Wednesday, February 18, 2009
Cheap Meal of the Week
So my goal is to post one example per week of an inexpensive meal that the whole family will enjoy. This week's meal is stir fried rice with chicken. The entire meal cost my family $3.85 and it fed us for one hearty meal with enough left over for Josiah to have for lunch. I used three chicken breast diced and sauteed up. Next time I make this, I may cut it back to two breasts as three made a lot and I think I could stretch two just fine. I made one cup of white rice (I like to make healthier wild grain rice but we were given a bag of white rice so I am making use of it) which I poured in the wok with a little soy sauce and the diced chicken. I then added carrots and peas from our frozen bags of veggies. I fried up two eggs and tossed those in last. This meal was actually pretty quick to make and definitely a hit with the boys. The egg does not have to be used, would cut the cost down a bit and you would not really miss it but we happen to like it so I added it and the meal was still under $4 (and I factored in the cost of buying rice, even though our rice was free).
Saturday, February 14, 2009
Valentine's Surprise
Yesterday was a very good day with a huge surprise from my husband. I had plans to take the boys over to my mom's house to make valentine's cookies. We were planning to get an early start so we could bring the cookies out to the great grandparents. I sent the boys downstairs just as I was finishing up so that they could put their shoes on. I ran down to put them in the car and could not find Josiah. I saw the deadbolt was unlocked so I stuck my head out to see if he had already climbed in the suburban. He was in the front seat but as my fear from his disappearance dissipated I noticed that Joel's truck was in the driveway. I rushed back into the house yelling his name. He was sitting on the couch laughing telling me that he had not exactly planned for me to find his truck first. We took a second to lecture Josiah about leaving the house on his own (which Joel did not realize he had done either) and then I asked him what he was doing. He told me we were taking the boys to my moms and going on a date. I am not one who like surprises and I get a little flustered so I just went with it and headed to the front door. That is when I noticed the box on the counter with roses on top and a box of these candies that I really like but will not buy because they are super expensive. He laughed and said I was supposed to discover that first before anything else. Ah, such is the life with toddlers :) So we all sat down and had fresh doughnuts from the bakery that we love. The boys were especially excited about this. Then we dropped the kids off at my moms and I went to a few quick jobs with Joel before we headed to lunch. He gave me a few choices and I picked the buffet at the new casino. We had heard that the food was good and it had all different ethnic cuisine stations that we were really excited about. It was really fun to see the casino since my dad was the superintendent on the construction of it and the lunch was great. There was a Chinese buffet, Mexican buffet, Mongolian buffet, American comfort foods and dessert buffet, along with salad bar. We definitely had our fill! It was a fun time alone together. And, even though I do not especially like surprises, I have to say that my husband's surprises have always been greatly appreciated.
He had to work today, which actually ends up being good so that I can make him a special Valentine's Day dinner here at home. One of his favorite meals is biscuits and gravy so I am making that with heart shaped biscuits. I'm going to try making a mixed berry trifle for dessert but we'll see if I have time to pull that off.
He had to work today, which actually ends up being good so that I can make him a special Valentine's Day dinner here at home. One of his favorite meals is biscuits and gravy so I am making that with heart shaped biscuits. I'm going to try making a mixed berry trifle for dessert but we'll see if I have time to pull that off.
Thursday, February 12, 2009
$200 Monthly Food Budget
So over the last two years Joel and I have gone from having non-mortgage debt to the tune of roughly $28,000 to being non-mortgage debt free. It took us fifteen months from start to finish and a lot of changes to our way of thinking. We decided that we did not want to be like the Jones' (the mythical family that has everything) because we realized that the Jones' were in debt up to their eyeballs. A friend recommended the book Total Money Makeover by Dave Ramsey and that got the ball rolling for us. We did not adhere to everything that the book talked about but we took the information and decided what parts of it would work best for our situation and then came up with a plan. We are goal driven people anyway, so this was just another goal that we wanted to achieve as quickly as possible. We sold a vehicle, we cut all unnessessary expenses, such as cable, netflix & home phone. We made a budget that we worked hard to stick to. We stopped eating out and I started cooking nearly everything from scratch. We gave ourselves $200 a month for food. Most people have no problems with anything we did until we get to the $200 for food part. I have heard many people say that they could never do it. I may have said that once upon a time too. We did not choose this amount based on what we were already spending. We looked at how much we had in the budget to spend and then we worked hard to make our monthly meals add up to no more than $200. And it has worked.
(I will take a time out here to say that I am cooking for three toddlers, not teenage boys. If I had teenagers, I would have to either increase my budget or use a different menu. We also are shopping with food prices in WA. Cheaper than some other parts of the country and more expensive than others. So, take this for what it is: encouragement that you can drop your food budget and a resource with ideas on how to do it.)
I think the biggest change we made to our shopping habits was to plan out our month of meals before ever going to the store. Then, we stopped shopping multiple times a month. We usually go once for most of the items and then after the 16th Joel will make a quick stop to get anything that would not have had a pull date to last the entire month, such as a second gallon of milk or more bananas.
We choose a lot of the meals for our month based on items that we have left in the pantry or freezer from last month. If I have a bag of rice left, then I will plan meals around that. If we happen to have chicken left, then I will plan meals that involve buying as little as possible to make that chicken into a full meal.
This month we started something new, just to try and see how we like it. We are doing the same meal each weeknight. So we have five meals that I make four times during the month and then the weekends are meals made out of leftovers. So here is the actual menu that I am using this month: Monday=Pizza; Tuesday=Teriyaki Chicken Legs with Rice; Wednesday=Spaghetti; Thursday=Tacos with Rice & Beans; Friday=Whole Chicken with Noodles, that I can then use to make the weekend meals.
For lunches, we eat sandwhiches or leftovers from the night before and for breakfasts we have cereal only on the days Daddy is home (or in other words, the weekend) and the rest of the time we have waffles, pancakes, pumpkin bread or muffins with fruit and eggs or sausage.
During the winter we buy frozen vegetables to go with our meals because that is what fits in the budget. In the summer we are trying to grow vegetables and hopefully this year will be able to freeze our own. We buy fruit but usually whatever is cheapest. Luckily my boys like almost any fruits or vegetables, so it makes it easy to buy the cheapest because they will eat it. We never buy meat that costs more than $2 a pound and we stretch it in most meals. A little bit of sausage goes a long way in spaghetti. The way Joel and I look at it is this: we are only doing this for a season, while we become debt free and save up an emergency fund. Then we can decide to eat steak and lobster if we want but for now, we are content to make a $200 budget work.
Most food companies will advertise meals that only cost $2 per serving right now. That adds up to a lot for a family of five at $10 per meal times at least twenty days in the month (because you have to figure in some leftovers and whatnot) that would eat up my $200 right there without taking into account breakfast or lunch or snacks. The last two meals I have cooked have cost us roughly $3.50 per meal. Again, with three toddlers, whose stomachs are the sizes of their own fists, our dinners do not have to be huge. I made breakfast pizza to try this week and it cost less than the $3.50. It consisted of crust, white gravy, sausage, eggs & cheese. Chicken legs with teriyaki sauce, rice and green beans also costs us less than $3.50. The chicken added up to the most for that meal at $2 for the entire meal because I bought it at only $0.79/lb.
I make my own bread and I buy my flour in bulk at Costco. I spent $20 this summer on two flats of Raspberries and made my own jam (total cost less than $24) which will have lasted me a year when we run out. So all I buy on a monthly basis for lunch is peanut butter. Occassionally we will buy lunch meat but the boys are pretty content to eat PB&J. I use the rest of my frozen berries to make fresh syrup instead of that sugary sticky mess that is sold at the store. So the boys get a serving of fruit with their pancakes or waffles.
We actually do not feel like this is a huge sacrifice because we like the meals that we eat on a regular basis. It is all stuff we already ate and I think the same types of meals that most families do eat. By the time we need to re-evaluate our food budget, we will be completely debt free and will hopefully be able to adjust for growing boys without it being a stress to our overall budget.
I hope that this gives you a better idea as to how we work with a $200 food budget. Let me know if you have specific questions or want to know more about something. There are tons of resources out there to help cut your food budget or that encourage debt-free living. If this whole idea seems very foreign to you, don't worry, it was to us as well a few years ago. But, we are very glad that we have begun this adventure!
(I will take a time out here to say that I am cooking for three toddlers, not teenage boys. If I had teenagers, I would have to either increase my budget or use a different menu. We also are shopping with food prices in WA. Cheaper than some other parts of the country and more expensive than others. So, take this for what it is: encouragement that you can drop your food budget and a resource with ideas on how to do it.)
I think the biggest change we made to our shopping habits was to plan out our month of meals before ever going to the store. Then, we stopped shopping multiple times a month. We usually go once for most of the items and then after the 16th Joel will make a quick stop to get anything that would not have had a pull date to last the entire month, such as a second gallon of milk or more bananas.
We choose a lot of the meals for our month based on items that we have left in the pantry or freezer from last month. If I have a bag of rice left, then I will plan meals around that. If we happen to have chicken left, then I will plan meals that involve buying as little as possible to make that chicken into a full meal.
This month we started something new, just to try and see how we like it. We are doing the same meal each weeknight. So we have five meals that I make four times during the month and then the weekends are meals made out of leftovers. So here is the actual menu that I am using this month: Monday=Pizza; Tuesday=Teriyaki Chicken Legs with Rice; Wednesday=Spaghetti; Thursday=Tacos with Rice & Beans; Friday=Whole Chicken with Noodles, that I can then use to make the weekend meals.
For lunches, we eat sandwhiches or leftovers from the night before and for breakfasts we have cereal only on the days Daddy is home (or in other words, the weekend) and the rest of the time we have waffles, pancakes, pumpkin bread or muffins with fruit and eggs or sausage.
During the winter we buy frozen vegetables to go with our meals because that is what fits in the budget. In the summer we are trying to grow vegetables and hopefully this year will be able to freeze our own. We buy fruit but usually whatever is cheapest. Luckily my boys like almost any fruits or vegetables, so it makes it easy to buy the cheapest because they will eat it. We never buy meat that costs more than $2 a pound and we stretch it in most meals. A little bit of sausage goes a long way in spaghetti. The way Joel and I look at it is this: we are only doing this for a season, while we become debt free and save up an emergency fund. Then we can decide to eat steak and lobster if we want but for now, we are content to make a $200 budget work.
Most food companies will advertise meals that only cost $2 per serving right now. That adds up to a lot for a family of five at $10 per meal times at least twenty days in the month (because you have to figure in some leftovers and whatnot) that would eat up my $200 right there without taking into account breakfast or lunch or snacks. The last two meals I have cooked have cost us roughly $3.50 per meal. Again, with three toddlers, whose stomachs are the sizes of their own fists, our dinners do not have to be huge. I made breakfast pizza to try this week and it cost less than the $3.50. It consisted of crust, white gravy, sausage, eggs & cheese. Chicken legs with teriyaki sauce, rice and green beans also costs us less than $3.50. The chicken added up to the most for that meal at $2 for the entire meal because I bought it at only $0.79/lb.
I make my own bread and I buy my flour in bulk at Costco. I spent $20 this summer on two flats of Raspberries and made my own jam (total cost less than $24) which will have lasted me a year when we run out. So all I buy on a monthly basis for lunch is peanut butter. Occassionally we will buy lunch meat but the boys are pretty content to eat PB&J. I use the rest of my frozen berries to make fresh syrup instead of that sugary sticky mess that is sold at the store. So the boys get a serving of fruit with their pancakes or waffles.
We actually do not feel like this is a huge sacrifice because we like the meals that we eat on a regular basis. It is all stuff we already ate and I think the same types of meals that most families do eat. By the time we need to re-evaluate our food budget, we will be completely debt free and will hopefully be able to adjust for growing boys without it being a stress to our overall budget.
I hope that this gives you a better idea as to how we work with a $200 food budget. Let me know if you have specific questions or want to know more about something. There are tons of resources out there to help cut your food budget or that encourage debt-free living. If this whole idea seems very foreign to you, don't worry, it was to us as well a few years ago. But, we are very glad that we have begun this adventure!
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