Yes, this IS a horror movie. Only it's real.

I think I’m going to stop writing and become a lobbyist. My first mission will be to change the term ‘cancer’ to ‘happy fun stuff.’ Seems like everybody has cancer these days and it’s quite a downer. The word comes up and the mood in the room turns gloomy. It’s no fun. Maybe if we called it something else (Happy Fun Stuff!), we’d be less bothered by the reality. “This sounds like a good thing! I like being happy! And I sure like fun stuff!” Stupid, of course. Cancer is cancer. You can’t dress it up, change the name, and fool people.

Oh, wait a minute! You can! It’s happened in our pantries, fridges, and cupboards. High fructose corn syrup (HFCS) is now ‘corn sugar.’ “But Mike, I eat corn. And I like sugar! What’s the big deal?”

Robert H. Lustig, MD, is a University of California, San Francisco Professor of Clinical Pediatrics (with degrees from MIT & Cornell), and his presentation, “Sugar – The Bitter Truth,” shows how HFCS is basically a poison, and, like alcohol, can cause harm with chronic exposure. You probably don’t have time to watch his 90-minute talk on YouTube (that’s this faithful writer’s gig), so I’ll give you the gist (you will miss out on awesome phrases like “multi-variant linear aggression analysis”).

Dr. Lustig explains that only our livers can metabolize HFCS and it travels through there as though it were a poison, like alcohol. HFCS then causes chronically elevated insulin levels leading to fat accumulation and such things as obesity, stroke, type-2 diabetes, liver disease, asthma, depression (mood swings, anxiety), and colon cancer. Booze without the buzz! Not like eating corn on the cob after all!

“But Mike, I can drink a few beers on the weekend or have wine with dinner and not develop these problems. So what’s the problem with HFCS? I don’t eat it all the time.”

The problem is, yes, you do. I do (did). We’ve all been eating it for many years. Here’s a little test to prove it. Wait … not a test … a fun project.

Pick out 10 random food items from your cabinets and fridge. Anything in a box, can, or bottle. Don’t think about it too much; three from here, two from there, and five from over there. Perfect. Now read all the ingredients and see how many list ‘high fructose corn syrup’ or ‘corn sugar.’ Go ahead, I’ll wait.

Hmmm hmm hmmm … do de do … La tee ta …

WOW!! Crazy, huh?? How many items? Three? Seven? Nine?!?

It’s in our bread! Our mustard! Cereals! Barbecue sauce! Pretzels! Juice boxes, snack mixes, salad dressings, crackers, sports drinks. And the list goes on! I couldn’t believe the bread crumbs I purchased had HFCS! I was expecting two ingredients: bread and crumbs. Consider that most fast food choices contain it and we can see how it’s affecting our kids diets big time as well.

Avoiding HFCS isn’t so easy because it’s everywhere. And now it’s hidden as ‘corn sugar.’ Plenty of ‘natural,’ ‘low sugar,’ and ‘diet’ products contain it. When I drink a beer I know I’m drinking a beer and having 12 in one day isn’t a great idea for many reasons. But when I’m ingesting HFCS, or my kids are, I don’t realize it and that becomes the problem. We Americans consume on average over SIXTY POUNDS of HFCS per person per year! It would be nice to know when we’re doing it.

The Corn Refiner’s Association has lobbied, successfully, to change the dirty HFCS name to ‘corn sugar,’ which the FDA claims to “enable consumer’s to easily identify added sugars in the diet.”’ I’m not an MD, but I know when I’m being hustled. Once we consumers found out that HFCS was to be avoided, or at least controlled, they changed the name! Fool me once …

Dr. Stephen W. Ponder of the Children’s Diabetes & Endochrine Center at Children’s Hospital in Corpus Christi, Texas calls type-2 diabetes the ‘family disease of the 21st century.’ He also makes the connection between the out of control childhood obesity rate of the last 30 years with the arrival of HFCS on supermarket shelves in 1975. Our vehicles have gotten bigger as well during the same time period to make room for those SUV-sized fast food sandwiches and their ‘little’ consumers.

Dr. Ponder explains that our food system has become convenient, pre-packaged, engineered to be tasty, enriched, refined, and, most of all, CHEAP! Better food requires more prep time, may be harder to find (especially in poorer neighborhoods), and can be more expensive than energy-dense processed foods. The young are falling victim to HFCS.

Once again we see that looking for one label, ORGANIC, means no HFCS, and no corn sugar. Call it any name you like, even Happy Fun Stuff; it’s not good for you or your children.

Maybe I’ll just change my title from ‘Writer’ to ‘All-Around Good Guy and Organic Lobbyist.’ Full disclosure.

A few final items for the dinner party ...

It’s the morning of the final day of my family’s 30-Day Whole Foods Thrifty Challenge.  For this entire month, we have eaten only food purchased solely at Whole Foods on a budget of $491.10 for our family of three.  Our final food tally came in at $488.12, about three dollars under budget.

The first two weeks were harrowing; a big chunk of our budget was stocking up on staples and it took a while to recover from the hit.  We were saved, quite literally, by a $2.99/pound sale on chicken breast.  We stocked up and used the freed-up cash to focus on fruits and veggies.  The last two shopping trips were a comparative breeze; I literally went from tears because of our tight budget one week to dancing in the aisles the next as I happily piled pineapple and cucumbers into my shopping cart.  As we sat around the table for dinner last night I asked everyone what they had learned …

Alex (son):  I learned that having breakfast together is nice, and we should; we’re a family.

Greg (hubs):  I learned that I like fruit more than I thought I did and I’m going to control snacking from now on.

Me:  I learned that it’s possible to eat healthy on a tight budget, but it takes patience and planning

Here’s what we did:

Shop as a family so we could make decisions as we went.  Our son wasn’t always with us, but with Greg and I together, we could make on-the-fly decisions as we spotted sales.  That meant I was more likely to cook it and Greg was more likely to eat it (even though, ultimately, neither of us had a choice).

Bravely tried new recipes. I added a homemade bread recipe, banana bread, chocolate chip cookie recipe, shepherd’s pie, and meatball recipe to my arsenal of family dishes.  Not all of them are “healthy,” but we definitely enjoyed them, and the sweets I cooked are healthier with lower sugar than what I would have picked up at the store.

Self-imposed limits produce results. I’m not sure we would have stuck to this budget if we weren’t blogging about it.  I had a night or two when I felt really tired and, normally, I would have skipped cooking dinner and ordered in. But I couldn’t.  The end result was about a minute of whining (at least in my head) and then I just got up and went to the kitchen.  (And Greg did handle dinner a couple times during the month; plus ALL the cleaning.)  Cooking dinner really wasn’t any more difficult than ordering in food and it was healthier.

We lost weight. My husband lost nine pounds and I lost five!  We attributed it to no longer snacking that we were unconsciously doing.  We both feel great and my husband is looking pretty darned hot!

Almost no processed foods. We barely ate processed food.  The only thing we had was macaroni and cheese, crackers, pasta, and one bag of potato chips.

Here’s what we didn’t do: menu planning!  I had a rough idea of what I wanted the first week and then realized quickly that (a) I know how to cook and didn’t really need to plan for it and (b) there were so many unadvertised specials that it didn’t matter what the menu in my head said, it was better to go with the flow.  So that’s what I did, varying fruits and vegetables depending on the sales, and worked with the staples to create food my family would eat.

We are wrapping up the Challenge with a dinner party tonight.  I’m still not sure if it’s 8 or 10 people, but I’ve got enough regardless.  We’re doing roasted chicken, rice and veggies, a side salad, homemade bread, and two kinds of brownies (lemon and chocolate).  We even had enough money to buy three bottles of wine, a chardonnay, merlot, and cabernet ($8.97 total).

I’ve learned a lot these past 30 days and I’m proud of myself and my family for achieving this.  The experiment has touched me.  I’ve learned how hard it is to feed your family healthfully on a tight budget.  I have a new appreciation for the struggle of families near the poverty level as they fight obesity plate by plate.  It’s not easy, folks, and there are no simple answers.

I hope you learned something too.  Whole Foods isn’t necessarily more expensive than any other store, you just have to learn how to shop there.  I suggest signing up for a Value Tour at your local Whole Foods and get to know the staff; they are always super nice and will steer you to the right cut of meat or the best ingredient for your dish.  I need to say an official thank you to Whole Foods for taking our bet (Yay!!) and for providing gift cards to four weekly winners so they could get a chance to try to live a little more healthy too.

Cheers,

Lisa

It’s Day 27 of our 30-Day Whole Foods Thrifty Challenge, and time for the final weekly winner of a $125 Whole Foods gift card.  And that winner is …

Lindsey M.!  Congratulations!  (look for an email from us to collect your prize)

Thank you to everyone who signed up to our email list for their chance to win.  We’ll be sending our first True Food Movement newsletter next week so look for it in your email inbox.

Check back in next week as well as we recap how we did on week 4 of our Challenge and then celebrate the successful completion of the full 30 days, including what we’ve learned, what habits we plan to adopt, and how you can take part in a Challenge of your own.

As always, thanks again to Whole Foods for kindly providing the gift cards for each weekly drawing.

Read ALL the 30-Day Whole Foods Thrifty Challenge posts

Banana bread with apples and pineapple for breakfast

My family has recently “discovered” banana bread.  We are thoroughly enjoying it as a special treat throughout the week, using it as a snack and as a special breakfast along with a lot of fruit to keep things healthy.

I’ve adapted what’s below from “Simply Recipes” and it’s really delicious.  I’ve made it four times now and each time the loaf has been moist and a perfect balance of flavors.  Enjoy!

Ingredients

• 4 ripe bananas, smashed
• 1/3 cup melted butter
• 3/4 cup sugar
• 1 egg, beaten
• 1 teaspoon vanilla
• 1 teaspoon baking soda
• a pinch of salt
• 1.5 cups of all-purpose flour

Directions

Preheat the oven to 350 degrees F.  Grease the inside of a 4 x 8 loaf pan.

Peel the bananas and cut them into large chunks in a medium bowl.  Add the melted butter and, using a hand masher or wooden spoon, mash until it is very well blended with only small banana chunks visible.

Add the sugar, egg, and vanilla and mix again.  Sprinkle in the baking soda and salt and mix again.

Add the flour last and mix a final time.  Make sure you’ve got every nook and cranny blended thoroughly as I’ve found the flour likes to hide in clumps!

Pour mixture into the pan and bake for one hour.  Cool on a rack, remove from the pan, and enjoy!

Some of my go-to cookbooks

They offer up beautiful photos of amazing dishes, but did you ever think about cookbooks as a savings tool?

It’s true; a good cookbook can show you how to eat well with just, and only, the right ingredients.  No more failed experiments in the kitchen.  No more leftovers glaring defiantly at you from the fridge, taunting you to do something original with them.

I’m not going to insult you by pretending to know your tastes.  Maybe your cooking skews Mediterranean or Asian or old-fashioned American.  Whatever it is, you can find a cookbook that will suit your needs.  Look for the following attributes in a good cookbook.

Simple Ingredients

Are the ingredients foods that you know?  Or do you have to trek to some far-flung neighborhood in your city to procure a unique item from a specialty store?  If the ingredients are easy to come by, it’s a recipe that you can keep using over and over.

Not Too Many Ingredients

If most of the recipes in a book have more than 10 ingredients, you’re not going to be cracking the spine a lot.  If the recipes are generally five ingredients and under, it’s even more likely to make your regular menu rotation. The fewer the ingredients, the more the flavors will shine through, and you’ll know it’s a fast and easy dish you can turn to in a pinch.

Stretch Your Comfort Zone

If you’re used to a certain style of cooking (for me, it’s 1970s American; I know … that’s, um, typical), going to something totally out of your comfort zone means you’re not likely to use the cookbook often.  But, if it stretches you a little bit from your usual dishes, you can really get value out of a cookbook.

Fill In Your Gaps

Maybe you’re not a vegetarian, but a cookbook on vegetarian cooking might give you some great ideas for sides.  Maybe roasting scares you, so a book on the subject can add some versatility to your kitchen.  I recently picked up a slow cooker cookbook and have already made four great dishes from it that I’ll definitely use again.  The economic benefit of a slow cooker, by the way, is you can buy lower-quality meats at less cost and cook them slowly for hours, creating a tender, juicy meal.

It’s easy to be tempted by dazzling photos of mouth-watering meals or a celebrity chef’s name on the cover.  Remembering the tips above will help you to develop a cookbook library that you reach to again and again instead of creating a library of future yard sale offerings.

What are some of your favorite cookbooks?

Cheers,

Lisa

The juice box is not your best friend.

One of the knocks people give about why they don’t eat more organically is ‘the price.’ Getting the things we want in life requires sacrifice and consuming better food is no different. When you want that extra-special vacation, you cut costs somewhere else to make it work in your budget. When you want to lose an extra pound or two, you pass up the cheesecake. Switching to organic/sustainable habits takes the same resolve. And a bit more effort. I’ve found there are plenty of opportunities to ‘mine’ savings right in your own home, creating the extra money for better-tasting, and better-for-you food.

A big money-sucking culprit is the juice box. Don’t let the ‘box’ tag fool you either; each is lined with polyethylene plastic, so whether you spend 30 cents per juice box for ‘regular’ ones or 60 cents for organic, there’s a much better way to save MONEY and RESOURCES. People love to buy in bulk at the big ‘club’ stores to save money. But when it comes to drinks for kids, that same notion goes right out the window. Suddenly the smallest, most expensive option becomes the choice. It all boils down to time. Hmmm, time and money.  We meet again my old friends!

The grocery store does the math for you already, presenting the ‘price per’ amount on the shelf right next to the item’s actual cost. Checking the ‘price per  fluid ounce’ for juice boxes vs. the ‘price per’ for a jug or bottle, organic or not, and you’ll realize how much money you can save. Some folks drive across town to save five cents on a gallon of gas then spend a few extra DOLLARS on kid’s juice moments later at the store. Methinks this ain’t wise.

Buy the bigger juice containers at the store and purchase small, reusable cups that transport easily with the kids. Here’s the tricky part: take the time to wash and refill them! How much time? We’re talking maybe a minute or two if you wake up late in the morning and find you didn’t wash the cup the night before. “But it’s a madhouse in the morning!” “We barely have enough time to get the kids dressed!” “It’s just easier to pack the juice boxes!”

There it is: it’s EASIER. Yes, of course it is. So many things are easy these days. Maybe it’s all become too easy. Faster. Quicker. Disposable. Less effort. Get through our chores so we can get in front of the TV faster, to Facebook faster, to some other distraction faster. But are these distractions or excuses? You really can’t find even a couple minutes a day to do these little things? Like filling a juice container?

Do my wife and I serve (organic) juice boxes at our kids’ birthday parties and at big summer barbecues? Yes. Do we allow our kids to drink (non-organic) juice boxes at parties they attend? Yes. Sometimes easy makes the most sense. I’ve been trying to make the distinction between easy and lazy.

Here’s some more math: two juice boxes for two kids in a lunchbox is 20 a week. 80 a month. 700-800 a year! And that’s just juice boxes packed for lunches. Do I have a few ‘bad choice’ reusable plastic bottles in the cupboard at home? (“Dad! Too babyish!”) Yes, of course. But with a fourth and second grader now, I can do the math (and I hate math), and it seems I’ve saved between 5,000 and 10,000 little plastic bombs from the landfill.

Small steps lead to bigger ones. A jump to organic can sometimes be a big one, so why not try and get off the juice boxes first, then make the organic juice choice later, if you can. Sustainable? Check. Organic? Hopefully, but let’s get some momentum going.

We often hear, and repeat, the old timey sayings we heard growing up: “Nothing comes without hard work.” “Time is money.” “A penny saved is a penny earned.”

I’ve never heard one of those sayings about things being ‘easy.’ So go ahead and buy that jug of organic juice, because it’s not so pricey after a little work.

Look at all the veggies! The haul from our last grocery run.

Dare I say giddy?  Was that me doing a little dance in the produce section?  Why yes!  Yes it was.  Our bargain basement purchase of chicken at $2.99 a pound last week freed up so much room in our budget that we finally had lots of choices.  It felt awesome!

And yes, we got chocolate chips too.

This shopping trip we indulged in extra apples, celery, spinach, and carrots, as well as bananas and pineapple.  We bought frozen veggies, but went for the pricier mixed variety ($2.79 a bag instead of $1.99 per bag) and we got one more bag than we usually do.  For once we left the store and I wasn’t worried that we’d have enough food to make it to the end of the month.  I felt confident that we’d be fine.

Here’s a rolling tally of purchases so far.  At the moment we have spent $401.49 with one shopping trip left.  I have $89.61 to make it through the next week and throw a dinner party!  Right now that seems easy, but maybe I’ll be sweating it the last day (fingers crossed I’ll be good).

As we head into the final week, we’ve gotten the hang of buying groceries on a tight budget.  We’re confidently checking the areas of the store we need to check, keeping a running tally in our head of how much we’re spending, and weighing options for healthy living with a few treats.

Two Drawbacks

Despite scouring magazines and recipe sites, there’s only so much you can do to make the same food taste different.  We don’t have a lot of condiments or sauces to work with so it tends to be a mixed veggie/protein/rice combo or a mixed veggie/protein/pasta combo.  It’s okay; it’s tasty, but I’m craving some variety for my palate.

The other big regret I have is we just can’t consistently buy organic at the levels that I’m used to.  No organic protein at all! We’ve been able to get organic apples every week and organic celery once but that’s about it.  It’s been frustrating and will definitely end once the challenge is over.  That said, I actually shopped at Whole Foods almost exclusively before the challenge because I trust their meat department better than anyone else in my area.  So while I know what I’ve been buying this month isn’t organic, I know it’s still pretty good.

Weight Loss

After we realized that my husband had lost seven pounds during the first two weeks of the Challenge, I’ve been tinkering with portion sizes and giving him more liberal servings.  He lost two more pounds during week three, and I’ve dropped another pound myself (five pounds total, but at least two pounds is water weight from adjusting to this fairly clean diet.)

Honestly, I think the main reason why we’ve both lost weight is because (a) we’re not “grazing” on snacks anymore; it’s so easy to do a fly-by through the kitchen and grab a morsel or two which adds up! and (b) we’re eating almost no processed foods.  Outside of purchasing a bag of pasta, a box of crackers, and a box of mac and cheese, literally everything else is from scratch.  Zero chemicals, zero “fake” sweeterners or flavorings, just what my kitchen, my stove, and my talents can provide.  I wish we had a chemical screen at the beginning and end of the month; I’d be curious to see just how much gook we’ve purged from our bodies.

I’m off to make chocolate chip cookies now, a treat that I know will last for the next six days and only costs 16 cents a cookie.  Way cheaper and way tastier than the store-bought kind.

What have you learned about frugal living that you’d like to share?  I’d love to hear your tips and tricks especially about mixing up the menu and getting a little variety.

Cheers,

Lisa

Read ALL the 30-Day Whole Foods Thrifty Challenge posts.

Stephanie T.!  You should already have an email in your inbox letting you know how to collect your winnings!

Everyone who signed up to our mailing list was eligible for our weekly drawing every Friday in January (sign up is in the right-hand column).

Remember you need to double confirm to be on the list and eligible to win, so please remember to click the link in the confirmation email you receive so you will be officially entered.

Have a great weekend everyone and we’ll be back on Monday with a post about week three of the Challenge!

Read ALL the 30-Day Whole Foods Thrifty Challenge posts

My Grandma's writing keeps me connected to her

I come from a long line of cooks.  My Great-Grandmother and my Grandmother were known for putting together a delicious feast.  My Mom wasn’t as into the kitchen as I’ve become lately and she bequeathed me my Grandmother’s 1936 cookbook.

Here’s what I love about it:

• Her notes are all over it.  I love seeing her handwriting jumping out at me, linking the love my grandmother had for me with the love I have for my family, especially my son.
• The ingredients are so simple.  It’s just food, no fancy anything! The cookbook was written for the matriarch of the time who was resourceful and knew how to stretch a budget.  I love that!

So here’s my Great-Grandmother’s recipe for lemon pie.  You’re on your own for the crust (feel free to buy store bought). Below covers the filling and the meringue.

Ingredients

• 1 lemon, grated
• juice of the same lemon
• “scant” cup of sugar (no more than 3/4 cup)
• a pinch of salt
• 2 egg yolks
• a small piece of butter (the size of a walnut)
• 3 tablespoons cornstarch
• water

Directions

Heat the oven to 325 degrees F.

In a double boiler, add the lemon juice and sugar and wait until it begins to dissolve.  Add salt, egg yolks, and butter, stirring regularly.

In a separate bowl, stir in the three tablespoons of corn starch in a little water. Pour one cup boiling water over this mixture.  Add cornstarch to the double-boiler and stir until thick.

Meringue

• 2 egg whites, room temperature
• 2 tablespoons sugar

Combine the two items above together and beat until the meringue forms.

Place the filling and meringue in the pie crust.  Place in the 325 degree oven for about 20 minutes.  Pie is done when the meringue is just turning golden brown.

A side note here: my Grandma would often make a different meringue with three egg whites, six tablespoons of sugar, a half teaspoon of vanilla, and a quarter teaspoon of cream of tartar.  Feel free to use either one.

This wasn't on our menu planning, but was too good a deal to pass up, one of the tricks you follow when shopping on a very limited budget

We’ve been getting a lot of interest in our 30-Day Whole Foods Thrifty Challenge, trying to feed a family of three for a month on a budget of $491.10 (the USDA’s “Thrifty” budget level) while shopping only at Whole Foods. And yes, this means NO eating meals outside the home; all our son’s school lunches have been brown-bagged.

Below is a tally of all the food that was purchased over the 30 days, including what we needed to buy for our celebratory “dinner party for eight” on the final day.

Some math to put all of this in perspective:

• $491.10 breaks down to $16.38 per day
• Which breaks down to $1.82 per person per meal
• For comparison’s sake, the USDA “Liberal” budget level, the highest of the four, budgets $971.40 for food for our family; that’s $10 less than double what we spent this month.  Caviar, anyone?

Read ALL the 30-Day Whole Foods Thrifty Challenge posts.

MEAT

Chicken Breast                         61.07                        15.11 pounds

Ground beef                              35.17                          9.12 pounds

Chicken sausages                     7.46                          2.14 pounds

Beef shoulder                             7.12                           2.04 pounds

TOTAL: $110.82

FRESH PRODUCE

Apples, organic                        27.68                        32 apples

Cucumbers                                  9.90                        10 cukes

Pineapple                                  15.00                        6 pineapples

Garlic                                            0.56                        1 clove

Lemon                                          3.95                        5 lemons

Onions                                          9.55                        9.07 pounds

Potatoes                                     10.50                        11.4 pounds

Tangelos                                      5.44                         3.14 pounds

Butternut squash                        5.88                         4.56 pound squash

Bananas                                       6.79                        25 bananas

Celery, organic                            2.99                        1 bunch

Celery, regular                             2.49                        1 bunch

Broccoli crowns                           2.99                        1.2 pounds

Grape tomatoes                           4.99                        2 pints

Carrots                                        12.47                        12 pounds

Fresh spinach                            10.47                         3 9 oz. bags

Fresh basil                                    2.69                         2/3 oz. package

Grapefruit                                      1.86                         1.25 pounds

Orange                                           2.04                         2 oranges

TOTAL: $138.24

FROZEN & CANNED VEGETABLES

Frozen spinach                              2.69                        1 16 oz. bag

Frozen green beans                      6.47                        2 16 oz. bags & 1 32 oz. bag

Frozen broccoli                              8.46                         3 16oz. bags & 1 32 oz. bag

Frozen veggie medley                22.71                        9 16 oz. bags

Canned, diced tomatoes            17.91                        9 28 oz. cans

TOTAL: $58.24

DAIRY

Eggs                                               25.51                        9.5 dozen

Butter, organic                                4.99                        1 pound

Butter, regular                               14.47                        5 pounds

Milk                                                 13.96                        4 gallons

TOTAL: $58.93

PROCESSED FOOD

Mac & Cheese                               5.45                        5 boxes

Golden crackers                          14.75                        4 12 oz. boxes & 1 9 oz. box

Pasta                                                5.95                        5 16 oz. bags

Potato chips                                   1.99                         1 5 oz. bag

Oatmeal                                          1.34                         1 7.5 oz. box (5 pouches)

TOTAL: $29.48

BAKING

Flour                                               13.16                       20 pounds total (4 bags)

Flour, whole wheat                        3.29                        5 pounds total (1 bag)

Cane sugar                                   10.48                        6 pounds total (1 lg & 1 sm bag)

Chocolate chips                             4.98                        2 12 oz. bags

Cocoa powder                                5.99                        1 7 oz. container

Brown sugar                                   1.59                        1 16 oz. box

TOTAL: $39.49

MISCELLANEOUS

Orange Juice                                15.95                        5 half gallons

Ground coffee                                 4.99                        1 14-ounce container

Olive oil                                            5.99                        1 liter

Maple syrup                                    7.99                         1 12 fl. oz. bottle

Oats (for oatmeal)                           2.00                        1.26 pounds

Jasmine brown rice                        4.99                        5 pounds

Sliced almonds                               2.04                         5.5 ounces

Wine                                                  8.97                         3 bottles (dinner party)

TOTAL: $52.92

GRAND TOTAL FOR FOOD:
$488.12 ($2.98 under budget!)