Frugal Meal Series: Black Bean Burgers and Sides

Welcome to my new series aimed at helping families on a budget with some new and cost effective ideas for meals! I aim for around $5 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 couple years ago, but with the current economy it has increased to about $80/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, 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 homemade black bean burgers with homemade pasta salad and some chips.

Total cost of meal for 4: $4

Cost per serving: $1

Click here for recipe for homemade EASY black bean burgers!

Click here for recipe for homemade deli pasta salad

Price Breakdown:

Can of black beans 0.75 + ingredients to make burgers 0.25: $1

1/2 pack of hamburger buns: 0.50

1/2 bag of chips: $1

1/2 recipe of pasta salad: $1.50

You can alter these recipes as you like. For the burgers I like to add cheese and I eat mine without a bun. The pasta salad is very versatile as well--I did not have celery so I add some leftover roasted red peppers and fresh bell peppers. The burger recipe makes 4 average size patties so you will have leftover buns from the pack of 8 to use elsewhere, or you can double the recipe to make 8 patties and save for leftovers. The full pasta salad recipe makes a ton, so for this dinner we barely ate half with a lot of leftovers. These burgers are on repeat at my house as they are quick, easy, cheap, and healthy! Definitely a rare combination.

Healthy Baked Chocolate Oatmeal Breakfast Bars (Gluten Free)

This is a great breakfast (or even healthy dessert!) option to break up the monotony of cereal, toast, or plain oatmeal in the morning. Enjoy cold or warmed up! No added sugar and gluten free, this dish is lightly sweetened with maple syrup and peanut butter.

Ingredients:

2c milk (or soy milk to make this vegan)

1/2c maple syrup

1/3c peanut butter

2c oats

1/4c cocoa powder

1 tsp baking powder

1tbs flax meal

1tsp vanilla

Pinch salt

1/3c chocolate chips

Preheat oven to 350°. Mix all ingredients except chocolate chips in large bowl with spatula, smashing the peanut butter to incorporate into mixture. When mixed well, stir in half of chocolate chips. Grease an 8x8 pan and pour batter into pan. Sprinkle the remaining chocolate chips over the top. Bake for approx 50min until inserted toothpick comes out clean. Cool completely then cut into serving size bars and store in the fridge.

Frugal Meal Series: Steamed Cabbage and Smoked Beef Sausage

Welcome to my new series aimed at helping families on a budget with some new and cost effective ideas for meals! I aim for around $5 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 couple years ago, but with the current economy it has increased to about $80/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, but I don't include typical pantry ingredients i.e. spices/oil/butter/milk etc. unless it's a significant amount.

For today's meal we had steamed cabbage with roasted beef sausage.

Total cost of meal for 4: $6

Cost per serving: $1.50

Price breakdown:

1 pack smoked beef sausage (Aldi): $3.50

1 small head cabbage: $2

1 large onion: 0.50

seasonings + oil

This was our healthy and Irish-inspired meal for St Patrick's Day. I diced the entire head of cabbage and 1 onion to saute in a pan until tender with a bit of oil and seasonings. The sausage I sliced into thirds, then those into halves for a total of 6 slices that I roasted in my toaster oven. Each child got 1 slice and the adults each got 2 slices. There was lots of cabbage leftover for another meal, so that cost could easily be cut in half to lower the actual cost per serving.

Goodbye February, March is Speeding By

Before I even realize it, March is halfway over! Here's a recap of what we've been up to the past few weeks....

First of all, our sweet furball Mr Cuddles turned 18 on February 13!!! We got him as a kitten in 2005 and he's been with us ever since! His sister Snuggles was a year older than him, we got her as a kitten in 2004. They were best friends until her unexpected death in 2015. Sadly Jacob never got to know her. 

Here are some pics from 2005 of Cuddles as a kitten!

And now the old man....

In my last post we were prepping for our trip to Oklahoma...until I tested + for the Rona the day before we were to get the rental car!!!! My symptoms were thankfully mild (first time every having it!) but we decided to be safe and call off the trip to prevent spreading it to any family. I quarantined in my room x5 days while the 3 boys all shared a stomach bug.... Fun times!

After everyone was better and the boys went back to school after their break, Nick and I got away for a lunch date in Rochester and tried a great little Vietnamese place. The pho was amazing!

I met up with a friend at Letchworth for some winter hiking along the gorge. Time to start getting back into shape!

My big guy got some new glasses, and High Honor Roll! He is acing his 2 college classes as well with a GPA of 4.0

I went to the library and got some interesting reads...

After another big snow storm I finally got to take the boys sledding! Brad also had a friend over for a sleepover so he went with us as well.

Now is almost "spring" and I have lots of craft shows coming up, as well as our big family cruise to celebrate our anniversary! Check back soon for updates....

Frugal Meal Series: Porkchops

Welcome to my new series aimed at helping families on a budget with some new and cost effective ideas for meals! I aim for around $5 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 couple years ago, but with the current economy it has increased to about $80/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, but I don't include typical pantry ingredients i.e. spices/oil/butter/milk etc. unless it's a significant amount.

For today's meal we had porkchops, dressing, and corn.

Total meal cost for 4: $6.79

Cost per serving: $1.70

Price breakdown:

Pack of 4 thick boneless porkchop (Aldi): $4.79

Box of herb dressing mix: $1

1lb bag of frozen corn: $1

This was a simple but filling meal that fed all 4 people with no leftovers. Preparation time was approx 30 min. The dressing mix was a box preparation that needed water and butter. The corn was steamed and I added butter and salt. The porkchops were seasoned with steak seasoning.

LaZy Days

Look who lost his front two teeth!

I can't believe this big guy is going to be 8 in April! Time is flying...meanwhile my TEENAGER wanted a typewriter ahaha! So of course I found one for him and he bought it with his money. He loves it and even took it to school a few days--after typing up an essay on all the reason why he should be allowed to bring it. My requirement was for him to get signatures from his teachers in support of this and if the majority said ok then he could. What a hoot!

This "winter" has been super mild. We had a couple good snow storms in Dec but honestly they melted pretty quickly after and since then it's just been clouds and rain. Now we are back into the 40s almost 50s! and I don't even know if we'll get any remarkable snow before spring officially starts. What a disappointment! The kids couldn't even go sledding yet.

Because of so much yuck weather, we've just been staying inside and doing hobbies and crafts while the kids are in school. I've been working hard on my herbal business and had a 4 day craft show in Jan, then I have another big one coming up this Saturday. For those interested in supporting my small business you are MORE than welcome to check out my new online store HERE and see what I have to offer. If you are in Oklahoma and reading this....I have a special offer for you but the deadline is Feb 15! Read below.....

Since it's February, that means our ancient kitty will be a whopping 18 years old soon! He still tolerates us daily and is always looking for a comfy spot to take a nap.

Every evening Nick and I pack lunches for the boys to grab the next morning. We try to mix it up so they aren't eating the same thing every single day (like I had to growing up....) and they loved this grilled chicken salad I packed them! I always grab a couple bags of mandarin oranges when they go on sale as well. Perfect snacks!

Our next big thing is our pilgrimage to Oklahoma while the boys are out of school for a week. I rented us a Prius to drive so that will be a new experience for us! The hotel we are staying at in OKC has an indoor pool and of course the boys are stoked about that. Hopefully we can see our family while we are there...some are more difficult than others to get out of their house! We will probably not go back next year as it is getting hard to leave for that long with everything else we have going on at home. An unfortunate decision....but any family who would like to see us are more than welcome to take a trip north!

Check back later on for pics from that trip!

Celebrating 20 Years of Marriage

Yesterday Nick and I celebrated our 20th anniversary!! How amazing that it's been this long already. We have so many memories that we've made and when we look back we just can't believe how time flies.

I worked the night before so after my nap I got ready and we headed out for our dinner reservation at 5pm to try hibachi for the first time! We ate at Kobe Japanese Steakhouse in Rochester and had front row seats to watch the chef cook for us.

We started with a salad and mushroom soup. Both were delicious! Then the chef got started cooking veggies, rice, noodles, and our chicken.

We did get to try saké as well! All of the food was so good and flavorful. We were very happy with the dinner and ended up taking a small box of leftovers home!

The evening didn't end there! We found a Dairy Queen (for nostalgia's sake) and shared a banana split and a cheesecake blizzard for dessert. Yum! I can't even remember the last time I had a banana split.

We got home just in time to tuck the boys into bed, then we put on comfy clothes and watched a show together with a glass of Moscato. The BIG celebration will be in April when we take our first family cruise to the Bahamas!!!!! We are all very excited about that.

Some of you may have known me back in 2003 when Nick and I got married....yes I was VERY young but I didn't let that get in the way of what I wanted. I had Friday January 17 off of school so we grabbed our moms and headed to the OKC courthouse downtown to get married by the JOP! Very romantic indeed. (Fun fact, the same JOP performed the marriage for my brother Eric in 2015). 

On our 1 year anniversary in 2004 (yes I was still in high school!) we had an actual ceremony at the church and did a reaffirmation of vows with a reception at my mom's house! So by the time I graduated high school I had already been married 2x haha!

Our first year of marriage was bare bones, starting from nothing! We lived in my inlaws empty rental house in exchange for fixing it up and keeping it from being broken in to (OKC south siders you know what I mean) but we had no bathroom sink, just a mini fridge in the kitchen, and no heat. Our mattress was on the floor, the hot water in the kitchen didn't work, and we used an electric blanket to stay warm at night. Wow!

Announcement from the newspaper (I don't think they do this any more unless you submit it?) I wonder if the other young couple that was married that day is still together.

A couple pictures from us dating in 2002.

Every bit of progress we made was due to hard work and careful decisions to follow our goals and bring us to the life we have today. We have seen family and friends' marriages dissolve and with every argument we both know it takes hard work and mutual respect to make it last! We've worked very hard to break generational curses, overcome poverty, and start a new amazing beginning for our boys. I know before we realize, they will be grown with families of their own. We hope we have set a good example for what a strong marriage looks like, and we can't wait to see what the next 20 years will hold!