Grocery Haul

I watch a lot of Mom blogs.

Mostly video.

Does anyone do written blogs anymore?

I'd love to do video blogs but I just don't have the time to edit videos! Nor do I know how. Maybe one day...

Anyway.

For some reason, I LOVE watching grocery haul videos. I have no idea why.

I thought it'd be interesting for me to do a Grocery Haul post for a couple of reasons: A) my family is allergic to legit everything and B) I've changed as an eater these past 6 months during my fitness journey.

Here's a general breakdown of categories for our family:

Gluten-Free: Ava and myself. Well, we are technically not allergic to gluten, but to wheat. Since all things wheat have gluten in them, it's easier to find "gluten-free" items than "wheat-free" items. But, I still need to read the labels, you know, just in case.

Eggs: Mila, Ava, and myself. We are allergic (mostly) to egg whites. I cheat here and there and eat a yolk every once in a while but I shouldn't. We are all able to handle baked eggs. (Like muffins, cakes, etc. - as long as it's GF for me and Ava). Ironic that we have so many chickens!

Cow's Milk: Mila and Ava. They drink soy milk currently. When Mila was a baby, we tried all kinds of milk to see what we'd like/tolerate. Coconut milk (eh), hemp (no thanks!), oat milk. Soy tastes the best. Our allergist actually said mare (like HORSE) milk would be a good alternative but I couldn't find it anywhere (at least not where it was meant for HUMAN consumption!) Goat milk is too similar to cow's milk so that's a no-go.

Nuts (of all kinds): Mila, Ava, and myself. All nuts. Peanuts included, even though they are a legume. Pistachios. Hazelnuts. Tree nuts, pine nuts. Cashews. Walnuts. Pecans. Almonds (I MISS ALMONDS). You name the nut, we are allergic.

Garlic: Ava. What in the actual fuck? Yeah. Even our allergist was surprised at this one.

Sunflower (as in seeds, oil, butter): Now fuck me. When Mila was diagnosed with nut allergies, peanut butter went out the window. I found out from a coworker at the time that Sunbutter was delicious. It IS. It's also fucking expensive - hello $5.49 a jar! But, I ate this shit all the time when I was pregnant with Ava. Mila had it every morning for breakfast and so did I. We used it in place of PB. And Ava is allergic. Of course, she is. Have you ever read labels on like ALL THE FOODS IN THE WORLD? They all have some sort of sunflower oil in them. All the things that are GF? Sunflower oil.

I read so many labels (and touch so many packages - ugh) and have to put the items back on the shelf because of our allergens.

Mind you, since many of our allergens are NOT common, so they are not usually listed separately in the ingredients list, like milk, eggs, nuts (the top 8 usually are).

Now, let's continue.

The above is what my kids are allergic to.

The below list is just MY allergies.

Corn: I can't believe I'm allergic to corn. I grew up eating corn. Corn on the cob with salty butter dripping down my face. Yep. Mexican street corn at the fair? YEP I'M ALL OVER THAT MY FRIENDS.

Buckwheat: I'm not even sure what this is, but I've been seeing it around more, recently. I assume it's just another grain that can be substituted with regular wheat.

Soy: Now this is a biggie for me. SOY? Soybeans? TOFU? WUT THE FUCK. WHY ME. <insert self-pity> Everything that does not have milk, eggs, or nuts, usually has soy. Some sort of soy. Edamame? Soy.

That's not even the full list. That's just the big ones.

Now that we've gone over all of that, you're probably wondering what the fuck we eat.

Protein.

Vegetables.

Potatoes.

Rice.

The hardest part is the snacks.

School lunches.

Going out to eat.

Until last year, Ava was able to eat wheat. So girlfriend LIVED on noodles. Any kind of noodle. Noodle with sauce, without sauce, with meat. Without meat. Plain. WHATEVER. Then her numbers went up. So we had to legit stop feeding her her favorite food.

Thankfully she can eat rice.

So, even though it's clear that we are limited in what we can eat, it's not as bad as you'd think. I'm grateful that we can eat what we can. After speaking with our allergist, I asked him if we were some of his worst cases. He said in the sheer NUMBER of allergens, yes. But in severity? No. Not even close. He has patients who can legit only eat 5 foods. So yes, I can still be grateful.

So here's a typical grocery haul day for me. This was documented on Saturday, January 15.

First up: fresh produce. This we can eat! Our normal haul consists of some staples like broccoli, potatoes, onions, salad bags, romaine lettuce, cucumbers, tomatoes, peppers. Some fresh herbs. All depending on what I need for the week and what's on the menu (which reminds me to start my post on meal-planning. I used to meal plan but then had kids and you know, got busy and overwhelmed with life).

After fresh veggies we pick up a TON OF FRUIT. OMG THE FRUIT.

We eat a lot of fruit in our house. We go through apples, bananas, pears, grapes, kiwis, blueberries, and oranges pretty regularly.

After the produce, we head over to the breads. I get bagels for Steve and Italian bread for Mila.

Then it's on to the Meat Section. We go through chicken, beef and pork pretty regularly. I rotate in some fish when possible. And I have to grab enough bacon. Good lord my kids eat a lot of bacon.

From there we head into Nature's Marketplace to grab some of the items we need that are organic, specialty, etc. This is where I grab the soy milk.

I shop at two grocery stores and I have to admit - I should've started shopping at one of them a million years ago. I was young and naive, what can I say?

In my area, Wegmans is the biggie.

Let's reflect on when Steve and I were in the Top 100 Customers of 2019. I still can't believe that happened!

The other store I frequent now? ALDI.

Yep, I said it.

My mom has been telling me for YEARS (and I mean, YEARS!!) to go to ALDI. I was misinformed and thought they were a cheap grocery store.

I was wrong.

They have so much stuff and it's all amazing quality. Many of the cheese and chocolate are from Europe.

So I usually go to ALDI first, then to Wegmans.

ALDI has new stuff each week, so I get what I need from there and then get the rest of my goodies at Wegmans.

This is what they call "The Aisle of Shame" and yes, I'm a member in the FB group.

On sale for $.49 cents! I grabbed one.

My kids love bacon. It's so much cheaper at ALDI than at Wegmans. Wegman's brand bacon is $5.79 compared to ADLI's $3.39. BUT they are all out. Dang it! But luckily I still have a package from last week.

Here's what I was able to grab during my lunch break. Lots of fresh-looking produce.

All of this stuff is pretty...regular. The soap and stuff I don't get weekly, but you get the idea.

Never seen these before so I thought I'd give it a try.

I live for their weekly specials. You just never know what they'll have! I was trying to think ahead to this weekend - there's a big football game Saturday night so I wanted to have some snacky foods ready for when Steve got home from work. Kickoff is at 8:15 and he'll get home around 8:45.

And um. OMG. I hemmed and hawed over whether to get this. This is like...heaven for me. All things chocolate. Ugh. I couldn't walk by it. Not for $4.99! And I didn't want to pass it up and regret it.

My ALDI total was $77.76 - I always try to remember if I needed to buy hygiene products, or paper products, etc. which obviously does not happen every week.

Now, my Wegmans Haul. Let's see if I can keep it under $72.24. I'm trying really hard to keep our grocery bill at $150 per week. That still seems like a lot but due to our multiple, various allergies, there's just nothing I can do. Fresh produce and stuff are pricey, people! Gluten-free is pricey!

I stopped at Wegmans on Friday, during my lunch break. This is out of my norm, to be honest. ALDI gets new stuff on Wednesdays, so I try to go towards the end of the week. Then I usually hit up Wegmans on Saturdays. I don't usually have time during the day Fridays to get there.

BUT, I made it happen.