Saturday

We went shopping yesterday.  I spent 26.00 and another buck at the dollar store for Two  packages of pepperoni.

Yesterday we had spaghetti and garlic bread and salad in the vegetable Bin.

About mid week, it is time to clean the fridge and take note of what needs to be eaten soon.  Maybe it is time for a vegetable soup or stock, or banana bread.  Betty Crocker has a good recipe for banana blueberry bread.  It takes oatmeal and so really good and good for you.

There are a lot of good and good for you recipes out there.  Most take the simplest of ingredients.  The more processed the food, the more expensive it is and the more preservatives it may have in it.

Remember, the more someone does the cooking for you, the more it's going to cost.  They want to get paid like the rest of us.  LOL.  With few exceptions, ready made and boxed dinners are really expensive in terms of cost, and nutrition.  If you can cook as fast as making the trip to the store, or the mix takes just as long to cook scratch , the box mixes are pointless.

Cooking some meats ahead and using instant mashed potatoes makes sense to me.  Making mashed potatoes is time consuming both in making the dish and cleaning up afterwards.  For a weeknight dinner, instant mashed is good .   I find them for little money.  There is a coupon for Betty Crocker a gratin or scalloped potatoes on the net.  ( check coupon.com) .  They are a buck at the dollar store.  With the coupon they are BOGO.  You don't get many potatoes for fifty cents.  I also got pepperoni for fifty cents.  I haven't got toothpaste for free lately, but I'm still watching and building my stock for the women's shelter.  I did find gloves for granddaughter.  I don't want to spend more than a buck for the , kids loose their gloves and I don't know if she will even wear them.  It's certainly not worth my time to knit them at her age and the yarn would cost more than a buck!  

My average for meals has been going down, which is remarkable  since the drought is still rearing it's ugly head on food prices.  The USDA projects that they will be occurring well into 2014.  In addition, the SNAP program is taking a hit.  My sister says that it is going to be 35.00 a month average.  The combination is not a good one for people on a thrifty budget.  The people with six digit incomes won't notice as much, but higher prices and less money hits the poor hard.  Making scratch good food on the cheap is a way to get through without sacrificing nutrition or having no food in the pantry at the end of the month.

Thanks for stopping by

Please share

Jane