Pantry Staples

It seems like there’s two extremes when you dive down the Internet rabbit holes of “trimming your grocery budget” and “cooking allergen free”. They don’t play well together. I look at a website that touts something like, “Feed your family of 6 on $200 a month” and feel totally defeated because I can’t eat most of the food they list. On the other hand, the Paleo bloggers are pushing recipes that use a 1/2 jar of almond butter, for a loaf of banana bread. Not exactly cost effective for a large or hungry family! Where’s the happy medium? How do you hold competing values of thrift and frugality while recognizing that food quality and type has a real impact on the day to day functionality of you and your family? If you’ve got an autoimmune disease that’s impacted by diet, or your kid breaks out in hives or rashes when they eat certain things, what’s the answer? You still have to feed everyone, the grocery budget is almost always one of the biggest variable expenses, and it all feels overwh…