Off White Living

In our modern world we “vote” for things with our money. If you think about money as energy, how we direct our energy says a lot about what are values are and what is important to us.

How many of us have thought about our grocery shopping from the perspective of values? I didn’t until I began studying the work of John DeMartini and his emphasis of living inside one’s value system. Now I see many people in conflict because they say they want to be healthy/eat welll, but they “vote” for junk food or foods that make them feel bad physically or emotionally.

Today when I did the weekly shopping, I got the inspiration to give you both a guide to shopping the off-white way, and an invocation to examine how you trade your financial energy for food energy everyday. In a lot of ways, money and food are the same: We need both to live, it hurts to be without, and the repeated habits of how we use each of them carves out our life experience in a lot of ways.

For today’s project I had $100 to spend. Part of my food value is spending $100/week for 2 active adults to eat. It may seem like a lot, but some of my food values include:

• buying nice groceries so that I enjoy what I have to fix and won’t be tempted to go out
• having as much fresh produce as I want. Feeling deprived or having food devoid of color and texture make sad and want to eat sugar 😦
• Buying good quality food. I’m worth it. My husband is worth it. We consider it our health insurance policy. This means no trans fats, no HFCS, and really no white sugar/flour at all. We also don’t buy stuff with MSG and try to avoid soy protein isolate and “natural flavorings” as much as possible. The latter two are hard, as “natural flavorings” are in everything

I’d rather spend more $$ on my weekly groceries and feel empowered about my choices than just get the minimums and then either have to go back for more, or start eating out. The less times I go to a grocery store in the week, the better. Supermarkets are a notorious place where I have little control (especially if I’m hungry, angry, lonely, or tired (HALT)). I’ve been known to get sucked into a vortex of fresh donuts or oatmeal cookies and once that happens, all bets are off.

Okay, back to the project:

Of $100, I spent $96, and here is what it looked like:

Here is what I can make with my purchases:

large tray of veggie or meat lasagna
eggs for breakfast 4-6 days/week + eggs to cook with
mushroom barley stew
quinoa pilaf w/green onions
2-3 servings of fruit/day (x 2 people)
roasted beet ravioli with almond cheese
Spinach salad x 5-7 days
Collard green dolmades (like stuffed grape leaves)
carrots + beandip for snacking
almond milk hot chocolate daily
3 sweet potato dinners
spaghetti squash with redsauce, goat cheese and basil
tabouleh
hamburgers x 2-3 dinners
salmon X 2 dinners
chicken enchiladas
roasted chicken breast with garlic and onions
quick refried beans for side dish
beet green + Swiss chard salad with grapefruit/ginger dressing
fresh ginger tea with fresh lemon
and more…..

And here is what I spent:

Dry goods/boxed food: $22.41: almonds, almond butter, tabouleh, pasta sauce, dried apricots, dehydrated beans, 1 cup of Nile soup, quinoa, etc

Dairy/meats: 33.96: Salmon, hormone-free chicken, 7% lean gr. beef, ricotta and mozerella cheese (for lasagna), almond cheese, and eggs

Fruits and veggies: $39.63: spinach, collards, ginger root, apples, zucchini, onions, yams, spaghetti squash, green onions, cherry tomatoes, avocados, etc

That is 41.5% spent on FRESH produce. If I factor in the dry goods, that’s $62.04 on plant-based foods, which is 64.6% plants and 35.4% animal products. And all of it is 100% refined sugar, MSG, hormones, white flour free!

Another perspective: of the 51 items purchased, 28 were fresh fruits or veggies (55%) and I got a total of 25.81 pounds of fresh produce. I also purchased 6 whole grains/nuts that were NON-boxed, which makes 34 whole plant-based foods, or 66.7%.

And yet another perspective: I got the foods I need to eat well 100% of the time for my body and my husband’s body, so I have to hassle with stressful food choices 0% of the time: priceless