Our Experiment

Dr. Daddy and I decided to do an experiment. For the past month we have bought no meat. I know for some of you this is fairly standard :) but we actually do like meat and still eat it, we just haven't bought any. Or rather, I haven't cooked any. We're not actually going vegetarian. But we would, theoretically, like to buy better meat (organic/ local/ grass-fed/free-range/hormone & antibiotic-free, etc. etc.) but have you seen how much that costs? It makes sense that quality comes at a price, but we only bought meat before when it was under $2/lb. So even thinking about something over $5/lb is outrageous. So we decided to see if we didn't buy meat at the grocery store, how that would impact our grocery budget, and if it saved us money, use that to buy better meat less often. It also is a bit of a fun challenge for me to come up with creative, interesting, healthy, tasty recipes.
The short of it is that it isn't a lot cheaper to eat vegetarian if you're trying to be creative. I know lentils & legumes are cheap. But there are only so many times I want to eat lentils & legumes. :) I think I get points for creativity. But not for saving money.
Have you done any interesting experiments lately?
Any good recipes?