I’ve been trying to convince friends and readers for years that our
groceries (or eating out) don’t have to cost us an arm and a leg. The Live Below the Line challenge runs for 5 days, from May 7th – 11th. The challenge is to feed yourself on less than $1.50 a day- the amount a U.S. person living in poverty would have to spend. While it’s not necessarily the most delectable menu, it’s very possible to do!
Yesterday I ate $1.38 worth of food. I was hungry after breakfast, but stuffed for quite some time after dinner.
Today I decided that a single serving of grits for breakfast wasn’t going to cut it for me. I was hungry by 10 am yesterday. I’m used to eating a rather large breakfast. But- I wanted to be sure that I stayed within my budget so I opted for just 1 serving of raisin bran instead of my usual 2. That’s $.24 plus a half cup of milk at $.06 for a total of $.30 for breakfast. By 11:30 I still wasn’t hungry, so I think this was a better choice for me.
Typically on Tuesdays and Thursdays I eat a banana and a large spoonful of peanut butter for lunch on my way to pick Turkey up from school. Today was no different. 
Total cost: $.26 (remember our peanut butter was free)
I had an afternoon snack with Turkey like I usually do on Tuesday/Thursday. Today it was a fudge round for $.17. I fell in love with fudge rounds when we lived in NW Arkansas near the Little Debbie outlet stores. they regularly sold the boxes of giant fudge rounds for $1.50! This box was $1.99 and I was pleased to find them at that price since it’s the 2nd box I’ve had in the last 2 years.
For dinner we had homemade mac n cheese, hot dogs and green beans. I’ll be posting the recipe for the mac and cheese tomorrow night. Usually we have ham with our mac, but we’re out. Paying retail price is not something we do very often. The kids usually gobble this meal up and ask for 2nds or 3rds. Ok, by kids I mean Little One, but Little Turkey usually eats it pretty good too. I ate 2 hot dogs @ .22, 1 servings of green beans @ .15, and 1 serving of mac @ .28 for a total cost of $.65.
My total cost for today’s food is $1.38. That leaves me an extra $.24 from yesterday and today to be able to eat later in the week!
Check back tomorrow evening to see how I do with day 3.
sounds like you’re doing a good job of this – looking forward to the recipe!