Groceries - November 20, 2025.

 This purchase will make it look like I spent a lot more in November than I had planned to spend but this was our Azure Standard order. You will see by the quantities of most of this that it's way more than we will use in one month. This order was $460, including 8.5% shipping costs. Beneath the list, I will share info about each item because for those who don't buy in bulk, this may seem like a really weird list of items.

We will usually order from Azure monthly (that's how often there's a local delivery) in March through October. We don't usually order in November and December because the deliveries in our area of almost always the week of Thanksgiving and the week of Christmas. An 18 wheeler delivers the items to a drop location and we HAVE to be there. In January and February, there's often snow or ice and we don't drive in that so we make sure we have enough of everything we need (or want) to get us through til March. The only reason we ordered in November this year was that Vince wanted to get a big bag of Allulose so I placed an order for that and added a few things to it.

Here's what we ordered:

• Allulose - 55 pound bag. Vince uses this as his sweetener. Coffee, tea, lemonade. If I'm making a dessert that's something I know Vince will eat a lot of it, I'll use Allulose in it. This bag will last us well over two years. We store it in 5 gallon food grade buckets with gamma seal lids. That's how we store all our grains, flour, baking items, beans, corn, etc.
• Three 12 packs of 8 oz. jars. I have a plan! Vince is going to build me a very narrow shelf unit to sit at the back of the countertop, against the wall, where I do most of my prep work. I will store the spices and items I use most often in these 8 oz. jars where I can easily get to them without having to dig through the spice cabinet for them. I plan to have salt, pepper, oregano, basil, cinnamon, baking powder, baking soda, etc. there. Otherwise, these are jelly jars for us. I'm going to make cranberry sauce to can. We use that with roasted chicken so having a half pint is perfect for a couple of meals.
• Two 1 pound bags of organic Ceylon cinnamon. Vince uses this in his coffee. I make a cereal that he eats for breakfast and he puts the Ceylon cinnamon in that. We use it in our overnight oats. We go through more of it than you might think but two bags will last us over a year. I ordered two bags a bit over a year ago but I think I gave Chad a half pint jar of it.
• A 4 pound tub of palm fruit shortening. I order this usually twice a year - usually in October and April. I had ordered it last month but they were out of stock. I use it for cookies, biscuits and pie crusts (some butter and some palm fruit shortening). It has a high smoke point so I'll often use it for Browning meat.
• Organic Sorghum - 25 pounds. We use that in place of rice. It can also be milled for gluten free baking but I haven't used it that way. This site has some interesting nutritional info on sorghum.
• Popped Black Sorghum with Avocado Oil and Sea Salt. I love this - better than I like popcorn. They only had a few "sets" left - one comes with three bags and one comes with 6 bags. I wasn't sure that I would get either because they load the trucks with what's there and there seems to be no rhyme or reason as to who gets what. If it's on the shelf when they load your order, you get it. I ordered one of each so I'll get 9 bags (4.3 oz. each). Since I won't order again until March, we'll run out but nine bags will be nice. This is kind of a luxury item and not something we eat every day. We can pop the sorghum grains we have but we don't have black sorghum. I am going to plant some next year and see if I can grow it.
• Baking Powder - Azure's is made with tapioca starch instead of cornstarch and is aluminum free.
• Raw Mesquite Honey - this is 1.4 pounds (pint jar) and I ordered two. This is so good on biscuits with butter. I don't use it for cooking - just for eating on toast or biscuits or in hot tea.

That's it for our Azure order this month. Next order we place will be in 2026. Weird, huh?