Tuesday, August 2, 2011

Sale on Ground Chuck


As I mentioned in one of my posts last week, IGA has ground chuck on sale for $1.99 a pound. Today was the last day of the sale, so I went and bought twenty pounds. This is another example of how I save money by using The Pantry Principle

In essence, The Pantry Principle means storing commodities today for future use. Stocking up when the price is right on food and non-food items you and your family use on a regular basis. Not only is this the most economical way to shop and live, but shopping this way will provide security for you as well. When emergencies arise your family will not be found wanting with The Pantry Principle.

Amy Dacyczyn describes The Pantry Principle on pages 172-173 in her book titled, The Tightwad Gazette II. Amy states that the idea of planning meals thirty days in advance in not the most frugal way to go about planning menus for your family. She states that planning meals in advance is backward and that stick-to-your-list thinking does not allow an individual to take advantage of unadvertised deals.

 The best approach that Amy suggests is what she calls The Pantry Principle which she first learned about in a book written by Barbara Salsbury and Cheri Loveless called Cut Your Food Bill in Half. Amy claims that many families do not take the concept far enough to save the maximum amount of their money.

The basic idea behind The Pantry Principle is to stockpile your pantry with food that you are able to purchase at the lowest possible price. The purpose of grocery shopping then becomes a trip to replenish your pantry, and not a trip to purchase specific ingredients for specific meals. 

The lowest price I have paid for ground chuck in the past was $1.39 a pound, but that was before the Great Recession. Ground chuck today costs $2.99 a pound at the regular price, so I knew the IGA sale was a good stock up price. 


I brought it home and packaged it up into two pound packs for the freezer.I kept one pack out to make meatloaf for dinner and the other nine packs went into the freezer to be used for meals later. Now whenever I want to use ground chuck to make dinner, I can get a bag out of my freezer knowing that I bought it at the lowest possible price

2 comments:

  1. Great sale, wish I could find something comparable up here! I totally agree with this post on stocking up, within reason based on your needs and storage space, and based on your price book.

    Cheap eats here today:

    Bfst: homemade toasted whole wheat bread with homemade jam, yogurt/cottage cheese and fruit, coffee/oj, hard boiled eggs. One kid chose oatmeal.

    Lunch: beanies and weanies, salad, homebrewed iced tea, oatmeal Scotchies

    Dinner: homemade crockpot beef-dried pinto chilli, homemade Southern buttermilk cornbread, tossed salad, more iced tea.

    ReplyDelete
  2. Sounds like good eating at your house today, Carol.

    Truth is I would have bought more if I had more money, but with no income from school this month and cs being lower than normal for the last 4 months, I feel like 20 pounds was the best I could do right now. But, it will definitely help in the long run. :)

    I'm thinking of doing beans for tomorrow night's dinner. I have okra from the garden and that fried along with some cornbread would be good. :)

    ReplyDelete

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