The Pantry Challenge

The pantry challenge started as a humble way for us to save some money and to minimize the amount of clutter in our kitchen. One day, I was trying to decide what to make for dinner and I came across a box of flavored rice that had expired almost two months before. I cannot even explain what happened next. This was not the first thing to ever expire in our kitchen but this was the first time I felt this way. I was so upset by this. I was so sick of living in clutter and chaos. We were working on becoming debt free and this box of rice represented everything that was wrong with our lives. It was my breaking moment.

I sat at my kitchen table, deep in my thoughts for a short period before deciding that if we were ever going to live our dreams we needed to make some serious changes in our behavior. We had somehow found ourselves in a life of excess and none of it was making us happier. We knew what we really wanted to do with our lives but until that moment, sitting at my kitchen table holding a box of expired rice, it all seemed like a dream. It was then that I fully understood what I needed to do. Everyone from my husband and family to my friends and teachers has told me that I am capable of anything. I have proved them correct a number of times over the years. I have the kind of single-mindedness that is needed to succeed at anything and also drive other people crazy. At that moment, I turned all of my stubbornness towards one thing and one thing only, preparing ourselves in every way to live the life of our dreams. When we had begun talking about our future plans we wrote out a list of the things that were standing in our way. The first step was paying off our credit card debt and the first step toward that was sitting right there in front of me. Thus, the pantry challenge was born. We had been working very slowing on our debt snowball but after this moment we really ramped up the momentum.

Our pantry was bursting at the seams with food but that was not all of it. The refrigerator and freezer were full. There was overflow in a set of cabinets next to the pantry. There was a cabinet next to the stove full of spices, seasoning mixes, oils, and bottles of vinegar. There was another half a cabinet that held two containers of toddler snacks and food. We also had a deep freezer full in our garage. I had no idea the amount of stuff hiding in that kitchen and no idea the amount of money we had spent on all of it to just sit there.

I dedicated an amount of time to go through all of it. I disposed of the things that were expired, made a pile of things that would expire soon, and began planning meals around what was already in our kitchen. It was so easy at first. There were pasta and sauces, meats and vegetables, and easy prep meals from boxes and cans. We were saving money and slowly cleaning things out. Eventually, the easy to figure out meals started to run out and we were left with the more unusual things. We continued on but had to start to supplement with trips to the grocery store.

I discovered some things about myself during this challenge. I realized that I used to buy the silliest things if they were simply on sale enough and I often went grocery shopping with no plan or lists of any kind. I bought a lot of things because I wasn’t sure if I already had one at home. That behavior caused us to possess no less than 8 bottles of ranch dressing. We go through a bottle about every two to three months. That means we had 2-3 years worth of it. While we are struggling to pay off our credit card debt, I think that there may be better ways to allocate our funds than by having a stockpile of ranch dressing.

My end goal was to completely clear most of the food out of the kitchen. I wanted to downsize the amount of stuff in our kitchen to simplify our lives a little and to make sure that we weren’t throwing money in the trash. I had no idea where this challenge was going to take us. I had no idea going in that this would help me to start meal planning again. I had no idea that this was going to encourage us to pack our lunches and eat at home more. I had no idea that this would lead to spending more time with my kids while we used up baking supplies. This challenge made a huge impact on our lives. I hope it does the same for you.