It’s been about eighteen days.
Yes, you can eat fresh and healthy food shopping very infrequently, if you are careful, know what to buy and how to cook.
‘Ripen at home’ fruits can easily keep for 2 -3 weeks, in the fridge especially. Things like plums.
Apples can be stored loose, with air around them in a cool place.
Store potatoes in a cardboard box, paper bag or basket. Store them with your apples.
Store tomatoes out of the fridge with as much vine on them as you can get, vine downwards.
A whole lettuce has a better shelf life than a bag of leaves. Store in the fridge with a piece of kitchen roll inside a sealed plastic container. Replace the piece of roll every few days.
To revive limp leaves eg cabbage or spinach, place into water, cover and refrigerate overnight.
Berry fruits can be frozen, bought frozen or cooked down into a sauce or compote.
You can freeze steamed or blanched mushrooms, or gently pickle them for a fresh flavour.
Squashes and pumpkins can last months with an intact skin.
Bananas can bee peeled and frozen and used in smoothies or to make frozen puddings that mimic ice cream.
Salads don’t have to mean leaves. You can make lovely fresh salads and salsas from the freezer - using chopped frozen tomatoes, sweet corn, finely diced red onions, fresh or frozen herbs (planted herbs last longer than cut) frozen peas and mint, frozen edamame beans and soy with grated carrot, fresh coleslaws from grating white cabbages, beetroots can be peeled and roasted or pickled, while cauliflowers and broccoli stalks can be finely chopped or grated, mixed with cooked lentils or butter beans. Tinned black beans and Feta cheese. Grated carrots lightly steamed with lemon juice, cumin and poppy seeds. Falafel, Hummous, all out of the store cupboard ingredients- as easy as you like.
That’s before we get into easy vacuum packed pouches of things like eg puy lentils, or into common freezer staples like pre-frozen vegetables, or into tinned fruit, or even a tin of baked beans, not to mention all the awesome fresh, healthy soups to be made.
You can eat really, really well if you think about how you store your produce, how to preserve it, how to make the best of it and to make shelf lives work for you, not the other way around. Too much dependence on use by dates!
I have “fresh” produce still in my stores from 4-5 weeks ago waiting to be eaten, and it’s not unusual for me to store something from the fresh section for 5-6 months before eating it.