Angel FoodMinistries

[Anne_in_VA]

Interesting thread. I wish I'd known about Angel Food when I was out of work for a year 5 years ago. It would certainly have helped with my food expense.

Nancy - I always enjoy your comments on threads and am impressed with your writing ability. Keep up the good work!

Karma to you!

[Frugal Nurse]

Feb 10, 2011 11:07:37 GMT -5 franticwoman said:

Nancy - you cover a lot of good stuff for your readers - they are lucky!

That's what is so "weird" sometimes: here, Target is much cheaper overall and they are expanding their grocery offerings. Not a full store yet but I can get maybe 70% done there. Ive been making a point of going there more often even though it is a pain. Ex: their store brank half and half creamer for a quart: $1.64. Elsewhere at the name stores: $2.50+ for the store brand, $2.99 + for name brand. That is a shocking difference to me and I resent paying so much for coffee creamer! Bleh! (but I cant live without it so..... :

WOW that sounds so expensive to me! I just bought a quart of Meijer's store brand half and half and it was only $.99. That's the luck of living in a LCOLA I guess.

[franticwoman]

99cents??

Lucky you! I mean that sincerly - that's great you have perks living where you do.

As far as prices, when I would read threads at MSN such as OP: Food budget for month is $300...posters would come on "What! That is sooooo much! My family of 6 eat for $210 and we eat great! blahblahblah...."

I'm exaggerating to be funny of course. My foodie friend and I always look at each other like what?! what are we doing wrong??

Wal-mart's brand (is that great value?) and Aldi's brand have it for $1.99 or so usually. For a quart. I figure if those two have a certain price it can't be found for much cheaper usually. Target is an exception for that item but I will pay $1.99 gladly, still cheap for me.

[bobbysgirl]

I just checked out the food on AFM. Some of it looked good, some of it was processed. They offer good balanced meals for seniors who are unable to shop and or cook.

The after school packs - one is healthy, the other is not. A bit expensive on these.

The bountiful pack and the fresh fruit pack look good and, from the information I have accumulated, are both good deals. My only thought is some of the fruit might spoil before a small family could use it all.

I figured out my household could go an entire month with the bountiful pack and the fresh fruit pack at a cost of 64.00. Not bad. Milk and bread would have to be added. I'm thinking about ordering these to see if it works out the way I have it figured.

[texaspn]

WE have been happy with the Angel Food so far. There are some things we won't use but I donate these to the food pantry at church. One bountiful box will keep us for a month-of course, I still need to go to the store but it does help a lot.

[bobbysgirl]

TEXAS: Is there 2 in your household?


NANCY: Terrific article. Your personality is shining.

L

[The Walk of the Penguin Mich]

Here the $31 box seems like a fair deal, esp. because it includes four lbs of meat and a dozen eggs. I'm not a big meat eater but I always assume meat is a bit expensive, no? I know ground beef runs like $4lb around here.

If I want to buy very lean ground beef, then yes....it could run $4/lb - otherwise <$3/lb for 80/20. However, I can regularly get whole chickens for less than $1/lb and packages of legs/thighs for 0.49/lb. Pork is ALWAYS on sale someplace for <$2/lb. So looking at the prices of meat in this month's box, you could probably buy comparable meat for $10.

[NancysSummerSip]

Thanks, bobbysgirl!!!

[kadee]

Living in a small rural community....
There are NO Meijer, Kroger or a bunch of other stores in my area. The nearest Publix is 25 mi. away.
We have Harvey's (Food Lion), Winn Dixie, Walmart & some small local stores.
The coupons that are offered in our local paper generally are for NON food items.
We do have a Rite Aid here but it is a very OLD store & very SMALL in comparison to the newer ones. Besides, they are high to begin with...by the time you buy something to get something you've spent more than necessary to buy the item else where on sale....and I used to manage this Rite Aid!

I've looked at the Angel boxes on line several times. They either contained items I wouldn't use or I could get more for less money by purchasing on sale in my own area. And we do have a local distribution point in our little town!

[NancysSummerSip]

I wondered about some of the AFM items in the box, and what people did with what they could not/would not use. They traded with other recipients, I was told. The volunteers had no issues with that, actually. The trading could not be done at the distribution premises, but once the boxes were in the recipient's car, they could do as they wished; the volunteers had no say in what happened after that.

That made pretty good sense to me; if you are not much of a meat eater, but could use the other items, then you trade with someone who needed those items, rather than pay more for additional meat products.

In the next few months, I will be doing some volunteer work in a very rural part of the state, and I am wondering what people do in situations like k66's, where there is very little choice in where you buy. Do folks cooperate and group-shop, do they grow more of their own, etc.

[973beachbum]

I'm confused.

I checked and rechecked and this is a thread about Angel Food Minstries. So where is Miss R?

She always is on threads about AFM. I must be really old cause I got glasses on and I still can't see her.

[kadee]

Nancy, some car pool to a near by larger city & shop at Sam's. Some grow a lot of their own. Some go without. Some, like me, do a combination of them all and we ALL watch the sales.
It is not uncommon for me to visit all 3 grocery stores on one shopping trip.
HOWEVER, the items I used to get at Walmart are getting fewer & fewer...I can either get them cheaper at a regular store or Walmart has quit carrying the item I wanted.


I wouldn't eat those senior (pre-prepared) meals at AFM. First, I don't know what the different contents are in them...sodium, sugar, etc. and second...I just don't like a lot of the stuff they have in them! Guess I'm picky!
After looking at all of this month's choices at AFM, I'm still not impressed. I can do better at our stores, have more fresh items and have a better quality of ground beef and still not spend any more than what they are charging. And I like looking at/handling the fresh items I am going to purchase. I don't mind some dings, but I don't want anything that is on the verge of rot either.
I did the math on that steak one...our local stores have it on sale cheaper this week (per #).

[texaspn]

Bobbysgirl: Yes, there are two of us. My husband is diabetic so our grocery bill is pretty high anyway but the AFM food really helps.

[NancysSummerSip]

MissR will be along, I PM'ed her. She's been working.

The contents/ingredient lists are availalbe for all the items in all the boxes. You may have to go online to get some, while others are already on the packages. The frozen/prepared items that are microwaveable are going to have a certain level of sodium and preservatives. In that sense, they are no different from many others on the market. Convenience has a tradeoff, and while it's not always a good one for everyone, it is commercially necessary when food is prepared on a large scale, so that it is available to the greatest number.
The don't have low-sodium/low-fat/diabetic/gluten free or other diet-specific specialty boxes that I am aware of. Good thought though. There are regions of the country where such boxes would do very well, I think.

[NancysSummerSip]

Question for k66: do you work together actively as a group, and let one another know when things go on sale?

[Deleted]

Here I am

We've never had a bad box of food from Angel Food. And each month there are eggs and shelf-stable milk along with whatever else is on the menu. If you don't want to drink the shelf-stable stuff, it's handy for cooking.

We're a multi-generational household of six, so sometimes when we get something like four pork chops or four steaks, we just keep them in the freezer until the next time we get four (usually one or two months later). If we aren't all going to be here at mealtime, the frozen casseroles will feed four people generously.

They don't show up on the regular menu online, but there are always fresh fruits/veggies in each box. I suppose they don't show it because it depends on what's in season.

The fresh fruit and veggies are definitely worth getting, and the special holiday boxes are always good, too.

I haven't tried the senior meals, but the info says that they are nutritionally balanced. They'd probably be good for someone living alone, and there are 10 meals to a box so that comes to $2.80 per meal, a good deal for somebody on a limited income.

And...if you don't want to buy Angel Food but want to do something to help, you can order a box or two or three for donation. If I'm not mistaken, you can order for donation online as well as in person.

At our pickup location if there's something in the box that you don't want/won't use, you can leave it at a table on the way out...there's a volunteer there, too...and it's there for anyone who wants it.

Also, you aren't limited to buying just one box; you can buy more of any of them or any combination of them.

For those of you who mentioned coffee creamers, I had to laugh at that, especially those who complain about the amount of sodium/fat in the box from Angel Food. It's certainly no worse than expensive Chemist's Delight in your coffee! I must be the last person on earth to use plain old milk in my coffee.

Before moving from the UP, we participated in a program called SHARE that was a food co-op. My favorite thing about their program was that they included a newsletter each month that featured recipes for some of the products in the box. Because it was a co-op, participants were expected to volunteer. Sometimes a group would get together and go to one of the warehouses to work for a few hours or a day. Most of us took turns meeting the truck on delivery day, sorting the food and packing the boxes, whatever was needed. Volunteering wasn't required, just much appreciated.

[djmj3284]

My husband and I used Angel food for about 4 months and just ate whatever we had without being picky. I usually got the bountiful box and a produce box. I noticed two things I ate more fruit, and I saved enough to start a good pantry. Now we don't use AFM, because I had the extra money to buy items when they were deeply discounted. Like 31 lbs of 93/7 ground sirlion at 1.29/lb, hams at Christmas for 0.77/lb, turkeys at thanksgiving for .39/lb and a splurge of corned beef at 2.99/lb at new years. So I have plenty of meat in the freezer (enough for months - I only have to buy something if it is super cheap now).

The breathing room AFM gave us when we were learning to control our grocery expenses, got us to the point that we can shop cheaper than AFM now.

[dragonfly7]

I distinctly remember some salty prepackaged Salisbury steak and some horrid frozen carrots, but everything else we received from AFM was okay. There was enough meat to feed DH and I at least 15 dinners. Glancing at this month's regular box, I count protein for about 18 meals (not including the eggs) based on our regular consumption, a couple more if we watched portions more carefully. Using it certainly teaches a person how to plan meals.

The reason we stopped ordering is our work schedules called for both of us to work on Saturday mornings, though you can arrange for someone else to pick it up for you.

[hereigoagain]

Nancy- They opened an Aldi's not far from me, in North Broward. I have not been there yet. I asked a friend of mine about Aldi's, they have them where she lives in Tenn. She warned me about needing a quarter for a shopping cart and bagging your own groceries. I'd like to see another competitor here too. Quite a few people I know go to Whole Foods, but it's too pricey for me and I'm not particular about organic foods.

Sometimes I have trouble with the eggs from the AFM box- just getting them all home without breaking any in the box! I blame it on my driving and empty trunk that lets the box slide around. The shelf milk is good here for hurricane season stockpiling too.

[kadee]

Question for k66: do you work together actively as a group, and let one another know when things go on sale

Nancy, sorry I never got back to you on this...I had other commitments.
Some of us phone or email about different things going on sale and some chat over coffee. But there isn't any kind of a "structured" group. The ones that car pool are generally either related or close friends. Some of the relatives also know that DH & I go to another town for his VA appointments & there is both Sam's & Costco there (and I belong to both). I will most likely be giving up the Costco membership as they tend to cater to a different eating group than I belong to. I don't do a lot of fancy stuff...mine is good old farm cooking! Sam's carries more items that I use so I will continue with their membership.

[NancysSummerSip]

Thanks, K66....I knew you would return when you could. I totally understand the commitments stuff. I had a few myself this weekend. Thanks for the help....this is the kind of thing I need for the start of a story.

Hereigoagain....my mother lives in north Broward (Coral Springs area), and we will be in Boca Raton before the end of the month, so checking out that Aldi's is entirely possible. Thanks for the tip! I understand they are looking to move north into Palm Beach. I wish they would. Riviera Beach and downtown West Palm each have ONE grocery store. That's pretty shameful.

[hereigoagain]

nancyinfl- Let me know what you think of the Aldi's, I pass it on my way home from work, but haven't stopped in yet. I'd like to see some more choices for groceries in our county, the main one isn't all that great, especially for produce. The Winn-Dixie by me is old and has a stale smell to it, so I'm pretty much at one chain too. I've picked up a few things at the SuperTarget, like milk, if I was there for other things. The prices seemed okay to me, but trying to do my entire list there would probably be more than the regular grocery store.

[NancysSummerSip]

All the Targets near me are new, which might explain the higher prices (?)
I also have two newer Winn-Dixies, but I know what you mean by the stale smell of the old ones.
I will definitely check out the Aldi's and maybe find a way to do a story on it, even though it is in Broward.

[hereigoagain]

nancyinfl- Have you checked out "Western Beef" in Boca? It is located in an old Winn Dixie space, it is an inexpensive grocery store. On their website, it looks like there are a few in NJ, NY and the one in Boca. I've heard good things about their meat dept. and the prices. I think you can view their flyer online too. You might want to check it out when you are down that way, at least it's in the county. It's off 441, south of Palmetto Park. I haven't been yet, but my husband has, along with some co-workers and friends.

[NancysSummerSip]

I know about Western Beef from when I lived in Fort Lauderdale, but there is none up here. I did not know they had groceries as well. I saw their delivery trucks ALL the time around town. I will add that to the list.

I just found a huge Latin grocery store a few miles from the office. Amazing what happens when you ask folks for input and go out and look around out there.

[pepperdoo]

I think I'm going to pass on this info to my Auntie. They could very well use Angel Food Ministries.

[hereigoagain]

They have the March menus up on the site now. I'm undecided, there are a few items I know we wouldn't eat at my house, but the meat selection seems good for March.