Links for FLL

Videos from Saturday

https://goo.gl/photos/1X1A7arDrvhi7p1T6

https://goo.gl/photos/ccGi51DePKPrKbZj6

https://goo.gl/photos/PNudvCKqstjGmf2u8

I didn't get a video of their project skit.

We are Scrapbusters! Best score of three counts.

Our giveaway is pig erasers and fast food erasers. Our problem we identified was waste from buffets and our solution was to have restaurants collect the food waste and have pig farmers pick it up!

This week's menu with recipes

So a friend was looking for suggestions for her menu this week. I shared our menu and am now sharing the recipes.

Monday - Pork Steaks, baked potatoes, cooked carrots, raw cauliflower 
(Sorry no recipes - I boiled the carrots and then put olive oil, garlic salt and salt and pepper on them and then put then in the crock pot. They are good roasted in the oven too. My husband cooked the meat.) We found it actually a little odd last night that we were having a meat, potato, veggie meal. The traditional "American meal" doesn't really happen very often in our house.

Tuesday - Roasted Tomato Pasta 
(adding artichoke is really yummy too)
We will be eating this with the person whose recipe card I took a picture of! 

Wednesday - Vegetarian Tortilla Stew (doubled)

http://allrecipes.com/recipe/vegetarian-tortilla-stew/

Red enchilada sauce works just as well as the green called for in the recipe. I make my own beans from dried and will use what I have either pinto or black or a combo. (My family will probably put in some real chicken too left over from Sunday.)

Thursday - Frittata 

(using extra baked potatoes from Monday instead of hashbrowns)

http://www.pamperedchef.com/recipe/Breakfast%7CBrunch/Cheesy+Ham+%26+Potato+Frittata/13403

I'll vary the veggies/toppings that I use based on what is in the frig! I use this as a guide. I put in as many eggs that I think we will eat (or have) and use what potatoes I have on hand. We like the left over sliced baked potatoes.

Friday - Potato Curry Soup

This is from an old cooking magazine that I will need to add later. It's made with potatoes and evaporated milk, ginger and curry powder. A friend made it with coconut milk and said it was delicious.

Saturday - Cheddar Chowder with Wild Rice

Here is the family favorite recipe and I will add wild rice because I was given some wild rice. The rice gives it a nice texture.

Cheddar Chowder

2 cups Water

2 cups chopped potatoes

½ cups chopped carrots

½ cups chopped celery

¼ cups chopped onion

1 ½ teaspoon salt

¼ teaspoon pepper

1 can whole kernel corn

1 cup cooked ground beef or sausage (optional)

Cheese Sauce

¼ cup butter or margarine

¼ cup flour

2 cups milk

4 ounces Velvetta cheese

4 ounces cheddar cheese 

Bring water to a boil. Add potatoes, carrots, celery, onion, salt and pepper. Cover and cook until tender, do not drain. In a separate pot, melt butter. Add flour to butter mixing well. Add milk gradually, stirring constantly until think. Add cheeses. Stir until cheese is melted. Combine all ingredients and add corn. Add meat if desired as well.

Makes 4 to 6 large servings.

As a side note - we don't like this soup frozen and then thawed. I will make twice the veggies and then freeze the veggies alone and make the cheese sauce to mix with the thawed veggies. The potatoes do fall apart some more, but it's soup. (This week I will be using veggies that are in the freezer.)

T-shirt Yarn Rug

Where to put those shoes when you come in from the snow? A T-shirt yarn rug.

We also use one as a bathroom rug. Because it's made with t-shirt yarn, it's absorbent, warm and very washable!

To make this knitted rug

I used The Addictive Baby Blanket pattern from Ribbed for Your Pleasure. (The pattern does make a beautiful baby blanket.)


Cut strips of 1in t-shirt yarn. The knitting needles that I used are 1/2in diameter.

Cast on 38 stitches (if using the Anne's Decorative Edge Edit). The pattern can be done in any multiple of 6 with an added stitch on each end.
About 80 rows total from the pattern.
Depending on the size of the t-shirts, one rug takes about 8 shirts.

Finished dimensions (after being walked on) approximately 25x20inches.

I feel like the photo shows more variance in the colors between the shirts than we see in natural light.

1 week post menu challenge

I declare the challenge a success!

So, we easily made it through the three weeks of the planned menu. Last week I was kind of bummed that I actually had to plan a menu again. I did a weeks worth and now I need to do that again. I think the longer range menu plan is worth the effort!

I have a few things that I will want to schedule into meals.
- Soup mix that was a Christmas gift - planned for tomorrow (Sunday) lunch. (I picked up some ground beef on sale and using homemade turkey broth instead of beef broth because that's what I have.)
- Wild Rice - after reading some recipes, I'm going to make some and add to one of our favorites - Cheddar Chowder
- Navy Beans - I will plan to make "picnic beans" soon

The freezer is still looking pretty full. I hate to plan frozen pizza unless I know it's going to be a crazy day. (If there's a plan, the less likely it will be crazy!)

The pantry is definitely looking emptier except for the baking corner. Baking challenge next?

Menu Plan
Sunday (15th) - Gift Soup, Salad, Banana Bread (from freezer)
Monday (16th) - Bean Burritos (pinto beans in frig)
Tuesday (17th) - Cheddar Chowder with Wild Rice
Wednesday (18th) - Chili with Meat (on the side) - will use black and garbanzo beans that i have in bulk
Thursday (19th) - Everyday Lentils with Naan (?attempt to make my own)
Friday (20th) - Spinach Artichoke Dip (spinach in freezer)
Saturday (21st) - Salmon Burgers, Balsamic Onions (cheap onions recently), Tater Tots, Lemon Cake (Mix)
Sunday (22nd) - Taquitos (freezer), stuffing (freezer)
Monday (23rd) - Mexican Spinach Lasagna
Tuesday (24th) - Pizza
Wednesday (25th) - Eggs
Thursday (26th) - Turkey (freezer), Green Bean Casserole, Potatoes
Friday (27th) - Fruit Salad for Spelling Bee Lunch, ?Dinner

Tuesday, 19th day of menu plan

Wow, I can't believe that it's been 19 days since I have menu planned!

Tonight's dinner is a combination stuff that was purchased for "sometime" or frozen for later and will come together tonight.

The meatballs were from a sale/coupon at Kroger at some point. We made vodka sauce (doctored from a jar) and froze what we didn't eat. The regular pasta was from some sale and the Gnocchi was given to me at some point. 

We are short on fresh vegetables because I've been trying to stay out of the grocery store, so I'll pull out a frozen one and maybe some 5 minute a day bread.

Looks like a pretty good meal for cleaning out the freezer/pantry!

Update on past days - 
Friday - we ended up eating leftover Tortilla Stew and did not make a new soup
Saturday - I didn't make a meal at all in the evening. We snacked through the day and my husband make pancakes in the morning
Sunday - For church we brought salad (from the neighbor), curried yellow split peas with potatoes and carrots with rice and cookies (which were both made by someone else but ended up at our house)
Monday - I gave my children the choice of Red Lentil Curry (on the menu) or potato curry soup and they chose potato curry. I had thawed a tenderloin and roasted it to go with the other vegetarian meals this week. (I had thought that we would eat this on Saturday, but didn't.)

I'm surprised at how some food supplies are lasting. The 10 pound bag of potatoes has now been used for multiple meals and there are still some there.

Yesterday the lack of left overs and some other convenience foods for lunch was evident, but no one went hungry! The pantry is definitely starting to look a little more bare which is good. The freezer still seems pretty full. We need to eat some more peaches. I need to not buy fresh fruit so we eat the peaches in the freezer and the applesauce in the pantry.

Thursday 14th Day Menu Plan Update

It's Thursday and the 14th day of my menu plan to use up food in our house.

We are diverting from the menu today and just going with frozen pizza and cheese sticks and some salad. Today was supposed to be Pancakes and Eggs and Sausage. The sausage had already been eaten which was the main item to use up...though I do have quite a bit of pancake mix on hand. In the end, I didn't go to the store to buy the pizza or the cheese sticks, they were already there. So, I don't feel I'm cheating too much.

This past Sunday I made lots of things from boxes to use up stuff according to plan. I had baked the turkey in my freezer since November earlier in the week. I had a box of Stove Top and I had a box of cheesy potatoes and a jar of gravy. At potluck I served turkey with the potatoes and stuffing and gravy! Someone else brought corn - it was a prefect bland colored from a box/bag kind of meal.

Soon after I started my clean out the frig/freezer/pantry campaign, I did go to Aldi and ended up spending $80...so I think I need to continue with the menu planning beyond next Sunday because I still have lots of food in my house. I even found a few things in my pantry that I had forgotten about. 

Here's my Aldi cart from the other day.

So I think that the best way for me to save money on groceries is to make a plan and then stay out of the grocery store! If I don't go, we eat the food in the house.

I did run into Aldi today and bought 5 things, only 5 things and I had enough cash in my food money stash to cover it! I am proud of myself for doing the minimalist shopping!

Update on Saturday, Sunday & Monday

Saturday night 
I did make homemade pizza.
The funny thing is that I put more in the freezer than took out!
I made enough crust to freeze some for the next pizza night. I also make enough sauce for our next pizza night too!

I used up mozzarella cheese that I have bought to make pizza "sometime". 

I didn't end up cutting up the fresh veggies though which is pretty unusual. We had some drama happening that night and I think we were just ready to eat.

Chocolate Cream Pie was made by my younger son earlier in the day, but no one ate any on Saturday.

Sunday
Because there was a whole lasagna left over from Friday night, I just warmed that up for Sunday. I didn't end up getting any peaches out of the freezer. I used up some of the food that I got from our neighbor for salad, but there were two other salads there too so not much was eaten. It was not the best anymore so what didn't get eaten went to the compost pile.

We did serve the chocolate pie and most of it was enjoyed.

So, in reality I could add one meal to the end of the list since three days in we skipped a meal!

Monday
We cooked the bacon that has been in the frig for a few weeks. (I can't believe that my carnivore men did not consume it earlier.) 
We ate the menu that we planned!

I had rice in the frig that was planned for Sunday that I made fried rice with for lunch today. Other people ate left over pizza.

The turkey is pretty much thawed for tomorrow. (Yes, this was a Thanksgiving purchase. This is why I made the plan.)

Menu Plan Update for Friday the 16th and a little about our eating habits

So, I started on a three week (or so) menu plan to use up stuff in our house.

A little about our eating habits...
We are family of four with one pre-teen boy and one early teen boy that is growing like crazy. Generally all four of us eat three meals and snacks at home a day. Mom is a vegetarian though the rest of the family is not.

I generally plan out a weeks worth of dinner meals and grocery shop for those meals and pick up items that are on-sale/have great coupons for beyond the list. I do not specifically plan breakfast and lunch.

Everyone makes their own breakfast which is usually cold cereal, oatmeal, homemade granola and yogurt, homemade bread/toast or fruit or whatever seems interesting. Lunch is "from the frig" with left overs. Mom and Dad are usually good about eating left overs and I try to have salad in the frig too. Older son prefers to have sandwich and yogurt but younger son does like to make a box of mac and cheese. Both will eat lots of cut-up fresh vegetables at lunch.

Sunday we participate in a potluck meal at church so the meal plan is for lunch and not dinner like the rest of the week. Sunday night is popcorn and whatever else you find in the frig or what friends may bring when they come over to play games.

Update for Friday, January 16th
I had picked up two containers of ricotta cheese at Aldi. They don't always have this at my Aldi and my family likes dishes with ricotta cheese.

I had about 8 manicotti shells and a package of lasagna noodles that I picked up with a coupon or Ibotta rebate or something awhile ago so that was the inspiration for this evenings meal.

I had planned to pick up some sauce, but Friday morning I found myself with a tray of sliced tomatoes that needed to be dealt with immediately. So I make a sauce in the pressure cooker with the tomatoes, some frozen red onion, frozen chopped celery and some spices (including basil from the summer).

The cheese filling consisted of ricotta cheese, a box of frozen spinach, egg, garlic salt and a jar of marinated artichokes. I had enough filling and sauce for the manicotti, a pan of lasagna and then four lasagna noodle "roll-ups". Only a few noodles left over!

My family enjoyed it! Almost the entire lasagna was left over.

Using up stuff dinner menu plan

Our pantry, frig and freezer are not over-stuffed, but we do have quite a bit of food in the house. When I make our weekly menu plan, I do try and use what we have on hand, but I decided to think about this for about three weeks instead of just one.

My goal is to "use up" stuff that we have frozen and maybe save up some of our grocery budget for later months. I also want to blog about how well we stuck with the menu plan.

Green items were in the pantry/freezer/frig that were not previously designated for a meal. I do buy in bulk for dried beans and rice, so there are large bags of those sitting around which will be replaced when they are used. I froze or canned a few vegetables from our summer garden and froze some fresh fruit that we bought in season. We will eat more vegetables than what is listed. I will buy what is on sale at the grocery store and make an attempt to use what we have frozen, I just didn't plan all of this out.

Friday, January 16th
Manicotti, lasagna
   - manicotti noodles
   - lasagna noodles
   - parm cheese
   - moz cheese
   - ricotta cheese

Saturday, January 17th
- homemade pizza
(make extra dough for freezer)
Chocolate cream pie box mix

Sunday, January 18th
Black Beans/Rice
- can of tomatoes w/ chilies
- black beans in freezer
- rice in frig
Peaches 
Salad

Monday, 19th
Scrambled Eggs
Bacon

Tuesday, 20th
Roast Turkey (thawed since Sunday)
Roasted Potatoes
Green Bean Casserole
- French Fried Onions

Wednesday, 21st
Lentil Tacos
- Red Lentils
- Soft Tortillas
- Fajita Veggies (freezer)
Salsa

Thursday, 22nd
Nachos
- pinto beans in freezer
- tomatoes with chilis for cheese sauce
- Salsa
- Black Olives

Friday, 23rd
Stir-fry w/ Tofu
- Sesame Ginger sauce in frig

Saturday, 24th
Pork Tenderloin
Mashed Potatoes
Veggie TBD

Sunday, 25th
Turkey (Left over from Tuesday)
Stove Top Stuffing
Gravy
Potatoes (?Box)

Monday 26th
Falafel
 - Pita
 - hummus

Tuesday, 27th
Cheddar Chowder Soup
- Celery (frozen)

Wednesday, 28th
Tortilla Stew
- Enchilada Sauce
- Pinto Beans
- Corn Tortillas

Thursday, 29th
Pancakes
Eggs
Chicken Sausage

Make Gooey Butter Cake
- Cream Cheese
- Cake Mix

Friday, 30th
Potato Curry Soup
- Evaporated Milk

Saturday 31st
Left-overs or a meal that we skipped

Sunday, Feb 1st
Salad
Dal
- yellow split peas
Rice
Peaches (frozen)

Monday, Feb 2nd
Red Lentil Curry
- Red Lentils
Rice

Tuesday, 3rd
Gnochi
Pasta
Vodka Sauce
Meatballs

Wednesday, 4th
Black Beans/Rice
- Black Beans dry
- Rice
- Celery (frozen)
?Tenderloin

Thursday, 5th
Lentil Tacos
- Hard Taco Shells

Friday, 6th
Pizza
- Crust (from 1/17)
- Sauce (from 1/17)

Saturday, 7th
Chili
- Kidney Beans (freezer)
- Chickpeas (freezer)
- Celery (freezer)
Corn Bread
- Buttermilk
- Corn Meal

Sunday, 8th
Ham Slices
Mexican Rice
- Rice
Corn Bread
- Buttermilk
- Corn Meal