Whole 30 Day 5

Sundays are crazy for us.
We live 45 minutes from church, and with Sunday school starting at 9:45, it's a mad scramble to get four kids up, fed, dressed and ready and out the door on time.
All that to say, breakfast was......nothing.  Not ideal, but typical for a Sunday.

Lunch:
Made our first-ever trip to Whole Foods...
...and ate while we were there.  Paul and I split a big container of cioppino (a thick seafood-y soup) and a small container of their salmon-cucumber salad.  The salmon salad was entirely W30 compliant.  The soup had white wine in it, down the ways a bit on the list of ingredients.  Not W30 compliant, I know...but we decided that yesterday was about the "spirit of the law" rather than the "letter of the law"...and a Whole Foods seafood soup was a hundred times better than any other fast food we could have eaten in the nearby area.

Dinner:
...was a repeat of lunch.  We finished off our leftovers.

Our first Whole Foods trip was an experience, to be sure.  We had three of our four kids with us.  I don't know if all WF stores are tightly arranged, but this one certainly was.  
My son thought it'd be fun to start off the adventure by pulling an avocado from the bottom of the slanted display, just to see if all the others really would fall.  As I scrambled to retrieve the four that did fall, I caught several looks...from others who obviously thought that our decision to bring three kids along was less than prudent.
I was ga-ga over all the fresh sausage choices.  We buy our organic beef from the farmer who lives almost right next door to us, so I'm never really in search of cuts of "whole" meat.  What I do have a hard time finding, though, are healthy, flavorful sausages.  I love to have them on hand to toss in a skillet with veggies for a quick meal.
I ended up getting two pounds of their organic mild pork Italian sausage, and two pounds of their organic spicy chicken Italian sausage.
  
I bought an 18oz package of their uncured bacon...it has just a bit of sugar in it, but I shared my thoughts about things like that in this post.  Before you get all huffy with me, read or re-read that post.  This is our second Whole 30...and this time around it's all about finding our balance in everything...finding a way to be able to sustain this healthy way of eating.
I bought a few other incidentals, nothing exciting...items that I'm sure will be mentioned here or there through future posts.

I admit, I did go through a bit of sticker shock.  While it was nice to have the confidence that I could pronounce and recognize all the ingredients in the food I was buying, it was also distressing to pay $10 for eighteen ounces of bacon and $5 for a two-ounce bag of freeze-dried fruit (albeit, theeee very best dried fruit I have ever tasted).
Like I've said before, and I'm sure I'll say it a hundred times again, this go-round of the W30 is all about us finding our balance.  We have to find what works for us.  It's not a realistic option for me to continue cooking two meals for dinner every night--one for Paul and me, one for the kids.  Sure, I can do that for 30 days...but what about after that?  If we're going to have homemade pancakes and bacon for breakfast some morning (post-W30, obviously), am I really going to feed them bacon that costs $8+ per pound?
And I know...I know that the quality you pay for in food today, you will reap years later in health for your body.  I understand that.  But I also have to look at the numbers.  I have to.  And the numbers have to work.  I can't spend $300 or even $200 on our weekly groceries.
So, that's that.  That's where I am right now.
Excited about my Whole Foods finds, excited about using them in some of our meals...but also searching for some balance in making this a lasting change for our whole family, not just for Paul and me.  And I should mention here, my kiddos aren't picky eaters.  Sure, they each have their veggie or two (or three) that they don't like...but they all like a good hearty spinach and romaine salad, loaded with fresh veggies.  My struggle isn't in finding food that they'll eat and like...my struggle is in making it an affordable option for our large-ish family.

Do you have a favorite place to find deals on whole, clean, healthy foods?
I've actually thought about asking our local small-town butcher if I could do a special bulk order of sausage, and if I did so, could I dictate the recipe? ((Our local butcher makes all their own sausages on site.))
Has anyone had any experience with doing something like that?
I'd love to hear your thoughts, suggestions, and especially, experiences in making clean eating more affordable for your family.

3 comments:

  1. OK, to start off, we have a Safeway (regular grocery store), Trader Joe's, and Whole Foods all within two miles of our home. We chose our location partly on the convenience of the grocery stores (we also have a Fred Meyer, Albertson's, and multiple other grocery stores within a 10 mile radius.
    That being said, I take care of MOST of my grocery shopping at Safeway and Trader Joe's. We also have a favorite butcher out near the Portland airport, which is across town, so Ryan stops there when he is coming home from the airport or doing work on that side of town. If we need a specialty item, pre-prepared, or are just struggling with coming up with a meal, we can always "run" (literally) to WF and pick something up.
    It's not always easy. I was a picky shopper before kids, and healthy diets, but now I am even more so.
    We are MAINLY gluten free because Lorelai has a sensitivity, paleo because it is Ryan's preference, Reece and I just go along for the ride.
    I've figured out what is most affordable/available at each store and buy accordingly.

    ReplyDelete
    Replies
    1. See, Stephanie, I think that's what it's really going to end up being....a lot of shop and compare and shop and compare...and learn different stores and their prices and their specialty items. I tend to steer away from our two little local grocery stores, but I should probably check out their meat departments. I wonder if they might have some things that would be comparable...and if nothing else, we'd save money not having to drive so far.

      Delete
  2. Erin, have you checked out Azure Standard? It is a food coop based out of Oregon and they have routes that deliver to your area. I buy all of my nuts, dates, coconut, carrots, fresh produce that's on sale, and lots of other W30/paleo things from there.

    ReplyDelete

Related Posts Plugin for WordPress, Blogger...
Blogging tips