Grocery Plans for April

The month of March is wrapping up and my family did really well on our budget. We still have a couple of months before the income reduction takes place, but we do want to see what is possible for us, in order to judge if this is doable or if we need greater income. Here's a really good sign -- we had a super-low credit card bill this month, perhaps the lowest that it's been in a couple of years.

The Groceries

One of the issues with working with basic ingredients is the need to regularly prepare foods from scratch. With this idea in mind, I've spent some time each day preparing individual food items for ease of use, such as peeling and trimming a dozen carrots at a time, shredding a head of cabbage and making a bottle of cole slaw dressing, toasting some raw almonds for snacking, and making scratch pudding and putting into small jars for homemade snack-pack pudding cups. I estimate that I spend 1 hour per day (in addition to regular meal prep) making these easy to grab foods that are appreciated by myself and my family. So, for 7 extra hours per week, or 31 extra hours this month, I've been able to strip away about $125.00 from our grocery budget. $4.03 is not a great hourly wage, but I've been able to do these little kitchen jobs anytime that it works out for me.

Besides the money savings, I feel that we are eating more real foods and less processed junk. It seems "cleaner," more like how we're supposed to eat. I think this is a fantastic bonus!

While I sit here and make out next month's shopping list, I have $1.87 leftover from March's grocery budget to roll over to April's. I don't feel the need to go out and buy anything else in these last couple of days with that $1.87. So, going into April, I have $126.87 for food items. In making out my list, again I had to whittle it away a bit to fit the budget. I primarily made my choices based on nutrition for the dollar spent, allowing for a couple of non-nutritive items, too, such as coffee and sugar.

This past month, my two big stock-up items were a 25-lb bag of yellow onions and 21 pounds of ground beef. I still have a lot of both of those items in stock. My two big stock-up items for April will be a 25-lb sack of dried pinto beans and a 50-lb sack of all-purpose flour. Both of those items are in amounts which should last our family several months, providing an inexpensive protein source and a basic baking ingredient for our meals and snacks. Pinto beans tend to be the least expensive dried bean in my area, with versatility to use them in several different preparations.

In addition to the beans and flour, I'll also be buying smaller amounts of dried white beans (for sandwich spread), butter, orange juice, apple juice, raisins, bananas, carrots, potatoes, frozen spinach, chicken leg quarters, hot dogs, whole wheat flour, canned tomato paste, shredded cheese, sugar, coffee, and enough milk and eggs to last the month. (One of my promises to our family at the beginning of this month was that there would always be plenty of eggs, milk, and bread. I kept that promise, ensuring family members that there would always be something from which to make a meal or snack.) I'll be shopping at Walmart, WinCo, Fred Meyer (Senior Discount Day on April 2 -- just have to be 55+ -- no special card, just tell the cashier you're over 55), and Smart Foods/Cash & Carry.

Easter is in April, but I do have a budgeted amount to spend for this holiday that is separate from the grocery budget. I've reduced this budget considerably from last year, but there is still enough to cover the cost of a ham and next years' Easter egg hunt candy. (You may recall that I buy the next year's Easter candy on clearance after the holiday and store until the following year.) So, at least there is no need to use the grocery budget for the Easter ham. We also have 2 birthdays in this month. We have a couple of gifts cards for a restaurant in our area. I offered these to our daughters for their birthday celebration, but they turned us down, wanting burgers and fries at home instead. So, we'll have a dual birthday lunch celebration in a restaurant using those gift cards. (Lunch is often less expensive than dinner, hence the lunch celebration.)

We're doing really, really well, and I'm about as surprised as anyone else! I'm still not sure if this is sustainable. Although, if there had to be an optimal time to begin this, it is now in early spring. I've begun planting the vegetable garden. I planted snow peas last week and have just this week started cool season greens from seeds, indoors. Our early spring garden has lots of watercress, sorrel, chives, kale, garlic chives, and Swiss chard to provide variety to the narrow range of veggies that I'm purchasing. Plus, our rhubarb is now up and should be ready to harvest in mid-April. And, I still have some canned and frozen vegetables in store. We're taking this just one month at a time. Life is good.

Saved $20 by Borrowing From the Garden Again

Last spring, I bought a spring color bowl (a pot that was pre-planted with spring bulbs and primroses) from the garden center, to place on a table just outside the bedroom window. It brought me a lot of joy in the early spring weeks.

I had planned on  buying another one for this year. I thought again, then decided to raid my garden. I "borrowed" some daffodils, tulips, grape hyacinths, hyacinth, and some primroses from my yard and put together my own color bowl, using a pot and soil that I already had. When my flowers are done blooming, I plan on returning the bulbs and plants to the garden and finding something else to put in these pots.

Anyway, the other day, it took me about 30 minutes to dig and pot, and it will take another 15 minutes to put all of the plants back. So, forty-five minutes of work for $20 in savings -- that's a pretty good deal. Since I had really planned on buying a color bowl this spring, this is a real savings (as opposed to a theoretical savings).

6 Things to Do to Dig Out of Feelings of Deprivation and Self-Pity

Financial set-backs tend to stir up the pity pot for me. So, this go-round, I'm being as proactive as I can. Here's the list that I'm following in order to ditch those feelings of deprivation.

• make an abundance of good foods using your least expensive and abundantly-supplied ingredients, such as bar cookies, breads, yogurt, pudding, flavored popcorn, or granola. I find that if we have a lot of foods available to snack on or make quick meals with, we all tend to forget that our budget is much smaller.

• use the good stuff -- sit in the living room that is usually reserved for guests, have dinner in the formal dining room, use the good china or silver, use those towels that you save for visiting guests, light candles. Our family tends to save the "good stuff" for guests only. Honoring our guests with those nicer belongings is a hospitable thing to do, but sometimes, we need to honor our own family and indulge in using those belongings which are set aside for special occasions. Using a really soft and stain-free towel can put a smile on my face and make me feel pampered.

• this one is helpful when I am wanting "new" stuff -- refresh or refurbish some worn household or personal items, such as bleaching plastic cutting boards and white dish towels, ironing a few favorite shirts, dusting and tidying surfaces in your home, re-dyeing faded clothing, polishing leather shoes, scouring the outsides of pots and pans. We hear this a lot -- we live in a throw away society. We seem to have lost the tolerance for lived-in looking belongings. When something begins to look dingy, instead of restoring the item to its former appearance, it gets tossed into the giveaway pile and replaced with a new version. Not only is this wasteful, but it seems to change the way that I view my possessions. If a blouse looks limp, I no longer choose it to wear. If my dish towels are stained, I don't want them on display when guests are in the house. I have a faded black shirt sitting in the pile of clothing to be dyed soon. It no longer looks nice, so I've avoided wearing it this past year. It used to be a favorite shirt. Once it's re-dyed, I'm hoping it will come back into my clothing rotation. While I shouldn't base my self-esteem on the condition of my belongings, keeping my possessions in good order does make me feel better about myself.

• take advantage of freebies, such as concerts in the park, or books, dvds, and magazines from the library, or free days at museums, or free giveaways at local fast food chains. There are a lot of freebies out there. How can someone possibly feel deprived while eating a free ice cream cone?!

• set yourself up for some serious relaxation, such as a bath with essential oils, candles, and/or music, or lounge in the sun, or have a lie down with music in the background, or spend time in prayerful meditation. For me, de-stressing helps me find my way back to my purpose in this life, which in turn helps me to minimize the significance of a financial set-back.

• this one is probably the most important (but often overlooked) thing to do when self-pity kicks in -- get outside of yourself and do something for someone who could use a little TLC. Volunteering is a great way to find those who could use your kindness and friendly smile. Seeing that someone else is also struggling can put our own situations into proper perspective and give us a sense of belonging to a larger pool of people. 

Is there anything you would add to my list of proactive steps?

Edible Flowers for the Pots and Baskets this Summer

I had planned on buying some flowering annual starts for some pots and hanging baskets that I have in the yard. I have now rethought that idea and am now planning to plant edible flowers from seeds in those containers. As it is now the 3rd week of March, and I haven't started any seeds indoors, I went looking for quick-to-grow flowers. Nasturtiums came up on the list.

I know from past experience that they do grow well in my yard and we enjoy them added to cooking. The flowers, petals, and seed pods are all edible. They can be added to egg dishes, salads, used in place of lettuce on sandwiches, or sauteed with other veggies. The leaves and petals are peppery in taste.

According to WebMD, nasturtiums contain Vitamin C and may help fight bacteria, viruses, fungi, and tumors. As with all foods, they may pose health complications for some people. WebMD specifically cautions against ingestion of nasturtiums for those with kidney disease.

Nasturtiums are easy to grow, requiring with minimal care. Some say they thrive on neglect. For about $2, I can buy a packet of 20 to 25 seeds, enough that I hope will fill about 5 baskets or small pots with nasturtium plants. These should save money over buying flowering annual starts and provide some edibles for our meals. One question -- should I take the seeds out of the gardening budget or the food budget?

Anyone else grow edible flowers?

Comparing the Cost of Egg Salad to Peanut Butter

While peanut butter is a less expensive alternative to luncheon meat for a sandwich filling, there may be even cheaper options. I knew this going into March. When I began making up my grocery list, I became aware that I would have to cut a few items. So, I began brainstorming alternatives for many items on my list. At about $1.40/ 16 ounces for the cheapest peanut butter available, this was one of those items. I have mentioned that we've been using homemade bean spread this month. When using canned beans, bean spread is quick and easy to make and costs about 65 to 75 cents per pint.

Another alternative to peanut butter is egg salad. I think most of us know that egg salad is a frugal sandwich filling. Are you interested in knowing just how frugal it may or may not be? Of course, your cost per pint will be different from mine, as the prices for ingredients vary by region. However, you can use my calculations for your own comparison of peanut butter to egg salad.

I'll use large eggs in this calculation, because this is the size that is often advertised on sale this time of year, and the size which is mentioned in most egg salad recipes. The USDA has sized eggs according to weight, with a large egg weighing in at about 2 ounces. Within a carton of eggs, each weighs slightly less or more than 2 ounces, but a carton of a dozen large eggs must weigh at least 24 ounces, not including the packaging. FYI, the egg weight also includes the shell. Each large egg contains about 3.25 tablespoons of edible content, or 1.625 liquid ounces, or 50 grams boiled and peeled* (about 1.76 ounces). If you use 7 large eggs to make a batch of egg salad, the egg content of the batch would weigh about 12.32 ounces. The ingredients that are added to the chopped, boiled eggs will bring the weight of a batch of egg salad up to just over 17 ounces.

I buy mayonnaise in 1-gallon containers at Cash & Carry, an institutional supply chain that also sells to the public. I pay about $1.79 per quart. A quick Walmart search for my area says that a 30-oz jar of Great Value mayonnaise sells for $2.48. In a large batch of egg salad that uses about 7 or 8 eggs, most recipes call for 4 ounces (about 1/2 cup) of mayonnaise. My Cash & Carry price for the mayo, then, is about 22 cents. The same amount of the Walmart mayo would be about 33 cents. Many recipes also call for pickle relish, prepared mustard, chopped green olives, and/or pimento. The average amount of these ingredients in a 7 or 8 egg batch of egg salad is about 3/4 to 1 ounce (1  1/2 to 2 tablespoons). The cost of these ingredients is variable. If you go with a thrifty version and use Walmart Great Value pickle relish (24-oz jar for $1.98) as your added ingredient, the cost is between 6 and 8 cents for 3/4 to 1 ounce of relish. (I make my own each summer with my vegetable garden rejects, so I estimate my cost for relish is about 2 cents.) It may be obvious that adding chopped green olives or pimentos will increase the final cost in comparison to using sweet pickle relish. (At Walmart, pimentos are 31 cents/ounce and green olives are about 20 cents/ounce.)

The 7 boiled eggs, once peeled, weigh about 12.32 ounces, the mayonnaise weighs about 4 ounces, and the extra ingredients weigh about 3/4 to 1 ounce, bringing the batch of egg salad up to 17.32 ounces.

I recently bought a 5 dozen box of large eggs at Walmart for $4.75. The cost for 7 of those eggs was 55 cents. If I add Cash & Carry mayonnaise, my cost per batch rises to 77 cents. However, this month I was out of mayonnaise. So I substituted homemade, plain yogurt blended with a bit of mustard, vegetable oil, salt, and curry powder. I estimate that my homemade blend for this batch of egg salad was about 13 cents. I also added about 2 tablespoons of homemade relish, at a cost of about 2 cents. My cost for a batch of egg salad was about 70 cents. (If I had mayonnaise, my cost per batch would still only be about 79 cents.) So, 65 to 73 cents for 16 ounces of egg salad, compared to $1.40 for 16 ounces of peanut butter. Egg salad was nearly half the cost of peanut butter, making peanut butter an easy target for the axe from my shopping list.

For someone without access to an institutional supply store and without homemade pickle relish or yogurt, instead shopping at Walmart for all of the ingredients, the cost for 16 ounces of egg salad would be about 87 to 89 cents.

The cheapest peanut butter at Walmart this week is the 64-oz jar of Great Value Creamy Peanut Butter, at $6.44, or $1.59 for 16 ounces (452.5 g). So, about 95 cents for egg salad compared with $1.59 for peanut butter. The egg salad is still less expensive by weight than peanut butter.

So, that's a pound for pound comparison. There is also the consideration of how much egg salad is used per sandwich compared to peanut butter. I don't use the serving size of 2 tablespoons but use about 2  1/2 tablespoons (40 g/ 1.41 oz) of peanut butter per sandwich. With egg salad, I use roughly 2 ounces of egg salad per sandwich (the amount of about 3/4 of a boiled egg combined with extra ingredients). So for me, the filling for a peanut butter sandwich costs about 12 cents, whereas the filling for an egg salad sandwich costs about 8 - 9 cents. If I bought all of the ingredients for egg salad at Walmart, my cost per sandwich would rise to 10 - 11 cents each. Skipping the peanut butter and making egg salad was still the less expensive option, but only by a small amount per serving.

Going into my calculations, I thought for certain that egg salad would be a huge savings over peanut butter. And it is, if measured by weight for each, but not so much when considering my usage. Because we tend to use so much more egg salad per sandwich than peanut butter, the savings (even when figuring in my homemade ingredients) were small. However, our family does use bean spread in comparable amounts to peanut butter. So bean spread at 65 to 75 cents per 16 ounces is about half the actual, per sandwich cost of peanut butter. Considering that a batch of egg salad takes me about 15 minutes of hands-on time, but a batch of beans spread takes about 5 minutes of hands-on time, I'll be sticking to bean spread for the most part, adding in egg salad every now and then for variety. When preparing so many foods for my family from scratch, I am all about saving time as well as money.

We will buy peanut butter again, when the budget allows for it, as it is a food that we enjoy. Enjoying what we eat is important, too!

By the way, if you're looking for a couple of good bean spread recipes, the cookbook Laurel's Kitchen has a few.

Here is a modified hummus recipe. You can skip the sesame seeds, but they do add a nice flavor to the spread.

And here is a modified recipe from Laurel's Kitchen for her Zippy Soybean Spread. I use cooked soybeans in a version similar to this recipe, but I omit the vinegar. I use garlic powder in place of fresh, and omit the green pepper and celery when I don't have it, but this is a good use for celery leaves that you might not otherwise use. I use vegetable oil in place of olive oil, and I use more than 1 tablespoon, probably closer to 3 or 4 tablespoons. I add salt to taste.

And here is my own loose recipe for black bean sandwich spread. Four ingredients: cooked black beans, salsa, oil, and salt.


Over to you -- is egg salad significantly cheaper for you than peanut butter, given the prices for ingredients which are local to you?



information on egg sizing and liquid usable weight of large eggs is from thekitchn.com
*weight of peeled, boiled egg from Joy of Baking

Spring Blooms From the Garden

Crocus blooms don't make very good cut flowers. However, if you dig carefully (keeping the bulb and most of the root structure in tact), you can "borrow" a few crocus bulbs from your garden to enjoy indoors for a week. I dug these crocus on Monday. They are now bringing cheer to the kitchen eating area.

In my rainy climate, most of early spring can pass by with nary a clear day to get outside to enjoy garden blooms. Bringing some of the blooms indoors ensures that I will indeed get that chance to marvel at their beauty. I dig a couple of crocus, grape hyacinths, and primroses, then place in pots of soil for indoor loveliness in the weeks leading up to Easter. I keep them watered like any other houseplant. When the blooms have faded, I return the plants to the garden, adding a bit of bulb food to the hole in the soil as I replant. I water them in good, then rely on our abundant rainfall in March and April to take care of the rest.

I also brought some cherry tree branches into the house. I pruned the fruit trees this afternoon and thought how lovely some stalks of cherry blossoms will be in a few days. So, I brought some of the thinner branches indoors for vases.

How the Month's Grocery Budget is Going

Here’s where we stand with the grocery budget for the month —

It’s a little past mid-month, and I’ve about depleted my allotted $125 for March. I went to Walmart the first weekend of the month, spending $29.81 for the items that I had determined would be least expensive in that store, including 5 dozen eggs, 10 lbs of chicken hindquarters, 2 heads of cabbage, some garlic powder, vegetable oil, and bananas. On March 5th, I shopped the Senior Discount Day at Fred Meyer, following the same game plan as Walmart, spending $57.01 and buying canned green beans, canned dried beans, canned tomatoes, 1 package of chocolate chips*, bread, frozen orange juice concentrate, butter, milk, and ground beef, with the ground beef as my stock-up item. On the 14th, I went to Safeway and bought 8 heads of green cabbage, spending $8.78. This last week, I went to Walmart to buy the Oreo-style cookies, a package of frozen French fries, and another bunch of bananas, spending $5.64. Finally, Monday morning, I was driving right by Cash & Carry, so I decided to stop and finish my grocery list for the month. I bought 10 lbs of carrots, 25 lbs of onions (my 2nd stock-up item for the month), 10 lbs of potatoes, 32 oz container of frozen apple juice concentrate, and a bunch of very green bananas (to get us through the last week of the month, I hope). I have now spent $123.13.

I am well-stocked on all of the food groups. I may not have lots of some particular foods, such as butter and flour, but I do have a large container of oil and enough other grains to get through the month. I did decide to buy loaves of bread instead of baking bread this month. I didn't have enough in the budget to buy the two 50-lb sacks of flour that I normally buy, getting the best price per pound and resulting in homemade loaves of bread that cost about 50 cents/loaf. Instead, I bought the cheapest bread that Fred Meyer sells, at 80 cents/ loaf. Next month, I'll have the money to buy the 2 kinds of flour that I use in bread. A similar situation with buying the canned dried beans. The canned beans were 45 cents each. I've been using them to quickly make a container of sandwich spread once or twice per week to substitute for the peanut butter that was out of my price range. The cost of bean spread using canned beans and other ingredients is about 75 cents per pound, while peanut butter was $1.40 per pound in a 64-oz container. Next month, I will buy a large sack of dried beans to cook for meals and make sandwich spreads.

On a very low budget, I find that I have to pick and choose which foods to buy in large quantities, and which to wait for another month or opportunity. The goal is to buy two or three basic items per month at a super low price and in quantities large enough to last for 3 or 4 months. By doing this every month, after a few months I should have enough of the basics that I can splurge occasionally on non-basic ingredients. It will all work out, and truly, we are being well-fed.

I still have $1.87 of March's grocery money left. Should we need a bit more fresh fruit, I will pick up one more bunch of bananas for 42 cents per pound at Walmart.

In the total food budget (including eating out), we have been exceptionally good. We haven't so much as bought a single burger out. My daughters had coupons for free birthday frozen yogurt and invited me to come, but I declined and sent them off together to enjoy their birthday treat. If I had gone, my frozen yogurt would have cost about $5. In addition, I had to go to the mall on a couple of occasions this month (birthday gift shopping and walking/exercise), every single time I brought my thermos of coffee and some sort of snack in my purse. On another occasion, I had a 3-hour wait in the city for one daughter. Not only did I find free, street parking, but I brought a book and my laptop for entertainment and a thermos of tea and my lunch plus snacks, avoiding the purchase of any food or drink while I waited. Also, our Sunday lunches have reverted to eating home-prepared, quick foods. We add interest by eating on the deck, on the grass, or at the mall. When we have warm, sunny Sundays, we plan on cooking hotdogs over the fire ring or taking sandwiches to the beach for our after-church lunches. Our original goal was to preserve a family time each week, where we all share a relaxing meal together. Eating out after church helped get that going. Now, I think we are continuing but without the restaurant expense.


*the chocolate chips sound like a money-waster on such a tight budget. However, I am using them to make homemade candies for our family several times this month. If you figure a regular chocolate bar weighs 1.55 ounces, then one 12-oz bag of chocolate chips would yield 7.74 candy bar's worth of chocolate. The 12-oz bag of chocolate chips cost just under $2. 7.74 candy bars would cost about $6.11, based on a price of 79 cents per bar at Dollar Tree. Maybe this sounds like rationalizing the purchase of a non-essential item. For us, having some treats sprinkled throughout the month may prevent some of the discouragement that can set in when you constantly feel deprived.

DQ Free Cone Day 2019

photo source: https://www.dairyqueen.com/us-en/Promotions-US/

Do you have a Dairy Queen in your area? This coming Wednesday, March 20 is DQ's Free Cone Day. Not all DQ's participate, and not valid at mall locations. Phone your local Dairy Queen to see if they are participating in this offer on Wednesday, the 20th.

Birthday Dinner for My Daughters

The birthday dinner this year was a little more tricky to pull together than previous years, as there was very little wiggle room for "special" ingredients. However, my daughters and I brainstormed what we could do with what we have and still make the meal a special one. Now, you need to understand, "special" to my daughters does not mean steak, lobster, roast or anything that you might normally think of for a special, home-cooked meal. "Special" to my daughters meant burgers and fries for this birthday. So, for their birthday dinner, that's exactly what we did.

I had ground beef in the freezer, the ingredients to make buns, plus ketchup, mustard, canned tomatoes, garden watercress, a tiny amount of onion, plain yogurt, garlic powder, a packet of au jus mix, and cabbage (for a slaw-style salad). I did splurge and bought one 2-lb bag of seasoned French fries, for a little over $2 at Walmart.

I baked a batch of burger buns on Saturday, so the basic burger was covered. Because this was a special burger meal and because our selection of on-hand ingredients didn't match what one would think of as usual burger toppings, we put together some different toppings, which we billed as "gourmet." Here are the toppings from our "gourmet" burger toppings bar:

• au jus for dipping French dip-style (surprised me, this was very popular with all)
• tzatziki, without the cucumber, using strained yogurt, olive oil, mint (didn't have dill), lemon juice, garlic powder, salt (also very popular)
• salsa made from canned tomatoes with jalapenos, to which I added fresh onion, garlic powder, chili powder, salt, chipotle powder, pa inch of sugar, and vinegar, cooking it down for about 20 minutes
• watercress
• rosemary mustard, made last summer
• plus the usual ketchup and yellow mustard

Our birthday dinner menu was as follows:

• burgers with our "gourmet" toppings bar
• seasoned fries from a package
• cole slaw, made with a vinaigrette mixed with yogurt
• cookies and cream birthday cake
• 1 bottle of sparkling cider to toast the birthday gals
• 1 bottle of homemade lemonade
• 1 bottle of water

We served the lemonade and water in empty sparkling cider bottles, as we did for one daughter's graduation reception last June. I have saved the quirky-shaped or nicely-colored cider bottles that we've received over the years. They make nice bottles for water on the dinner table or for taking lemonade on a picnic.

The entire meal used an extra $4.12 out of our grocery budget for the Oreo-style cookies and the seasoned fries. That's considerably less than what we had originally planned for their birthday before we knew about the upcoming income reduction. 

Cookies and Cream Birthday Cake

Today is my daughters' birthday.  One of the ways that I show them my love is to bake a special birthday cake. This year's cake is mostly about taste and texture, and less about beauty. I gave a lot of thought to what kind of cake to make for them. One daughter really loves Oreo cookies, and the other loves cookies and cream ice cream. So, the logical choice for this year's cake was a cookies and cream cake.

I had a white cake mix in the pantry, along with plenty of cocoa powder and confectioner's sugar. The only ingredient that I needed to buy was 1 package of Oreo-type cookies, which I found at Walmart for just under $2.

Once home, I mixed the cake mix according to package directions, then folded in 12 crushed cookies. I left some kind of large chunks, as you can see in the split cake. The cakes baked in slightly less time than the mix instructions suggested.

After baking, I cooled the cakes, then split each so that I would have a 4-layer cake. Between the layers is the dark chocolate frosting which also is glopped onto the top of the cake to hold the cookie "garnishes." The dark chocolate frosting is simply a homemade, cocoa powder buttercream frosting.

After the layers were assembled, I frosted the sides and top with a cookies and cream frosting -- a vanilla buttercream frosting into which 12 crushed cookies are folded. I used a baggie with a corner cut out to pipe globs of dark chocolate frosting on the top, after which I placed a half cookie into each chocolate blob around the edge, and 1 whole cookie in the center. To finish the sides, I took some cookie pieces and crushed them finely with a rolling pin in a bag. I then scooped up the cookie crumbs, and pressed them onto the sides of the cake. The crumb finish kind of hides any messiness of the cookies and cream frosting. I'm hoping this will be a hit tonight.

A Couple of Early Garden Herbs and Greens for Making Salads

In our cool maritime climate, I can count on a couple of herbs and greens to return early each spring, from which I make some of our early-season salads. These include watercress, sorrel, garlic greens, chives, violet blossoms, and the fall-planted Swiss chard and kale.

Yesterday afternoon, the sun was out, warming our yard for the first time in months. I ventured out to the garden to see what could be poking through the winter-weary ground. This is what I found.

This is watercress. I planted it about 15 years ago, from a small bundle of watercress which still had its roots, purchased from the produce section of the grocery store. I was using watercress in tea sandwiches and had a few leftover stems with roots attached. I thought that I might as well see if it grows if planted. It did, and it reseeds itself every year. I particularly like sprigs of watercress in place of lettuce on egg salad sandwiches. But it also makes a nice green for an early salad.

Here's what a single stem of a watercress plant looks like. Despite its name, it doesn't need to grow in standing water. In fact, it grows throughout my vegetable garden. Watercress is high in vitamins A, B6, B12, C, folate, and the minerals magnesium, calcium, phosphorus, and iron. Watercress may help fight breast cancer and may help prevent colorectal cancer. It may also help thyroid, cardiovascular, and bone health, and may help prevent cognitive decline. (www.organicfacts.net)

These are garlic greens. Garlic greens are the above ground, immature portion of garlic. What most of us think of as garlic is the bulb of a mature garlic plant. In early spring, the bulb sends up shoots that look a bit like fat grass stems. As the season progresses, the bulb grows and begins to form sections. At that time, the green portion turns brown and dies back.

Garlic greens have the same immune-boosting and anti-bacterial/inflammatory benefits of the garlic bulb, but the greens are milder in flavor. A few shoots snipped into bits adds a nice zip to salads and sauces.

This is sorrel. Sorrel is a perennial herb, coming back very early in the spring in my region. The tender baby leaves are good in salads, imparting a tangy, almost lemony flavor. Sorrel is high in oxalic acid, so the recommendation is to eat it in moderation. Sorrel is rich in several vitamins and minerals, and it is known as a digestive aid, as well as being beneficial for diabetics. It is reactive to aluminum and cast-iron, so it should only be cooked in stainless steel or enameled pots. Cream of sorrel soup is a well-known use of this herb, but it is also delicious in omelets, quiches, mixed in with mashed potatoes, added raw to hummus, and fresh used in chicken sandwiches or salads. 

Due to the health warnings about oxalic acid, anyone concerned about adverse effects should read this article from www.verywellfit.com.

These are baby sorrel leaves. When picked young, both stalks and leaves are tender. Later in the season, the stalks are stringy and are best removed from the leaves before using in cooking.

I plant both kale and Swiss chard late in the summer for early spring harvesting. Early spring is a low time for the garden and a period of high produce prices at the market, so having something for garden harvesting is welcome. The chard and kale will bolt some time in April, but for now, we have something fresh and green.

My salad spinner is full of herbs and leafy greens. Time to make a salad. An herb salad is so highly flavored that I treat it almost like a condiment. I chop the pieces small, then dress in a sweet vinaigrette and serve in small portions. Its bite is refreshing and wakes up the palate during an ordinary supper.

These early garden herbs and greens will continue to produce for about a month, adding variety to our budget-vegetable rotation of cabbage, carrots, onions, and canned vegetables.

Will You Be Buying Cabbage this Week?

In my area, gone are the days of cabbage priced at 19 cents per pound during the week of St. Patrick's Day. However, today's price is still a fair deal. This week in my area, green cabbage is advertised at 49-50 cents per pound (checking those online flyers for all the stores near me). That's a good enough price for me to stock up for use as an everyday vegetable.

In my new budget, there's a distinction between everyday vegetables and special occasion/holiday vegetables. For this month and next, I've set a price limit on everyday vegetables at 50 cents per pound. Keeping to that limit, I found fresh carrots, onions, potatoes, and cabbage, as well as canned green beans, pinto beans, kidney beans, garbanzo beans, white beans, and tomatoes. I will buy what my budget allows from that list this month. We have some frozen peas, canned and fresh pumpkin, and kale, watercress, and chives in the garden to round out the veggie selection.

As for the cabbage, I bought 8 heads of green cabbage this week. If stored properly, cabbage can keep up to 2 months in the fridge. Given this will be a primary vegetable for us in the next month, I expect we will consume it all before the 2-month mark.

What are your favorite ways to prepare green cabbage? Our three primary uses for cabbage include: sliced and sauteed with garlic, soy sauce, and sesame oil, with or without meat; some sort of slaw as a salad or to top sandwiches; and added to tomato or chicken-based soups. With 8 heads of cabbage, I am looking for new ways to prepare this vegetable.

Alternative Hot Beverages: Tisanes

the color comes from the spices -- there is no tea in this beverage

In cutting our grocery spending this month, I was forced to take a long hard look at our non-nutritive beverages. I am a long-time coffee-lover. I also love a good cup of tea. I've talked here about switching from caffeinated to decaffeinated beverages in 2018. This has actually been one of those fortuitous changes, not only because I feel better physically, but also it has now allowed me to venture into alternative hot beverages, as I am no longer tied to finding a source of caffeine.

Last week when I found that great deal on ground beef I realized that in order to really stock up, I would have to cut a few items from my list. One of those items was decaffeinated instant coffee. This was a struggle for me. After loading up my cart with packages of ground beef, I headed to the coffee aisle. I put a container of decaf into my cart, then took it out again, put it back in, then after some shopping, I put it back on the shelf. I still had some decaf at home, so I knew there would be a little for the month, but not a lot. I am stretching it out and making it last. Seeing my supply of decaf coffee and tea dwindle got me to thinking about some alternative hot beverages that I could make at home, using what I have on hand. As they don't need to have any caffeine, my options are wide open.

Our cabinets are filled with herbs, spices, and flavorings. Some of these won't be used before their flavor has been lost, so I thought I might as well begin experimenting with homemade tisanes. A tisane is basically an herb or spice tea without the Camellia sinensis  (the plant that is the source of tea leaves). Tisanes can be made from dried or fresh leaves or petals, such as mint, basil, lemon balm, or chamomile, or tougher material, such as bark, roots, or berries, like cinnamon, cloves, cardamom, or ginger. Tisanes can also be made from fruit, such as berries, stone fruits, or fruits with cores, like peaches, cherries, or apples. In addition to the plant material, most of us also keep liquid flavorings, such as vanilla or almond extract. All of these pantry staples can make economical, delicious hot or cold beverages. And for those of us with shrinking grocery budgets, there is no need to outlay any additional money for the ingredients for these alternative beverages, if we use what is sitting in our cupboards.

Preparing a tisane usually follows one of two approaches, decoction or infusion. The choice of approach is dependent upon how much heat and time a material requires to extract the full flavor. So, for a tough item like cinnamon sticks, whole cloves, cardamom berries, chunks of apple, or a slice of fresh ginger root, a tisane will require greater heat and longer brew time, such as through decoction. Decoction is the term for simmering substances in water for a period of time to extract the full flavor, anywhere from 5 to 30 minutes. Strain out the solid pieces and serve. Stainless steel or enameled pots are recommended for simmered tisanes. Aluminum is reactive and should be avoided.

The approach for extracting flavor from softer material, such as blossoms or leaves, consists of pouring boiled water over the substance and steeping for 3 to 5 minutes. This method is called an infusion. This is all that is necessary to impart the flavor of soft plant matter, and in not subjecting it to prolonged heat, this simplified approach preserves the bright notes of delicate material.

This week, I've been making tisanes with whole cloves, broken pieces of cinnamon sticks, and ground ginger. Ground spices could also be used, but I was not satisfied with using ground cinnamon in my tisane, and heated cinnamon in water becomes slimy. I have used ground cloves to add a bit of a punch to second-batching my spices. If venturing into the world of tisanes interests you, I think something spicy, such as cloves, cinnamon, and ginger is a good starting point, as it is like many teas with which most of us are already familiar.

Second-batching
This is my term for reusing the tisane spices in a new pot of water for a "second batch." I use the same broken piece of cinnamon stick and the whole cloves, plus I add a couple of pinches of ground cloves and ground ginger to the fresh water. After 40 minutes of simmering, I have a fresh pot of the tisane. Second batches seem to require slightly longer simmering time than first batches.

My recipe (if you could call it that) for a spice tisane is 20 whole cloves plus 1/4 teaspoon ground cloves, a 1 1/2-inch piece of cinnamon stick broken into 4 to 6 pieces, and 1/4 to 1/2 teaspoon of ground ginger in 6 cups of cold water. Bring to a boil, then reduce heat and simmer for 30 minutes. A personal preference -- a bit of sweetening brings out the flavor of the spices, while the addition of milk recalls steaming mugs of chai latte.

Leftovers can be stored in a glass jar in the fridge for about 5 days. When making tisanes with whole spices, I store the beverage with the spices still in the liquid. However, when making a tisane with leaves, petals, or fruits, I strain the solids out of the liquid before storing. I think the keeping quality increases when soft material is removed from the liquid. And knowing this, I am more likely to drink the leftover beverage if I believe it has been properly stored.

I have a variety of spices in my cupboards that should make delicious tisanes. I will be experimenting with different blends in the coming months.

Need Some Springtime Cheer?

Here's how my speckled eggs turned out. A reminder, I used regular eggs, blown-out and painted for this project. I had the eggs and paint already, so this didn't cost me anything.

I love how they turned out. And today of all days needed some cheer.

Here are the eggs after putting on about 4 to 5 coats of acrylic paint. I painted in small bits of time, over the course of 3 days.

For speckling the eggs, I placed them all inside of a cardboard box, in the bathtub. The overspray should clean out easily with a little cleanser. I speckled with a toothbrush dipped in paint and rubbed over the tines of a large fork.

There were some blobs of dark paint that needed a little touching up with the original paint. However, that only took a few minutes and then my eggs were ready for display. The nest is Spanish moss in a compote, and the whole arrangement now graces our kitchen table.

The best part of this project was painting the eggs. I listened to some peaceful Gregorian chants while painting. The whole experience was completely relaxing.

The Very Low Grocery Budget

A blog friend wrote to me over the weekend, asking for suggestions for managing a shrinking grocery budget. Without going into details of my friend's situation, I replied, "yes, this is something to which I can very much relate."

About a week ago, I found out that our income would be cut significantly. We have about 2 months advance notice, but I believe that this is no time to delay implementing changes. So, for the foreseeable future, we have cut our food-only grocery budget to $125 per month. To give perspective, my grocery spending had hovered around $225 to $250 per month for the last year. Essentially, right now we have to halve this area of spending. When we sat around talking and asking ourselves if we could do this, the answer was that we don't have any choice right now. So, yes I believe that with God's help, we can do this. What I said to my family was that there would always be plenty of food in the kitchen. It may not be their first choice, but it would be healthful and as delicious as I could make it.

In the coming few weeks, I'll share some of the changes that we have implemented to help reduce our costs. The first is something that has been evolving in our house over the past year and a half and will now be an official part of our plan. You may know, my young adult daughters live at home. Both of them are working currently, and as such, they each have some disposable income. They buy their own "special" foods. If they want a food item that is not on my regular list or within my budget, they know to buy it themselves. This may be chips, chicken nuggets, all-beef hot dogs, pizza rolls, or a particular brand of cookies. They pay for it, and it is theirs. Yes, our cabinets, freezers, and fridge have packages labeled in Sharpie with names, and we all respect each other's property. I believe that this has been a really good experience for them. The two of them are learning to shop smartly and weigh whether or not a particular food-want is truly worth it. So, that was one of my first suggestions to my friend, as I know she has a 17-year old at home who has a part time job. Giving pizza, burger, soda money to her teen could be something that she could let go of. When I was a teen, if I wanted something that my mother wasn't planning on buying for the family, it was up to me to buy it for myself with babysitting money in the early years and part time job money later on.

How we stand right now -- we pretty much depleted our surplus stores of food in February, so I'd say we are close to the position of any other family with a sudden loss of income. I have shopped at 2 of the 3 stores in which I plan on shopping for the month of March and have spent about $87 of the $125. I came across an unheard of price for ground beef a week ago, at 85 cents per pound on mark down, with my Senior discount and stacked with a coupon. This is my stock-up item for the month. I bought 21 pounds at that price. Choosing one especially low-cost item for the month and stocking up on it was my second suggestion to my friend. Had it not been for the ground beef, I would have chosen a 50-lb bag of pinto beans as a stock-up item. I'll save that for next month when my budget is replenished.

Speaking of -- I must go tend to my pot of beans. That's all for now. Hope you are well.

Earning a Small Amount of Money By Logging What I Am Already Doing to Improve My Health

If you don't know this yet, Walgreen's has a program where if you track your healthy and health improvement behaviors, they will reward you in the form of bonus dollars to use in the store. Now, it's not much, but it's basically free money for keeping a daily log of sleep amounts, weight, blood pressure readings, blood glucose readings, exercise, and smoking cessation.

For me, three of these activities are already on my daily list. So, simply logging into Walgreen's site once a day earns me 60 to 80 points daily. In a little over a month's time, I earn $2. Like I said, not a lot of money. However, I think the real value is the motivation that the program provides for me, to keep up with maintaining good health.

There's nothing in it for me if you sign up. I just thought I'd share what I've been doing to keep myself motivated and earn a couple of dollars along the way. Here's the link if this interests you.

Mug Cakes to Go

A little impromptu "picnic" in the mall's food court over the weekend necessitated the making of a super quick, scratch dessert -- mug cakes in mason jars. I mixed the batter in a bowl and divided between 4 small mason jars. Next, I microwaved for 1 minute. Screwed some lids on and we were set for dessert. Yum! Along with sandwiches and bananas, we had a nice little lunch all packed in under 10 minutes.

The food court at our local mall has lots of tables, some near a large fireplace, others up against large windows. It makes a nice place to take a "picnic" on a cold, winter day. Afterward, we did a little window shopping and got in a good walk. Malls are also great places to go for a walk when its cold or rainy outside. Just leave the credit cards at home.

Online Comparison Grocery Shopping

The internet has certainly changed the shopping experience, don't you think? One of the best frugal uses of the internet is to comparison grocery shop between several local stores. No need to keep a price book for stores that provide their prices online. Just pull up your favorite stores and search specific items.

After I took a thorough inventory of our current supplies, I made my list of must-haves to get through the month of March. Then, I pulled up the websites for Fred Meyer, Walmart, and Cash & Carry -- stores which are local for me, are my usual low price go-to's, and have their prices listed online. I went through my must-haves list, one by one, and checked each store's current price per item. From that information, I was able to create a shopping list for these 3 stores in order to get the lowest price on each item.

Some store sites make it easy to find their prices by the user providing their store location of choice and using the search bar. Other stores do make you jump through a very small hoop to get the local store's pricing. Walmart is one such store. That small hoop is the navigation of the site as if you were filling a cart online. For instance, this is my local Walmart, found through the grocery.walmart.com page.

By clicking on the orange box "View Store Details," I am brought to this page. See the orange box that says "Start Shopping Now?" Clicking on that box gets me into the price lists for my store. I can use the search box to access pricing for anything that Walmart carries in that store. There's no need to actually put anything into a virtual cart. I just use the search function until I've gone through my must-haves list, then close that tab.

So, on my laptop, I had tabs open for all three of my favorite stores, which meant I could jump between stores to check for the low price leader for each item. It was pretty easy and assured me that I would be getting those lowest possible prices for my area, with one exception. The exception is a local favorite, WinCo. WinCo does not have an online price list. My best way to quickly access pricing information is with my previous shopping receipts. I also have an idea of what items WinCo usually beats every other store in my area.

Once in the stores, I keep my eyes open for special deals not listed online. This week, I found cabbage at Walmart and ground beef at Fred Meyer at unexpected low prices. I made on-the-spot decisions for how much to buy and what to nix from my list to accommodate these purchases. This week, I saved several dollars by using the internet to comparison shop for groceries, yielding an extension of my rather small budget to include more food for our household. I do this for other products. It only makes sense to do this for grocery shopping, as well.

Do you compare grocery prices online, too? What other ways have you found to comparison shop for your groceries?

How My Canning Jar Ring/Lid Looks Painted

Just thought I'd show you what the painted version of the glued-together lid looks.

The whole project took just minutes to glue and spray paint. But I think the end result is a canister that looks respectable sitting on the countertop. I may still add a decorative knob on top, or may not. I'll see how I feel when I do a couple more jars to complement this one. I have an area of the counter dedicated to making hot beverages -- a little coffee and tea station.
Just thought I'd share the finished painted look.

On Amazon, a single, one-piece black mason jar lid sells for about $1.33 (in a pack of 6 for over $8).

I was able to make my own version for free, using what I had on hand (used lid and ring, and spray paint from another project many years ago). I'll be using this idea for lids for some mason jars candles that I am making as gifts.

Springtime Craft/Decor Project: Speckled Eggs

I see these in the stores every spring. I think they're beautiful and always wish to buy a package for myself, but they seem kind of expensive, at about $15 for a dozen. Well this year, I'm making my own. I have acrylic paints in a variety of shades -- blues, greens, brown, black, and white. And I've begun saving whole eggshells. I've been blowing out the contents of eggs as I've needed them.

So far, I have 5 intact shells. I am working toward a dozen speckled eggs. After blowing the insides out, I wash them out with hot soapy water, shaking up the water inside the eggs to get them clean. I've set the carton next to a heat vent to dry them thoroughly.

Once I have enough, I'll seal the holes with paintable caulk, then paint and speckle. I hope to have these done by mid-March. I'll share photos once I get them painted.

Supplies needed for making speckled decor eggs: intact hollow eggshells, painters' caulk, acrylic paint, paintbrush, toothbrush.

Updated:
To blow eggs: wash the exterior of the egg and dry; use a pin or needle to poke a small hole (like in the above photo) in the pointed end; in the flatter end, poke a slightly larger hole, using a small nail to enlarge the hole made with a pin (if it cracks just a little -1/4 inch long cracks, that should be okay as it will be covered up with painter's caulk); blow through the pointed end, every so often using the pin/needle to break up clogs and the yolk through the flatter end hole. Blowing eggs with smallish holes can be troublesome. The trick is to get the hole size just right. You could try slightly a slightly larger hole than what I've pictured. I wanted minimal caulking to perform on my eggs, but will experiment with a larger bottom hole in the next one I blow out.

this is the size of hole on the flat end of the egg

For fun, I also thought I'd show you some other eggs I have blown out, with larger holes in the flat ends. These are for confetti eggs. If you ever read the Tightwad Gazette, the author mentions making confetti eggs for her kids when they were young. The holes are larger so that you can fill the eggs with confetti. The eggs are dyed after blowing out but before filling with confetti. Once filled, the large hole is "patched" with a small square of colored tissue paper and white glue. When my kids were in the 6 to 13 age range, they enjoyed having a bunch of these eggs to throw, smash, and shatter on Easter (outside, of course!). These five eggs are leftovers from many years ago. I'm waiting for some younger friends to whom I shall give these.

Surprise Meal Inspiration When Whittling Down the Fridge, Freezer, and Pantry

As I mentioned a little over a week ago, in early February, we decided to halt grocery shopping and use up as much as possible from our freezers (3) and fridges (2). It's actually been kind of fun to see what we have, then make something from it. It's also been great to have those "instant" meals of frozen leftovers. We did run out of milk last week, with no plans to buy more until March. As none of us rely heavily on milk for nutrition, this is no big deal. Whereas many households use cereal as a mainstay for breakfast, our family has always been happy to have alternate quick foods like banana bread or toast, which maybe supplemented with a slice of cheese or yogurt (while that lasted). I was going to say that we are also running low on fruit, until I began listing what we do have. We have a handful of tangerines, raisins, dried cranberries, dried prunes, bottled lemon juice, frozen blueberries, frozen blackberries, frozen plums, frozen cranberries, frozen orange zest, and frozen juice concentrate. I'd hardly say that is the same as "running out of fruit!" We also have a good amount of vegetables, in canned, frozen, and fresh forms.And, there is still meat in the freezer. The good news is that eating down the freezer is requiring us to use the pieces that no one has really wanted, such as the leftover turkey legs from Thanksgiving.

Despite still having quite a lot of food, just thinking that we're not grocery shopping for most of the month adds a suggestion to our subconscious that we are being deprived. In response, I have gone above and beyond what is called for to make sure my household feels that there is plenty of great food left. I have pulled out several boxes of snacky foods, such as crackers, granola bars, and pop-tarts. I moved the case of Cup Noodles to a front and center spot in the pantry. I made chocolate peanut clusters, 2 loaves of banana bread, roasted some raw almonds, boiled some eggs, and made more flat soda jello. My daughter made cereal-marshmallow squares (rice crispy treats with other cereal) and a blackberry pie. We were out of hot dog buns so I used corn tortillas and made hot dog taquitos to go with frozen sweet potato fries for dinner one night. Another night, I pulled frozen eggs and cooked yams from the freezer, plus 1  1/2 softening apples from the fridge to make a frittata, sweet potato casserole, and an apple and raisin crisp. When I was tempted to buy a chocolate treat for myself one afternoon, I came home and made a tiny batch of chocolate covered almonds, using chocolate chips and some of the roasted almonds.

Still, today and the next few days will prove to be the most challenging for meal and snack prep, as our supplies continue to dwindle. One freezer is now empty. Taking a quick survey of what's left, we've and made tentative plans for the week's meals. I found a block of turkey breakfast sausage and a bag of prunes to use in a breakfast for dinner meal tonight. My daughter will be making a pumpkin and chicken sausage soup along with another blackberry pie, all using frozen ingredients, for tomorrow night's dinner. Friday night, I'll make something Tex-Mex themed, using some frozen cornbread, frozen cooked beans, cheddar cheese, frozen canned tomatoes, onions, and seasonings. The amazing thing is that I think we could probably go another 10 days without shopping and still eat well.

We may have been mildly inconvenienced, but we accomplished a couple of significant goals. We used up foods that had been lingering for a long time and might have been thrown away at some point, due to the deterioration of food quality. We saved a lot of money on groceries this month, spending approximately $90 for February, which is about $130 under budget. We proved to ourselves that we don't need as much variety as we think we do. We found new possibilities for meals and snacks. Of course, we'll be happy to have our supplies replenished in early March. It is nice to get things cleaned out, every once in a while.

The message that I get from this experience is that most of us probably have a couple hundred dollars worth of food in storage. Should any difficult financial situation arise, most of us could live for several weeks without spending any money on food. It's like a little emergency savings account.

Turning Used Canning Jar Lids/Rings into Storage Jar Lids

You know this, right? For dry storage, you can hot glue canning jar lids and rings together to make lids for storage jars and canisters.

I found that this works best when I apply the hot glue to the lid edge (as opposed to the inside of the ring). I can get the glue on faster and press the lid into the ring before the glue sets up. I allow the glue to firm up for a couple of hours before using the "new" one-piece lid. The great thing is I used pieces that might otherwise end up in the garbage. The lid has been used in canning, while the ring is showing some rust inside.

This is the lid to my new coffee canister. I'll be spray painting the lid and attaching a knob later this week.

How Serendipitous!

About a year ago, I found this Spode cup at Goodwill for $1.99. Then last weekend, I found the saucer at Value Village for $1.99. A matching cup and saucer for $3.98! These pieces in this pattern sell for a minimum of $10.00 on ebay. I'm pretty certain that I could get $10.00 for the pair at a garage sale in my area. But I won't sell them, at least not yet. I'll get some enjoyment from the pair for a little while. I love treasure hunting at thrift stores. I find the loveliest items for a fraction of what similar pieces would cost if new!

Water Flavoring Squeezy Thingies

Okay, so I got this water flavoring as a freebie at Fred Meyer this past fall. I discovered that I really like this stuff. However, I'm not about to spend $2.99 to buy more when the majority of the cost is the plastic container. So, I set out to make my own, reusing the container from the used-up freebie item.

Basically, this stuff is artificially-sweetened, fruit flavoring. You squirt a little bit into a glass of water and it colors and adds a hint of flavor to a glass of water. I like this because I drink more water if I use it. It's not super strong, like a glass of punch, but just lightly flavored. The way that the container works prevents one from using enough to make a glass of super sweet water. And if artificially-flavored Kool-aid isn't one's thing, then this is also possible to make with lemon juice and stevia or other powdered sweetener.

I was super pleased that the lid just screwed off. The place on the container where the lid meets the bottle was concealed beneath the plastic wrapping. After twisting off the cap, I mixed some Kool-aid powder and a couple of packets of artificial sweetener in about 1 tablespoon of water, then poured it into the squeeze bottle. I sampled some squeezed into a glass of water and adjusted the Kool-aid and sweetener until one or two squeezes was just right for my taste. That's it. I keep this in the fridge and expect to go through it in about 3 weeks or so, at which point I'll wash it out and refill, probably trying lemon juice and stevia or Splenda.