Eat From The Pantry Challenge

Yesterday I posted my goals this next year regarding our grocery budget plus some personal goals. Today I read the post at Money Saving Mom . She and FishMama are putting out a challenge to eat out of the pantry, freezer and refrigerator from Jan 1 to Jan 31. Cutting spending on groceries and put the difference to charity, debt or savings.

Those who are joining in are linking their posts and setting up their own challenges and plans.
http://www.moneysavingmom.com/money_saving_mom/2009/12/eat-from-the-pantry-challenge-my-goals-and-plans-and-come-link-up-yours-too.html

Hubby and I talked about it tonight and think we can cut our costs and put the extra into our savings plan for $1000 emergency fund. So instead of $62.50 I will cut this down as close to 50 percent as possible or 31.25 a week.

1. we will be buying dairy and produce as needed each week

2 we do not have a big freezer so will buy some meat. We buy a rotisserie chicken every week and will continue to do this plus what is else is needed for my menu plans.

3 plan menus around what I do have in the pantry and in refrigerator

4. I will allow myself to buy items that are free or close to free.

5. We do go out to eat on Sunday's with family plus again during the week for lunch. This comes from another envelope. I would like to see how I can cut this back during January adding that to our emergency fund.

If you are interested in joining us post your challenge on your blog and just comment here and at Money Saving Mom . Please go to Money Saving Mom and read the other posts. Everyone is coming up with their own plan and will be sharing recipes and ideas. Should be fun to see how we all do during January.

So between now and January 1st I will take stock of my pantry and plan some menu ideas around what I have. Anyone have any ideas for corn flakes and tomato soup. I am really stocked up on these thanks to good deals and coupons.

Thanks For Stopping By... Lets Keep Saving Together ... Grace

2010 Budget Plans

Dear hubby and I have been working on our 2010 budget. Our biggest problem is we are in our 60's and semi retired. There is not enough income to cover all the out go. Our biggest challenge is to pay our own health insurance mainly mine.
I am pleased to see so many young people working on budgets, paying off debt and building up savings. I heard all this 40 years ago but never did any of it. I just built up debt and put off saving for retirement. We lived in the moment. Now our retirement is not what someone would want.
So here we are 61 and 66 years old and working part time jobs. We have a some debt mainly a car loan of under $10,800. But each month we are struggling to keep that part time money coming in and trying to sell on eBay for extra cash. We have sold on eBay since 1998 but with economy we are making less than in the past.
We will as in the past do taxes at H R Block for the season and this will give us income, but could interfer with the other part time income and not put us ahead. Time will tell.

So for 2010 our goals are to
Make enough money every month to cover the shortage of $1200 or cut back where necessary to balance the month.
Build up a $1000 emergency fund . We will be putting $150 a month into savings to do this. Savings is very little since my life insurance bill is due end of year and we did not have all money needed.
Give at least $300 a month to the church ear marking it to the needy or Salvation Army to feed the hungry.
Put money into a traveling budget so we can go home to Minnesota to see our children in 2010. and have an end of the year trip. We were not able to travel home this year.
Budget $250 a month for groceries and personal items . Should there be any money left over it will roll to next month grocery fund so if there is a refund I want to do I can have a build up of cash.
Budget $250 a month for eating out. Should not all this money be spent it will go into savings for our emergency fund.
Once emergency fund is at $1,000 then extra money will be put on car loan to pay if off sooner.
End of season at H R Block if there is a bonus this will be put either on emergency fund or car loan.
Any extra rewards at CVS, Walgreens etc will be used for groceries or personal items.
Refund / Rebates will go into emergency fund. I am waiting $58.00 in rebates to still come.

On a personal note
I want to excercise at least 3 times a week
Lose a total of 40 pounds over the year
Declutter my home, selling excess on ebay.

Are you preparing for next years budget and goals. I would love to hear your plans.

Thanks For Stopping By... Lets Keep Saving Together ... Grace

Eating Out On Less Dollars .. Using a Coupon at One of Our Favorite Pizza Joint

Today before grocery shopping we stopped at one of our favorite pizza places. Pepperonis Pizza Joint in Richmond Texas. We love the Peperoni special with pepperoni, green peppers, black olives, and tomato slices. Crust is thin and sauce is spicy just right.
My coupon savings book had a coupon for 50 percent off a medium pizza. We added to soda's and our total bill with a tip was $12.44.
This is our third eating out with a coupon from the entertainment book.
Cost of Entertainment Book was $30.00, so far we have saved $17.00 eating out. You can now find this same book at half off on the internet. Next year I probably will wait to get it half off.

Thanks For Stopping By... Lets Keep Saving Together ... Grace

End of the Week Grocery Challenge Round up

Time to add up my grocery receipts and see how for the week ending the 18th. I had gone to Walgreen's twice , Kroger's once and Randall's once for a total of $31.63.

First trip was to Walgreens.I love FREE . Walgreens was offering 3 small cans of Tomato Sauce with in ad coupon. for $1.00. There was an internet coupon available to print. $1/3 printable coupon



Second trip was also to Walgreens Quick to Walgreen's today for some of their deals. Picked up 4 cans of Campbell's Cream of Chicken soup 69 cents each with in ad sale, 2 Coffee mates 2 for $3.00 , 3 cans of Progresso Soup for 99 cents each and 3 cans of hunts tomato sauce 3 for $1.00 with in ad coupon. Also picked up 6 bottles of coke 3 for $4.00. In additional all bottles had coupons on them offering $1.00 off 4 bottles Had coupons for everything and oop cost was $16.38.

Add a stop at Kroger's for Blue Bell Ice Cream on sale for $2.99 each, buying 2 for $5.98. A savings of 53 percent.

Last a stop for dairy products and bread at Randalls for a total of $9.27 at a savings of 25 percent.

So groceries for the week cost me $31.63 with 3 trips out to eat costing us 56.26 for a total of 87.89 less than our $125.00 budget. Total so far for the month is $179.51 for total food at home and eating out which is $70.49 under budget.

So how is your food budget doing so far this month. My goal is to eat out less and stay under budget. So far we are doing okay.

Thanks For Stopping By... Lets Keep Saving Together ... Grace

Whats For dinner How About Some Meat Loaf

What's For Dinner tonight is Meat Loaf with lipton onion soup mix. We really love the taste. Will eat half tonight with baked potatoes and spinach. Tomorrow night will have home made hash with left over baked potatoes and meat loaf. Recipe is at this earlier post if you are interested in trying it http://couponloversunite.blogspot.com/search/label/Recipe%20Collection%20Meatloaf

This is one of our favorite dinners. I only use 1 pound of hamburger. You could easily double the recipe for larger family or freeze one meat loaf for future dinner.

Thanks For Stopping By... Lets Keep Saving Together ... Grace

Menu Planning Monday

Time to get out my plan this week for dinners. A little late but better to plan it out late than not at all.
Monday Tonight we ate left overs of our Rotasserie Chicken, made Yukon Gold Instant potatoes that had been on sale, Chicken gravy bought on sale and peas.
Tuesday We will have home made Meat Loaf and Baked Potatoes. We bought 10 pounds a while back and need to use some of them. My meat loaf has onion soup mix mixed in and is fantastic.
Wednesday we will have the left over meat loaf and baked potatoes and make a fantastic hash out of it. Cook up some Over Medium eggs to go with it. Breakfast for dinner yummy
Thursday Grilled Cheese and Tomato Soup with Chips ( have to work till 8 pm easy fast dinner)
Friday Home made Spagetti Sauce over Pasta and hot bread
Saturday Burritos and Refried Beans
Sunday Leftovers

Thanks For Stopping By ... Lets Keep Saving... Grace

Grocery Cart Challange Balancing the Food Budget 12/11

Time to balance out my food budget for the week of 12/6 to 12/11.
First trip to Randalls was just for salt hate running out of salt. Needed to get water so easy to run in for one item and walk the aisle to see if anything good happening. oop 62 cents
Next time was also Randalls to shop with my e coupons was a good shopping trip. Total oop $23.15 with savings of $34.12 or 60 percent.
Last trip was also to Randalls for my Nabisco Crackers for my $10.00 rebate and for the Viva Paper Towels much needed. Total oop was $18.40 with savings of $21.78 or 55 percent.

Total spent on groceries was $45.55 and we will get back $10.00 for the rebate.

Went out to eat a total of 3 times for lunch with a total cost of $46.07.

Total spent this week on food was $91.62 which is less than our allotted $125.00 a week

Whats For Dinner Pea Soup Tonight for under $5.00

Made pea soup last week with the ham bone left over from Thanksgiving dinner, yes some at the dinner did not like Turkey. Glad my sister made a Turkey for hubby and me and a couple of the others.
Pea soup was so good thought we would do another batch. Snowing and cold in Houston. Yes Snowing. I left Minnesota because of snow and here it is snowing. Will melt fast I hope.
Decided to try add a few more items for
Tonight's Thrifty Pea Soup

1 cup of chopped onion cost me .... 25 cents



1/2 Tablespoon of garlic 10cents
oil for sauteing



1/2 tsp of oregano 10 cents
1/2 tbl of salt
1 tsp of pepper
1 cup of diced potatoes ... 40 cents
2 small carrots diced ..30 cents



1 celery stalk diced ..30 cents



1 pound of dried split peas ... 99 cents
8 cups of water or chicken stock ( free I used water )



and diced ham ... $1.62




In a large Dutch oven over medium heat, we sauteed onion in oil until transparent.
Added some garlic, tablespoon of salt, teaspoon of pepper to the onion.
To this added 8 cups of water, small carrots, celery and potatoes peeled and diced and dried split peas. And finally cut up the other half of the ham piece we bought yesterday for scalloped potatoes with ham.
Bring to a boil then simmer for about 40 minutes or until peas are soft. Serves 5 to 6




Turned out great, was so tasty and so frugal. Cost us $4.00 for this pot of soup and we will get 2 meals out of it. We added the left over Pillsbury Grand Biscuits from last night and had dinner for under $5.00

Thrifty Shopping and Several Dinner Ideas

Pantry is full but still needed a couple of items to make it through the week. Went to Randall's to buy a Rotisserie Chicken and since I had 12 boxes of Betty Crocker Au Gratin Potatoes ( have coupons for Cola bottles) figured it was a good idea to buy a ham slice.

Picked up a bag of peas to make pea soup with part of the ham slice.

So for a few items in the pantry and $ 10.56 spent at Randall's I have at least 5 + dinners

Ham and Scalloped Potatoes with Pillsbury Grands ( have a few in the refrid)

Pea Soup with left over Grands

Chicken with potatoes, I bought 10 pounds earlier this week.

Pea Soup later in the week

and with left over chicken we can a have home made Chicken soup. Our recipe is fantastic and that will give us more than 1 meal.

Good tasting and frugal eating. Plus I added a bag of Tidy Cat Litter that I had a coupon for and had added to my Randall's card from one of the Internet sites. Tidy cat ended up costing us 79 cents.

20 Ways To Save At The Grocery Store

I just read a great posting on 20 ways to save at the grocery store. All put together nice and clear. Take a jump over there to read what Wicked Cool Deals has to say.

http://www.wickedcooldeals.com/2009/02/20-ways-to-save-at-grocery-store.html

I use most of these ideas and feel it is important not only to save for my own family but hopefully be an example for others in my family. In turn I want to be able to help you out there reading to save money on groceries and eating out.

I have made so many mistakes, have spent so many years not using coupons seriously or doing rebates. Today I look forward to reading the grocery ads and blogs to find the best deals.

We have never had so much food in our pantry ever. My pantry is getting fuller by the day. I have a main list on my pantry door telling me what I have and how much.

It gives me a sense of comfort knowing I have a good stock of coffee, soup , food items, and laundry products. If it was necessary, I could go without buying some of these items from a few weeks to months.

Eating Out On Less Dollars .. Using a Coupon at a Pizza Joint

Today was the last day of a 6 days of Tax classes. Glad it is over for the time being.

We planned ahead and knew there was a CiCi Pizza place within blocks of school. Had never been there before so perfect time to try it out.

Ci Ci is a Pizza place that is mainly a buffet featuring Salad bar, 2 pasta choices ( same pasta with 2 sauces)

and several types of Pizza to choose from plus cheesy bread. They even have a couple of desert choices like pizza crust with a apple pie filling ( to sweet for me)

Food was good, prices fair, and they kept busy adding more Hot Pizzas and picking up plates. Cost of Entertainment Book $30.00

Total saved $5.00 with coupon today .. Total of bill $10.36 .. Total saved so far $10.00

Eating Out On Less Dollars .. Using a Coupon at a Sports Bar and Grill

As many of you know hubby and I eat out at lunch time alot. We wander around looking for things to buy and sell on the internet, we are involved with going to school to do taxes for the third year at H & R Block and usually eat out before class.
To try to cut our costs even more I have bought the Entertainment Book for the Houston area. With using this book and using the coupons from the Sunday paper or local papers we should be able to eat out on a few less dollars.
And we should be able to eat at places we may not have tried before.
Last Sunday we went to church with my sister and her hubby. After church we always go out to dinner. This time I looked in my Entertainment book and found a coupon for a Sports Bar and grill we had ate at once before. Food was okay and was real close to a used book I wanted to visit.
So off we drive and visit the Stadia Sports Grill in Katy Texas.
What was I thinking every TV was on and all to different football games. We are not sports people and it was blaring loud in there.
Oh well everyone else was happy and enjoying the football games and that is really what it is about.
Food was very good ( I had a barbecue hamburger that was very tasty and would buy again ) We ate our hamburgers and scooted off to a nice quiet bookstore.
We will probably stop by this sports bar again but it will be in the middle of a week at lunch time when it is quiet like a used bookstore.
We saved $5.00 on our lunch bill ... total of bill plus tip was $11.91 Total saved so far $5.00 with coupons

Organizing My Pantry before and after Pictures

After doing my earlier post about making Thanksgiving and the holidays easier and taking a picture of my pantry, I realized it has gotten out of hand.

I have never had so much food in my cupboard and that is great but I need to start finding ways to use some of it up over the next few weeks. This is not saying I won't buy the great deals I find, but in the same time want to clear out the old as I bring in more.

Right now in my cupboard I have

20 Hamburger Helper ( the majority of these were bought at Walmart on the clearance shelf for 50 cents each and I had coupons

6 Macaroni and Cheese Jiffy cups ( quick lunch )

11 Jars of Ragu Spagetti sauce

13 Betty Crocker Au Gratin Pototatoes ( these have coupons on them for liter Coke bottles)

5 Packages of Velvetta Macaroni and Cheese or Kraft Macaroni Cheese

5 Jiffy Blue Berry Muffin packages

6 Jiffy Corn Bread Muffin packages

1/3 of a package of Instant mash potatoes

1 Pasta Roni

2 1/3 boxes of Elbow Macaroni pasta

4 packages of Idahoan Mash Potatoes

1 Jello pudding

3 Jello

1 package of Taco Shells

1 package of Banquet Homestyle Bakes Creamy Cheesy Chicken Alfredo

1/2 package of Bisquick

1 Free Sample of Betty Crocker Potatoes

1 package of Carnation Instant Breakfast

1 1/2 bottles of Ranch dressing

1 bottle of Italian dressing

5 Bumble Bee Albacore Tuna packages

8 cans of Campbell Tomato soup

3 cans of Mushroom soup

3 Progresso Soup

1 Campbell Select Soup

2 cans of Rotel Tomatoes

10 cans of Hunts Diced Tomatoes with spices

1 can of peas

2 cans of popeye spinach

3 cans of Chicken gravy

5 Jars of Salsa

4 Cans of Hormel Chili

3 Jars of Peanut Butter

2 mustard

3 Lea & Perrins Worchester Sauce

1 Miracle Whip

5 + boxes of Cereal

3 boxes of Quaker Instant Oatmeal

4 + cans of Coffee

2 packages of Taco seasoning

1/2 package of Lipton Soup Mix

2 1/2 packages of Lipton to Go

plus samples of ceareal, and nutrition bars

This list shows what I have a lot of and what I have little of. I will print out this list and cross off as I use items or add items when I buy.

This is just the pantry items need to do an inventory list on items in linen closet and laundry, cleaning areas of home and put a list of that.

There is the before and the after picture of my pantry now. Not perfect but sure a lot better.

Coupons In Your Parade Magazine in Sunday Paper

Be sure to look through your Parade Magazine before throwing out your Sunday Paper. There are some coupons in there.

I found a coupon for $1 off 2 Oreda Steam and Mash Potatoes or Ore Ida Hash Browns, a coupon for $2.00 off The Fragrance Collection by Glade ( nice little gift for some one), $1.00 off Niva Body Wash

These coupons could vary around the country. You may have the same or maybe different. If you find different coupons comment here so others will know.

Thanks for stopping by.. Lets Keep Saving Together ... Grace

Grocery Cart Challenge Balancing the Food Budget

My shopping is sporatic. Some weeks I buy hardly anything and then we may have a mega shopping trip and I am there almost every day looking for deals.
I keep all receipts so I can see what and where we are spending our food money.

Part of our life is going out in the day to hunt for treasures to sell on eBay. This is always over the noon hour so on these days we eat out. I know we could cut back and bring a sandwich but to us eating out is part of the experience. Our treasure hunting is not on a daily basis, since we do part time work for my nephew and this can get in the way of hunting, but is sure money which means food and gas money.

So back to the budget. We have a weekly budget of $125.00 for the two of us for groceries and paper supplies etc and eating out..

My week runs Sunday to Saturday

Week 1 ... 10/4 to 10/10 Groceries $5.45

Week 2 .... 10/11 to 10/17 Groceries $63,64

Week 3 ... 10/18 to 10/24 Groceries 0 money spent

Week 4 ... 10/25 to 10/31 Groceries $117.19 ( Mega Sale Week)

Total for these 4 weeks was $186.28 or an average of $46.57

Week 1 ... 10/4 to 10/10 Eating Out $ 56.66

Week 2 .... 10/11 to 10/17 Eating Out $ 56.99

Week 3 ... 10/18 to 10/24 Eating Out $107.49

Week 4 ... 10/25 to 10/31 Eating Out $77.44

Total for these 4 weeks $298.58 or an average of $74.65

This averages out $121.22 a week so with in our weekly budget when averaged out.

Interesting to put in on paper and look at it. You see what really happened in this household. How are you doing with staying within your budget

Next topic of discussion will be how can hubby and I eat out at lunch time the days we hunt for treasures and bring down that cost.

I have joined in on grocery cart challenge. Take a look at how others are doing. Leave a comment here and there to let others know you have stopped by.

http://grocerycartchallenge.blogspot.com/2009/11/gcc-shopping-round-up.html

Thanks for stopping by ... Lets Keep Saving .. Grace

Whats For Dinner Home Made Meat Loaf Hash

One great part of having meat loaf and baked potatoes for dinner is there is left overs that make a wonderful hash. And it makes a great quick dinner. Fry up an egg , make a piece of toast and dinner is on. Best of all this delicious meal cost me hardly anything.

Thanks for stopping by ... Lets Keep Saving ... Grace

Menu Plan For The Week What Will Be For Dinner ?

Menu plans are never set in stone in this house. Last week I never made my Chicken Soup or the Meat Loaf.

Tonight ( Monday ) was my meat loaf dinner and turned out very good I am pleased to say

Tomorrow ( Tuesday ) is bible study so will have left over Spaghetti from Sunday dinner. Will be a late lunch / early dinner.

Wednesday will be home made hash using the left over meat loaf and baked potatoes Will add a easy over egg to top it off. Will bake some more potatoes for tomorrow nights dinner.

Thursday will be Home made Leftover Baked Potato Soup ( using some more of that 10 pounds of potatoes). I have not tried this but found the recipe at http://www.foodnet.com/ , so will give it a try. Will add some Pillsbury Grand biscuits.

Friday Hamburger Helper with ground beef and vegie. ( have lots of hamburger helper in pantry from a sale at Walmart a while back

Saturday Campbells Tomato Soup and Grilled Cheese Sandwiches.

Sunday dinner out with family after Church .. Left overs for a later meal.

Whats For dinner How About Some Meat Loaf

I had planned to have meat loaf last week but with things happening around here, I did not get to make it.
With Krogers having ground chuck on sale, tonight was the night. And it was great. We added Baked pototoes and Squash.
My recipe for meat loaf is off the Lipton Onion soup box. The box calls for two pounds of hamburger. I cut the recipe in half for the two of us.
To the hamburger I added 1/2 package of onion soup mix, 1 egg, 1/3 cup water,a couple of tablespoons of ketshup, 8 crushed saltine crackers and a 1/2 tsp of Worchester sauce. Baked for an hour.

And best of all we have half a meat loaf and several potatoes for homemade hash for early dinner tomorrow night.

Whats For Dinner Home Made Spaghetti Sauce

Whats for dinner tonight was home made Spaghetti Sauce over pasta.

Tasty with spice added. Oh so easy to make. We used 3/4 of a pound of hamburger. Browned and drained any grease.

Added 1 tsp of basil, oregano, thyme, pepper and 1 tsp of onion / garlic mixture. Plus 1/2 tsp of salt.

To this we add 1 Jar of Ragu sauce and 1 can of diced tomatoes. Simmer for about 45 minutes. Cook and drain spaghetti noodles and warm up some french bread with garlic butter.

Perfect for a Sunday or any night dinner.

Budgeting Our Financial Future

I was over at Pocket Your Dollars reading about her financial situation and I can relate totally with her.

We got our selves way over our head in debt. We now are living with no credit cards and have very little debt. We are working on a budget and if there is no money we are done spending.

Our biggest problem is, with the cost of health insurance which we have to pay our selves and life insurance there is more outgo than income.

There is somethings we have to do without. We can not give gifts like we would like to do to our children and grandchildren. There is no traveling for now and I do not go shopping, except for grocery deals and to thrift stores to look for items to sell on the Internet.

Our one entertainment is going out to eat mainly at lunch time and this has to stay within our food / entertainment budget of $125 a week.

We listen to David Ramsey on the radio and have his books. Our debt is lower than it was but we borrowed to buy a used car recently rather than buying a $1,000 beater we should have saved for.

Our goals for now is to save $1,000 emergency fund and then pay off the car as fast as we can.

This weeks update. .. We did poor. Went over our food / entertainment budget by $20.00. Does not sound to bad until I see that more than 3/4 of the budget went to eating out.
Savings for emergency fund is $110.55
Balance needed $889.45

We are trying to work extra hours at our part time job with my nephew, to build our Internet book business and as we have done the last two years we will work part time for H R Block.

I will try to give updates on Fridays on our progress and I hope that you will join me.

This week I have to admit we went out to eat way to often. Easy to do when you are out hunting thrift stores and estate sales during the day time.

I would love to hear from you and how you are doing with living within a budget.

Whats For Dinner Monday Night .. Beef Stroganoff

Last night my dh made his tasty Beef Stroganoff. Shortly after starting to date he came to my home and made this for me and won my heart. Twenty years later he still makes it for me and has my heart.

He cuts up a piece of beef , bought just under one pound,

sautes the beef, spices the beef with garlic and onion. Once beef is browned he adds 2 cans of beef gravy, 2 cans of mushroom soup

and lets that simmer while cooking the No Yolk Egg noodles.

At the end just before we are ready to eat he adds a small container of sour cream and lets that simmer for a bit.

Add hot french bread and what a dinner you have at home.

Best of all there is plenty left for us to have another dinner this week.

My Recipe Collection

My recipe collection is like my coupon collection in a three ring binder. It has recipes in my hand writing, my friends or mother's handwriting and recipes clipped. All are put into mylar pages.

Recipes that I have not tried are in a folder and stuck into binder.

When we find one we like it goes into a mylar page and added to the others.

Some of these recipes go back 30 years and are reminders of those I use to work with.

Fun memories as I look thru my recipes. I also love to buy and sell cookbooks on eBay. As I wait

to sell them they are also fun to search through for recipes to try. How do you keep your

collection of recipes. Are you daring to try new things or cook same recipes over and over like I

tend to do.

Thanks for stopping by.. Lets Keep Saving.. Grace

Menu Plan Sunday

Menu planning is one way to save money using what is in my cupboard and what sounds good us.

Hubby and I love pasta and left overs are a part of our life.

This week 's plan for dinner is

Monday

Hubby's Special Beef Stroganoff and French Bread with garlic

Tuesday

Rotisserie Chicken, Mashed Potatoes, vegetables

Wednesday

Home made Chicken Vegetable Soup, Pillsbury Grand Biscuits

Thursday

Left over Beef Stroganoff and left over Pillsbury biscuits

Friday

Our Home made Spaghetti Sauce over noodles and French Bread with Garlic

Saturday

Meat Loaf, Baked Potatoes and Vegetables

Sunday

Dinner out with family after Church

Lunches will be soup or sandwiches

Breakfasts are cereal or eggs and toast, or bagels with cream cheese

Grocery list for week is

Rotisserie Chicken

Beef for stroganoff

2 # Hamburger

Lunch Meat and Cheese

1 bag Frozen mixed Vegetables

Baking Potatoes

French Bread

Sour Cream

Peanut Butter

garlic

thyme

plus any good deals I see out there.

Will post recipes as we cook this week

Friday Night Balancing The Food Budget Or How Did We Do This Week

How is your grocery budget going. Are you staying on track, going over or spending less than bugeted every week/ month.

Until the last few months we never had a definite food and gas budget. Then things changed in our home and the budget began. With the budget came reading blogs online and mine began.

I have couponed and rebated off and on for years but never steady, I never tracked our living expenses either. We had our budget to pay the bills and when the money ran out we used credit cards. Now we are living on a cash basis and when the money runs out we are done for the week or month.

I have begun to coupon heavier, to do deals at Walgreens and CVS, to watch for sales at the grocery stores. I watch for rebates on thing we like or want to try and to build up a stock pile of food, paper products and cleaning products.

My week goes Friday thru Thursday. This last week we spent a total of $54.60 on groceries and household items. A lot considering others on line budget $10.00 per week per person and there is only 2 of us. This comes to over $25.00 per person.
I do have a large stock pile of pasta items, laundry soap, personal items. I could go awhile without spending there if I chose.

With menu planning, picking and choosing the deals better and not buying because it is a good deal I may be able to cut this down some. Hubby is pleased that we are budgeting, using cash only and thinks we are doing so much better, and I have to agree with him.
So how are you doing with your budgets. I look forward to hearing from you.

Whats For Dinner Using Pillsbury Grands

With all the offerings at Randalls with Pillsbury products I suggested we should use some of ours for dinner tonight.

Hubby and I made an easy chicken stew and placed over the freshly baked biscuits.

We used 1 1/2 cups of cut up chicken from a Rotasserie Chicken we bought earlier this week.

Placed in a kettle and added 2 cans of chicken gravy. Then we added a handful of frozen mixed vegatables left over from making soup last week.

Baked our biscuits while stew was simmering and then placed stew mixture over the hot Pillsbury Grand biscuits. Was really quite good and will be made again for sure.