 lb bag of onions and a 15 lb bag of potatoes, bacon, two packs of lunch meat and a loaf of garlic bread (to go with dinner tonight, because it will make people more happy to see me!).  The plus to this kind of shopping, is that there are none of those center aisle items (like oreos and pudding cups) and we will just have to make it through the week without them...A tip?  Make a big batch of pudding (either homemade or the package kind) and spoon the fresh pudding into smaller containers with lids and, voila, your own pudding cups!  These also make great homemade frozen treats although they don't go quite so well into the lunchbox!)...a label note: if you make the cooked pudding version of the packaged pudding, you get less saturated fat per serving, and it is almost as convenient.
And, what did I learn after almost a week of mixing with high level athletes?  Bananas!  Wow, there were a lot of those...As a parent, of course I know that bananas are good for you...but how good...
To answer that question, I did a little searching and what I found came from www.health.learninginfo.org (this info also matched what I had in my nutrition chart available from Health Canada).
A banana is a large berry (didn't know that!).
1 medium banana contains 100 calories, a large one, 125.  Bananas are low in calories, fat and sodium and packed full of nutrients... (making them a good choice for athletes)
452 mg of potassium, 33 mg of magnesium and 1/3 RDA of vitamin B6.  They contain 2g of fibre.
And, they taste good!  Another tip, the more ripe the banana, the higher the sugar content.  And there are lots and lots of great baking recipes that use bananas.
Happy Packing!