Here we go, another way to chop down your monthly costs, going where few dare to go!  Seriously, paper goods add up quickly, and most people don’t stop to figure just how much they are adding to their monthly costs.  Paper goods can be convenient, but the convenience comes at a cost.

We use very, very few paper goods, with disposable diapers being the biggest exception (in the winter, not the summer).  I don’t consider this part of our food budget – it’s budgeted as part of our miscellaneous needs each month, but the amounts aren’t very significant at all.  I think it’s a good idea for people to separate their miscellaneous expenses from their food costs, even if they’re purchased at the same store, so that they have a clear idea of what they’re really spending in each area.  I’ll start at the beginning, and if I forget something, then ask me, okay? 

Disposable dishes and cutlery – we hardly use these at all, except maybe on the second day of a three day yom tov if we have guests and I’m not feeling like washing any more dishes by that point.  At one point I realized that I never had enough silverware, and that the pieces from our service of 12 had slowly gotten lost.  (I think pieces sometimes get thrown away by younger children when they clear their plates.)  So as much as I like good quality silverware, I decided to head to Walmart and buy a bunch of cheapie stuff – they were five pieces for $1.  I got thirty each of soup spoons, small spoons, forks, and 18 knives ($21 total).  That gives me enough for the average Shabbos to get through without having to wash them.  (I don’t generally mind washing dishes, but on Shabbos I really dislike it.)  I recently stopped in and got a bunch more of that pattern, since I noticed the attrition rate was beginning to affect my supply.:)

Dishes – we use regular dishes all week, including Shabbos and holidays.  For Pesach, my inlaws’ contribution for several years has been a stack of disposable dishes – one year they asked how they could help (since they come for the seder, etc.), and that’s what my dh suggested, since particularly on Pesach, it seems that cooking and cleaning up from meals is nonstop.  Years ago, we also used paper plates for a couple of weeks after I gave birth, but that was when my kids were younger and I was doing all the dishes.  Now they’re well trained and wash the dishes, so after birth is the same as any other time. 

We also used to buy disposable plastic cups for Shabbos (we had enough to patch together from different styles during the week), because our glasses were always breaking, and it didn’t take long for a complete set to become uncomplete.  Then after I don’t know how many sets of glassware, I tried buying the rigid plastic cups, that are clear and look like glass.  They cracked after being dropped a few times.  Then I tried the unbreakable plastic (well, unbreakable to any other family, but we managed to break even some of those!), but most of them disappeared over time.   Kind of like the silverware dilemma I shared above.  (Those of you with small families might not understand how this is possible, but this is the reality I live with – that I can buy 20 – 30 cups and only find 2 when it’s time to set the table, and that’s when all the dishes have been washed. :))  I really didn’t like using the disposables, especially since I didn’t keep them enough at the forefront of my mind, and ran out too often.  I kept thinking about what I could use instead.  A couple of months ago I noticed some clear poly-carbonate cups in Walmart that looked like glass but were very sturdy.  The problem was that they were a bit more than I wanted to pay.  However, H-shem was guiding my steps in the store, and that very day I found the same glasses, but colored instead of clear, in the clearance section, for .50 each.  (I’ve never before noticed a clearance section in Walmart.)  I bought all that were left – I think there were 13, but would have gladly gotten more if they had them.  I told my kids when I brought them home that they must not be taken to other parts of the house, and so far, almost two months later, we still have all of them.  And none are broken.  So now we don’t need disposable cups even for Shabbos.  Whew – that saves us a big $1.29 every few weeks.

Napkins – okay, I use paper napkins for Shabbos/yom tov, though not the very expensive ones.  I’ve tried several times to use cloth napkins, and I don’t like them.  They don’t absorb – the material they all seem to be made of kind of just smears the grease around.  Then they get stained, and I’m obviously not a laundry maven, because I wasn’t successful in getting the stains out.  Putting out cleaned but stained napkins isn’t something I’m comfortable with, so they were relegated to rag status.  At some point in the last few months, I had the brainstorm to use colored wash cloths, which are great for wiping hands or table spills, but not so beautiful for Shabbos.  So I buy one large package of 500 napkins, 1 ply (I don’t remember how much they cost, but not more than a few dollars), which lasts at least at least a couple of months.  For weekday meals, we have the washcloths.

Paper towels – I don’t buy these at all, and don’t think I ever have (if I’ve had them, it’s because a visiting parent bought them).  I use cleaning rags – I used to cut up our old towels, but we didn’t wear out our towels at the rate necessary to keep up with the spills needing to be wiped up.  So to bulk up our supply, I bought a couple of large packages of shop towels when a local store was going out of business.  I think I got something like 50 for $15.  They’re red, which I like because they are easy to sort into the wash and out of the clean laundry basket, and I use them for everything – wiping down the table/counters, cleaning spills, wiping hands.  They’re also good for washing dishes with.  I keep them in a basket in the kitchen, along with any old towels, washcloths, and cloth napkins.  Also, old cloth diapers also make good rags – we also had some of these in our cleaning stash, but the conflict was that some kids didn’t distinguish between old cloth diapers that were ragged and very nice new ones.  You can see why the relevance of the red cleaning rags now, right? 

Plastic bags – I periodically buy sandwich bags, the cheapest ones that are $1 for 150.  I also reuse plastic bags that foods come in, if they are dry and clean, like bread bags.  They usually don’t need more than a quick shaking out of crumbs.  You’d be surprised how many bags come into your home that are useful in this way once you start paying attention.  I also reuse the cheapie bags I buy, if they are dry and clean – many of the times, I use them to put in a leftover muffin, piece of bread, biscuit, and there’s no reason not to use them again.  I don’t rewash baggies, mainly because: a) my kids wash most of the dishes, and I don’t ask them to do that, and b) I buy cheap sandwich bags (only ziploc type bags are worth washing), and don’t feel the effort is worth saving a dollar every two or three months.  Also, I have plastic containers of different sizes to keep food in, so this minimized how many bags I use.  Buying these was an upfront cost, but there are some companies that sell decent quality containers for signifiantly less than Rubbermaid.  Also, you can reuse the plastic containers that some foods come in (like cottage cheese, or margarine – not that I’m recommending you eat that horrible stuff, blech), and then you don’t have to buy any. I happen to be partial to square or rectangular containers because they use space more efficiently so I’ve chosen to buy the less expensive containers as my main containers.

Aluminum foil – I reuse the pieces that are basically clean and dry.  I don’t rewash it, though, because it gets too complicated to keep track of what was used for dairy and what was used for meat.  Not to mention too messy to store two sets of used foil.

Disposable pans – I’m very happy that since I recently aquired stainless steel baking pans, I no longer need to buy these. When I did buy them, I reused them a number of times, making it a long lag between buying new ones. 

Baking/parchment paper – I used a lot of this when I used disposable aluminum pans, because I didn’t like cooking directly on it.  Now that I’m using stainless steel pans, it’s cut down on my parchment paper use.  When I do use it, it’s usually for challah or cookies, and the pieces that are in good condition can be reused several times.

All of this does make for more dishwashing – significantly more – and more laundry – not so much more.  But it cuts down on costs, cuts down on time spent in stores, and cuts down on running out of something and needing to go to the store.  If you’re in an area where you’re charged for garbage pick-up, it also cuts down on your trash costs (the large cost of pick up itself, plus the small cost of extra garbage bags).  On an ecological front, it cuts down on the huge amount of things that go into a landfill and won’t be decomposed until long after our grandchildren are grown.  Nice when something can be good for you and the rest of the planet, too. 🙂

Avivah

So many times I hear people complain about the cost of eating kosher, and it’s true that kosher food tends to cost more.  But it’s not helpful to feel like victims and say how easy it would be to keep our food budgets low ‘if only’.  After all, many people who aren’t limited to eating only kosher struggle with their food budgets, and they would also have to learn new strategies and ways of thinking about their spending if they wanted to get their costs down.

I’ve often found incredibly cheap meats and cheeses (non kosher, of course), and thought how I could easily feed my family for $300-$400 instead of $600 a month if I didn’t have to eat kosher.  My feelings about this are, we all choose in what light we want to view the objective reality, and I don’t find it helpful to look at things in a negative way.  So I choose to remember every time I go shopping and put something in my cart that costs more than I’d otherwise pay, that I’m fortunate to be doing an easy mitzva – one that the only challenge to is sometimes paying a bit more.  Even though my budget isn’t very large and I like to save money, I’m doing it because what H-shem (G-d) wants of me matters, and I’m happy to have a tiny opportunity to remember that. 

All of that being said, let’s look at really what the costs of eating kosher are.  (By the way, I hear the same kind of complaints about the expense of eating ‘healthy’; everything that I’m writing here could easily be applied to that concern.)  In my opinion, the main concern is mostly meat and dairy products.  If you choose to eat lots of processed foods, that’s fine, but of course you’re going to spend a lot more money than if you cook from scratch.  In that case, it’s not eating kosher but eating processed foods that is costing you. 

What about poultry/meat costs?  Even when it comes to meats, you get to choose what you put in your shopping cart, and that determines how much you’ll end up spending.  There are always less expensive choices.  This week in our local kosher supermarket, there are turkey drumsticks and chicken wings on sale for .99 lb, which was a fraction of the price of anything else (I think chicken thighs for 2.69 lb was the cheapest thing I saw after that).  While every week there isn’t something this inexpensive, every week there are at least a couple of items that are significantly cheaper than usual (and wherever you may live, you probably have at least periodic sales).  Do you think if you found a way to regularly buy and cook only with the meats/poultry that are on sale that you’d save money?  (By the way, also as of today, the non-kosher chicken wings in a local store, also on sale, were 1.39 lb.  So it’s an inaccurate assumption to make that non-kosher meat is always less expensive.)   

Some of you will object that chicken isn’t meat, and meat is much more expensive.  You’re right, it is.  Again, you’re the one making the choices about what to buy, and whether you buy poultry or meat.  I spoke to a local kosher butcher recently to find out what cut of meat the chopped meat is ground from, and what he told me was interesting.  The least expensive chopped meat is made of the higher quality cuts of roasts that haven’t sold within a short time, which means there’s going to be practically no difference in flavor between the $18 lb roast and the cheapest ground beef.  The more expensive lean ground beef is made of neck meat, a tough cut of meat that isn’t good for much if it were sold on it’s own but people will pay more for because they think it’s healthier.  (Any kind of ground meat should be used within a day or two or immediately frozen after purchase.)   I like roast as much as the next person, but I can’t justify it as a necessity by any means, particularly for someone struggling with their food costs. 

You may insist that you have no way to lower these costs, but maybe you could take another look at what you’re eating, when you’re eating it, and how much you’re paying for it when you buy it.  You don’t have to have meat every night of the week, or even on Shabbos.  You could use a less expensive cut of meat.  Or you could use chicken.  Or you could use less per person, in stir fries or stews, instead of a large portion of protein per person.  There are lots of choices.  And you get to make them!

What about dairy?  If you eat only chalav yisroel, you’re going to be more limited, without question.  But again, you get to make the choices!  Buying when it’s on sale is critical in being able to enjoy ‘the good stuff’ without breaking your budget. Last week, I bought shredded cheese for 2.59/8 oz (and got enough to put some in the freezer for Pesach).  At the next store I went to, it was 5.99 for the same thing.   Instead of bemoaning how expensive it usually is, I wait until the price is right and stock up!  Also, I use cheese as an ingredient, not a main dish.  That means my kids don’t eat chunks of cheese with a meal, but enjoy it very much sprinkled on their pizza or into soup.   I take advantage of regular cottage/ricotta cheeses on sale (by the way, I don’t eat exclusively chalav yisroel), and again, buy alot when the price is good.  Since these things can be frozen, a limited refrigerator shelf life shouldn’t keep you from being able to take advantage of great sales and enjoy them on weeks when they are full price.   

Now, let’s be even more radical in thinking about dairy.  What about if instead of buying your milk at the store, you bought directly from the farmer?  That’s what I do, and I pay $2.50 per gallon (and if I watch the milking, then it’s chalav yisroel, too!).   I buy a lot once a month, and keep some in the fridge, the rest in the freezer.  Milk that is defrosted had the exact same flavor and consistency it had before it was frozen (except raw milk, but we’re not talking about that here). 

But you don’t live next to a farm, you say!  Neither do I.  Because the farmer I buy from lives quite a distance from me (almost two hours), I researched discount/bulk food shopping in that area, so that I can take advantage of being in the neighborhood when I get my milk.  I do a full day of shopping once a month, and the additional gas costs are more than offset by my savings. 

If you bought your own milk and felt cheese was really too pricey, you could decide not to eat cheese.  Or you could get a book from the library and learn about making your own cheeses, in which case a pound of cheese would cost you whatever you were paying for a gallon of milk.  I’m not suggesting that it’s for everyone, and if fact I still prefer buying my cheese to making it.  The point that I think it’s important to make is that there are many, many things we can do, if we want to, to get control of the supposed fixed costs of kosher food. 

At the risk of being totally redundant, I’ll say again that it comes down to evaluating the choices we make, looking at what our options are and what we can do, and being willing to either do something different, or stop complaining.  🙂    Happy shopping!

Avivah

I thought a friendly reminder about getting your taxes done now would be in order.  I know, I know, who wants to come to my blog to be reminded about taxes??  But it’s very freeing to have them done ahead of time.  We filed ours two days ago, and I’m glad to have it done before there’s any last minute rush.

In addition to the nice feeling of getting something big that has to be done out of the way, there’s also an economic reality to be aware of.  I hate to sound like the voice of doom, but if you have fun following national economic news like me, you know that things aren’t looking good right now financially for a bunch of states.  And you probably also know that so far, two states aren’t going to be sending out tax refunds, just IOUs.

Hopefully, those will be the only two.  But as the saying goes, better one bird in the hand than two in the bush.  So get in line early and get your taxes done. If you have a refund coming to you, it’s a lot more likely you’ll get it if you file taxes sooner rather than later, if trouble arises for your state.  If you do live in a state that ends up having trouble honoring their commitment to give you back the money you’ve lent them interest-free all year (can you tell how extremely unimpressed I am by governmental financial management?), you’ll be glad to have your funds back in your account rather waiting for your state government to miraculously find money they don’t have. 

Avivah

I had a productive day of food shopping today.  And yesterday I stocked up on six months’ worth of grape juice (thanks again, Debbie!), enough to hold me over until they run a good sale again (usually it’s about twice a year around here, a month before Purim and a month before Rosh Hashana).  Two of my kids, when they saw how I bought ‘only’ 35 bottles (64 oz each), said, “That’s it?  Don’t you think you should go buy some more?”  They initially thought I had stopped only because I bought everything available on the shelf.  Do you think they’re developing a skewed attitude of what a normal amount of food to buy is??  (But I agreed that they might be right, and maybe I’ll get another six to be sure I don’t run short – we do use a huge amount on Pesach.)

When I woke up and saw it was snowing (something I hadn’t expected when I went to sleep last night), I momentarily considered cancelling my planned monthly shopping trip.  But I decided to stay with my original plans, and I’m glad I did – I don’t like pushing things off once everyone is expecting something.  There was a good amount of snow and hail while I was driving, but the highways stayed clear, and we got there and back in a decent amount of time.  While we were driving, we enjoyed listening to the first cassettes of the set we gave my dd8 and ds1o for Chanuka – Fellowship of the Rings.  (It’s amazing how much value we’re getting out of that 20 cent gift – dh also started listening to it on Sundays when he drives in to work!  At almost twenty hours of listening time for the entire set, with the two it was given to plus others in the family now enjoying it, we’re way below 1 cent per hour of entertainment!)  They are much further along in the story, but willingly agreed to start at the beginning so everyone else would know what was happening.  Since we were driving for over four hours, plus the kids wanted to stay in the van and eat lunch while I made a quick stop into one of the stores, they got plenty of listening in!

My two oldest kids were the only ones who went with me five weeks ago, and both of them felt like this was a puny shopping trip, lol.  Last month, you may remember, I hadn’t been shopping for seven weeks and had two months of food money budgeted to spend instead of one.  Besides buying only one month’s worth of food today, part of why I think this trip seemed so measly was that I bought fifty pounds of sucanat ($85).  (I was so glad to find the supply has been resumed after months of not having any available from the wholesaler, and in the nick of time (ie, with just a few pounds of sucanat left in my house – I was already thinking I might be forced to buy brown sugar), I was able to order it again!)  Between that and the grape juice, it used up a third of my monthly budget!  Since a bag of sucanat doesn’t take up much room in the van, despite costing as much as two 50 lb bags of wheat and 25 lb of millet combined, the van didn’t impress them as being very full today. 

But I still got a case of eggs (30 dozen), 50 lb potatoes, 40 lb yams, 5 cases of yogurt (6-32 oz containers per case, 30 containers total), 40 lb bananas, and a case of cherries.  And 15 lb butter, 16 lb cottage cheese, 15 lb chevre, 25 lb flour (white – for Purim baking), 25 lb sugar (for Purim baking and Pesach), 4 lb walnuts, 10 lb carrots, a few lb polenta, 25 lb grits, 8 jars of almond butter with honey, 6 boxes herbal tea, and lots of miscellaneous stuff. 

I also did all of my Purim shopping today, and the kids got all of their stuff for mishloach manos.  I’m not sure what we’ll send from the adults in our family yet, but I’ll use what ingredients I have on hand and figure it out!  I also got started on Pesach shopping, which was nice – four boxes of matza farfel ($1), five cans of matza cake meal (.79 each), several bags of sugar, a bunch of strawberry and raspberry jello (I don’t usually buy this, but at .33 each the price was right and it’s useful for some of the sorbet type desserts I like to serve on Pesach), cocoa, #10 can of pizza sauce (1.99) and a couple of chocolate chip cake mixes (because they were cheap – .89- Pesach cake mixes are so unbelievably expensive that I would never consider buying one otherwise).  It’s not a lot, but it’s that much more I won’t have to buy when Pesach is a week or two away.  I don’t buy many processed foods even for Pesach, so I shouldn’t need much more than lots of matza, oil,  and potato starch (of the non perishables – obviously we’ll need a lot more food than that!) – I have to check what I put aside last year as far as spices and anything else I might have tucked away. 

I’m planning to go shopping again in five more weeks, which will be a week before Pesach, and buy enough for six or seven weeks (for Pesach and the weeks afterwards).  Then I won’t have to shop again until two or three weeks into May.  I don’t usually think this far ahead as far as when to shop, but I’m trying to shedule my shopping trips now so I don’t feel any pressure of us running low on food supplies when I give birth (due very beginning of May, though the last two babies were two and three weeks early).  Like this, I’ll have at least a few weeks after birth before going shopping again after Pesach. 

When my  husband called from work late today, he asked if I got what I wanted when I was shopping.  I told him I never get what I want – I get what there is, and what I buy is what I want!  But that’s by no means a complaint!  I have such incredible gratitude every time I complete my monthly shopping trip.  H-shem (G-d) is so good to me, because He always sends me the items that I most want, when I need them! 

Avivah