We’re working hard to whittle our grocery bill down.  I put a lot of time and effort into finding the bargains, sales and deals but there is nothing more frustrating than purchasing a box of cereal and having it consumed in one day.  If you have kids, you know what I mean.  So we analyzed the situation and decided that in addition to being a little more creative with meal planning and shopping the sales, we needed to start enforcing the rule of “how much is in a serving?”  

On each box or container of food (usually located near the nutrition information) is a small recommendation of what a suggested serving size is.  Along with that information is usually an approximation of how many servings are contained in the package.  We have now begun measuring and counting the food items according to the recommended serving size.  (It is a good educational experience too because the kids need to use their math skills.)  It is amazing how much longer a box of cereal will last if you actually use the recommended serving sizes as a guide.  Here are some of the foods in our pantry and the serving sizes recommended on the box:

Rice Chex cereal:  Serving size is 1-1/4 cup

Cheerios:  Serving size is 1 cup (although for children under 4 the serving size is 3/4 cup). 

Saltine Crackers:  A serving size is 5 crackers.  

Cheez-It Baked Snack Crackers:  A serving size is 29 crackers.

Pretzel Sticks:  Serving size is 42 pretzels.

Lays Classic Potato Chips:  A serving size is 15 chips.

Triscuit Crackers:  Serving size is 6 crackers.

Our next experiment will be to keep notes and see if there really are the amount of servings per box that are claimed to be. 

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