Feeling under the weather is so dreary. I guess colds and viruses have their way with us all every once in awhile, but I can't wait to feel better again! I looked at my blog today and couldn't believe how many days have gone by since I felt like posting - or eating - or, well, doing much of anything. What a week!
The chores I do these days are done out of pure desperation. Run out of clothes (well, good clothes)? Guess I'd better haul myself down to the laundromat. No time or energy for sorting or turning out pockets or mulling over modern fabrics. I made my bed once a few days ago when I couldn't stand not having the bedcovers tucked in all tidily. I have no appetite still, so I'm eating catch as catch can. My housekeeping routine flew a white flag to illness several days ago.
So I'll make this a brief post. I noticed that my one-month mission in analyzing my food dollar ran its course a couple days ago. Here is how America's Housekeeping Book (1945) recommends that housewives spend their "food dollar":
It helps also occasionally to keep a detailed food record for a couple of weeks or a month with separate totals for cost of cereal foods; fruits and vegetables; meats, fish and eggs; milk and cheese; and in a final class, fats, sugar and miscellaneous items. On a modest income, in order to get a balanced diet, not far from 1/5 of the food money should go for each of these five groups.
As embarrassing as it's been to bare how my own food dollar breaks down, I guess things can only improve from here!
Fats, Sugar and Miscellaneous Items = $247.04 (66%)
Fruits and Vegetables = $40.40 (11%)
Cereal Foods = $37.95 (10%)
Milk and Cheese = $30.64 (8%)
Eggs, Beans, and Soy = $19.64 (5%)
Part of the reason the first category is so large is because I eat many more frozen, prepared foods than is good for my pocketbook or my waistline. When you have a deathly fear of doing dishes or dirtying up a kitchen you don't want to clean, reheating frozen foods is a heck of a lot easier than cooking a meal from scratch. Using multiple pots and pans. Spilling things on the stovetop.
I am very surprised by the total I'm spending on food. In one month, I spent $375.67. What I thought I was spending on food was about $250-275 per month. Quite a difference between perception and reality! I'm sure that as I reform my dinner habits - slowly, but surely - there will be some changes here. So I'll try this mini-mission again in several months and plan on seeing some improvements.
13 comments:
It's so hard to stay in a routine when one is ill! It is good to adjust for this time and not to be discouraged. You will feel better and return to your new/old ways soon!
Thank you, sweetie! I love it: my new/old ways... I don't know about breakfast, but I'm going to try picking my early morning routine back up again tomorrow morning.
yes, it really can be startling when you add up how much you spend on food and other things... whatever you think is your budget, is really at least 10% more
it's quite worrying sometimes
Hope you get to feeling better very soon!
Glad to see you are back! Get better soon :)
I know how it is to be see and trying to 'live up to the past'. For me, though, had I not had hubby to care for and the need to keep at my house as much as possible (it definitely suffered though) the structure of it made me do more when I was ill than I normally would. Is that good or bad? I don't really know. It helped having Gussie, though I only had her one day and the weekend I was really ill, she wasn't available, so it can pile up. I am finding, surprisingly enough, that my food bill has gone down ( I too have tried the formula in the home keeping book, these should be mandatory wedding gifts!)with canned vegetables accompanying fresh and baking things from scratch. I first thought all the ingredients would eat up my budget, but they tend to last longer than I thought. The initial stocking of the pantry with drygoods seemed pricy, but cornstarch, baking soda/powder, these things last awhile. It is always a pain with the food budgeting, I know!
Hope you feel better. I felt guilty when I didn't blog, do you feel the same way? Like you are letting people down, must be our sympathetic housewife natures.
I so happy to hear you are feeling at least a little better!
Don't quite understand why "Fruits and Vegetables" has to mean only fresh, though. In Minnesota, if I ate only fresh fruits and vegetables in the winter, I would be limited to onions, carrots, lettuce and celery all winter! Perhaps a frozen boil-in-bag of broccoli and pearl onions drenched in cheese sauce should not be counted, but a frozen bag of green beans or a bag of mixed vegetables to be thrown in our soups? A frozen bag of blueberries for our pancakes? Perhaps it could be stretched that far.
Andrea
I'm so sorry you're sick! I hate when I get knocked off my feet by some silly cold or flu. Really makes you wonder how the households ran when the wife was sick!
wow! i can only imagine the cost around these days...granny lavern only spent 100.00 a month for many of her years...wow something to think about i'm inspired...i sure hope you feel better soon kitten...cat
I "found" your blog about a week ago and LOVE it! I've been trying to adapt some of the cleaning ideas to suit my family (I have a 2.5 and 1.5 year old) and I can't believe how much more time I seem to have!
I was thinking about your food budget and, as we are on a tight budget, we only spend $400-$450 per month for the 4 of us. To reduce your costs you could have a cooking day and freeze all the meals so it's only 1 day of dishes every few weeks... just a thought...if you need to save money that is!
I hope you feel better soon - thanks for such a unique blog (well, compared to what I usually read it is :)).
Rebecca
Why DOES food, real food, have to cost so much?
Certainly, the more you make from scratch, the more you'll save, but you can still save on the premade stuff if you watch for sales and keep an eye out for coupons on your favorites.
Have you seen the 93yo lady who cooks recipes from the depression era? She has some videos on Youtube.
The one I watched was "Pasta and Peas." She said they ate a LOT of pasta during the depression LOL!
I'll look for the link if you haven't seen it yet.
Roxanne
I found an article about the 93yo lady. Her name is Clara Cannucciari:
http://www.nydailynews.com/lifestyle/food/2009/02/27/2009-02-27_clara_cannucciari_is_a_youtube_sensation.html
Roxanne
Yowza - I'm in comment heaven! Thanks to all of you for stopping in and wishing me well.
Elise, first off, your new pic is so pretty! I was very surprised to see how much I am really spending on food. Forewarned is forearmed, right? Now, at least I know. What I couldn't do with that extra $100!
50sgal, I noticed too as I was starting the vintage breakfast menus that it just seemed like I was having to buy a new ingredient every time I turned around, but once you have your pantry stocked with the basics, it really makes a difference. And basics don't have to mean your meals are lacking in variety. The housewives of yesteryear were very savvy about marketing, weren't they? They planned their menus around what was in season or on sale. They knew how to work leftovers and use everything up before it'd gone stale or bad. Not only have I been spending more than one person should be spending on food, but I probably lose a good deal of my food dollar just to spoilage.
Andrea, I definitely counted frozen fruits and veggies that were "straight up," so to speak, in the fruits/veggies category. It was those combo items that vexed me - like, ahem, frozen pizza. If I wanted to get real creative, I could've broken the price of one of those into thirds or something, but how to categorize all those dreadful preservatives, additives, sauces, etc. I felt like they usually deserved to sit there in the naughty corner with all the other fats, oils, etc.
Rebecca, you're very kind. I am planning on starting out with some vintage dinner menus once a week (on the weekends) and making good use of those leftovers. I've frozen some of the baked goods I made for my vintage breakfasts and it makes me feel so rich to have real food in the freezer, you know?
Roxanne, I'm headed right over to read the article. The bit about pasta is so interesting. I've always thought people in that era not really being very aware of pasta - except spaghetti! My mom remembers her mother and aunts and uncles talking about eating extra diluted soups during the Depression.
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