Because of this, I decided to take pictures of my groceries every week, mainly as a form of personal entertainment (like taking pictures of my veggie garden), but also to help me keep track of what I eat, and how healthy it is or isn’t — and maybe keep visual track of how much things cost, keeping in mind that some things are “specialty” items, and others are organic. I also want to answer the world’s question (in my own way), “What does a vegan eat?!” (Anything that doesn’t have animal body parts, derivatives or by-products in it.)

Here’s the original picture I took on Saturday, 7/26/2008 of my left-over groceries from last week, which will last for at least another week, except for the potatoes & fruit:

Sun. 7/27:

The carrots are mostly for my dog. But since they’re “people food” and I might share with him, I included them as groceries. Total cost was around $48 something.

Snack food packages from work will be pictured in the next batch of groceries.

Here’s what I picked out of the garden on 7/31:

Tuesday, 8/5/08 — food I didn’t need, but went shopping with my sister-in-law on our way home from a day trip in Wisconsin, because the organic food is cheaper than where I buy it here:

8/10/08: Good karma. I brought a few small tomatoes, jalapeno & cayenne peppers to church today, expecting to give them to a lady who had some straw to bring to me. She wasn’t there, so I gave my little offering to a few random people. Marge, who works at my laundromat and has a natural farm, brought a bunch of produce today. She gave me the cabbage, and enough green beans for me and my dog. I could have taken more. But as it is, she would only take 25 cents. This is a whole lot more than I gave out today. I’m going light on groceries this week, since I’ll be out of town from next Thursday through Sunday. And I still have a refrigerator and cabinets full of food. So I really don’t need anything, except to find a way to use up the perishables by Thursday morning.

Maybe (except for food or snacks I buy at work, bread & cereal), my goal will be to supplement what I’m trying to grow, with what Marge has to offer. Although she isn’t a vegan (anymore, as she was years ago, after working for the USDA), and raises a few animals, her farm is natural, which goes beyond organic. So she doesn’t use animal-based fertilizers on her crops. For that reason, I find her produce more edible than anything organic I could buy locally or in the stores.

I was out of town from 8/14-18 and still had a ton of food in the house. Here are pictures I took of the last two “pickings” from my garden on 8/18 & 8/23, along with a picture of some produce I got from Marge at the laundromat, who has a natural farm not too far away. Her’s cost $7.00. Not bad for better-than-organic. I also bought two bottles of walnut & pecan pancake syrup from Didier’s Farm in Buffalo Grove(?) — $4.95 each, along with some sunflower seeds & sweet potato chips, which aren’t pictured. (Too difficult to picture snack food, if I don’t have it at home.)

The onions are huge! Marge said she started them in the ground in March. Next year, I might try growing some onions.

As of 8/29, other than snack food (which is sometimes substantial, like nuts, sunflower seeds, Luna or Clif Bars, or granola bars, not just chips or cookies) that I buy at work, and what I pick from the garden or buy from Marge who has a natural farm, I haven’t made a trip to the grocery store since 8/5, when I didn’t even need to go then. (That kind of makes up for the gas price, and what I spent on food for 3 days at AR2008.) But I’m finally out of cereal (except for the kind I’d have to cook), down to one frozen loaf of bread, and getting low on pasta.

8-31-2008:

I shopped for coffee & cereal (I forgot the pasta). I spent $81.76, but some of these things will last me longer than a week.

Here’s what I picked on 9/6/08:

Here are pictures of what I bought between 9/6 & 11/16:


(The carrots are mostly for my dog.)









(The veggie slices are not vegan. It is a soy cheese, but has some milk by-product in them. My store doesn’t sell Tofutti mozzerella slices. And the Health Food store was closed when I stopped by. So I couldn’t get any Follow Your Heart for the pizza I wanted to make.)

Here’s what I bought on 11/16/08. It’s really about two weeks worth of food:

So far, that is what I bought, or picked from my garden (except for snacks at work) for almost 4 months. It’s all pretty much the same. So I may stop now.

However, I may do something similar for Lent. I’ve been thinking again about “giving up plastic”. So I may buy 6-7 weeks of food before Lent, and only buy what I absolutely need each week, using cash instead of my credit card. We’ll see…. (We’ll also see what kind of expiration dates things have, to know if I can buy that much in advance.)