Before we get started in this second part of my Grocery Shopping series (you can read part one here), I thought it would be fun to tell you a little bit about myself and my family, so you can get an idea of what type of foods I aim to purchase for us.
I try to buy as healthy of foods as possible. Some months I can afford to buy organic fruits and vegetables, some months I can’t. I have noticed that when I do buy organic, the quality of organic produce is superior to the “standard” fruits and veggies (they last longer, they taste better), and I’m wanting to slowly start incorporating more organic produce into our diets.
I am not anti-packaged or frozen/prepared food, but I definitely read the ingredients list to see just what we’re actually eating.
I try to get items with the least amount of sugar as possible, such as canned fruit in 100% fruit juice (rather than light or heavy syrup), jelly without any added sugar, 100% fruit juice for Seth, etc. I check labels to make sure that what we’re consuming isn’t just tons of sugar dressed up in pretty packaging.
If I buy meat, it’s almost always going to be organic and/or grass-fed or free-range. We rarely eat red meat at home (I could easily be a vegetarian; my husband - not so much), so when I do splurge on red meat, it definitely needs to be quality. The few extra dollars per pound is worth it to me to not be consuming added chemicals and steroids that may be found in lesser-quality meats. We tend to stick to chicken and turkey when do eat meat.
I haven't had any problems with generic, store-brand food. That being said, when I do buy store-brands, I check the labels against the name-brand that I would typically buy to see if there are any added ingredients. I don't buy store-brand meat, however.
Now that you’re a bit more acquainted with my shopping style, here are some tips that have helped me significantly, and hopefully can help you on your grocery shopping trips as well.
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{Live & Learn: My Personal Tips}
Shop Your Kitchen FIRST
Before I hop onto Pinterest to look for recipes for the month ahead, I like to look in my own kitchen first to see what I have left over. Sometimes I don’t use up every thing that I bought for the month prior, or I’ve purchased non-perishable bulk items at Costco that we didn’t finish. I’ll start by going through my freezer and making a list of what I have in there that we could use for meals in the future. By the end of the month, we mostly have a few pieces of meat, frozen fruits and vegetables that are left. Then I will head to my pantry and look for items that I can use. This is where you get to be creative. Currently, I have a box of cornmeal that I’ve had in my pantry for a couple of months that I need to use up. Pinterest says that I can make lemon blueberry pancakes out of them, so that’s just what I’m going to do. I may even make a double batch and freeze what we don’t eat so we have an easy meal for later on.
Store Your Food Properly The way you store your food will determine how long it will last, and how fresh it will be when you need to use it. I’ve created a PDF for you (which you can download here) to print out to remind you of which fruits and vegetables go in which drawer.
Take some of my greens, for example. After a couple months of storing my green onions and cilantro in the vegetables drawer at the bottom of my fridge and having them waste away quickly, I thought to myself, “Hey, these are actually plants, and my onions still have the roots on them still. What if I stood them upright in a jar with some water so that they can continue to grow?” And, you know what. It totally worked! I store them at the top of my fridge, because it’s not as cold as the bottom of the fridge is.
Fruit
As mentioned in part 1 of this series, my family and I usually stick to apples, bananas, the occasional orange, seasonal berries, pears, and grapes. I also have canned fruit on hand for the latter part of the month. As soon as I get home, I like to put my non water-retaining fruits (typically things with tough skins get soaked in this wash) and hard vegetables in the sink filled about ½ way up with water, and about a cup of white vinegar to get them all cleaned off. Another method that I learned from my friend Amanda recently is to use 1 cup Apple Cider Vinegar (ACV) to around 6 cups of water. Let them soak for 20 minutes, and then lay them out on a towel on the counter to air dry. Most of our fruits will be stored in our fruit bowl that is out on our counter. I hardly ever store fruit in the fridge (unless they are cut up already) because I personally think they lose their flavor when you stick 'em in the fridge. The one exception would be ripe avocados. I've found that putting your semi-soft avocados in the fridge prolongs their life! Hurray!
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Tricks I’ve Learned Along The Way:
Rotate your berry containers, and especially your leafy greens, so they’re not laying in the same place for multiple days. I’ve noticed that when I do this, my greens and berries last much longer and don’t mold or rot as quickly.
Freeze your little heart out: bread, shredded cheese, fruits, vegetables, even gallons of milk (but be sure to leave room at top of the jug so it has room to expand!).
Have a meat container in your freezer to contain all the meats. Mine is just a plastic bin that I picked up from Dollar Tree, and it serves its purpose wonderfully. I know exactly where all my meat is when I need it, and don’t have to hunt all around my freezer to find it.
Freeze things as flat as possible. I got this tip from my friend, Kim. Way back when I was a newlywed, I had no idea what I was doing when it came to food. If dinner tasted decently okay and my husband ate it, it was a success in my book! This is so embarrassing to even admit, but I remember putting leftover soup into gallon baggies and just sitting them in the freezer. Not even laying them flat. I had the hardest time figuring out how to store the bags of frozen soup because it was so bulky and didn’t fit anywhere! What was I even thinking?! Oh, to be young and naïve. I remember Kim telling me to lay them flat to freeze them and they are much easier to stack on top of one another, and you can even stand them upright for maximum storage! I do this with my shredded rotisserie chicken when I store them in my meat container in the freezer. I can fit a lot more in the container this way, and it works like a charm every time!
Store things in Mason jars in your fridge, it makes things last longer. I cut up about 1.5 lbs of strawberries last month and stored them in 3 separate Mason jars. They didn’t mold in a couple days, like they typically do, but held up well for a week! We used them in our oatmeal, fresh fruit smoothies, yogurt, and I may have even put them on my ice cream :) I also like to do this with cut up lettuce for salads, as they don't turn brown as quickly.
Bring a helper with you to the store. For a while, my brother would come to Costco and Fred Meyer with me, and it was fantastic! He is a Car Trunk Tetris pro and always made all of my groceries fit - no matter how impossible it may have looked from the status of our cart. It was really great to be able to spend one-on-one quality time with him, and it’s also nice that he lifts the heavy boxes for me ;)
Fridge Organization
My refrigerator has three different “levels”, if you will. On the top shelf I like to keep my leftovers either on the top or middle levels, so I don’t forget about them! I also store bread up here, as well as my salad dressing and sauces on a lazy susan in the back.
The second shelf doesn’t have a ton of room, but I’m able to squeeze 5 dozen eggs here each month, as well as some more leftovers. In my deli drawer I keep all of our cheeses and tortillas. The third shelf - the bottom of the fridge - is the coldest and where I like to store our lunch meat, yogurt, milk, and Kombucha. I try to keep my dairy and drinks as close to the back of the fridge as possible, to ensure that they are at the correct temperature (you learn a LOT about milk temperatures and “The Danger Zone” for food after working at Starbucks for 4 years … )
I found this infograph to be very helpful in remembering where in the refrigerator is best to store things.
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Are you still interested in learning more of my tips and tricks? Follow me on Instagram @growingbravely for real time tips and updates on my Insta-stories! I usually announce a day or two before my shopping trip what time I’ll be heading out for the day. I'd love to have you join me!