DAY 0 - Ready, Get Set..

I roped my boyfriend, B, into this doing this experiment with me. I didn't even have to explain it, he was in as soon as I said the word "challenge". Pssshh. Boys. "$12 a day? Easy," he said. "It'll be just like college - you know I bet we don't spend that much more on food now anyways." I didn't even have to give him the whole speech I had planned to talk him into it. Lucky guy.

It's true that we live very cheaply. We are recently graduated and very broke. We cook almost every meal at home - not only out of necessity but because that's how our mamas raised us. I make my coffee at home (the kind that comes in a plastic tub. no fancy seattle brew), B cuts coupons obsessively, and we rarely eat out. But, I've never gone to the grocery store with a calculator. That's the scary part. We have a weekly budget but we've never had a maximum budget and if we go a couple dollars over we usually don't worry. Until this week. 

Then we have another hurdle. Together, we have a rainbow of food allergies. Between the two of us there are allergies to tree nuts, avocados, milk, mustard, some types of fruit, and a mild gluten sensitivity. 

AND, we've made it our mission to try to eat as healthy as possible on the budget. Because I know B would just eat potatoes in all their various incarnations (french fries, baked potatoes, tater tots, hash browns…) all week if he was doing this challenge on his own. This will be hard as well. Have you looked at how much a bag of lettuce costs?? But that's really part of the challenge, right? Because if we all we had to do was spend $7 on a day's worth of calories, I live 2 blocks away from a Taco Bell and could do that in my sleep and still have bus fare left over. 

The plan going into this week is to keep cooking every meal, cutting coupons and buying on sale. Like Sam, we're going to shop at all of our usual grocery stores. And there's no room in the budget for snacks, sweets, alcohol, juice, tea, OR COFFEE. Not to mention the things we take for granted like cooking oils, and seasonings. 

So here we go. The pantry has been cleared and tomorrow is DAY 1. We start the day with Instant Oatmeal for breakfast then we're off to the grocery store with our calculator. Wish us luck.