You may recall that I posted my remorse about wasting food and grocery money a couple of weeks ago, and expressed a desire to cut down, be more thoughtful in what I buy and make.  I thought as a follow-up, that I would write an article addressing some of the challenges inherent in efficient cooking for one, since that’s one of my major problems.  Useful, right?

This is not going to be that article.  Why?  Well, because I spent a whole bunch of time this weekend looking for good guidance on the subject of cooking for one person, and frankly, all I managed to do was make myself testy.  I’d love to find some great guidance that’d let me cook my lunch and dinner on a regular basis without wasting food or making myself sick eating the same thing over and over.  I am starting to wonder, though, if that kind of guidance exists.

read more »

So, the recession drags on.  It has recently been brought home to me that I spend too much money on, well, pretty much everything.  While I’m still not hurting for money for basics, which makes me pretty lucky, it would be idiotic of me not to give some serious thought to buckling down to saving some more money and increasing my emergency cushion a little in case something happens.

What I most need to do, really, is just spend more deliberately — give more thought to what I do and don’t spend money on.  I’ll be working on that.  But one item that I’d really like to work on that will actually require some thought and planning is my grocery bills.  As I mentioned recently, I am a total grocery impulse shopper.  This makes my cooking life pretty entertaining and frequently an adventure, but it also has the drawback of sometimes saddling me with completely bizarre foodstuffs that I have no idea what to do with, or 2/3rds of the ingredients for a recipe that I can’t quite make.  I also haven’t really spent a lot of time thinking about what the most cost-effective use of my money is; my tendency is to buy anything healthy that I am at all tempted by to encourage myself, even if it turns out to be pricey.

read more »

Folks, I am an impulse shopper.  I know, you’ve all seen my fashion posts, but oddly enough, I’m not talking about clothes.  Clothing I usually stalk and meditate on for at least a few weeks and sometimes a few months before buying.  If I buy something on the spur of the moment, usually either it’s something pretty basic, or I have Lily or AJ along egging me on.  (Those two are pure evil, let me tell you.)  No, what I’m talking about is groceries.

read more »