Buying Groceries

Let's all admit it: we like to read blogs at least in part to be voyeuristic, am I right?  No, I'm not going to share any big secrets, but I did think it might be entertaining to discuss what almost exactly $100 bought me at the grocery store on Saturday.  I happened to have a trip that included no baby necessities or pharmaceuticals, just groceries, so let's look at it and analyze it a little bit, just for kicks.
Here we go...in the order in which it went across the scanner:

• 1 gallon of whole milk
• 1/2 gallon orange juice (with calcium)
• Morton's sea salt
• Bulk ground cumin (buying spices in bulk is WAY cheaper - try it out)
• Ziploc snack-size bags (I know they're bad for the environment but I'm addicted)
• Wheat thins
• Wheel-shaped pasta (the boys love it)
• Whole wheat bread
• 4 bell peppers
• 1 lb ground Italian sausage
• 1.5 lbs lean stir-fry steak
• 1 dozen naturally-nested eggs
• Cantonese Oyster sauce
• Tillamook low-fat sour cream
• 2 packages of peach-flavored Yo-Baby yogurt
• 2 large carrots
• 1 lb bulk orzo pasta
• 1 cucumber
• 1 bunch cilantro
• fresh grated parmesan cheese
• Smuckers simply-fruit raspberry jam
• 3 lbs boneless chicken breasts
• 1 yellow onion
• 1 white onion
• 1 shallot
• 1/2 lb cremini mushrooms
• 1 lb white mushrooms
• 4 tomatoes on the vine
• 1 lb organic strawberries
• 3 large avocados
• 3/4 gallon of Tillamook chocolate ice cream
• 2 bottles of Mexican Coke
• Baking cocoa powder
• 1 cup of quinoa in bulk

...and there you have it.  That is one week's worth of groceries for our household on a week where I have actually planned all of our meals.  I am not a coupon clipper, but I do try to buy what's on sale when the option is available.  While I consider myself to be a fairly cheap person and a bargain-shopper, I am not big on skimping on groceries.  I am somewhat discouraged about how few things $100 buys these days.  This was maybe 3 bags of groceries and I don't think there is anything super-fancy in that list of stuff.  Sigh...we still must eat.
Some explanations of my groceries:
I prefer to buy whole foods (as in not packaged stuff or mixes) whenever possible.  I do not use cake mixes, no rice-a-roni kind-of-stuff and we do not use cream-of soups except for the rare breakfast casserole or cheesy potatoes.  We eat very little cold cereal and if we do it is only cheerios (well, we prefer Joe's Os) or raisin bran.  I actually bought more meat on this trip than I normally would since I needed to stock up a bit.  We tend to mostly use meat as more of a flavoring than a main-dish.  My son is currently obsessed with chocolate ice cream and insists that it is the ONLY kind of ice cream he will eat.  We use ice cream as a reward for actually eating meals or for being "brave" and trying new foods.  The Mexican Coke is my splurge and I tend to only drink it during dinner prep on nights when my kids are driving me insane.  You might say it's my own equivalent to a glass of wine.  We all have to have our "something"...