Grocery Project

I completed the first half of my grocery project on Monday. I photographed all the groceries I purchased during the month of March. I'm also going to photograph the groceries I buy in July, because that's when the farmer's market will be in full swing.

March is a little skewed because I was on vacation for almost a week and every meal while away was eaten in a restaurant. I didn't bother to include those meals in my total since when I'm not on vacation I only eat out once or twice a month at best. I spent a total of $230 on groceries for the month and I think that's somewhat under my average monthly bill, which I figure to be around $300.

This project was inspired by looking at these photos and I simply was curious to see how my purchases compared. I think my spending is on par with the average American's spending. I'm not a terribly frugal shopper when it comes to groceries though. I tend to buy what I want without worrying about price, I try to buy quality stuff and I don't use coupons. This is probably balanced out by not buying many "convenience" foods, which are often more expensive and less nutritious than whole foods.

So if you find yourself terribly bored, you can have a gander at what my groceries look like for one month. If you've done a similar project, I'd love to see it too!

What a week's worth of food looks like

I keep revisiting these photos and pondering the various implications within. The trite observations are easy enough: Italians eat a lot of bread, Germans drink many of their daily calories, Americans hardly eat any real food whatsoever and people in Chad don't have enough to eat.

It's inspired me to photo document my groceries for two months. I decided on a month at a time because what I buy during any given week isn't necessarily what I'm eating that week; if canned tomatoes are on sale into the cart and cupboard they go. I also really don't know how much I spend on food. Although Quicken has a category for groceries, I put everything I buy during a food shop under that category, even if it's paper products, medicines or light bulbs. So I'll spend some time pouring over my receipts and figuring out how much money I'm spending on actual food. I'm also curious to know if I'm buying and eating as much fresh produce as I believe. Since we're coming up on a new month, I'm going to photograph my groceries for the month of March and repeat the process during the month of July (which is when the farmer's markets here are in full swing). I'll be posting the pictures on my Flickr account and I'll probably post a month end wrap up here.

I admit this is a way to keep the dining table free of books and sewing projects once in a while. I'll need somewhere to lay out the groceries.

Finally, Neil Gaiman has posted his novel American Gods on the web for your reading pleasure. As I understand it, it will be available for two months free of charge by way of his blog's 7th year birthday gift to his readers. Or something. Anyway, he asked his minions to spread the word and the link far and wide. Of course, I do his bidding. You will find the link in the sidebar to the right.