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Angie Mc
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| Posted: Jan 17 2012 at 5:58pm | IP Logged
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My sister (Jenn Sal) and I just got off the phone and were talking about...food.
For me, every January I want to eat better and spend less on food after all that Christmas feasting!
For Jenn, she has 4 littles 10 and under and is expecting #5 in March.
We want to remember recipes and ideas that have worked for us in the past AND find new ideas to keep us motivated.
Can you help? We sure appreciate it!
Here's a blast from the past Healthy Banana Cookies and more. You can freeze the bananas and defrost them in the refrigerator when you've collect 3 or 4.
Love,
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Angie Mc
Maimeo to Henry! Dave's wife, mom to Mrs. Devin+Michael Pope, Aiden 20,Ian 17,John Paul 11,Catherine (heaven 6/07)
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Kathryn
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| Posted: Jan 17 2012 at 9:14pm | IP Logged
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 Ok...I'm only laughing b/c I saw the title and thought to myself, OH...where does someone else eat fast food really cheap?! Like...Wendy's $1 menu!
Wish I could help esp. after my 2nd grocery trip in 5 days has me feeling the pinch. Will be curious what others can offer.
I did freeze our overripe bananas and just bought plain yogurt to make smoothies for the kids...something I usu. just buy a big jug of flavored yogurt. Also, I finally took all my bread heels and made my own bread crumbs and put them in the freezer for future use. Tonight was meatless spaghetti with extra chunks of tomatoes and zucchini. I usu. add zucchini, onion and/or green pepper to almost every recipe I make.
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MichelleW
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You can make your own vegetable broth from scraps. I used to do this when the kids were little. I haven't since our last move. I think I just forgot about it. I put a gallon plastic tub in the freezer and then I would throw celery tops, clean carrot peels, and onion skins into it. When the tub was full I would dump it into a saucepan add water and boil it all. Then strain and voila!--vegetable broth!
Also, for soup I had another tub in the freezer. I would throw leftovers that were less than a serving size into it and when it was full make it into soup. Always different and always delicious.
We always eat roasted vegetables in season. Served with polenta it makes a very inexpensive but healthy meal.
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Michelle
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MaryM
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| Posted: Jan 17 2012 at 11:32pm | IP Logged
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Kathryn wrote:
| Ok...I'm only laughing b/c I saw the title and thought to myself, OH...where does someone else eat fast food really cheap?! Like...Wendy's $1 menu! |
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ha ha - that's what I thought, too reading the subject line...
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Mary M. in Denver
Our Domestic Church
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JodieLyn
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| Posted: Jan 18 2012 at 4:53am | IP Logged
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Well it doesn't start off fast but ends up that way
I make a huge pot of pinto beans.. I actually cook them in my electric roaster (like a big turkey roaster one.. what are they 18qt?) I cook 4-6 pounds of beans at once. I don't soak so I just have to start them before lunchtime.. they need about 6 hrs to cook.. set the roaster at about 350*.. add chopped onion early on and the onion "vanishes" so you just have the good taste and no arguments from the kids that don't like pieces of onion.. then when they're almost cooked after about 5 hours I add salt, oregano and cumin.
Served the first night as a bowl of bean soup with some sort of bread thing - tortillas, chips, cornbread, crackers. Then it's parceled out into containers for either the fridge or freezer and I can take a meals worth of beans out and have burritos, tostadas, whatever mexican thing or make a quick soup or chili etc. and it's quick because you don't have to wait on beans to cook.
If I have beans and cheese and tortillas on hand anyone from about 8yrs on up can make dinner and it's done in a very short time.
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Jodie, wife to Dave
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Bridget
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| Posted: Jan 18 2012 at 6:46am | IP Logged
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Random ideas...
-Hard boiled eggs
-stove top pop corn for snacks
-any oatmeal cookie recipe - reduce the sugar, add an extra egg and nuts to boost nutrition
-fresh fruit
-plate of raw cut veggies
-Hormel has a decent, nitrate free lunch meat, WalMart sells it cheaply
-Roast a couple of whole chickens and just slice the meat from them for a couple of days adding a side and veg, then use the bones and scraps for soup (that's not fast, but you can start early in the day and leave it)
-ground turkey is cheaper than ground beef for tacos, pasta, sloppy joes... my family does not mind the switch
-any kind of meat chopped up with cooked veg, rice and a little cheese over it
I love Jodie's bean plan!
 Hugs to Jenn, that last trimester with all littles is a challenge!
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Bridget, happily married to Kevin, mom to 8 on earth and a small army in heaven
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Tina
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Pulled BBQ Chicken: We buy the big bag of frozen chicken breasts from Costco. I throw 3 or 4 into the crock pot in BBQ sauce to cook for about 4 hrs, then pull the meat apart and cook for another 2. We make sandwiches from that.
BBQ Chicken Pizza: The second day I use the leftover bbq meat to make BBQ chicken pizza which the kids love. We buy the whole wheat crusts from Boboli (you could make your own, I'm just not handy like that  ), use bbq sauce as the pizza sauce and use either shredded colby jack or shred from a block of cheddar. Then top it with bits of the leftover chicken. I guess it's not supercheap, but it makes a lot and those 4 chicken breasts go a long way.
We also have manwich. Very cheap....probably high sodium, but no fat and I count the sauce as a veggie We buy the lean beef and wheat buns, but overall it's still pretty cheap.
Some nights I make scrambled eggs with veggies cut up and melt cheese over top, then serve with whole grain bread. I fail at making omelets, but these are still good.
And we use protein bread (I think Arnold makes it) to make grilled cheese sandwiches. It's more expensive than regular bread, but when it's making a full, healthy meal for your family, I consider it to be worth it. We serve carrot sticks on the side.
Barilla (sp?) makes a protein pasta too. So to save money (and because my kids don't like meat with their pasta) I use that and storebought sauce  , melt some mozzarella cheese on top and serve with salad or carrot sticks.
These are just some ideas of things we do. I'm not one for spending loads of time in the kitchen, but I do want my kids to eat healthy-ish meals.
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Grace&Chaos
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| Posted: Jan 18 2012 at 11:39am | IP Logged
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Like Jodie, pinto beans are big around here. As are cooked rice (I can later use it for several meals as a side and as a last resort ends up being rice pudding); same thing with pasta.
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Jenny
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ShannonJ
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| Posted: Jan 18 2012 at 11:57am | IP Logged
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Beans and rice here too. Great cheap eats! I try to make at least two meals a week without meat and beans are definitely the bulk of those meals!
Black bean soup, black bean burritos, refried beans with pintos in the crockpot. I like to make a big batch of refried beans and then throw the leftovers into the black bean soup. Red beans and rice are a big favorite.
Ham has been a kick here lately too. We cook a largish one and eat from it for several days.
Day 1 - Ham, rice, and pineapple
Day 2 - Ham and cheese casserole
Day 3 - Ham and potato soup
Day 4 - Use the ham bone to make split pea soup
Lots of sandwiches in between. Then toss the bone to a very happy dog! 
I also like to pick up a rotisserie chicken for a quick easy meal. Around here they are cheaper than cooking your own. You can make all sorts of quick recipes that way.
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Grace&Chaos
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| Posted: Jan 18 2012 at 12:41pm | IP Logged
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ShannonJ wrote:
Ham has been a kick here lately too. We cook a largish one and eat from it for several days.
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I found this is a good one too. My kids don't get tired of ham and oh the possibilities
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SallyT
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I haven't embarked on this yet, but I've just bought the Well Fed cookbook by Melissa Joulwan ("Paleo Eating for People Who Like to Eat"). One of the great "good-eating-strategy"ideas in this book is to do a "Sunday Cookup," where you prepare not your week's finished meals, but all the elements for the various meals, with room to be spontaneous about what you're actually going to have on a given day.
For example, you might grill a couple of pounds of skinless, boneless chicken thighs to keep in the fridge to make any number of quick, easy chicken dishes. You'd brown a couple of pounds of ground meat (beef, pork, chicken, turkey, lamb, whatever) for the same thing: it would be ready to put in chili, lasagne, meat sauces, whatever. You also buy and chop a week's worth of vegetables and partially steam them, so that they will cook up really fast when you need them. Obviously all her recipes are paleo and don't include things like pasta, rice, beans, dairy,and all those other easy, cheap things, but the idea is a really good one. How many times has the spaghetti squash in my fridge gone to waste because I wound up always putting off thinking about dinner when it was too late to cook a spaghetti squash?
Meat's not cheap, of course, but you can potentially get several meals out of one meat purchase. For example, this week I made three meat purchases: a huge pack of chicken breasts ($10-$11), a big pack of beef stew meat (about the same as the chicken, I think), and a large Boston butt pork roast (about $14-$15).
Those prices made me faint a little bit, but the chicken breasts which I cooked up on Monday night (baked in coconut oil with some cranberries thrown in) were dinner that night, lunch for my husband, older son, and me on Tuesday (youngers had pbj), and lunch again for a number of us on Wednesday -- I chopped up half a warmed-up breast, put it on some fresh spinach, spooned little warm pan juice over it all to wilt the spinach, and had a very nice warm salad. The kids (3 at home, ages 8, 9, & 14) either half-breasts (the 8 and 9yo) or a whole one (the 14yo). So for about $10.50, I got three meals for five people.
Yesterday I cooked the pork roast in the crockpot -- we ate roughly half of it last night in the form of pulled pork, with applesauce, some leftover diced butternut squash from Monday night, and spinach salad. There's plenty left to form the basis of tonight's meal, and maybe then some. I haven't decided yet what to do with it -- I could make some new sauce to go on it, though because I have choir tonight, I'll probably just toss it in the over to reheat gently while we're all at Mass, so the others can eat when they get home.
The good thing about these meats is that they are really filling -- even with fairly well-grown children (ie kids who've outgrown the toddler/preschooler non-appetite), we consume far less meat at a meal than I think I had assumed we did. So a big cut does stretch a long way. If we have leftover pork tonight, I might make something for tomorrow like pork fried "rice," using cauliflower in place of the rice, per one of the Well Fed recipes. Still figuring this out . . .
Meanwhile, we still have stew meat, which I'm going to go ahead and make up into stew in the crockpot today, to have to fill in the gaps. Friday's meatless -- I bought 5 doz eggs at the beginning of the week, because we eat eggs like crazy, and I'm planning a crustless quiche with the remains of my big bag of spinach salad.
After years of struggling with making meal plans, which I don't do well, and trying to be frugal, which is much harder when people in your house eat low-carb (that's why I bought the paleo cookbook: out of frustration with trying to cook for my dieting husband and my should-be-dieting self), one thing I've discovered about myself is that while I'm making my list and shopping, I'll be in denial about the need for things like . . . lunch. Or snacks. So then we come up short of resources for lunch and snacks, and somebody winds up going to the store and spending more money (and woe betide us all if it's my husband, though I can be pretty bad about impulse buying myself).
Making myself actually buy, on the front end, what we are actually going to need to eat for all meals for a week feels sort of heart-rending, because I'm spending so much mooooooonnnnnnnneeeeeeeey, but I am finding that we're all feeling well-fed and much happier already -- the meals are there, and we're not as tempted to go out "because it's Mom's choir night," or whatever, and we don't keep running to the store for things I should have bought to begin with. We had slid into all these bad habits over the holidays, so that's a kind of feasting I'm really trying to rein in.
I haven't yet done a Sunday Cook-up, but I'm hoping to try it out this weekend, to have us ready to greet the coming week.
Going to put my stew together now: beef stew meat with carrots, parsnips, onion & garlic.
I hope this ramble was remotely helpful!
Sally
Sally
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Jenn Sal
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| Posted: Jan 18 2012 at 3:09pm | IP Logged
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Thank you for starting this, Angie!!!
Recently, there was a great deal on boneless, skinless, chicken breasts at a local grocery store (Harris Teeter). I ended up with a TON of chicken! With the help of this site: Frugal Foods for Large Families I was inspired to think "out of the box" and cook up many dishes. They suggest buying whole chickens, which I usually do, but this deal was even better.
Here's what I made:
Chicken Fingers Parm (from Desperation Dinners)
slow cooker chicken caccitori (2 batches)
Slow Cooker Chicken Taco Soup (2 batches)
Crockpot Chicken Sweet Potatoes
Then I baked and cubed several to use for:
2 Chicken Pot Pies (First time I ever made these from site above. I had left over pie crust from Christmas.)
Chicken Stir Fry with brown rice(used frozen stir fry
veggies)
chicken salad
chicken with brown rice and cheese
served on salad greens
I was surprised how I had most ingredients for all of these meals on hand. We never got sick of chicken and I have two meals in the freezer! 
Bridget...thank you for the hugs and the reminder of hard boiled eggs!
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Jennifer, Texas
Wife to Mark, Mom to Cora 13,Kade 10, Sarah in Heaven 12/05, Colette 7, Corin 5, & Kieran 2
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Angie Mc
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| Posted: Jan 19 2012 at 11:33am | IP Logged
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AWESOME! Keep all these great ideas coming!
Today: Made 40 servings of my own Taco Seasoning. I'll add this to chicken thighs in the slow cooker.
I call my slow cooker chicken thighs "International Chicken" because I'll add different spices and/or veggies to make Mexican, Greek, Asian, BBQ, and other versions for variety. Tip: Don't add water or broth.
Love,
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Angie Mc
Maimeo to Henry! Dave's wife, mom to Mrs. Devin+Michael Pope, Aiden 20,Ian 17,John Paul 11,Catherine (heaven 6/07)
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Jenn Sal
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| Posted: Jan 19 2012 at 11:55am | IP Logged
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Angie....the Chicken Taco Soup recipe uses that same BILL ECHOLS taco sesoning recipe. It's really good!
Oddly enough, last night my dh and children wanted tacos made with the seasoning packet. I don't know why I have one...but I looked on-line for something and found this: Homemade Taco Seasoning They loved it and the recipe is equivalent to a packet(you don't need to add water). Next time I will try the BILL ECHOLS.
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Jennifer, Texas
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Jenn Sal
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| Posted: Jan 19 2012 at 12:05pm | IP Logged
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I know sweet potatoes are better for you, but my sister made these years ago and I fell in love!!! BTW, cheap, fast, and filling.
Cut up a buch of potatoes, mix them with mayo (I use safflower or conola), heavily sprinkle with SPIKE and bake. I usually serve them when I don't have anything really filling left. We've had them with some veggies, left over ham, eggs, whatever! They're good cold, too.
Thanks for the recipe, Angie
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Jennifer, Texas
Wife to Mark, Mom to Cora 13,Kade 10, Sarah in Heaven 12/05, Colette 7, Corin 5, & Kieran 2
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Angie Mc
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Oh yes, roasted Spike potatoes...mmmmmmmmmmmmm!
Which reminds me of potatoes, especially a potato bar.
These aren't quick but...I have finally mastered mashed potatoes: approx 5# russet potatoes cleaned and boiled whole with peel. Once tender, cut in half width wise and place in potato ricer. Press while warm. Add stick of butter and a can or two of evaporated milk (depending on how thick/thin you like them), salt & pepper. YUM!
Love,
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Angie Mc
Maimeo to Henry! Dave's wife, mom to Mrs. Devin+Michael Pope, Aiden 20,Ian 17,John Paul 11,Catherine (heaven 6/07)
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4 lads mom
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| Posted: Jan 19 2012 at 8:23pm | IP Logged
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Angie, we are vegan now....that helps.....one thing I made the other night was loved by all....I took brown rice that I had already made, and sauteed it with some onion, and black beans, (that I had made for less than $2 for the whole bag), along with a small carton of firm tofu chunks, ($2.50) and put them in tortillas....I seasoned it with chili powder, garlic powder, onion powder while in the skillet...and they put salsa and romaine lettuce on top. Big hit around here, everyone felt full....we do a ton of beans now....and tempeh....It might be worth perusing vegan blogs and such, I get a lot of inspiration from them. Seasoning is key with vegan cooking, as far as I am concerned...it can be super cheap, but you can’t skimp on the seasoning.
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Angie Mc
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Sounds yummy! And yes, I'm very into seasoning and condiments.
How about...banana and Nutella. This has been my go-to small meal/snack for months! I buy the Nutella bulk at Costco.
Love,
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Angie Mc
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ShannonJ
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Angie Mc wrote:
| How about...banana and Nutella. This has been my go-to small meal/snack for months! I buy the Nutella bulk at Costco. |
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Can't keep Nutella regularly stocked here. It ends up as Nutella on a spoon instead!
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~Shannon
Mom of dd 12, ds 9, & dd 5
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Jenn Sal
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| Posted: Jan 20 2012 at 9:44am | IP Logged
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Lentil Soup!!! Lentils are cheap and I just cook in water. I may add an onion, carrot or celery. Filling, too.
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Jennifer, Texas
Wife to Mark, Mom to Cora 13,Kade 10, Sarah in Heaven 12/05, Colette 7, Corin 5, & Kieran 2
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4Real Forums : Our Lady's Loom, Larder, and Laundry
Topic: Fave Fast Good Cheap Food
