The Downshift: How Week 2 on a $4/Day Budget Went, & Week 3 Shopping List

Perspective is everything. A few weeks ago, a free coffee or discovering there was just a little bit of sour cream left over would have been but a minor blip on the excitement scale. At the end of week two, it’s a celebration. Spice oil feels like a night out at a fancy restaurant. Popcorn is a gourmet treat.

But for real, popcorn and spice oil got us through week two. That, and the prospect of pizza come Friday. We’re really hungry this week, hungrier than last week, though the food we’ve been eating has been really delicious.

Spice Oil Good and Cheap

I’ve been beating myself up this week. My ‘bulk items’ are running out quickly. We’re already 2/3 of the way through our olive oil, more than half through our 10 pound bag of potatoes, 4/5 through our salt, and all the way through our oatmeal. These were items I thought I would have to buy once (maybe twice for the oatmeal) over the six week period.

This week has made it clear that I need to be better building my pantry. It’s much harder than I thought. We seem to only be able to afford one or two of those building blocks a week, and, as I mentioned above, those are going fast. I’ve been cursing my pizza decision  as often as I’ve been craving it. $10.70 for the core ingredients was too much.

I was feeling pretty down planning our week three food budget, and was having a difficult time making ends meet while still keeping things half local. It took two hours and a fair number of post-it notes, arranging and re-arranging different ingredients and meal options. In the end, I still don’t know if it will work out.

This week, I’ll take a new approach. I’m cutting out bread in favour of gluten free flours and I’ll be attempting to make flatbread and regular bread. I’ve heard from many of you that making from scratch on those basic but often pricey items has been a game changer (thought the risk is that I’ll end up with burnt or in-edible food).

I’ll also hopefully do a bit more foraging. We tried foraging for the first time in our lives this week – blackberries. There is currently a 2L container sitting in my freezer. I have no idea what to do with it yet. I’m a little scared to use it, to be honest. That’s something else that has come up this week – hoarding the food that is left.

Foraging for Blackberries Halifax

Shopping has also taken on a whole new level of difficulty. The past few weeks, I’ve visited anywhere from 3 – 6 grocery stores or farmers markets to make our budget work. I’ve done this while being painfully aware that transportation is a luxury. Not everyone has access to a car, and with gas at the price it is at, it adds a whole other level of budget consideration. Food security – true food security anyway – is about so much more than being able to afford healthy groceries and access is something that is not talked about nearly enough.

There are many people who do not have a food source in walking distance. Bus adds additional time, scheduling considerations, and difficulty (heavy or multiple bag transportation). We all need to get our food from somewhere, but when transportation access or cost is already an issue, chances are that shopping around for the best deal is not an option.

We have not factored transportation costs into our food budget. In fact, one of the things we are trying to do IS to shop around to get a sense (and thus hopefully give a sense) of shopping options around the province. So far, we’ve found that farm markets tend to be the most affordable for locally produced goods like produce and eggs, however they often aren’t a one-stop-shop. No Frills and Costco have come out on top for bulk items, but No Frills are limited throughout the province and Costco requires a membership – an additional expense.

I’ve noted some pretty negative elements of our current eating endeavours, but it isn’t all bad. I love having my meals planned out for the week. I love knowing what is for dinner every night. I love that next to nothing is being wasted in our home.  We’ve also loved almost everything we’ve eaten.

But there are some serious hurdles. With that in mind, here is our week three shopping list:

Mayonaise – No Frills: $2.97
Parmesan – Foxhill (Local): $4.35
2 Lemons – No Frills: $1.50
Salt – Bulk Barn: $0.22
Mustard – No Frills: $2.00
2 Cans Tomatos – No Frills: $2.33
6 Corn – Noggins @ Seaport Market (Local): $3.00
Flour Mix – Bulk Barn: $5.73 (rice flour, tapioca flour & potato starch)
Yeast: $0.72
Chickpeas – No Frills: $4.19
Butter – Sobeys: $3.99
Sesame Seeds – Bulk Barn: $1.02
Garam Masala – Bulk Barn: $0.65
Onions – Withrows (Local): $1.25
2 Bonnet Peppers – No Frills: $0.35
Eggs – Withrows (local): $3.95
Cheese – Sobeys: $4.99
Cucumbers – Withrows (local): $0.70
Carrots – Noggins @ Seaport Market (local): $3.75
Flax Flour – Bulk Barn: $0.54
Tomatos – Sobeys (local): $1.60
Ginger Root – Sobeys: $1.30
Potatoes – Withrows (local): $3.60

We were under budget by $1.30 which we are carrying over to next week to give a bit more breathing room. We were also under on our local purchases by $5.80 which we will also aim to make up next week.

Read Our Past Posts in This Series Here:
Post 1: The what and why of our $4/day food budget
Post 2: Preparing to eat on $4/day (and our week 1 shopping list)
Post 3: Week 1 meals and recipes and how it went 
Post 4: Week 2 Shopping List and Prep

About the author

Gillian Wesley

Since getting together six years ago, we have given away our television, begun weekly DIY nights, experimented with urban homesteading, challenged ourselves to drive less (100 days car-free in 2013), and have learned more about food security. We have experimented with a range of budgeting strategies, all of which involve consuming less stuff. We buy food with reducing packaging in mind. We got a dog. We have been doing these things for a variety of reasons: financial, social, environmental, to achieve a better work-life balance. It has resulted in us enjoying an increasingly simple and satisfying lifestyle. We’ve been influenced by a lot of people we’ve encountered and things we’ve read about along the way, notably the Transition Movement, the Antigonish Movement, and, more recently, traditional Acadien living. And we’ve learned that we are by no means alone. There are many, many people who are taking steps to downshift their lives. Sign up for our eNewsletter, and we’ll send you a round-up of our new and upcoming projects once a month.