Trading Up Downtown

My husband and I were superstars with meal planning this week. On a whim, we stopped by Trader Joe’s yesterday afternoon to do our grocery shopping for the week. Usually, we sit down and plan out our meals with the help of coupons, in-store sales, recipes, etc., but this week, we got it together in about 60 seconds while standing in the bread aisle of Trader Joe’s. I’m still impressed. We had quite a bit of food leftover from last week’s trip, so our shopping wasn’t all that big.

In this week’s cart:

• Bananas (NuVal score: 91)
• Dry Roasted Pistachios (NuVal score: 67)
• Butter (NuVal score: 1)
• Romaine hearts (NuVal score: 100)
• Avocados (NuVal score: 89)
• Eggs (NuVal score: 33)
• Frozen shrimp (NuVal score: 75)
• Frozen edamame (NuVal score: 91)
• Rib eye steak (NuVal score: 30)

Save

Our grocery shopping trip was last-minute this week, so we shopped for in-store sales and used our reusable bags to save as much money as we could without planning ahead of time. We still managed to come in under our weekly grocery budget, but I think if we had coupons and really paid attention to the in-store sales and planned our meals around them, we would have saved even more. Oh, well. There’s always next week, and I’ll be sure to get my save on big time!

Do you tend to spend more when you don’t plan out your meals? How much more would you say?

I did just a small grocery shopping this weekend since I’ll be out-of-town Wednesday through Friday this week. My husband will still be home and, of course, he’ll need to eat, but when I’m away from home, he usually orders take-out or eats pasta, so a lot of the time, the fresh food (mainly fruits and veggies) in the fridge goes bad. I’ve learned this lesson the hard way a few times in the past. I hate wasting money, so instead of stocking up on tons of food that might not get eaten, I kept my grocery shopping small this week. Plus, last week’s shopping was pretty big, so we actually didn’t need all that much food to begin with.

Here’s this week’s cart:

• Bananas (NuVal score: 91)
• Tomatoes (NuVal score: 93)
• Broccoli (NuVal score: 100)
• Kale (NuVal score: 100)
• Cucumber (NuVal score: 93)
• Bell Pepper (NuVal score: 94)
• Dry Roasted Pistachios (NuVal score: 67)
• Almonds (NuVal score: 81)
• Canned Bumble Bee Tuna in Water (NuVal score: 57)
• Veggie Patch Chick’n Nuggets (NuVal score: 33)

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I wasn’t planning to buy canned tuna, but when I saw they were on sale for $0.99 per can, I stocked up. I couldn’t pass up that deal! Plus, Canned Bumble Bee Tuna in Water (NuVal score: 57) is my favorite brand, and I know it’ll get eaten in our house, so I didn’t second guess myself when I added 10 cans to my cart!

Did you score any sweet deals at the grocery store this week?

From this week’s grocery shopping, it looks light we’re right in the middle of the holiday season!

I think the eggnog, apple cidar, and holiday sugar cookies say it all!

Here’s what’s in this week’s cart:

•  Bananas (NuVal score: 91)
• Broccoli (NuVal score: 100)
• Romaine lettuce (NuVal score: 100)
• Cucumber (NuVal score: 93)
• Potatoes (NuVal score: 93)
• Arnold 100% Whole Wheat Bread (NuVal score: 37)
• Land O Lakes All Natural Extra Large Brown Eggs (NuVal score: 33)
• Van’s Homestyle Frozen Waffles (NuVal score: 25)
• Teddie Super Chunky Peanut Butter (NuVal score: 38)
• 93% Lean Ground Beef (NuVal score: 30)
• Athenos feta (NuVal score: 24)
• Cabot Extra Sharp Cheddar Cheese (NuVal score: 22)
• Thomas Light Multigrain English Muffins (NuVal score: 42)
• Hood Golden EggNog (NuVal score: 24)
• Apple cider
• Polaner All Fruit Strawberry and Grape Jelly (NuVal score: 1)
• Mezzetta Marinated Artichoke Hears (NuVal score: 30)
• Nestle Tollhouse Sugar Cookie Dough (NuVal score: 3)

Trade

I didn’t realize this trade-up until I got home and checked the score of the Thomas Light Multigrain English Muffins that I bought at the grocery store. They score a 42, which is higher than my usual Arnold Sandwich Thins 100% Whole Wheat, which score a 37 on the NuVal scale. Nice!

What are your favorite holiday-inspired foods?