Updates on the baby steps

I just thought everyone might like to see how the project is going!

1. Eliminate soda:  It's going pretty well.  Hubby brought how 5 two-liter bottles from work one day last week and I've had a couple glasses.  Both times it tasted sickening sweet and I had to have a glass of water to combat the sugar.  I'm definitely over the addiction.  I drink mostly water and tea with the occasional glass of orange juice.
2. Salads:  Still buying organic lettuce and making my own Caesar and ranch dressings.  I'm not overly thrilled with the 1000 island recipe and need to do some more searching.
3. Crackers:  I'm making all graham crackers, cheese crackers and animal crackers.  I've given up on the snack cracker for right now and I'm buying Kashi 7-grain crackers.  They are a little pricey, but so is using pound upon pound of flour for crackers that are ok, but not "to die for."
4. Eliminate GMO sugar:  I finally purged the last of my cheap powdered sugar stash over the weekend.  I am now buying evaporated cane juice (and trying to use less overall), and C&H brown sugar and powdered sugar.  Eventually I'll probably get rid of brown sugar and add a bit of molasses and extra cane juice in substitution in recipes, but for now C&H is cane sugar so no genetically modified sugar beets and that's good enough.  Down the road, when I have more money to devote to groceries, I'll buy large quanitities of Rapadura, but right now that's not an option.  I will make this change knowing that there is better, but what I'm doing is better than nothing at all.
5. Organic apples have been reasonably priced, so not buying them hasn't even been a consideration.  As of yesterday, they were within $.10/pound of conventionally grown apples.  That's not enough of a difference to justify buying the cheaper ones.
6. MSG and nitrate(ite) free meats:  I'm doing reasonably well.  Yesterday I bought nitrate/nitrite free deli meat and bacon.  I like the Hormel deli meat (if not the company), so 2-3 packages/month will work there and I bought Applewood Farms Bacon.  It's on the menu for tonight, so hopefully it's tasty.  For now, we are really limiting ham.  In the past months, I purchased a whole ham and we used it for 4-5 meals.  I'm steering away from that.  There isn't a nitrate free version that is remotely affordable, so we will still eat it on holidays or family gatherings, but not as part of our normal meal rotation.
7. Following superfoods recommendations:  Meal planning was a little harder than I imagined, but not too bad.  The food that I found getting skipped most often (and it really surprised me) was tomatoes.  Hubby's digestive system doesn't do too well if he eats a lot of acidic foods, so we try to only have tomato-based foods every third or fourth day.  Therefore, we are lacking there.  Since canned tomatoes have BPA in the lining of the cans, not consuming so much might not be a bad thing anyway.  We'll see what happens with our garden this summer.
8. Meal planning:  I did a lot better last week and with this month's plan, I tried to incorporate several easy meals and easy alternatives.  I also bumped up the budget back to $500/month (including any eating out).  If I were feeding just the 5 of us, I don't think $300 would be unreasonable.  Feeding the daycare kids and providing the variety of options is proving more difficult than I had imagined, especially since food prices have gone up even in the last month.  Additionally, I've added a consistent morning snack which increases the cost as well, but I think it helps the little ones focus more and play together better, which is important for their development.  I'm hoping (fingers crossed here) that once I start buying in bulk and get the garden going, that I can bring that number back down.  We'll see.

Overall, I've fallen off the wagon a couple times, but not too bad.  I've got to go.  I'm off to make mac 'n cheese for snack and an apple salad for dinner.

Week 6: Additive and preservative free meats

A couple years ago, one of my friends was reworking her family's diet due to food allergies/intolerances.  One of the things she was really concerned about was sodium nitrite and nitrate added to their foods-particularly processed meats.  For a while when our income was larger, I went ahead and specifically purchased additive free meat.  But, as we had to tighten our belts, I started doing some reading as to why nitrites and nitrates might be harmful.  I needed to make an educated decision as to whether or not I wanted to prioritize my grocery dollar for this change. 

Through articles found on Six Wise and LiveStrong, I've found that sodium nitrite/nitrate has been linked to cancer, respiratory and digestive issues.  Anecdotally, I have learned, from a couple of people on forums that I read, that removing the additives (along with MSG) from their diet has also eliminated their migraines.  Given that my husband suffers from asthma, acid reflux and migraines, I decided that we would eliminate this for the most part.

I don't often buy lunchmeat, but for the times that I do, I will buy Hormel Natural Choice.  They also have a bacon and pepperoni option (pizza, anyone?).  I have already purchased bacon for this month, but for my next big grocery trip, I will price this and see how it compares in cost to what I already buy.  My big hurdle is bone-in ham.  I buy one ham per month and use it for probably 5-6 meals (baked ham when I first cook it, then ham and beans, and then chopped up pieces to use in chef salad or in ham and cheese omelets, etc.).  I saw on Hormel's website that they do offer a boneless ham option, but I really like the bone-in, so I'll have to do some researching on that to see if there is nitrite/ate free option and how costly that is.

Another friend is avoiding monosodium glutamate (MSG).  Since I'm getting rid of senseless additives, I thought I would include this one too.  MSG is a common ingredient in many processed foods including breakfast sausage.  I'm a sausage kind of girl.  I love sausage, egg and cheese breakfast sandwiches, sausage crumbles in my scrambled eggs or with onions and mushrooms on a pizza.  I found what I hope to be a great turkey sausage recipe that I will review tomorrow-only I will use pork instead of turkey (because, I'm not a ground turkey kind of girl!).