My fridge, at the moment, with most of the produce I bought today inside.

On this local “money smart” board I am on, there was a discussion about how much is a normal amount of money to spend on groceries per family, and a financial consultant gave a really high number that many people were shocked to read. A bunch of extra frugal minded and just relatively frugal minded friends were surprised by the number, and all claimed to be spending much less each month on groceries than that. The financial consultant wanted to know what exactly we were buying that we were spending that little…

One of those friends and I decided that for the next month, we’d keep track of every single grocery (and food/eating out) expense we have for the next month- yes, even when we go to the store and just pick up one thing, so we can see exactly how much we’re spending, and what percent of our money is getting spent on what. I’ve decided to scan my receipts daily, and when there isn’t a receipt, just write down what was spent and on what. At the end of the month, I’ll tally up every expense, and see how much we’re spending total, how much on different categories, etc…
This will also be beneficial for us to help us decide if we want to be spending the way that we are, or if there’s anything we want to change. And it’ll help us know for sure if the estimates we have on how much we spend monthly is accurate or off.
And yes, those nonsensical waste splurges will be tallied up as well….
For those of you who are local and know the name of my other neglected frugality blog… I’m posting my receipts and expenses there each time we spend, and at the end of the month, I’ll do a summary on this blog… (If you’re local and don’t know the name if my other blog, email me at pennilessparenting at yahoo dot com and I’ll give you the address. If you don’t know if you’re local to me… you’re not.)

Because of this project I’m undertaking, I’ll try to post here more often about my shopping trips, what I bought, and why.

Today I went to the farmer’s market to produce shop. A few days ago I went to the grocery store and was very disappointed by what I saw in the produce department. All the produce was much more expensive than it was in the past. The cheapest veggies were 40 cents a pound, but most were closer to $1 per pound or more… I know that most American readers will probably think those prices are amazing, but in my country salaries are much lower, so $1 per pound veggies are pretty expensive for most…

When prices are expensive for produce, I tend to head to the reduced rack for groceries that are cheaper because they are past their prime, but the reduced rack has been nearly empty the last few times I went shopping, other than onions, which I bought, and peppers, which we don’t eat because they cause stomach upset in our family…
I decided that if my family wants to continue eating a healthy diet without breaking the bank, I’d need to find another place to do my produce shopping. The farmer’s market is an hour plus trip each way from my house, but its the best place where I can find good deals on produce in my area, so even though the trip is tiring, I decided that I needed to make it anyhow…

This is what I got at the farmer’s market today and why:

Even within the farmer’s market, there is a place to get even cheaper produce. This is a whole “reduced rack” stand, with lots of produce, usually past prime, that you can get cheaply. The catch is- the guy who runs it is an older, often grumpy man… and none of the produce in his store is labeled by price. If you ask him how much something costs per pound, he’ll get annoyed at you, and will likely give you a high price. If you insult the food at the store by claiming that it is sub par in any way (even if it is true!) he will be upset with you. If you argue with him that his prices are too high, he’ll raise the prices even more, and after you come back to him in the future, he’ll continue to give you high prices…
So what do you do? You pick out produce that looks good to you, put it in bags, and give it to the salesman. He’ll weigh it, or eyeball it, and name a price. You do NOT argue with him. You do not say “That is too expensive.” You just take it, smile, say “Have a nice day” and trust him that he gave you a good price. And if you’re nice and polite to him, and he likes you, once you pay, he’ll throw in extra food in there for free afterward.

You have no idea how hard this is for me, how much every fiber of my frugal self rebels against this method of shopping. Trust the salesperson that he’s giving me a good price? Yea right! Trust that the salesperson is a snake and will rip you off because you’re too trusting… But no, not in this store. In this store, trust is what is needed. And the trust pays off…
I’ll get to that in a few minutes.

Today, I bought from him a bunch of sweet potatoes (perfect looking, just a little smaller than average), a TON of pumpkin (in my location, 1-3 lb chunks of pumpkin are sold, not whole pumpkins… and I picked out 3 chunks), a bag of carrots, a shopping bag filled with scallions, about 5 pomegranates, a bunch of persimmons, a weird looking squash of sorts, and a bag of potatoes… All perfect quality. He charged me 17 dollars for the lot…. and then threw in an extra pumpkin chunk. I thought at first it seemed like a lot of money, but I kept my mouth shut…
But then when I got home, I weighed it… It weighed 43 pounds! Which meant on average I was charged 39 cents a pound for the produce! And since some of that produce (sweet potatoes, etc…) generally goes for $1.30 a pound in the grocery store, and the rest of the produce generally goes for 80 cents to a dollar a pound, getting the lot for 39 cents a pound is beyond amazing! I am freezing most of the pumpkin so it will last me for a while.
If you noticed, I didn’t buy any mushy things from him. I just bought stuff that lasts a while, because I’ve had too much experience buying cheap overripe pears, tomatoes, etc… from him, and then coming home to a wet, mushy mess that wasn’t very salvageable. So now I just buy harder stuff from him…

After shopping there, I walked around the market, and supplemented my shop with some more stuff:
9 lbs of oranges for $2.80 for snacking, a few zucchini for 65 cents a pound (a higher price than I like to pay for it, but lower than I’ve seen lately, and I really like zucchini in soups), a few ears of corn on the cob for 65 cents (I cut these into small circles, boiled them, and will be freezing them to send in my sons’ lunches for school), 1 large bunch of celery for $1.40 (celery is expensive where I live, and this is a decent price for it. I am freezing the leaves, etc… to use for soups), 2 large bunches of radishes for $2.25… which isn’t so cheap if you don’t consider the leaves food… but we will be using the radish leaves as healthy greens.
Even though I already had persimmons, I saw some being sold for 32 cents a pound (usually they’re sold closer to a dollar a pound), so I decided to buy 8 more pounds of persimmons. I know it seems like a lot, but persimmons are some of our favorite fruit in this house, so these will all end up being eaten, without a doubt.
Then I bought about 8 or 9 avocados at 75 cents a pound, which is a pretty decent price for them, and will be freezing some of them for guacamole (yes, avocados are freezable).

As for non produce stuff- I bought roasted, shelled peanuts from a vendor (some salted, some not), because I find they’re a good, healthy snack to have around the house, are a good thing to send with my boys as proteins in their lunch, and are much cheaper than any other “nuts”. (Don’t worry, peanut allergies are very rare where we live, so that isn’t a concern with their lunches.) I bought them at this vendor because it’s the cheapest place, I’ve seen, by far, to buy peanuts.

Altogether I spent 36 dollars on my shop today. And came home with a huge amount of produce, that should last us for a while. 😀 And I know that if I’d bought those stuff at any other place, I probably would have paid closer to 75 dollars for the lot, if not 100…

Do you know how much you spend per month on groceries, down to the last cent, and not just a guestimate? How much are you spending? (In dollars please.) If you don’t know, would you want to do this challenge with us? (I started the challenge yesterday, and plan on continuing it until the 16th of November, after which I will post the results.)
If there was a store near you that in order to get good pricing, you have to just trust that you’ll get a good price, would you be able to do so, or would your frugal senses make you unable to do such a thing?