AARON'S END OF CHALLENGE TOTAL!

So, the last and final meal. Kind of wish I had some less anticlimactic to offer besides a bootleg version of pork and beans, but… it is what it is. I imagine there are people out there who live on $5 of food per week out of necessity, every week – and excitement is not what they feel when they are preparing and eating their meals.

For my last supper, no blasphemy intended, I cut up another one of my 11 cent hot dogs, but this time I mixed it in with a 1/3 of a can of blackeyed peas. The can of blackeyed peas was 25 cents, so that portion was 8 and 1/3 cents. How do I know it was actually a 1/3 of a can? I poured all the beans out on a plate, split it in three, took a picture, and then showed the picture to a few people and chose the consensus smallest pile of beans. Yeah, it’s that deep.



Then I threw in some hot sauce and spices (would have put in BBQ sauce if I had some, but I didn’t – I’m a bad, bad Memphian). Heated it all up, and voila! Pork and beans. Well, pork and peas, technically, but you get the point.

Total through Day 6: $4.35 and 2/3 cents.

Day 7
Breakfast – 8.5 cents
Lunch – 33 cents
Dinner – 19 and 1/3 cents

AARON’S TOTAL COST OF FOOD FOR THE EAT CHEAP CHALLENGE: $4.96 and ½ cent.

That’s right. Give me a 5 dollar bill on Monday morning, tell me to eat for the week, and I’ll bring you back change on Sunday night. What. And I actually had 21 full meals. I didn't have to resort to 25 calorie "meals" like, oh I don't know, half of a banana and two fingers of diet soda, or a green pepper and some wilted lettuce (ahem- still love you Wendi). One could realistically sustain themselves for a week on a 5-spot - which I would have thought was totally impossible 7 days ago.

After Wendi posts her total, I’ll come back and post again about what I feel I’ve learned from doing this challenge, and my thoughts for the future.