Salads

One way to save is to grow your own salad. Here I have planted a freezer full of salad
Today I had a nice big salad about noon. Very fresh and tasty.

The thrifty, simple, mostly vegitarian diet I've been eating is paying off. My doctor
told me this morning my blood work is perfect as is my blood pressure. I have also
lost weight. This is all good news for a 70 year old.

Freezer Full of Salad

Simple foods

Today it was my usual pumpkin toast and 1/2 banana with a bit of peanut butter for breakfast. This really sticks with me and it was about 1 p.m. when I started feeling hungry. I heated up some of my cabbage vegie soup. It has whole wheat spegetti in it and brown rice. That kept me full until this evening when I had a plate of cold asparagus and sliced pear with granola on it.

My morning was spent outside raking the horse corral and hauling the rakings to various spots to either plant grass or fertilize the garden. I took a long walk in the evening with my dog out the back way . It was a beautiful day.

Shopping plan for week

This morning I got up and looked over this weeks grocery ads. I ordered coupons for Express Salad $1.00 off one as Safeway has Fresh Express Salad for $1.00. Cottage cheese is on sale at Smith's for $1.00 and fuji apples and oranges are both under $1.00 a # I purchased three bags of apples two weeks ago when they were 1.00 for 3# and still have quit a few apples. I have 1 or 2 oranges and 1 grapefruit so I'll see what's up for free at the little shop down the road before I purchase.

I will consider these things but I don't really need anything except cottage cheese. I'll share the Express Salad coupons with my daughter. The salad will be . 35 cents a bag with coupon.

Today, I'm going to make asparagus soup out of the stems from the asparagus I cooked yesterday. I'll put it in the blender , strain it and then add a basic cream soup base mix to it made from powdered milk and whole wheat flour. I'll had the cooking water to the mix and whalla , cream of asparagus soup. I could add a few chunks of the more tender heads and stems that I cooked yesterday too.


I'm going to make my cabbage soup today too and boil up some eggs for snacks and t0 shred or slice on salads.

A friend sent me a new blog that is interesting it's ; http://www.livingon1500foroneyear.blogspot.com

This family of four is trying to make this years budget $1500. That includes gas and oil changes, haircuts and household expenses. She's been couponing and stockpiling since July 2008. It will be interesting to watch their progress. She has some recipes on her site and her shopping.

Guess that's it for today.

A new week

I've been cleaning up leftovers this past week and eating from some of the canned goods I purchased this past month. Last week was full of other chores and obligations. From the little place that picks up Grocery stores day olds I got pears, banana's, avacados, some corn tortilla's, and bread. Safeway had asparagus for $1.00 a bunch and so I got three nice bunches plus a bag of their shredded cheese for $4.99 for 2 #'s.

Today I cooked up the asparagus and put it in the frig after having a nice plate of it. For dinner today I'm having spinach burrito's on corn tortilla's (free) with an egg and some shredded cheese. My breakfast was my usual, toasted pumpkin bread with peanut butter and 1/2 banana.

Last night I made up my brocolli, mushroom gravy mix and had it over brown rice. I really like it a lot. I probably could eat it every day.

Those are my healthy economical meals these past two days.

I used 3, $2.00 off coupons for 3 shampoos. I bought 9 bottles of shampoo for $3.00. I have all the shampoo I will need for the year and I still have a few coupons left.

This past week I've had a lot of free meals such as avacodo on toast and sliced pears with a little granola on top. I've had my .30 cent a can ravioli and chili a couple times too. It's been pretty cheap eating for the past week. I did eat out once this week at Subway. Got the sandwich of the day with drink so it was under $5.

That's the roundup. I'm saving money on chicken food by letting my chickens out during the day to free range and only feeding after they are penned so the pidgeons can't get the chicken feed. The mustang and burro aren't eating as much as there is grass in the pasture. I cooked up a bunch of kidneys and rice for my dog. The kidneys cost about .75 cents a package. I also add a few vegitables too.

Sustainable Agriculture: Curing America's Eating Disorder

Can you grow local on a small scale?

Cooking Today

It's a rainy day all socked in. I baked my pumpkin bread today even though I have a couple more slices still in the freezer. That feels good as I'm set for another week at least. This is really a healthy inexpensive food.

Then I made a brocolli salad: Simple recipe
2 cups bitesize brocolli flowerettes.
1/2 cup chopped walnuts
1/2 cup craisens( cranberry raisens)
2TBS mayonaise
1TBS red wine vinegar
1 packet of substitute sugar

I don't know how to calculate the cost but I'm guessing about $2. for 3 - 4 servings. I had one serving and then later I had a nice helping of my brown rice with brocolli, vegie and brown gravy dish I made the other day. I still have two more servings of that. These are highly healthy foods at budget prices. I don't think I'm eating for $1.00 a day probably closer to $2.00 but the foods I'm eating are natural and not prepackage junk.
I wish I could be accurate about the cost factor but it is very hard to price all items. For instance I purchased the huge package of brocolli flowerettes for $3.99 I have used about 1/2 in the vegie dish and the salad. That would be $2.00 worth of brocolli. I used 1/4 package of a very large pack of fresh mushrooms for the dish as well. It cost $2.99 . That is about .75 cents worth of mushrooms. I have had 4 meals of this dish so far and think I have two more meals to go. I cooked 2 cups of rice and there was 1 onion and 1/2# of spinach in the dish as well. The brown gravy was maybe .15 cents for 2 cups and I'm still using. I'm thinking outloud here. Ill see if I can figure the cost per serving. Ah ha the vegie, mushroom rice dish is about .80 cents a serving. Not bad for a very healthy , delicious and filling dish.

The Price of Hunger

I've been looking at the food stamp challenge. Often what I see in peoples food baskets is not the best food for a $21. a week diet. I hope this blog will give people some idea of what they can eat for $3.00 or less a day.

Fighting Hunger Day To Day

A giving soul.

Yesterdays Cooking

I had my usual pumpkin bread, peanut butter and banana breakfast only half a portion of the bread and peanut butter.
For lunch I stuffed the last turkey meat ball crushed with the leftover rice and tomato sauce into a bell pepper that looked a bit wilted in the frig drawer. I baked it and that made a very good lunch.
Dinners recipe:
Make your favorite brown gravy.
In a large wok pot chop an onion and brown with a little oil while you cut up 1 cup of fresh mushrooms. Add mushrooms to onions and brocolli heads, about bite sized. Cover and steam till both are almost tender, stirring occasionally, then add 1 cup fresh spinach, cover and steam some more until all are tender. Put your vegie mix on top of cooked brown rice and pour gravy over. Yum! and healthy. I forgot to mention that I also added 1/2 to 3/4 cup cooked chick peas. I keep brown rice and one kind of bean cooked all the time. I like humus so I cook chick peas in the crockpot, make humus and usually have enough for a chickpea stew .

Sam's Club has a very large bag of fresh brocolli heads for $3.99. I will be eating lots of brocolli until it is gone.

Meanderings

Yesterday was good for planting. I got 16 brocolli plants planted in cinder block holes. I'm setting up a raised bed for my asparagus. I decided to set up cinder blocks and then put the asparagus on the ground and cover the roots with dirt. Cinderblocks have very nice planting holes in them so in went my brocolli plants. There are still 3 plants left in the so called 6 pack. Very good deal. Once they were watered I left them to do their thing. I also scattered bird seed which is mostly millet out in the pasture. I'm sure many birds will get some but there may be enough to grow to produce a crop. We're supposed to get a very good rain this weekend. I also planted some fava beans my friend sent me.

I did a little math today. I'm setting up a book on calorie count and cost. Brown rice is about .30 cents for 960 calories. That would be 2 cups uncooked, 6 cups cooked. With some greens from the garden that would be pretty thrifty eating . An egg is about 100 calories and has lots of protein. Since I have chickens that added to rice with greens I grow could really pare my food budget. Perhaps 2 or three days a week I'll do a rice day with eggs and vegies. Those should be about . 50 cents a day and 1200 calories.

Calorie Restriction CBS4

Interesting video about calorie restriction. I just read this morning that a person could also improve their health with very short bursts of exercise. Maybe like dancing like crazy. These bursts are said to protect against type 2 diabetes and lowering the blood pressure.

Catching up

On Tuesday I had to drive to Henderson, about 90 miles, for business. I ate twice out. I purchased a salad at Trader Joes for lunch and later just before heading home I had a slice of pizza with drink at Sam's Club in Bullhead City. About $6 for both.
Before I left I put in the crock pot some split peas, carrot, onion and celery stalks with chili pods and lots of water to cook up some split pea soup or dahl if you will. I let that cook all day while I was gone.
This week I purchased with my coupons 40 cans of hormel chili and 20 bags of Nabisco whole grain crackers. The 40 cans of chili cost $9. with sale and coupons. The crackers were .75 cents a box. Yesterday, I reorganized my food storage and got the shelves all lined up and filled in. I'm feeling very good about my food storage.
Yesterday, I checked the sales and saw that one of the local grocery stores is having $5 off chef boyardee pasta when you buy 10 cans. I got on line and purchased 20 coupons for $2.00 of chef boyardee pasta $1.00 off 3 cans. I will purchase 30 cans of pasta for $8.00 for my food storage with these coupons this week. I think this is as good as money in the bank.
I purchased a 6 pack of tomato plants and 2 , 9 packs of brocolli plants for $10. This will jump start my garden as these plants will be ahead of the seeds I've planted. The brocolli had at least 12 plants in each pack. I love brocolli and the leaves are edible too for greens. Today I want to get them planted before the rain comes this weekend.
At the supermarket I looked on a 1# bag of rice and found that my rice that I buy in bulk costs me .15 cents per cup of uncooked rice. That makes it .15 cents for 3 cups cooked brown rice. Very thrifty. Yesterday, I had a cup of brown rice with dahl on top for lunch and then a large salad later with steamed brocolli and carrots for dinner. I feel quit full with the 1 slice of pumpkin bread. OH, and I learned that canned pumpkin is now selling for over $2. a can. I'm so glad I have quit a few cans still in food storage that I got for about $1. each. Next year I will either grow them or buy a bunch when Walmart has them for sale at Halloween for $1.00 a pumpkin.
Got to get out and do the planting.

Other nations

Last night I was watching Youtube. There was one on the poor in Afghanastan. A mother with her children cook over an open fire in the shelter. The fire was fueled mostly by plastic. Imagine those fumes. Their diet consisted of dahl and a flat bread much like tortillas cooked over the fire. They'd dip their flat bread in the dahl. I'm sure their dahl and flat bread cost less than a dollar a day.

Another Youtube told about the reduced calorie diet and how this man was in very good health because he ate a diet based on the maximim nutricion from the minimum of calories. There was also another Youtube on the Okinawans who live much longer healthier lives. One of their rules is to leave the table 80% full. Never stuff yourself. They also eat whole grains and a lot of vegitables fresh from the garden.

This morning on tv there was a short segment about reducing our belly fat. It was basically the same eat small amounts of nutritionally dense foods 6 times a day rather than large meals.

I think I am going to eat only half of the pumpkin bread I eat now. That means half a slice instead of two half slices. I feel very full after eating the two slices. I'll keep you posted on how this goes and I will be posting some of the Youtubes on this blog.

Yesterdays menu

Same as the past two days. Pumpkin bread and peanut butter. .25 cents

snack free orange .00

lunch brown rice and porcupines in tomato sauce .50
dinner brown rice and porcupines in tomato sauce .50

chocolate pudding with blueberries and granola .50

Total 1.75

No recipe today.

Gardening is a good way to add to your food supply. Yesterday , I started my tomato plants, planted some potatoes', peas, greens and radishes. The young almond trees are just starting to get buds , a sign that the season has turned and Spring is on it's way. I also noticed a few new leaves on the pomegranates. Waiting on trees is a long haul but each year I get more fruit and the trees get bigger. I planted a green gage plum this week. It was bare root.
I have been having about two salads a week from my mesculin growing in an old freezer full of dirt.
Todays Recipe:

Enchilada Caserole:

This is as I made it this week.

12 corn tortilla's torn into pieces
3/4 cup browned ground turkey ( You could use tvp)
1/2 can olives sliced
3/4 cup monterey jack cheese cut in 1/2 inch squares
home made chile verde sauce/ or canned
1 can cream of celery soup/ or homemade

Mix chili verde and cream of celery soup till well mixed . Mix all ingredients in caserole until all ingredients are well covered with sauce. Bake until bubbly in 350 degree oven about 20 minutes. Or divide into individual baking dishes and freeze extra's and bake one at a time.

tortilla's .45
ground turkey .20
olives .50
chili verde sauce .05
celery soup .40
cheese . 50
= 2.10
4 - 6 servings

Yesterdays Menu:

two slices of pumpkin bread
1 Tbs peanut butter
1/2 banana .25 cents

enchilada caserole .50 cents

porcupines on brown rice.50 cents

chocolate pudding with pear and granola
.25 cents
total: 1.50