Let’s face it; we’ve all seen our cost of living increase a
lot over the past year. My family’s grocery budget has more than doubled. Foods
like steak, shrimp and bacon are a luxury these days. You wouldn’t think that
this would effect my education, but when you’re studying to be a caterer, it
not only effects my education, but my business as well. After pricing certain
foods that I’d be needing to use in my upcoming text, I realized that I was
going to have to do something to help keep the costs down or my education would
have to come to a grueling halt.
As I was walking through the produce aisle of my local
grocery store, I priced some of the fresh herbs and spices they had available.
I realized that buying these fresh items were going to put a serious dent in my
grocery budget. I wouldn’t mind spending the extra money if I knew that I would
use all of products, but the fact is, when you buy something like fresh basil,
you don’t use the whole package. You put a great deal of it back in the fridge
and watch it go bad. This is not an option for me.
One of the other things I’ve noticed is how the cost of
produce is skyrocketing, and the quality is diminishing. A year ago I could buy
a few bunches of broccoli for a dollar or two and now I’m spending more than
five on them. Needless to say throwing fresh produce away is killing me inside.
You can plan out a menu and buy only what you need when you shop, but that
doesn’t always work. Being disabled, I have good days and bad days. When I have
a bad day my husband does the cooking. He usually asks me what I was planning
on doing for dinner and when I tell him, his usual response is, “Yeah. I can’t
cook that.” Since we don’t always follow my menu to the letter, we can throw
out quite a bit of produce.
I have recently taken some steps to remedy this wasteful
situation. If I’m going to be a caterer I will have to use fresh products more
often than not and since the cost of these items have gotten out of hand, I’m
taking steps that will help me to control costs now and in the future. In my
next blog I will let you know what actions I am taking and how they are working
out.