We started planning Thanksgiving in August—not the week before the holiday. We checked Flashfood and the grocery store’s reduced rack for deals. We also froze bargains as we found them. That planning helped us serve Thanksgiving dinner to four adults and a teenager on October 11, 2026. And the chicken bones are being saved for another meal.
Our dinner wasn’t made entirely with Flashfood food. Some items came from Zehrs reduced racks, Amazon Resale, our garden, pantry supplies and generous relatives. That mix is precisely what makes this a realistic family budgeting story.
Our Thanksgiving Dinner at a Glance
- Guests: four adults and one teenager
- Main course: two whole bacon-wrapped roasted chickens with apples and oranges
- Sides: homemade cranberry-orange baguette stuffing, mashed potatoes, gravy, corn, carrots, broccoli, maple brown sugar butternut squash, and marshmallow-topped sweet potatoes
- Bread: cinnamon hot cross buns—not dinner rolls
- Dessert: discounted La Rocca pumpkin cake and family-gifted homemade apple crisp
- Next meal: planned soup from the leftover chicken bones and meat
Why Planning Ahead Matters When Grocery Prices Keep Rising
It’s no secret that Canadian families are feeling the grocery squeeze. Statistics Canada’s August 2026 Consumer Price Index reported grocery prices were 29% higher than in August 2021. They still rose 2.8% over the latest 12-month period, even though the pace had slowed.
The researchers behind Canada’s Food Price Report 2026 forecast a 4% to 6% increase in food prices during 2026. For an average family of four, that could mean up to $994.63 more spent on food over the year. That figure is a forecast, not the actual grocery bill for every family.
That’s why our Thanksgiving plan started in the freezer, not with a last-minute full-price grocery shop. We can’t control grocery prices, but we can watch for worthwhile deals, use what we have, and avoid unnecessary waste.
Our Biggest Budget Secret: Start in August and Shop the Freezer
We began looking for Thanksgiving groceries in August and September. When a useful Flashfood deal appeared, we bought it and froze it safely for later. That’s how both chickens and the reduced-salt bacon became part of our holiday meal without one enormous last-minute grocery bill.
By October, we knew what we had in the freezer and pantry. We built the menu around those ingredients. Planning ahead didn’t mean following a rigid shopping list: we originally hoped to buy focaccia for stuffing, but ended up using a reduced-rack ACE white baguette instead.
Two Flashfood Chickens for $12—and the Moistest Chicken
We served two whole chickens purchased through Flashfood for $12 total. I covered them with bacon from an earlier Flashfood purchase and arranged apple pieces and an orange in the roasting pan. The bacon and fruit added flavour during roasting. We thought they helped keep the chicken juicy, and everyone at the table commented on how unusually moist it was.
These are our real chickens, photographed while preparing and roasting them—not stock photographs or an imaginary dinner.
One $5 Allocation From Our Flashfood Produce Bundles
We bought two mystery produce bundles for $5 each through Flashfood. We used part of that haul for Thanksgiving and the rest for other meals. For a fair estimate, we’re counting $5 of that produce spending toward Thanksgiving. The rest of the haul fed other meals.
That produce contributed butternut squash, celery, potatoes, corn, carrots, and onions, along with an orange. About two days before Thanksgiving, we chopped the celery and froze it in a bag. On cooking day, it went straight into the pot with the onions. Buying cheaply was only half the strategy; preparing the food before it spoiled mattered just as much.
Mr. CBB’s Cranberry Orange Baguette Stuffing
The stuffing began with a 350 g ACE Bakery white baguette from the Zehrs reduced (“cheap”) rack, marked down roughly 50%. Our receipt shows $1.34 paid. First, we dried the bread cubes. Then, we added sautéed celery and onion, garlic, herbs, dried cranberries, orange zest and broth. Finally, we baked the stuffing until golden.
We used approximately half of a 900 mL carton of PC Organics chicken broth purchased for about $1.50 at half price, so we’re counting about 75 cents of broth toward this meal. The fresh parsley and garlic came from our garden.
The separate Mr. CBB’s Cranberry Orange Baguette Stuffing recipe will be linked here once it’s published.
Maple Brown Sugar Roasted Butternut Squash
The big butternut squash came from the produce bundle. We halved the squash and removed the seeds. It went into the oven with a little butter first. Later, we added our homemade sugar-free maple-style syrup, brown sugar and Ceylon cinnamon. Then, we returned it to the oven. Everyone enjoyed the sweet roasted flavour.
Our homemade sugar-free maple syrup recipe is already on the blog, and this squash will have its own full recipe soon.
Mashed Potatoes, Vegetables, Sweet Potatoes, and Hot Cross Buns
We served mashed potatoes made with a little Flashfood milk and some sale-priced butter, plus corn, carrots and a large bag of Flashfood frozen broccoli purchased for $1.
The sweet potatoes were a gift from my sister-in-law. We baked them with jumbo marshmallows purchased through Amazon Resale. Our relatives also contributed homemade apple crisp. These contributions mattered to the dinner but did not cost our household anything extra.
Instead of regular dinner rolls, we had cinnamon hot cross buns, another reduced-price find.
Yes, We Had La Rocca Cake for Dessert
We picked up a La Rocca pumpkin cake through Flashfood for $10.24 compared with a listed regular price of $32. The actual cake and its layers are in our Thanksgiving photographs. We also bought a pumpkin pie for $1.28. However, we didn’t serve it at Thanksgiving. It is not included in the dinner cost.
Screenshots From Our Discounted Thanksgiving Shopping
Here is a visual compilation of shopping screenshots and receipts behind our Thanksgiving planning. Some orders also contained food for other meals, and some purchases were from reduced grocery racks or Amazon rather than Flashfood. These are examples of what we bought—not a claim that every item shown was served at Thanksgiving. Next, you’ll find the dinner costs, based on the amounts we actually used.
How Much Did Our Budget Thanksgiving Dinner Cost?
Here is the working breakdown of the items and food portions we can price from the receipts and our cooking notes:
| What we served or used | Our cost allocated to dinner | Cost basis |
|---|---|---|
| Two whole chickens | $12.00 | Flashfood purchase; both chickens |
| Reduced-salt bacon | $2.75 | Flashfood; whole frozen pack |
| ACE white baguette | $1.34 | Zehrs reduced rack; receipt price for whole baguette |
| Produce for this dinner | $5.00 | Our allocation from Flashfood produce bundles |
| Frozen broccoli florets | $1.00 | Flashfood; purchased frozen |
| McCormick gravy mix | $2.00 | Two packets from a 12-pack purchased for $12 |
| Chicken broth | $0.75 | Approx. half of a 900 mL carton bought at 50% off for $1.50 |
| Butter | $1.22 estimated | Approx. half cup (113 g) from a 454 g package costing $4.88 |
| Milk for mashed potatoes | $0.09 estimated | Approx. half cup from a $3, 4 L purchase |
| Jumbo marshmallows | $1.13 estimated | Approx. half package, based on reported $2.25 package price |
| La Rocca pumpkin cake | $10.24 | Flashfood purchase; listed retail comparison was $32 |
| Cinnamon hot cross buns | $0.79 | Discounted purchase; served, rather than dinner rolls |
Our documented and allocated subtotal is approximately $38.31 for the five-person dinner, or $7.66 per person so far. This is not yet the final fully loaded cost.
Costing note: This is a working ingredient ledger, not yet a certified final total. Some pantry ingredients—dried cranberries, brown sugar, homemade syrup, seasonings and any other ingredients actually used—still need small portion estimates. Flashfood service fees also need treatment in the full spending ledger. The $5 produce amount is an allocation of a larger purchase, not a separate additional transaction.
Our household’s out-of-pocket cost for the gifted sweet potatoes and apple crisp was $0, but that does not mean those foods had no value. Also, the amounts above should not be compared with whole-package retail prices to claim a precise percentage saved. We want readers to see how we arrived at every number.
The Savings Continue: Chicken Soup From the Carcasses
After dinner, we saved the chicken bones and leftover meat for soup. That way, our $12 chickens will stretch beyond the Thanksgiving table. We won’t count the soup servings until we’ve made it, but it is already part of our no-waste plan.
What We’d Do Again Next Thanksgiving
- Watch for useful holiday ingredients months ahead.
- Freeze suitable bargains promptly and label them.
- Check the freezer before building the holiday menu.
- Prepare short-life vegetables early, like the chopped celery.
- Mix Flashfood deals with reduced-rack, pantry and garden ingredients.
- Count only what the dinner actually used when calculating a cost per person.
- Plan a second meal from leftovers.
Want to Try Flashfood?
Inventory changes by store and day, and not every deal will suit your family. For information directly from the company, see the official Flashfood website. For details on the app and how we shop it, visit our Flashfood savings guide. You can also read our earlier article about planning a budget Thanksgiving dinner.
Affiliate/referral disclosure: Some links or codes in our Flashfood guide may earn Canadian Budget Binder a credit or commission at no additional cost to you. Please check the current offer terms.
Your turn: Do you start shopping for Thanksgiving or Christmas months ahead, or do you buy everything the week of the holiday?