Owlhaven » Frugality

Grocery Store Poll: in which I wonder just how crazy I am

Owlhaven — Wed, 17 Feb 2010 00:47:11 +0000

In an average month I shop for groceries at 6 different stores, depending on where the sales are. Regular stops for me are: Costco (warehouse store), WinCo (a discount grocery store in the Pacific NW), Wal-Mart, Pauls (locally owned grocery store with great meat prices), and sometimes a dollar store or an ethnic market. How about you? Remember to count convenience stores, drugstores, ethnic markets, warehouse stores, the dollar store, and anywhere else you buy groceries. Count every location that you typically visit as one store: for example, if you shop at a couple different Wal-Marts on opposite ends of town, count that as two stores, not one.

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In this second poll, tell me how many different times you buy groceries in an average month. Count every stop, even the quick trips in for a single item. In case you’re curious, I shop about 6 times a month.

Frugal grocery shopping

Owlhaven — Fri, 12 Feb 2010 22:37:11 +0000

There’s a great article in The Oregonian this week about frugal shopping. Very fun to unexpectedly see a mention of my book at the end of the piece. Speaking of my book, thanks to all of you (54 people so far!) who’ve weighed in and posted a review on amazon. I am especially thrilled to see that couples and singles are also finding the book useful.

Freezer cooking this weekend!

Owlhaven — Fri, 29 Jan 2010 22:50:28 +0000

This weekend I’ve decided to join Money Saving Mom and Life As Mom’s freezer cooking challenge. I’ve got lots of ingredients in my freezer and pantry. I just need to translate those into some meals that will come together easily in the next weeks.

Here’s my plan:

3 Hamburger Enchilada casseroles (Thursday)
3 dozen banana-almond muffins (Thursday)
3 loaves of banana bread (Thursday)
Big batch of granola (Friday)
Big batch of refrigerator bread dough (Friday?)
3 Cheesy Chicken Casseroles (Friday)
Double batch of Bean and Ham soup (Saturday)
Big batch of Taco Soup (Friday)
Double batch of homemade mac and cheese

Yesterday I did the enchiladas, muffins and bread. The enchilada recipe is basically this one (Family Feasts p. 102) but with ground beef instead of chicken. Thanks to the great hamburger sales lately, I was able to make 3 casseroles with only $5 worth of ground beef (6 lbs). Pureed tomatoes and corn from last year’s garden added to the affordability of the meal. I figure that all three LARGE casseroles cost me about $15 to make.

I tried a recipe from Inn Cuisine for banana muffins. I tripled the recipe and substituted regular oats instead of oat flour, and almonds instead of walnuts. I also used fewer bananas– tripling the recipe would have meant about 10 bananas. I used 7. Boy, was it ever yummy!! It made 3 dozen muffins and 3 mini-loaves of bread.

This morning I made a triple batch of Cheddar Chicken and Rice Casserole using my daughter’s recipe. I’d been wanting to try it for awhile. They turned out really pretty. I’ll serve one this weekend, and have the other two in the freezer for later.

Then for lunch we had homemade mac and cheese. I doubled that recipe, topping it with a bit of crumbled bacon and chili powder to jazz it up a bit, and stuck half of it in the freezer for later.

Dinner tonight is Taco Soup (Family Feasts p. 182), already simmering on the stove. I’ll probably make corn bread to go along with it. That is all the energy I have today, but tomorrow I’ll finish up with the rest of the things on the list!

Cheap shipping envelopes

Owlhaven — Fri, 22 Jan 2010 16:19:29 +0000

Not sure if this is idea is a new one or an extremely obvious one, but I thought I’d share. Awhile back I was scouring the house for a shipping envelope big enough to fit a book and came up empty.

I thought about what I did have– TONS of gift bags in many different, lovely colors and patterns. I decided to use clear packing tape to turn a sturdy gift bag into an envelope. Not only did it work, it also looked way cuter than your standard yellow envelope. Since then I have used this tactic at least a dozen times, and found that it is accepted at our local post office and at 3 separate local shipping outlets, even one that had a big sign stating they didn’t accept paper-wrapped packages anymore.

Here are a few pictures of my tweak. Basically I flatten the bag, remove the string-handles, cover all edges with clear packing tape, and then fold over the top edge to seal the package, taping that end too. Easy, peasy. And your package ends up looking like you gift-wrapped it.

Are dry beans worth it?

Owlhaven — Tue, 19 Jan 2010 15:18:29 +0000

Ever wondered how much money you save when you opt for dry beans instead of canned? Well, here’s what you need to answer that question using the prices in your area.

1 pound of dry beans will make 6-7 cups of cooked beans
1 15-oz can of beans contains a little less than 2 cups of beans (drained)

Recently I priced bulk red beans at 80 cents/pound. Eighty cents is also about the price I pay for a can of cooked red beans (generic) in my area. That means that for me, dry beans are about 1/3 the cost of canned. How does that compare to prices in your area?

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Dry beans do take a bit more planning, but they don’t take a lot of actual supervision, especially if you cook them in a crock pot. The other day I decided I wanted to make chili the next day. That evening I put 2 pounds of beans in a big bowl of water to soak overnight, a job that took no more than 60 seconds. The next morning I got out my crock pot, dumped the soaking water off the beans, poured the beans into the crock pot, and filled with enough water to cover the beans by about 3 inches. That job took approximately 3 minutes. By late afternoon the beans were ready to be combined with ground beef and seasonings, to then simmer for another hour.

I figure that using dry beans took me an extra 5 minutes time. An equivalent quantity of canned beans (about 6 cans) would have cost $4.80. My dry beans were $1.60. That means I saved $3.20 with 5 minutes of work. That’s about $38/hr. Sweet, eh?

Using canned beans is probably not going to be a budget breaker for most people, but the most frugal choice is definitely dried. And the more often you choose the most frugal approach, the more money you’ll have in you wallet at the end of the month!

Grocery shopping…

Owlhaven — Sun, 10 Jan 2010 03:37:49 +0000

…with some media people is my mission in New York this coming week. Should be interesting! I’d love to hear from people who live in major cities: how do you save money on food?

30-Minute One-Dish Meals

Owlhaven — Tue, 05 Jan 2010 08:17:51 +0000

Recently myrecipes.com featured some recipes from my cookbook. Check them out if you’ve been wanting to preview my book. It was really fun for me to see what the food stylists did with each dish. They made the food look sooooo pretty–it made me wish that a food stylist lived at my house!

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A recent review from Epicurious: Books for the Budget-Minded Home Cook

Top Money-Saving Tips of 2009

Owlhaven — Tue, 22 Dec 2009 11:00:21 +0000

Check out Good Morning America Food Editor Sarah Moulton’s Best Cookbooks of 2009 (video!) Notice a certain orange-covered book on that list? To celebrate, I’m giving away 5 copies of Family Feasts for $75 a Week. To enter, comment and share a money saving tip of your own.

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You know the drill. You walk into the grocery store with a long list and a finite budget. The last thing you want to do is spend two weeks’ worth of grocery money on one week of food. But prices these days make it ever more challenging to stay within a budget. What’s a smart shopper to do?

1. Make a list and check it twice

Lists are tremendous money savers. Begin by thinking in terms of meals. Before I head to the store, I scribble out ideas for two weeks of dinners. Half the meals are family favorites: cheesy chicken enchiladas, creamy potato soup, and pasta carbonera are regulars. I then thumb through cookbooks and fill the rest of the two weeks with new and interesting-sounding recipes.

Once I’ve decided what we’ll be eating for the next couple weeks, next I write down the ingredients that I lack for those recipes. I skim recipes, check the pantry, dig through the freezer, and check my cupboards, making sure that everything I’ll need is either in my kitchen or on my grocery list. Once I have all the dinner ingredients written down, I add the items we typically use for breakfast and lunch, as well as goodies to make baking possible.

2. Go to the store less often

When you run out of something, write it on your grocery list. But don’t race to the store the instant your list gets an item or two on it. Every trip to the store is a temptation to impulse-buy. So I challenge myself to go just a day or two longer between shopping trips. We live 20 minutes from the store. The other day when I didn’t want to run to the store just for hamburger buns, I made my own fresh homemade rolls.

3. Expand the list of things you can make yourself

Did you know that you can easily make your own granola? Homemade white sauce takes 5 minutes to make and costs a fraction of a can of cream soup. Homemade salad dressing is equally fast and will save you a cool $2. Not bad for a 5 minute time investment. Even better if it saves you a trip to the store where you would potentially spend much more on impulse buys. Learning to make just one item per week will consistently give you more money in your pocket. Remember, it’s not only this week’s new recipe that will save you money. Gradually learning to make a variety of things for yourself will make your savings snowball.

4. Stock up when prices hit rock bottom

And I mean REALLY stock up. In October I bought enough ground beef on sale to last til February, which effectively extended that October sale for months, for me anyway. This month I put lots of $1.50/lb butter in the freezer, enough to make baking more affordable all winter for us.

5. Don’t be afraid to try new recipes

To earn a repeat appearance in my kitchen, a recipe needs to be tasty, easy to cook, and have ingredients that are affordable and easy to find. Don’t overlook ethnic food. I’ve found Chinese, Mexican and Ethiopian food to be both affordable and delicious. This West African Peanut Chicken is a good example. And here’s another bonus: ethnic grocery stores often have great prices on things like spices, sesame oil, coconut milk, and specialty pasta.

6. Remember WHY you want to save money

I developed my money-saving strategies so that I could stay home with my kids. You may be dreaming of finding enough extra cash to pay off a car or take a cruise or have another baby. Keeping your goals clearly in mind will make it easier to do the little daily things that will move you towards that goal!

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Post tags: Family Feasts for $75 a Week, frugal, Good Morning America, Mary Austin, Mary Ostyn, Recipes, Saving Money

‘Caviar’ Mushrooms

Owlhaven — Fri, 18 Dec 2009 06:46:19 +0000

For lunch today I adapted this recipe from Smitten Kitchen giving mushrooms the ‘caviar’ treatment. True confession– I’ve never had a crumb of caviar in my life. But this recipe is exactly what I love to do in the kitchen– jazz up something simple to make it taste like much more than a few simple ingredients.

I haven’t the foggiest idea if my version tastes like caviar. But I can tell you it tastes yummy, and would look elegant on toast points at a Christmas party. Actually, it looked pretty darned good at lunch today with a bunch of hungry children, most of whom went back for seconds. So good that now at 11 PM as I type out the recipe, I find myself mightily tempted to wander into the kitchen and make another batch.

‘CAVIAR’ MUSHROOMS

1/2 pound fresh button mushrooms
4 tablespoons butter
1 small white onion
1/2 teaspoon dried thyme
1/4 cup evaporated milk
Salt and freshly ground black pepper, to taste
Sliced bread
Additional butter, for buttering bread

Mince onion. Melt 2 tablespoons of the butter in a large sauce pan over medium heat. Add onion and cook, stirring occasionally, until onion is soft and beginning to get some browned bits, 3-5 minutes.While onion cooks, wash and mince mushrooms. When onion has browned just a bit, add dried thyme, 2 more tablespoons of butter, and the minced mushrooms. Sautee over medium heat for 2-3 minutes. Add evaporated milk, and cook for a couple more minutes, until it liquid reduces a bit. Salt and pepper to taste. Toast and butter several slices of bread. (A crusty good quality bread would be best, but I used what I had: the tail ends of two different loaves of whole grain, storebought sandwich bread, and it was still wonderful.) Cut buttered toast into quarters. Spoon a tablespoon or so of mushroom mixture onto each toast point. Serve and enjoy!

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Now for the recipes I’ve got my eye on, but haven’t found the time to make yet:

Easy hair beads for African hair

Owlhaven — Wed, 02 Dec 2009 07:29:29 +0000

If braids and beads are not a normal part of your life, you may just want to pass this post on by. But with 4 African American daughters, hair is a fairly large component in our life. The following braiding brainstorm is one that I am very happy with.

When we do lots of little braids for our girls, we will often finish the braids up with 4 or 5 pony beads. My 5 year old especially loves the way her hair flips around when she’s wearing beads, and I think it is adorable too. Over the years we’ve had several beading ‘needles’ or ‘wands’, onto which you thread the beads, making it easier to then thread beads onto each braid. Problem is, the beading needles are EASY to lose– I can’t tell you how often I’ve hunted high and low for the things.

Plastic craft string is a fairly decent substitute. But the other day I discovered that an even easier thing to use: a skinny ponytail holder, the kind that has a bit of metal on it. I took a few pictures of the process so that you can see how it works. Click on the pictures to enlarge. If you ‘mouse-over’ the pictures before you click, you’ll be able to read the explanation of each step.

And here’s a shot of my daughter with her completed hairdo on her 5th birthday last month.