Weekly Meal Breakdown #2

I've tried to do this post for the past few weeks, but it just hasn't worked out for whatever reason. This isn't the best week, but its better than the others have been. So, lets see how cheap I can get dinner this week:

Sunday - Chicken Noodle Soup
Oven Roasted Rotisserie Chicken $6.99
4 carrots $0.56
2 stalks celery $0.33
1 onion $0.25
1 box chicken stock $2
1 box chicken broth $2
1 bag egg noodles $1
Total: $13.13

Monday - leftovers of Chicken Noodle Soup
Total: $0.00

Tuesday - Beef Fajitas
London Broil Steak $5.12
5 flour tortillas $1.50
1 red pepper $0.88
1 green pepper $1.54
1 onion $0.25
Total: $9.29

Wednesday - Chicken with lemon, mushroom and chive noodles
3 chicken breasts $3.48
mushrooms $1.79
2 lemons $1.00
fettuccine noodles $1.00
chives $0.69
Total: $6.86

Thursday - Spaghetti w/ Garlic Bread and Salad
ground beef - $5.12
sauce $2.00
noodles $1.25
mushrooms $1.79
onion $0.25
6 slices bread $0.66
lettuce $0.28
carrot $0.14
cucumber $0.10
tomatoes $0.56
salad dressing $0.25
Total: $12.40

Now you're probably wondering how I get these calculations, right? Go back about 2 pages and you can see my meat breakdown when I go and stock the freezer with different types of meats. I start there.

Vegetables: typically I'll divide the cost by how many there are and then multiply that by how many I need. Obviously, I'm not going to count green beans or carrots, I'm just going to estimate. So, in the case of the carrots this week, we purchased a 2 lb. bag of carrots for $1.69. Its, a gigantic bag and looks to be about 12 carrots. So, $1.69/12 = 0.14 x 4 = .56. With lettuce, cucumber, and tomatoes, I divide it by how many salads I can make with them. Typically its 7. We buy mushrooms prepackaged so they are priced by how many meals they can make. I buy onions in a bag and usually there are 8 of them. I divide the onions by 10 because there are always at least 2 gigantic onions in the bag that I only use half each time.

Bread: I estimate 18 slices of bread to a loaf. $2/18 = 0.11 per slice

Condiments: Typically I avoid including these into pricing because it really depends on how much you use. A jumbo squeeze bottle of ketchup could last us 6 months if we didn't eat a lot of french fries and cheeseburgers. For the salad dressing, I guessed the large $4.99 bottle would provide 20 servings, so $0.25 each, which is how much those individual salad dressings at the salad bar cost.

Spices: I don't even bother counting these. Mostly because I don't even measure spices when I cook. I just eyeball it and make it taste right. 

So, lets see how we did for 5 days worth of meals... $41.68.

Not too bad! The soup honestly makes more than just 2 dinners. There will be enough left overs for me to take some into work for lunch one or two days too.