Fall and Weekly Menu Planning

The weather is beginning to get chilly and it's my favorite season of the year. I love the fall and winter (most of the time). I love taking the kids to the pumpkin patch, warming up with a nice bowl of chili and cable knit sweaters - cable knit anything for that matter.

Today there was a crisp breeze in the air that signaled a large pot of chili was in order. I figured while I wait for my crock-pot to do all the work for me, I'd also update with what I plan on doing for the rest of the week.

Day 1: Tacos

When we have tacos I always cook a little extra meat to throw into the chili. 

Meat (we use ground turkey) : $2.29 lb x 2

Cheese:                                    $2

Lettuce:                                    $0.99/1 head

Soft Taco Shells:                      $1

Hard Taco Shells:                     $1

Sour Cream:                             $1.50

Seasoning:                               $.69

I didn't include tomatoes in the price because we get these from the garden. Apparently they did very well this year because several people gave us tomatoes since they had so many.

Total Cost: $11.76

Day 2: Chili

My favorite! I always make tacos a day or 2 before I make chili since I use my leftover taco meat in the chili to spice it up a little bit. You can't really screw up chili unless you set-out to do just that, it's very forgiving. 

Meat (in addition to the leftover taco meat: $2.29 lb

Beans:                                                           $0.79 x 3

Tomato Sauce:                                              $1.10 x 2

I have chili powder on hand and since I'm not a huge fan of onions, I always use dried minced onions. My chili is super simple and goes a long way.

Total Cost: $6.86

Day 3: Chili Baked Potatoes

The great thing about making chili is that I can use it for days and one of my families favorite meals is chili baked potatoes. I "bake" my potatoes in the microwave because it's so less time consuming than putting them in the oven.

Potatoes (8 lb bag):                   $3.50

Cheese:                                      free (on hand)

Sour Cream:                               free (on hand)

Total Cost: $3.50

Day 4: Taco Salad

This is a free day (as in, you should have just about everything on hand). I make this by placing tortilla shells on a plate and then layering cheese,chili,sour cream,tomatoes,etc.

Tortilla Chips:    $1

Total Cost: $1

Day 5: Rotisserie Chicken

I love rotisserie chicken (or anything chicken, pretty much). I  have a rotisserie but before we got that, I would just roast it in the oven. Super simple!

Whole Chicken (on average, $0.99/lb)   $6

Vegetable:                                               $1 x2

Potatoes:                                                  Free (on hand from the chili topped baked potatoes)

Total Cost: $8

Day 6: Chicken Pot Pie

Chicken Pot Pie is super simple and so good and hearty! I use cream of chicken soup mixed with a can of mixed vegetables and shredded chicken. I mix them together and place it on a pie crust with another crust on top and bake it @ 350 for about 40 minutes or until the crust is brown and flaky. I also add in a little bit of milk since the soup is a little thicker than I'd like.

Cream of Chicken Soup:                                      $1

Vegetables:                                                           $0.60 + leftovers from day before

Chicken:                                                               Free, leftover from day before

Pie Crust (I use the ready made rolled up crust): $2

Total Cost: $3.60

Day 7: Leftovers,Takeout or a Meat and 2

I always allow one day for anything goes. I use this day to either get takeout if our schedules are busy, we eat leftovers or I make fish or something and use up what ingredients I may have on hand. If there are any potatoes left you could do a meat, potatoes and a vegetable. My husband and I both take our lunch to work so we don't have leftovers very often as we usually take them for lunch the next day if we do.

Total Weekly Cost: $34.72 (+ whatever your cost is on Day 7 - if any)

I could go on for days about how I use 1 meal and carry it over to make several others but I'll save my other "recipes" for another day. I coupon and used my non-coupon pricing on the ingredients but you could get all these ingredients even less. I go to the grocery store and get my meat when it's marked down in the morning and I stock-up on the essentials that I know we'll use. My Kroger had canned vegetables for $0.33/can a couple of weeks ago. They had a very strict 6 can limit so I went everyday and I sent the hubs in several times as well to stock up on 6 cans every trip. I buy what is on sale and plan my menu around it. Last week I was able to score rotisserie chickens for buy 1 get 1 free so that made them $0.50 lb. I also was able to get tortilla shells for about $0.75 box and cheese was $1.50/pkg so I stocked up on that so our costs this week weren't quite as high as my figure. We did however make up for it by ordering pizza one day so it all equals out in the end. I normally buy what is on sale and plan my menu around what I have but sometimes the sales aren't that great or I know I'll be too busy to go to the store so I just plan the meals a week in advance and I just buy whatever ingredients I don't already have. I've tried to do the whole freezer meal thing and I think it's great but it just doesn't fit with our lifestyle. My deep freezer is filled with meat and vegetables and I don't have room to store a months worth of meals in it so this is what works for us. I love, quick and easy and by making most everything beforehand, it doesn't get much quicker or easier!

More dinner deals!

I'm loving my new found creativity in the kitchen. Remember my meatloaf from the other day...well, we had a lot leftover & the boy asked me to make sloppy joes. I had no meat thawed out and surely didn't want to pay full price for some. Then a lightbulb went off...we have leftover meatloaf! I figured I'd give it a go and let me tell you...awesome!

I scraped as much sauce off the top as I could, threw it in a skillet, ground it up and topped it with sloppy Joe sauce. The kids actually finished up all of their food for once!

I set our monthly food budget at $250 & with my couponing and newfound creativeness, we're rockin it! The great thing is that we're actually eating better. I go to the store in the mornings whenever I'm in town and that's when the fresh veggies are marked down so I'm able to get so much more for my money. I'm grinding up my own meat so I know it's not filled with "pink slime" or who knows what else. We're cooking in the rotisserie more which cuts down on fat and we've limited going out to eat ALL the time like we used to. I'm loving it!

Ok, cost breakdown:
Chicken for sloppy joes (free, leftover meatloaf)
Sloppy Joe sauce: $0.99
Onion Rings:$2
Buns: $1

Grand total: $3.99 & the kids loved it! That makes it worth so much more

It's so awesome to be able to challenge myself and be doing so great with it. I hate wastefulness in anything but especially food and money. There are people out there going hungry so food should never go to waste. You work for your money so why not save as much of it as you can. Saving in some areas allows me to splurge in others (you should see the kids closets; whoa!) All it takes is a very minimal amount of planning and some creativity.

Dinner on a dime

Not quite literally a dime but pretty stinkin cheap! I got what I consider to be the best kitchen appliance ever. I'm about 10 years behind but I finally got a Kitchenaid stand mixer! I love it! I knew that to really put it to good use I would also need the meat grinder attachment and my super husband came through.

I love going to the grocery store in the morning and checking out the markdown meat. My meat grinder attachment has proven invaluable in the few short Weeks that we've had it.

A good quality, low fat, ground beef tends to run over $3.29/lb in my area. Ground chicken and turkey can be found for around $2.79/lb. However, boneless chicken breasts are regularly $1.99/lb and I never pay over $2/lb for beef of any kind. I scope out the markdown meat and get whatever I can that falls within those pricing parameters.

I sort through my meat. All of the cheap cuts of beef are ground up, put into ziplock bags, labeled and put in the deep freeze. If the chicken is boneless,I usually grind up about half of it and save the other half (especially if it's chicken breast). If I buy bone in chicken I cook all that I can fit into my roasting pan in one go. I fill my roasting pan with just enough water to cover most of the chicken, pop it into the oven on 375° for about an hour, let it cool, shred it up and into the freezer it goes. Shredded chicken is so versatil & we use it quite a bit. Don't throw out the liquid on the roasting pan because it can be boiled down and placed in the freezer as well so you should never have to buy chicken stock. I thought it was funny around the holidays to see people with 5 cartons of chicken broth in their carts and I've got a couple gallons at home that's fresher and virtually free!

I also like to check out the fresh produce section because I always find amazing deals. I was able to score 2 packages of romaine hearts for $0.25 each today. I plan my meals in advance but allow leeway for deals like this that come along.

For instance; I pulled 2#of frozen ground chicken out of the freezer last night planning to make spaghetti. I found the lettuce deal so I'm making meatloaf and salad instead. Total cost breakdown:
Chicken, $1.99/ lb x 2#
2pkgs lettuce, $0.50
2  cans vegs @ $0.50@, $1
Mac n Cheese, free (leftovers from last night)
Meatloaf filler, roughly $1

Total cost: $6.50 & we'll definitely have leftovers

Another example, I got a turkey after Christmas for $7 & it was an almost 22# turkey. I made it and we had that for dinner one night, turkey tetrazene the next night, turkey casserole the next night and with the turkey we have left in the freezer i'm going to make turkey pot pie. That one turkey was able to serve as the main course in 4 meals plus we made turkey sandwiches for lunch! I've found when you mix it up and use the same meat in different ways, you don't get tired of it. I don't eat beef or pork but I still buy and make it for the kids and my husband so they don't feel like their missing out.

I made a list of every dish containing meat that I can make and I store or in my coupon notebook. If I find a piece of markdown meat@the store I scan through my list and find something we haven't had in a while and I then gather the ingredients while I'm at the store. It's a win for the budget and a win for the family who likes different things. I personally could live off of chicken Caesar salads but majority rules so I'm forced to mix it up a little more than