Sunday, September 14, 2008

Shopping Spree...


Yesterday was so busy that I didn't even have time to blog. After a hugely successful and very fun trip to the Market, I painted for several hours, then went to a going-away party. I tried to dash off a quick "I'm too busy to write" entry, but my hand bumped something and deleted it all...took that as a sign that I should just come back and try harder in the morning.


Boy, am I glad we didn't get this weather yesterday! It ended up being really nice yesterday, albeit windy and kind of steamy. I hit Lincoln Square village at about 8, and week #2 shopping was ON. I wanted to focus a bit harder on vegetables and fruits - last week I only bought 4 apples because I was concerned that I'd run out of staples like meat and bread. Hardly!! By the end of the week I realized that my diet was actually LACKING veggies!! How could that be?!? I still got plenty of meat this week (and tried a couple new things), but really hit the salad stuff hard:

1 lb. chicken drumsticks
1 lb. turkey burger
pk. of 4 polish sausages (!!!)
1 lb. bacon
1 lb. deli-sliced ham!
1 lb. whole wheat flour
1 loaf Amish bread
jar strawberry butter


small bag chive and onion linguine
2 cucumbers
purple cabbage (to make slaw)
swiss chard (not sure WHAT to do with it but it'll be fun to try!)
2 spinach bundles
2 onions
2 zucchini
1 eggplant
2 red peppers
1 green pepper
3 ears corn (still tastes great, almost end of season)
1 lb. green beans
dark striped seedless watermelon
bunch cilantro
6 potatoes
8 Jonathan apples
4 pears
2 1/2 gallons Oberweiss milk

So I have like $15 left, believe it or not!! I kept circling the Market, trying to find other things to buy. I'm left with enough money to dash over to the Common Ground co-op if I need anything else. I feel really good about my purchases, though...the only issue is that I'll have to eat like crazy to get through all the fresh stuff!!

2 comments:

Lisa said...

Hi Michelle: This is great, what you're doing! Love love love eating local.

Regarding Swiss chard: I got some on Saturday; hooray for Jon's rainbow chard. I cut off the stalks (which you can also eat), chop the greens, sauteed some slices of onion and a couple cloves of chopped garlic in olive oil, threw in the greens along with salt and pepper, and cooked on medium heat for maybe 10 minutes. In a bowl, I dressed the greens with lemon juice and a bit more oil. Yum. We had the chard last night alongside Pasta Alley basil fettucine, and it was delicious.

Michelle Ryan said...

Thank you, Lisa!! I was going to search online today to try to find chard ideas...Jon threw out some ideas at the Market but I couldn't remember the details. I'll do exactly as you've suggested.