A Few Thoughts about the Reception That We Hosted

My daughter graduated from her university on Saturday evening (yay!), and we hosted the reception Sunday late afternoon into early evening. All went well-enough; I am exhausted, though. Today, I'll write up a few thoughts about our budget and some of the main items that we prepared. I'll continue again tomorrow with more thoughts. Later today, I'll get photos uploaded to my computer later and will post some of them this week.

On planning
Last year's reception gave me a lot of insight for planning an event, as far as spending and size. We entertained about 30 people, and we seemed to have close to the right amount of food, with nothing completely running out and not terribly too much leftover. In comparison, last year, we had a lot of leftovers, enough to eat for a few days and still have more to freeze for later. This year, we have enough leftovers for a couple of days of lunches and snacking, plus 2 frozen packaged items that I never baked up (one box of spring rolls, and one box of spanakopita) and 4 or 5 whole chicken breasts (I bought a family-sized pack to save on price per pound). I will set these items aside from my regular menu planning and use for a future special occasion, such as a potluck or hosting another gathering later this summer.

The spending
I met my goal to spend half of what we spent last year. At just about $100, it was still quite a lot. This was an amount which was budgeted separately from our grocery budget, so at least this doesn't impact any of our other spending. While $100 sounds like a huge amount to spend on a party, we did entertain about 30 people (that works out to about $3.33 per person). Plus, if we hadn't celebrated in this way, we might have spent nearly this amount to take the whole family out to a nice dinner. What is clear to me, though, is that other types of receptions, such as weddings, could be doable for a fraction of what caterers charge, given a low-cost or free venue, such as a home or church social hall, and some free-labor/helpers, such as family members. My two daughters were hugely instrumental in getting the interior work done, while my husband was a big help in getting the outside of the house looking tidy (he also did some cleaning chores in the house, too!). Of course, working from my own kitchen, I did use some ingredients that I had at home, but I consider the cost of those items to be a wash when weighed against the leftovers which will supplement our eating for the next few days and beyond.

The shopping
Learning where to buy different food items is an on-going process. New stores move into the area and old favorites either close or change their pricing strategy. I tried to buy most everything at what I thought would be the lowest unit price. However, I ran short on time and skipped a stop at Dollar Tree for crackers and pretzel sticks and opted for Fred Meyer on those items instead. I spent an extra $2 as a result. I also used Fred Meyer for most of the produce. I didn't pick up the strawberries until Saturday afternoon (one day before the event). After checking strawberry prices online, I went to Sprouts and bought 3 pounds, saving about $2.70 compared the the next lowest price in town for strawberries. If I had purchased all of our produce (lettuce, green onions, cucumbers, baby carrots, celery, grape tomatoes, oranges, and broccoli crowns) I may saved another $5 or so. Despite not saving as much as I could have, I did gain some valuable information that will affect my produce shopping for the rest of summer and into fall (maybe even year round) -- Sprouts has some really good prices on produce and I can take advantage of this for my regular shopping. Sprouts is a new store to my area, so I am just now learning what they offer at a good price compared to my other shopping options. For the other items that I purchased, I did well. I researched online where to find the best deal on particular items and shopped at a total of 5 stores, including Cash & Carry wholesale, Fred Meyer, Walmart, WinCo, and Sprouts.

The lay-out
Once again, I spread the food stations around the house somewhat. The main area used the dining room table and the buffet in the dining room. The buffet is up against a wall, where I have electrical outlets, so this is where I set up the crock-pot of soup. I set up the mini crock-pot of chocolate fondue (along with the dippers) in the other main gathering room in our home, on a table up against a wall. Like last time, I set up the kitchen table with small platters of items, plus a bottle of water and cups. I also set out a small plate of veggies and dip and some sweets on both a coffee table and a side table in the main gathering room. We encouraged guests to use the living room, family room, dining room and kitchen. A few people found spots to sit for the entirety, but most folks milled around a bit, moving from room to room, with the dining room and family appearing to be the most congested. In our house, the dining room is directly across the hall from the family room, so I think proximity to the dining room influenced most folks to move into the family room. This is something for me to consider the next time we host a large event -- set up the main food station in close proximity to the seating area that I want guests to enjoy.

The individual items: sandwiches, potato salad, and soup
If you remember, I said I would be making 3 kinds of sandwiches. The first, ham, Swiss, and Dijon on homemade French bread to which we added lettuce and green olives, made about 35 small sandwiches. This is the variety of which we have the most leftovers, perhaps enough for lunches today and dinner tonight. We also made chicken salad on mini croissants. I used 3 boneless, skinless chicken breasts, celery, green onion, rosemary, mayonnaise, salt, and pepper for the salad portion, plus I added a smear of homemade cranberry sauce to the inside of the croissant. I made 24 of these sandwiches, and at the end of the evening, there were 2 of these sandwiches remaining. I had about 2 cups of the chicken salad leftover after filling the croissants. I set this out in a small bowl on the table for anyone who avoids breads. Most of that was also eaten. The third sandwich variety was a shrimp and pasta salad in a homemade cream puff. For the filling, I used about 12 ounces of extra-small shrimp, chopped into smaller pieces (I would have used salad shrimp, but Walmart only had the extra-small, 1 cup of small pasta, cooked, mayonnaise, lemon juice, green onion, and spiced fig jam. I cut the top mostly off of each cream puff (leaving a small bit attached), then filled the hollow and popped the top of the cream puff back into place. I made 23 of these sandwiches and we had 2 leftover. Because these were filled with a seafood item, I put about 8 or 9 out at a time, and refilled the platter as needed. That may have slowed down the consumption of these a bit, in contrast to the other varieties for which I put large platters out just as the guests were arriving. Three of us made 82 sandwiches in 1 and 1/2 hours and had about 20 sandwiches left over. The average, then, was 2 sandwiches per person.

For the potato salad, I had a hunch that we would run short of time, so we prepared a semi-homemade version. I bought a quart of prepared potato salad from the refrigerated section of the grocery store. To this, we added diced celery and chopped green onion. We topped the now-improved commercial salad with hard boiled egg wedges, paprika, and a bit more green onion. I really think this looked and tasted homemade, yet we out-sourced the troublesome task of getting the potatoes cooked just right without becoming mushy. One quart of potato salad was just about right for 30 people, considering there were several other side dish items from which to choose.

The tomato-basil soup was a huge hit -- I received several compliments on the soup, regarding flavor and texture. My thinking is that a lot of people simply don't make soup from scratch anymore, so this soup may have seemed different and special to anyone more accustomed to Campbell's. I used canned tomato paste, canned tomatoes, lemon juice, sugar, dried basil, garlic powder, onions, salt, oil, and water. I began the soup with browning some onions in oil. Once browned, I pulsed them through the food processor to reduce to a chunky puree. I followed this up with pulsing the canned tomatoes, just until it was mostly puree with a few small chunks remaining. The small chunks added texture to the final soup. The remaining ingredients I added to taste, yielding just over 3 quarts of soup, in total. I made the soup a couple of days in advance and then put it in the crockpot about 5 to 6 hours before the reception to heat it thoroughly, setting the crockpot to High. We have about 1 cup of the soup left over. I added a small toppings bar of short breadsticks, and shaved Parmesan. While the soup could be sipped, I also had plastic spoons set out. The soup was served help-yourself style from the crockpot, with a bunch of china tea cups and a ladle. Although I tried to use washable/permanent flatware, dishes, and cups, tea cups are on the small side, so I do think the plastic spoon was a good flatware choice, as they were lightweight and less likely to topple out of a small and shallow cup. I washed 17 cups at the end of the evening, so the soup was interesting to just over half of the people, with some folks enjoying "seconds" on the soup. Considering that soup was just one component of the spread, 3 quarts was just barely enough for 30 people.

More thoughts and some photos tomorrow.

Thank You! And the Menu for the Reception

Thank you, all of you, for your wonderful soup suggestions. After reading so many thumbs-up for a tomato-basil soup, that is what I decided to go with. I make a pretty good tomato soup using canned tomato products, and right now, I happen to have canned tomato paste and canned whole tomatoes in stock. I'll use a combination of dried and fresh basil (I only have a small amount of fresh basil right now). In addition, I picked up some short grissini (breadsticks)  and shaved Parmesan cheese for the cups of soup. I think this will work out well and add another dimension to the reception.

Okay, so here's the full menu:

Tomato-basil soup (in the crockpot), served in cups, with breadsticks and Parmesan

3 kinds of sandwiches

• ham, Swiss, and Dijon on homemade sliced French bread
• shrimp and pasta salad in homemade cream puffs
• chicken salad with homemade cranberry sauce on mini croissants

A large bowl of potato salad

3 kinds of hot appetizers

• mini veggie egg rolls (frozen item - Walmart)
• spanakopita (frozen item - Fred Meyer)
• smoked sausage and tater-tot kabobs on toothpicks

A tray of homemade hummus and crackers (Dollar Tree)

A veggie and dip tray

The dessert buffet will have:

Mixed nuts

Boxed chocolates

A platter of meringue cookies

Homemade carrot sheet cake

A big jar of jelly beans (bought on clearance priced at 3 bags for 50 cents)

chocolate fondue in a mini crockpot, with plain tea biscuits, whole strawberries, marshmallows, orange segments, and pretzel sticks for dipping

Lilac lemonade and water for beverages. I was going to add a tea, but now with the soup using up the cups and crockpot, I'll skip tea. 

Two days before, I'll make the hummus and prepare a veggie tray. I'll be able to make the chicken salad, potato salad, and tomato-basil soup the day before. The morning of the reception, I can make the shrimp salad, assemble all of the sandwiches, and frost the cake (already baked and in the freezer). 

I think that there is enough variety that anyone with dietary restrictions should still be able to find a lot that they can eat. Any suggestions? 

Super Busy Week and Needing a Suggestion for Drinkable Soup

As you might guess, this week leading up to the graduation reception for my daughter is a busy one for me. We shifted the time of the reception from just an afternoon one to a later hour to accommodate some guests who are important to our family. This means that our gathering is crossing the dinner hour, and I want to include more substantial foods that can still be eaten while standing or off of a lap (no knives, finger foods are preferable). I've decided that in addition to serving small sandwiches and appetizers, I will serve a soup to be consumed from cups, ie. drinkable. The weather forecast suggests cool-ish temperatures, so a hot soup will work out fine. I'm looking for suggestions for a soup that does not require a spoon, but could be sipped from a cup -- no or minimal chunks in the liquid. In addition, I want the soup to be substantial enough to be filling. I could make it from scratch or partially from scratch the day before or the morning of. I'm all ears for suggestions!

Semi-Homemade Cup of Noodles

Somehow, my family got hooked on Cup Noodles instant entrees this past fall and winter. I had bought a case of them at WinCo, and their convenience for single-serve meals and snacks won our hearts. I'm talking about the styrofoam container of noodles and seasonings to which you add boiling water. It's not fancy. However, when I've just walked in the door, and it's about an hour after I normally eat lunch, these hit the spot in a hurry.

We ran out of them a month ago; but I still had most of a case of ramen noodle soup packets, the kind that make a pot of soup to feed 2 people. So, for the last several weeks, we've been making our own Cup Noodles in mugs, using part of a packet of noodles, some of the seasoning packet, additional dehydrated carrot pieces and chives from my garden. We add water to fill and microwave individual servings for a little over a minute. We top these with lentil sprouts or boiled eggs to make a quick but filling meal.

At WinCo, I was paying about 33 cents each for the styrofoam container Cup Noodle product. Ramen soup packets cost me about 20 cents each, when bought in a case from WinCo or 5-pack from Dollar Tree. We get about 2 servings from a packet of ramen soup. That's 10 cents per serving on the noodle and seasoning part of our soups. The dried chives come from our garden. The cost of home dehydrated carrot bits, fresh lentil sprouts, and one egg comes to about 15 cents, bringing the maximum cost for our homemade "cup o' noodles" to about 25 cents. It should be noted that our homemade version is a much more substantial snack or meal than the commercial product.

I don't know if anyone else makes individual servings of ramen from a packet, so I thought I'd share this in case it's helpful to someone else.

Cheap & Cheerful Suppers for the Tail End of May

Friday (cost about -- $1.80)
pinto bean and vegetable soup (this was a delicious soup -- I made it early in the day and one daughter and I had it for our lunch, then the whole family had it for dinner. I used saved fat from Wednesday's meatloaf, as well as liquid from rinsing out the meatloaf pan. The flavor of the soup was wonderful. I added cooked pinto beans from the freezer, canned tomatoes, carrots, onion, chili powder, garlic powder, and garden Swiss chard.)
fresh-baked French bread
bread pudding made from the last of the failed batch of muffins earlier in the week, topped with homemade vanilla frozen yogurt

Saturday (cost about -- $1.35)
scrambled eggs with Swiss chard, canned tomatoes, and onions
carrot sticks
hash browned potatoes

Sunday cook-out (cost about -- $1.20)
hot dogs in homemade buns
cole slaw
s'mores

Monday (cost about -- $1.65)
pasta primavera (vegetables and herbs, tossed with cooked pasta, and topped with mozzarella)
focaccia
strawberry-rhubarb sauce

Tuesday (cost about -- $1.70)
bean and vegetable soup (made with ham stock and ham fat, so it had the aroma and flavor of smokey meat)
fresh-baked bread and butter
homemade vanilla frozen yogurt, topped with homemade cocoa mix

Wednesday (cost about -- $2.65)
spaghetti with meat sauce (using 1 pound of the super-discounted ground beef from a couple of months ago to make 6 adult servings --2 of which are for the freezer)
peas
vanilla frozen yogurt topped with homemade jam

Thursday (cost -- free)
We went to a design exhibit for a family friend. There were enough snacks to fill us all up, so no dinner was needed.

It was a busy week, translating into some very simple and last-minute dinners.

We used 1 pound of ground beef and 6 ounces of hot dogs for meat for the entire week.We also used about 1 cup of mozzarella cheese, which is as expensive as meat for us. We had eggs for dinner on 1 night and beans as the primary protein source on 2 nights.

I have to confess something (shhh, my family doesn't know this). I cheated a bit on the flavor of the strawberry-rhubarb sauce on Monday. I did add some frozen strawberries, but not much. To boost the flavor, I added strawberry Kool-aid powder. And yes, it was deliciously strawberry-y.

Breakfasts this week were steel cut oatmeal, homemade granola, homemade donuts, toast, butter, peanut butter, jam, yogurt, and milk. Lunches seemed to feature a lot of lentil sprouts and ramen soup and sometimes lentils in ramen soup. We also had leftover homemade soup, peanut butter sandwiches, eggs, carrots, rhubarb, yogurt, raisins, juice, and milk.

This is the last day of May. Consequently, my fridge is looking a bit bare. June's shopping is just around the corner, though, so that old Mother Hubbard look will soon vanish.

What was on your menu this past week? Do you have any go-to meals that you can whip up from scratch in 20 minutes or so? I expect this next week I'll be making extremely simple meals, as I finish up the preparations for my daughter's graduation shindig.

Have a great weekend!

Four Fortuitous Things Boosting My Buying Power for June

Don't you just love it when the things that you had wanted to buy anyway go on sale? Or when you think that you're all out of a particular needed ingredient, but then you find a stash of it tucked away? In one week, my grocery buying power got a big enough boost to allow me to buy more than double of one item for June. Here's what happened to make this possible:

• I had put marshmallows on my list for June, and then this weekend I found a whole bag tucked away in the garage freezer. When we thought we might have a mouse in the house, everything that was in a bag or other soft packaging in the pantry went into the fridge or the freezer. Apparently, a bag of marshmallows was amongst those items. We can use these for s'mores in June. Savings -- 96 cents
• My daughter made sugar cookies for the Sunday school class that she teaches a couple of weeks ago. After baking a bunch of them, she decided to freeze the rest of the dough. This weekend, she suggested that we use homemade sugar cookies (using this frozen dough) in place of graham crackers for June's s'mores. That'll work! Savings -- $1.68
• I had budgeted 49 cents per pound for a watermelon for June, with a maximum of $4.90. Over the weekend, Albertson's had watermelons on sale for 29 cents per pound. Even though it isn't June yet, I went ahead and bought 1 large watermelon. I spent $4.14 for that one. We won't cut into the melon until June begins. According to eatbydate.com, whole, uncut watermelons will keep for 7 to 10 days on the counter or 2 to 3 weeks in the refrigerator. At 29 cents per pound, our watermelon will be one of our primary fruits for the first half of June. Bonus -- I'll save the rind to make more pickles, following the recipe in this post. Savings on the melon -- 76 cents.
• When I first made my June shopping list, the 10-lb bag of yellow onions was selling for $4.84 at Cash & Carry and the 25-lb bag was about $7.50. I checked their website again this week, and the 10-lb bag is now $4.19 and the 25-lb bag is now $7.00. The previous 3 money-saving events/choices saved me $3.40. That savings will allow me to buy the 25-lb bag of yellow onions, spending $2.16 more than the budgeted $4.84 for onions. Plus, I will still have $1.24 leftover! I'll try not to spend it all in one place.

The 10-lb bag of onions would have lasted about 2 months in our house. Buying the 25-lb bag means that I can delay buying more onions until sometime in the fall, freeing up a couple of dollars of grocery money for other foods this summer. And my price for onions dropped from 40 cents per pound to 28 cents per pound. Now that's a bargain!

Making Lilac Lemonade

The jar on the right contains lilac syrup. I made this a couple of weeks ago when the lilacs were in bloom in my garden. My plan is to serve lilac lemonade at the upcoming reception.

My first attempt at lilac syrup turned out very pungent, so much so that I diluted that batch substantially with additional plain simple syrup. The end result was pleasantly floral when mixed with lemon juice and water.

Lilacs don't naturally impart their beautiful hues to the syrup, so I dyed this batch with the blueberry juice from a thawed bag of blueberries. It's now a beautiful shade of, well, lilac. The carafe to the left contains lilac lemonade. I'll fill my thrifted punch bowl with lilac lemonade for one of two beverages.  We have some lovely magenta roses just beginning to bloom in our garden. Keeping with the floral theme of the lemonade, I plan on making an ice ring filled with rose petals. The second beverage will be a decaffeinated spiced tea, which I'll keep hot in my large crockpot. In addition, I'll also serve water in repurposed cider bottles.

Did you know that lilac blossoms are edible? I didn't until a friend told me just a few weeks ago. You can use the blossoms in scones, tea cakes, and poundcake. In addition to lemonade, the lilac syrup is also delightfully floral when added to a pot of plain black tea. The syrup keeps in the refrigerator for 2 weeks or in the freezer for several months.

Advance Preparations for a Big Party: The Cake

So, I'm working on menu items for the graduation reception for my daughter. I am preparing as much as I can ahead of time and freezing. I figure that if I do at least one thing toward the reception each day, I should be able to put this together as much from scratch as possible, without fully exhausting myself. The other day, I baked the cake part of a quarter sheet carrot cake and two dozen cream puffs (using the recipe in this post, but making 24 cream puffs instead of the recipe's yield of 12-15). I stashed both in my freezer. I'll frost the cake and fill the cream puffs the morning of the reception.

I was pricing sheet cakes at WinCo the other morning. Their quarter sheet carrot cakes begin at $19.98.  By baking my own cake from scratch, I believe that I will save at least $12, and I think it will taste much better.

I wanted to make my cake look as much like a bakery cake as I could, so that meant taking it out of the pan to frost the sides as well as the top. I baked the layers in a 9 X 13-inch rectangular pyrex baker. If you've ever tried to get an entire cake out of an extra large pan, you know that keeping it from cracking is a bit tricky. I followed a trick of my mother's and lined the baker with waxed paper.

My mother would grease and flour the sides and bottom of the baker, then line it with waxed paper, using one sheet across the length of the pan and another across the width. There would be overhang on all four sides. After lining the pan, she would brush oil lightly on the waxed paper, to ensure the cake would release without pitting. She allowed the cake to cool for 15 minutes in the pan on a rack. After this brief cooling, she would lift the cake out of the pan, using the overhang on the long ends as handles. After another 10 minutes of cooling, the cake would be carefully turned onto a large rack, and the waxed paper would be peeled off. I can tell you, this worked like a charm for me. I was able to get both layers out of the large baker without sticking to the pan or developing cracks.

Cheap & Cheerful Meals for Mid to Late May

Friday (cost: about $1.40 for 4)
bean burger patties, made with pinto beans, bread, egg, salt, chili powder, garlic, then fried in ham fat and oil
rice (mix of leftover brown rice and some freshly cooked white rice)
mushroom gravy (from a packet) over the bean burgers and rice
Swiss chard (from the garden), garlic, canned tomatoes

Saturday -- cook-out (cost: about $1.05 for 4)
hot dogs in homemade buns
cole slaw (cabbage from purchase around St. Patrick's Day)

Sunday (cost: about $2.00 for 4)
leftover ham, chard, and cheese quiche plus blueberry coffeecake from brunch
ramen soup with added dehydrated carrots and chives

Monday (cost: about $1.90 for 4)
baked pinto beans with diced ham
asparagus and green beans with cheese sauce (leftover asparagus and cheese sauce from brunch)
roasted potatoes, carrots, and onions
bread pudding (made with a failed batch of muffins), topped with leftover, hardened, homemade caramel sauce

Tuesday (cost: about $1.10 for 4)
Swiss chard quiche
bananas
oatmeal, rhubarb, white chocolate bar cookies

Wednesday -- rushed meal prep as I had to leave for an evening meeting (cost: about $1.75 for 4)
meatloaf
brown rice
peas

Thursday (cost: about $1.25 for 4)
carrot soup
ham salad sandwiches on homemade whole wheat bread (ham leftover from Easter)
homemade sugar cookies

Meals from this past week seemed very ordinary to me. Despite that, they did their job and we all were fed. Breakfasts continued to consist of homemade granola, overnight crockpot steel cut oats, yogurt, toast, juice, bananas, rhu-sins, peanut butter, bean spread, and milk. I didn't know until Thursday that I would have a large supply of eggs to work with, so eggs were not a common part of breakfasts. Lunches used leftover baked beans, sandwiches filled with bean spread, peanut butter, or egg salad, ramen, juice, milk, tea, bananas, rhu-sins, carrot sticks, lentil sprouts, cookies, and homemade frozen yogurt.

We had our family gathering for Mother's Day this past Sunday (instead of actual Mother's Day). My preference was for a brunch, as I like brunch foods. So, my 2 daughters put together a nice brunch, using mostly what we had on hand. They did buy asparagus and strawberries, however. The menu was a ham, cheese, and Swiss chard quiche, roasted asparagus with cheese sauce, blueberry coffee cake (using blueberries from the freezer), chocolate-covered strawberries, orange juice, and a large pot of tea. My daughters did an awesome job, making everything from scratch, setting a lovely table, and serving us all.

What was on your menu this past week? Have a lovely weekend!

Grocery Planning for June

One week left in May, which means that I am planning what we need for the month of June.

I have 90 cents leftover from May, which means that I have $125.90 for June’s grocery budget. I’m including a couple of Father’s Day menu items in the budget, which squeezes things a little, but I think that we’re okay. The stock-up items for June are 50 pounds of sugar, 15 dozen eggs, and 25 pounds of brown rice. The sugar and eggs were on special, while the brown rice is a regular item for us, and I typically buy this in 25 or 50 pound bags. In about 2 weeks, I'll freeze about 10 dozen eggs to use in July and August.

It’s really good to see that my pantry is looking a wee bit more stocked these days. The garden is producing enough for us that I don’t need to buy much at all in the way of produce. In June, I should be able to harvest Swiss chard, kale, lettuce, snow peas, sorrel, strawberries, rhubarb, beet greens, and lentil sprouts. (You’ll notice that I skipped the raisins this month, as we’re using the dehydrated rhubarb in its place.) Plus, I still have some canned and frozen fruits and vegetables. I’ll be adding more rhubarb to the freezer throughout the season, plus I’ll make several jars of vanilla-rhubarb jam to add to refrigerator storage.

This morning, I compared 6 stores online as I made and then whittled my list. I didn't have to make as many compromises as I have had to in the previous 3 months. In this list, I am $1.52 under budget, so I have a tiny bit of spare money this month.

June Grocery list (124.38 out of 125.90 budget)

SmartFood Service Cash and Carry (71.59)

White Satin granulated sugar, 50 lbs, 21.98 stock-up item

Golden International mushroom soy sauce, 3.09, 5 lbs

First Street almond extract, 16 oz, 5.98

Simply Value imitation vanilla 2.99

Simply Value whole tomatoes, #10, 2.89

First Street large loose eggs, 15 dz, 8.30 (55 cents/dz)-- limited availability, stock-up item

yellow onions, 10-lb bag, 4.84

First Street medium grain brown rice, 25-lb, 10.97, stock-up item

First Street mozzarella cheese, 5-lb, 10.55

WinCo (12.19)

lentils, 4 lbs. 3.32  83 cents/lb bulk

soybeans- $1 worth

garlic granules – $1.15 worth (1/4 lb)

chocolate chips- Winco 1.68

graham crackers, WinCo, 1.68

bananas 8 lbs, WinCo/Walmart, 3.36, 42 cents/lb

Fred Meyer - senior discount day, (23.26)

hot dogs, 3 packs, 75 cents ea, (2.25)

milk, 10.43, 5 gals, (get 1 whole, rest 2 %)

butter, 2 lbs, 2.51 lb (5.02)

orange juice- FM 1.61,

smoked sausage, Father’s Day, 3.50

biscuit dough 45 cents, donuts on Father’s Day

Walmart (12.44)

Great value decaf, 3.52 (or 2 at Dollar Tree)

Gold Leaf chicken leg quarters, 10-lb Walmart $5.98

Great Value cocoa powder, 8-oz, 1.98

Great Value marshmallows, 96 cents, 10-oz

watermelon, Sprouts or Country Farms, 49 cts/lb 10-lb (4.90)

I pre-spent/purchased the sugar and eggs, as they were on sale or of limited quantity at a very low price. Since we're not using these two items at all in May, I am still counting these them as part of June's budget. This month, we'll be trying mushroom soy sauce for the first time. It worked out to be less expensive than the regular soy sauce, so we'll see how we like it. 

For meat, I'm buying chicken leg quarters, smoked sausage, and hot dogs. I still have ham, two chicken leg quarters, ground beef, and smoked salmon in the freezer and cans of tuna in the pantry. I have green beans, peas, spinach, blackberries, strawberries, cranberries, tomato paste, whole tomatoes, pumpkin, sweet potatoes, red potatoes, onions, carrots, orange juice, apple juice, pineapple, raisins, and corn for fruits and vegetables in the pantry, freezer, or refrigerator. In grains, I have all-purpose and whole wheat flour, coarse corn meal (polenta), steel cut and regular oats, barley, popping corn, and quinoa in the pantry. And I still have a lot of pinto beans left from April's shopping.

I have a separate budget for the reception after my daughter's graduation, and I expect there will be some nice treats leftover, including some fruits and vegetables, meats, and cheeses to round out our supplies. Knowing this in advance gave me some freedom in making out this month's grocery list.

That's about it for June's grocery list.

My Creative Mind's Eye

Right now, more than ever, I have to work with what I've got. That includes meals, clothing, tools, and landscaping. You may remember, last year we hosted a reception after one daughter's university graduation. Our other daughter will be graduating this year and we are hosting a reception for her, too. I've allocated some funds from the budget for the food for her reception (although this will be scaled back a bit from last year), but there is extremely little in the budget for sprucing up the entry garden, back deck, or yard. A lot of what needs doing is plain old labor to clean, prune, and weed. Last year, though, I had some money for flowers in pots, and that made a big difference in the first glance impression, I thought.

Seeing the ordinary in a new way
Working with what I've got involves taking a second look at many plants, rocks, and pots in our yard and finding the "new" in it all. Here's an example of what I mean.

What do you see in this picture? You probably see a bunch of ivy surrounding a dead shrub of some sort in a pot. Yes, that's what I saw, too. My regular me would think, "let's go to Home Depot and buy a new shrub for this pot." The creative me needs to find a way to use what I've got right here.

And what my creative side saw was the potential for an ivy topiary. After rubbing all of the dead needles off of the shrub I had something that would work as a frame for the ivy.

I also had a terra cotta finial sitting on a shelf in the garage. I trimmed the top of the dead shrub a little and fitted the finial firmly in place. Then I untangled the strands of ivy and wound them around the dead shrub, tucking the ends under to secure them. As luck would have it, there was a twin to this dead shrub surrounded by ivy about 15 feet from this one, and I had a second finial to use. So, I used the same treatment for the second potted shrub and I now have a pair of ivy topiaries, at no cost.  I think they look lightyears better than before.

Another example of seeing things with fresh eyes involves 2 pots at our front door. I usually buy flowers for these two pots. This year, I scavenged the yard for various succulents to fill both of these pots. I found 3 different succulents thriving in my yard. The variety in texture, scale, and color of the succulents makes up for the lack of blossoms. The bonus to using succulents is that I often forget to water the pots in the front of the house, and the succulents are very forgiving in that respect.

Another pot also needed some flowers of some sort. I scavenged some volunteer plants from the yard and popped them into that pot. Sure, I don't get to have exactly what I want. But that's the trade-off to saving money. I get free plants, but I just don't get to choose what they are.

I've got a couple of weeks to get the house and yard into shape, so I'm keeping myself quite busy with this work. I thrive on this sort of thing, though. I'm the type who does well with projects with a specific termination as opposed to ongoing work. So, this is a good thing.

I hope you're all doing well and that some of you were able to use the link for a free Kind bar yesterday. I'll be back tomorrow!

A Kind Bar Freebie to Send to Someone Special

This is not necessarily a promotion of one company over another, but it is a freebie of a bar that I enjoy. I thought I'd share the link, in case this interests you. Basically, you thank someone you know who has shown kindness by sending them an email with instructions for receiving a free Kind bar. I don't know how long this offer is active.

Here's the link.
Click through and then click on "SEND A KIND SNACK." Choose how you wish to notify your recipient (twitter, facebook, or email), and enter the necessary information.

(And just so you know, the only thing that I get out of posting this here is knowing that you might benefit from this freebie offer.)

Growing Lentil Sprouts in My Kitchen

This is my batch of lentil sprouts. They took 5 days to reach this stage. I began with 2 tablespoons of dried lentils (bought in the bulk bins at WinCo) and now, I have about 2 cups of sprouted lentils.

Lentil sprouts are good in stir-fries, salads, and sandwiches. Their flavor is much like alfalfa sprouts, and their texture is crunchy and mildly starchy when raw.

I sprouted mine in a pint-sized canning jar that I covered with a square of cheesecloth and propped at an angle in a cereal bowl with the open end down. I kept the jar in a dark corner on the kitchen counter.

So simple -- this is how I made mine:

I rinsed the lentils in the canning jar, then drained them. I filled the jar with water, covered with the cloth (secured with a rubber band), and allowed to soak overnight. The next morning, I drained the lentils, poured fresh water into the jar, and drained once more. Propped in the cereal bowl, the lentils were able to shed any excess water (which could cause them to rot). I rinsed and drained them in the jar twice a day. After 5 days, I rinsed them one final time, drained well in a sieve, and placed them on a paper towel to dry for 20-40 minutes. They're now wrapped in the same paper towel inside of a plastic bag. Stored this way, lentil sprouts will keep in the fridge for 5 days or so. Some sites say that sprouts can keep for weeks in the fridge, but I'll just count on a week at most. Since it's so easy to sprout more, there's no need to make a huge batch.

I just had a small pile of sprouts with ranch dressing. Very tasty! As we near the end of the month, and I find myself looking for something new to eat from our supplies, lentil sprouts will add that fresh bit of something to meals around here.

Cheap & Cheerful Suppers for Mid-May

homemade crystalized ginger

Friday (cost for 4 -- about $1.20)
scrambled eggs with garden chives
steamed carrots
apple wedges
rhubarb muffins
small amount of leftover rice and refried beans, topped with seasonings and cheese

Saturday 
went to a dinner party

Sunday (cost for 4 -- about $1.95)
beef and bean burritos
cole slaw (homemade dressing on shredded cabbage)
chocolate covered strawberries (I used dipping chocolate bought on clearance after Christmas)

Monday (cost for 4 -- about $2.05)
Mexican-inspired soup, made with leftover taco meat, refried beans, canned corn, canned tomatoes, Swiss chard, onions, and seasonings, topped with a small amount of shredded cheese and some fried tortilla strips
toasted homemade rye bread with butter
fruit salad of banana and strawberries

Tuesday (cost for 4 -- about $1.10)
leftover soup from the previous night, just plain tonight
homemade whole wheat toast with butter
(Three members of the family went out to the movies as a gift to their dad. The kids paid for treats at the movies, so that cost is not factored into my budget. However, the additional treats meant I didn't need to cook as much for dinner.)

Wednesday (cost for 4 -- about $1.05)
rice, pinto bean, and vegetable medley (using cabbage, carrots, onions, and chives)

Thursday (cost for 4 -- about $1.45)
Swiss chard, onion, and mozzarella frittata
steamed carrots
homemade whole wheat toast with butter

Once again, this was a week that was low on meat consumption. I used a grand total of 1/2 pound of ground beef for the burrito filling and Mexican soup. However, we did have cheese (which is just as expensive as meat) on 3 nights. We continue to use the inexpensive or even free fruits and vegetables, such as rhubarb (free), Swiss chard (free), chives (free), whole carrots, cabbage, and onions. The one exception was the purchase of strawberries -- 2 lbs of strawberries at Sprouts for $1.98.

We spent $8.80 on family suppers this week. That left $19.42 for breakfasts, lunches, and snacks for 4 people for the week. That's achievable if using less-expensive basic foods and what we can gather from our garden, combined with cooking from scratch for 95% of what we consume.


Breakfasts this week consisted of crockpot steel cuts oats, toast from homemade bread, homemade yogurt, rhu-sins (dried, sweetened rhubarb), scratch pancakes, raisins, bananas, granola, and milk.

Lunches included leftover soup, eggs, various sandwiches (using homemade bread, bean spread, and peanut butter), yogurt, various concoctions of fruits and vegetables (which included carrots, rhu-sins, raisins, bananas, juice, Swiss chard, cabbage, chives, onions), and ramen.


A few experiments this week:

• dehydrated carrot pieces to make single servings of instant soup
• sprouted lentils (thanks, YHF) to use on sandwiches and in soups and salads
• made crystalized ginger (using some aging and wrinkled fresh ginger) to use in baking

What was on your menu this week? Do you like experimenting in the kitchen, or do you prefer to use the same set of recipes?

Would You or Wouldn't You?

I'd love it if you'd weigh in on what you would do and why. Would you save white tissue gift wrap for the purpose of draining cooked meat or fried foods?

Some very lovely friends of ours gave me a beautiful Mother's Day gift, and it was wrapped in several layers of white tissue wrapping paper. I saved the non-torn sheets to reuse for gift wrap of my own. However, I still have several sheets of slightly torn tissue. I'm thinking of using this to drain fried foods or cooked ground beef.

My reservations: first, that it wouldn't perform well for this use (bits of paper might get stuck to foods); and second, it's pure white, which means it was bleached. Would it concern you that dioxins from the bleaching process might contaminate foods as they're draining?

Or should I just compost the slightly torn sheets? I already composted the mostly torn sections.

What are your thoughts?

An Easy Topping to Make a Bowl of Soup Seem Special

I often serve soup in bowls, just as is. However, sometimes I'm in the mood for something a bit more special. Maybe I need to bump up the calories, carbs or protein in a serving of soup, or I may just want the soup to be more visually appealing. Anyhow, here's one topping that I make from time to time -- deep-fried corn tortilla strips.

I know, the phrase "deep-fried" puts a lot of people off of the idea of making these. But they are simpler and produce far less excess oil than the phrase would connote. They are not at all fried in a deep amount of oil. In fact, I use about 4 tablespoons of oil to fry a batch for a few bowls of soup. There is normally about 1 to 2 tablespoons of oil remaining, which I save in a custard cup to use the next time or for sauteeing vegetables.

This is what I use:

• a small, heavy-bottomed saucepan, about 5.5 inches in diameter across the bottom of the pan and 3.5 inches high
• about 4 tablespoons of vegetable oil to start the frying
• 4 corn tortillas, cut into halves and then into thin strips
• a slotted frying scoop
• repurposed paper, such as the torn-open paper bag that sugar comes in

I heat the oil over a medium flame while I begin cutting the corn tortillas into thin strips. I test the oil by dropping 1 strip into the pan. If it sizzles and fries fairly quickly, the oil is ready. I remove that strip to the paper to drain. 

I fry the strips about 2/3 of a tortilla's worth at a time (a good-sized handful), turning the batch over a few times until they look lightly-browned. For a soup topping, the strips don't need to be perfectly fried as I would expect from making chips. Some will be more done than others, but on the whole they will be crispy. A batch that is large enough to top 4 bowls of soup takes about 5 minutes from start to finish and costs me about 25 cents.

By using a small-diameter saucepan, an oil depth sufficient for frying is achieved with less oil than a larger pot. In addition, because I turn the strips a few times during frying, the pieces do not need to be fully submerged in the oil to crisp up, as the sides of the strips are repeatedly exposed to the higher temperatures of the hot oil with the turns. 

After I'm done frying and the oil has cooled, I store any residual oil in a custard cup to use another time.

The soup in the above photo was a Mexican-inspired one, made with leftover taco meat, refried beans, canned corn, canned tomatoes, onions, seasonings, and Swiss chard from the garden. I topped this soup with a bit of shredded cheese and a handful of fried tortilla strips per bowl. The crispy texture of the tortillas contrasts nicely with the soup and gradually morphs into chewy morsels in the time from the serving of the soup to its full consumption. I served this soup with toast for most of my family. For me, with a smaller appetite, a bowl of soup like this is a full meal in itself.