And what if all you have to spend is 50 bucks?

I'm doing something a little different this week. I want to show how you can spend 50 bucks and get enough food to feed your family dinner, some breakfasts and some snacks and still have items to stockpile. No cakes and cookies on this list – if you've been stockpiling with me you probably have baking supplies stockpiled, cooked down fruit frozen in the freezer, possibly even frozen cream and half and half for making ice cream. No frills, this is a list of mostly fresh food that will give you a pretty varied diet without making you feel as if you are on a budget.

Basha

ribs – 88c/lb – limit 2 packs. I don't know how many pound are in a pack, so I'll presume 7 pounds each for a total of 14 pounds at $12.32

chicken leg quarters sold in 10 pound bags at 38c/lb or $3.80 for one, total $7.60 for 20 pounds.

10 of bags of russet potatoes – limit 2 – for 99c/each – buy 2 for $1.98

Stop right there – That's $21.98 for 44 pounds of food. Pretty good deal. Take the potatoes out of their bags and store in a basket in a cool, dark, dry place – like your pantry. Use to make side dishes. 20 pounds should last you 2 weeks or more.

Also get a seedless watermelon for $1.99 – there's 12 to 16 pounds in size. Who needs dessert when you've got watermelon?

An aside: Have you noticed that watermelons never have seeds? I prefer the taste of the seeded variety. I also like to spit the seeds into the grass, or speculate if a vine would grow in my stomach should I swallow one.

By the way - with the coupon on the front page of the Basha's ad, you can pick up Bar S hot dogs for 28c with an additional $20 purchase, so you just make it with the items purchased above. Go here and print out a coupon for the hot dogs, stack it with the store coupon (don't worry, that's allowed) and you get those hot dogs for FREE. (Isn't couponing fun?)

Sunflower Market

eggs – 99c/dozen

avocados – 3 for $1

raw almonds - $2.99/lb (this is a SMOKING price)

Avocado makes a wonderful sandwich mashed with a little salt and balsamic vinegar on toast. If the toast is whole wheat (preferably homemade), it's a very healthy and filling lunch.

Eggs would be great for breakfast a few mornings a week with some of the leftover potatoes from a previous night's dinner.

Almonds are great in cooking, in cereal, with fruit and yogurt and alone for snacking.

Sprouts

Vine ripened tomatoes for 77c/lb

Corn on the cob - 20c/each

Toss some sliced tomato on that avocado sandwich, or in the eggs, or grill them with the ribs or chicken. One of my latest things is to saute tomato cut side down in a flat pan with white wine vinegar and chopped garlic. No oil. Very tasty, very low calorie.

And corn goes with bbq. At 20c/ear, eat a lot of it.

Fresh and Easy

Strawberries – 98c/lb

red bell pepper – 2 for 98c

Bell pepper is great in eggs, cooked with chicken, chopped with avocado. Put the strawberries in oatmeal I hope you purchased a few months back when it was 50c/lb and eat for breakfast on the days you aren't eating eggs. Or you can pick up some cheap cornflakes for 98c/box instead.

Food City

Campbells Pork and Beans are 25c/can – pick up a dozen. These are great for quick lunches, as a side dish for dinner or breakfast and even make good snacks. Great to have around when you don't have a plastic container full of pressure-cooked pintos on hand.

Cucumbers – 25c/each – salads, snacking, in sandwiches

broccoli or cauliflower – 69c/lb – I like both and both are so full of vitamins and fiber.

Cantaloupe – 33c/lb

It's a melon kind of week – most other fruits are a lot more expensive. I meant to get this list up earlier and tell you to run to Food City for their Thursday specials – today is was cheap apples, oranges and pears, also onions. I'll do better next week. Definitely check out the Food City ads when they come out on Monday. They often have wonderful deals on Wednesdays and Thursdays.

Also, pick up a couple of pounds of Tilapia fillets at $1.99 pound

Fry's

chunk of shredded Kroger cheese for 97c/8 oz. Pick up 6

Albertsons

Pasta at 99c/box – pick up 2

Milk is cheapest at Fry's and Basha's for $1.99/gallon this week and if you MUST pick up store bought bread – Fresh and Easy has it for 88c/loaf.

There ya go. You'll spend at most 50 bucks on the above – and that's with stuffing your fridge. You'll have enough to make 2 rib dinners, 2 chicken dinners, 2 pasta dinners (al fresco sauce and shred some cheddar over it, if you like) and a fish dinner. You'll have at least a rack of ribs to stockpile in the freezer and probably 15 pounds of chickens to store there also as well as a couple of pounds of cheese. Breakfast is taken care of and so are a lot of lunches. And there's plenty of healthy snacking. Remember all that rice I had you buy last week. Shred cheese over it, slice some red pepper rings on it, or some tomato and cook until bubbly. That's a great lunch or dinner. Makes a good side with eggs the next day.

That's it for this week. If you'd like to learn more about eating good on the cheap and getting lots of groceries for free, log into CouponSense, sign up for a trial month, list me as your referral (number 1707971) and choose me for your instructor (Mindy C****). It's only 4 bucks for the first month and I promise you you'll get that investment back many times over in the first week.

Have a great holiday!