Frugal Meal Series: Minestrone Soup (Vegetarian) <$1 per serving

Welcome to my series aimed at helping families on a budget with some new and cost effective ideas for meals! I aim for around $5-7 per meal while trying to highlight dishes from scratch, meatless options, common ingredients, and whole grains. My typical weekly grocery bill for 4 was $50-60 just a few years ago, but with the current economy and inflation it has increased to about $80-100/week. This series shows you my average family dinners including cost breakdown, links to recipes, and other details to help inspire you!

Step 1 of saving money on your grocery bill is to MAKE A MENU! Once a week I sit down and write out a dinner menu for the next 7 days. I take into account what I have in the freezer, what our schedule is like for that week, what the weather is (hot/cold), and any leftovers. It also stops everyone from asking "What's for dinner??" From this you can easily make your shopping list to only get the items you need while keeping an eye out for any markdowns/clearance items you can stick in the freezer for a different meal. I do 90% of my grocery shopping at Aldi as I find that they have the best prices on most items. For a few other remaining items I go to Walmart.

Some meals I make are easy, some are more complicated. I mostly stick to tried and true dishes that I know everyone likes, but occasionally I like to try out a new one and experiment! I cook many style from American to Italian, Chinese, Mexican, and lots of Tex Mex. Variety is the spice of life!

For my cost breakdowns I will show real or estimated prices of items (based on current prices in western NY), but I don't include typical pantry ingredients i.e. spices/oil/butter/milk etc. unless it's a significant amount.

For this meal I made Minestrone Soup

Total cost for entire recipe: $7.42

Total servings: 6-8

Cost per serving: $0.93

Price breakdown and recipe:

1 small onion, diced.........$0.25

4 carrots, peeled and chopped...........$1

5 celery stalks, chopped..........$1

1 can diced tomatoes......$0.89

1 can northern/cannellini beans (rinsed/drained)........$0.89

1 can kidney beans (rinsed/drained)......$0.89

1 jar spaghetti sauce (use your favorite flavor)........$1.50

2c broth (I used homemade which was free)

1c water

8oz dry small pasta (I used elbow).......$1

1tbs Italian seasoning

3 cloves minced garlic

s/p to taste

EVOO

*optional: dice and add other in season veggies like zucchini

Saute onions, carrots, and celery in evoo 5-10min. Add garlic and  seasonings, stir and cook for a minute then add everything else EXCEPT pasta. PRO TIP: Rinse tomato and sauce jars with a little water and add that to the pot for the last bits of flavor. Bring to a boil and simmer 15-20min or until carrots are tender. Should still be pretty liquidy at this point. Add dry pasta and stir to combine. Boil another 7-10min until pasta is just al dente and soup is much thicker. Turn off heat and add s/p for flavor then serve! Delicious with Parmesan sprinkled on top and some buttered bread.

Girls Trip to Puerto Rico

For my final trip of 2025 I just returned from the beautiful country of Puerto Rico! This was my first time there and thanks to an amazing deal on a flight it was a spontaneous trip that I had a great time on. My friend Jessica and I started out early on a Friday morning flight and by 3pm we were catching an Uber to our hostel. 

I picked the Oasis Inn Hostel for it's location, reviews, and great price. Don't knock the hostel--most do have the option of a private room and a private bathroom! Our room was spacious with a couch, and the shared living areas/kitchen were absolutely spotless the entire 6 days we stayed there. We had our own keys to the gate and our room so we were easily able to come and go as we pleased. This was in the Santurce/Condado area.

Don't mind the sketchy wiring in our private shower.....

After freshening up a bit we headed out to find dinner our first evening there and enjoyed some absolutely delicious food at La Preña. They serve a variety of stuffed arepas and sides. We got tostones to share, and I had my first of many Medallas--the local beer there.

Before dark we also ventured around the area to a grocery store for a few things, and along the way passed this interesting wall of books on the sidewalk.

Saturday was supposed to be a free day, however our Sunday excursion got moved up unexpectedly so we headed out early Saturday morning to get picked up for an all afternoon trip of excitement and adventure!

We started at Charco Azul where we trekked thru the jungle to a hidden river that we jumped off rocks, swam thru caves, and ended with a 35ft jump off a cliff inside of a cave!!

After all of these and the steep hike back to the van, we welcomed the rum pouch they gave us and cooled off in the van on the way to our last stop of Mar Chiquita beach. This small but scenic beach is protected inside a little cove and we grabbed some quick food from the stands in the lot before dipping in the water and relaxing for a bit.

We got back to our room around 2:30pm and had just enough time to rest and change before heading out for an evening booking to learn salsa dancing! We met our instructor at a park right off the lagoon and proceeded to spend an hour learning the basic steps and moves of salsa. Enjoy the park kitty we passed on the way there....

At the end of the lesson he filmed us in action putting all the moves together to music! You can see by my laughing that we both still struggled, however it was a ton of fun.

From there we headed over to La Placita which was a highly recommended square to enjoy music and drinks in the evening. We got there a bit "early" for the activity to be started but we still heard some great live music and enjoyed a delicious dinner. We grabbed some drinks while we walked around the whole square, then after dark we grabbed an Uber to head back to our room for the night.

Sunday was a free day we slept in before packing up our beach bags to spend the afternoon on a new beach. We headed of to Escambron beach which is rated to be the best snorkeling beach in the area. Jessica had never snorkeled before, so today was her day!

We found a snorkel/scuba place that rented us the full gear for the day so once we got set up they showed us where the good spots where and we headed out. The first little bay we snorkeled in was a bit too cloudy for good viewing, so we used that as our warm up. Jessica caught right on, so after that we walked over to a different area where the water was crystal clear.

There we set up our beach blanket, ate a snack, then headed back into the water where snorkeled for probably another 3 hours!

We were blessed to find a sea turtle, and we followed him for a long time just feeding and swimming.

When we were done we rested in the sun for a bit then returned our snorkel gear and caught an Uber back to the hotel. Check out this neat rainbow above the cloud that I saw!

For dinner this night we tried a new place called Bebos that was down the road from our room. They had a good menu with decent prices, and we struck up a conversation with group next to us that was very nice. My chicken and rice was soooo good.

The next morning our Monday excursion started as we got picked up our meeting place for the group trip. The first part of the excursion was checking out Old San Juan. We got to see the cemetery, the fort, the capitol, and the iconic I ♥ PR sign.

From there headed off to the eastern part of the island for some fun in El Yunque rainforest! We trekked thru the jungle to our first natural waterslide for some swimming. This one was about 30ft long.

From there we trekked a bit further to the next natural waterslide that was about 100ft long!! This one was much faster and more intense, but so fun.

After all of that, we headed back to the van to head to the beach! We spent the next couple of hours at Luquillo beach where I finally got to eat a hot dog. After getting snacks and drinks we set up our spot in the sand and basked in the water and sun until it was time to go.

The next day was Tuesday, and our final full day on the island. We had nothing official planned, so we enjoyed a slow morning with some breakfast. We were gifted a mango so we added that to our oatmeal and it was delicious!

For our final day we decided to check out one more beach that had high recommendations. So after packing our beach bags for the afternoon we grabbed an Uber to head out to Piñones. This beach stretches far long the coast so we just kind of started at one end and worked our way back. The first section we were at was almost deserted with just a couple of surfers in the water.

I brought my goggles so I spent some time checking out the ocean floor and fish life.

Once we got hungry we packed up and started walking thru the shops (which were mostly closed thanks to it being a weekday) until we found a small one that had both fun music and good food! I had yet another pastelillo that was delicious as well as my first alcapurria. Once we finished our lunch and drinks, we walked to a different part of the beach that was a bit calmer and set up our spot to relax.

Look at this crystal clear water! It was fun to look around underwater with my goggles and watch the schools of fish.

After several hours on this beach, we grabbed an Uber to head back to our hotel to freshen up and find dinner. We ended up having our last dinner at La Preña once again because it was just so yummy! For sunset we walked to Condado beach just a few minutes from our hotel to enjoy our last fresh ocean breeze before leaving early the next morning.

We headed out bright and early the next morning and made it home by 3pm. Another amazing and successful trip to a new place and a new beach.