Cheap & Cheerful Suppers for mid-June (lots of berries!)

Friday

Huevos Rancheros
Warm corn tortillas
Spinach salad with creamy salsa dressing
Chocolate pudding

Saturday

Homemade veggie pizza, w/onions, tomato, and green pepper
Large tossed salad (given to us)
Fresh strawberries from garden
Brownies (given to us)

Sunday (Father's Day)

Hot dog cookout, hot dogs on
Homemade buns
Carrot sticks
Tossed green salad
Fruit salad
S'mores

Monday

Black beans, tomato and rice
Tossed salad
Fresh strawberries from garden
Leftover brownies (given to us on Saturday)

Tuesday

Kale-tomato frittata
Soybean falafel
Fresh-baked whole wheat bread
Leftover sausage, gravy and biscuits (from Sunday brunch)
Tapioca pudding (I found 1/4 cup of tapioca pearls in the cupboard, the day before, so soaked overnight to make pudding for Tuesday night)
Fresh raspberries from garden

Wednesday

Black bean chili (vegetarian, mostly, but flavored with chicken fat/stock)
Asian noodle and veggie salad over lettuce leaves
Fresh berries from garden (raspberries and strawberries)
Bread and fresh vanilla-rhubarb butter

Thursday

Marinara sauce over steamed kale and pasta (and a bit of leftover rice), topped with mozzarella and baked
Mixed green salad (saving the greens for tonight. It turns out I made too much dinner last night)
Steamed carrots
Vanilla pudding, topped with almond slivers and fresh berries


It's been one of those weeks where I keep finding things to use up in the fridge and pantry. Little bits of this and that, like the soybean/almond/coconut okara (from making soy-almond milk), a small amount of green pepper needing using (put on homemade pizza), a small handful of tapioca pearls in the cupboard, canned tomatoes from a large can that had been opened about week ago, olive liquid (went into chili), and various leftovers. A couple of the dinners sound like large meals, but in reality were lots of small amounts of many things. And we continue to eat a lot of eggs.

How was your week? Anything especially delicious for dinner this past week?

Have a wonderful weekend!

An indulgence on a budget -- a bouquet of a dozen roses

June is the month for the pink hybrid tea roses in my garden. As I was tending the garden, the other day, I was noticing just how perfect they were looking this year. The leaves look clean of spots, and very few aphids on the stems.

I just couldn't resist. I cut myself a lovely bouquet of 1 dozen plus (there are actually 13 in this bouquet), for a vase on my dresser. I wasn't counting, but my daughter commented that I had a dozen roses.

I can count on one hand the number of bouquets of roses that I've received in the last 30 years. A purchased dozen roses is quite an extravagance. So this is really a treat for me.

I was curious what a dozen pink roses was going for this week, so I checked out FTD and a few other online florists. Avas Flowers has a dozen pink roses for $34.99,  GlobalRose has them for $40, FTD is selling them for $49.99, and Teleflora has them for a whopping $63.71!

Five minutes of cutting, and I've saved $63.71! Of course, I would never dream of spending that much money on flowers for myself. So it's not a true savings. But I'm enjoying this bouquet, nonetheless.

Happy June, everyone! Don't forget to stop and smell the roses.

With whatever you have, do something nice for yourself. A lovely tea poured over ice. A bowl of fresh raspberries from your garden. A nice foot soak in epsom salt at the end of the day. Lunch, al fresco, on your patio or deck. A honey-oatmeal face mask. Or a bouquet of your garden-grown flowers.

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Alice sent me a couple of photos of her rock garden, where she has her potted herbs and veggies, as well as some ornamentals (day lilies, a flowering ground cover, 2 pink-flowering shrubs and some evergreen shrubs). She has a lovely little pathway set through her garden, so she can stroll through there, or tend her plants. I can see green beans, tomatoes, green onions and chives, all in pots. What else is in the pots, Alice? They look to be thriving. Have you been working on this garden for a while, Alice? It looks lovely.

Anyways, she and I wanted to share her photos, so I've downloaded a couple of them, here. Enjoy a little tour of Alice's garden.

the view approaching one end of the walkway

near where the other end of the pathway meets up with the house