10 Ways to Save Money When Cooking!

  Ten ways to be frugal and save money while cooking:

1.  If a recipe calls for sweet or red onions use plain yellow onions (cheaper).  All onions are sweet when cooked and yellow taste the same as red in a recipe.

2.  When a recipe calls for shortening use stick margarine.  It is cheaper and it has way less fat and more flavor.

3.  If your going to make alot of recipes that call for stock, fill your crock-pot with chicken legs and thighs (cheap) and cook for about 7 to 8 hours and then strain.  You now have the chicken to use in another dish and you get the stock which has alot more flavor than the boxed stock.

4.  If a recipe calls for red peppers, use green peppers instead.

5.  If a recipe calls for burger, use shredded chicken.  I have seen chicken legs and thighs in the 10 lb bag for as low as .39 cents a lb at Aldi's.  I never see burger cheaper than 2.79 a lb.  Chicken is way more frugal.

6.  Make a meatless meal once a week and save alot of money over the course of a year.

7.  Save alot of money by not buying spray pan coating and just go back to using a small amount of butter or oil to oil your pan.

8.  If something calls for evaporated milk you can substitute milk.

9.  When making a cake substitute half of the oil or shortening for applesauce and save money and calories and it will be just as moist!

10.  Instead of using bagged salad buy a head of lettuce and cut it up yourself.  It only takes a little bit and saves alot.

Leave a comment if you have some good ideas!

TRYING TO DO IT ALL!!

  Do you ever feel like you want so badly to get organized cause that is what is going to make you happy, just to get on top of of it all and have a place for everything, to have no junk drawers?  I sometimes walk into others houses that are completely organized and seem to be on top of the "get it together" mountain and think are they really or did they just do this for me.  Then I think no they got it together and I am just doing something wrong.  It's like you can control one situation at a time.  Right now I am trying to fill the freezer with pre-made meals so I don't have that overwhelmed feeling inside when everyone looks at me on the weekend and that slight panic of crud I need half a day to thaw and make something.  I am determined to cook an extra meal each day to freeze.  While I am on this mission to do this I find at the end of the day when everyone else sits down after work and I have been on my feet all day long in the kitchen I start hearing I need this shirt or this pair of pants for work tomorrow and I start thinking ok I felt so good getting the food in the freezer and a nice dinner on the table that I got involved with that and other things fall behind so I have to get on a schedule as to what order to do things.

  My normal morning is to get up with the grandbabies get them breakfast, changed and a sippy and then wake the kids for homeschool.  The older kids get up and eat and get busy on work.  I cannot start any type of food prep. unless I have made sure dishwasher is loaded, counters cleaned off and floor swept then what I need to add to that is fold whats in dryer and start another load.  That would give me 45 minutes of time to do food prep. while this is going.  I then usually get lost in what I am doing so I am going to set my timer on the stove or phone to go off in 45 minutes to switch the laundry.  I also find that if I am in the middle of cooking I think  I can wait on the laundry cause of the time it takes to fold clothes so I could throw in a basket, take to my bed and just dump there and lay shirts that could wrinkle flat and then I can either fold later or have all the kids get it done in a very short time.  Then when all the family is sitting around I never have that last minute laundry load at midnight to do cause I fit it in where I will barely notice it.

  I think I am still in the mindset that if I just do it it will get done faster and more peacefully but I am noticing more and more that the more I do this the more it is expected.  It doesn't seem to matter if I am watching tv with everyone or not cause no one notices.  I think everyone wants you in there but that would mean helping put dinner away or loading the dishwasher and that would mean putting down an ipad, ipod or computer.  I remember as a kid we had jobs and I learnt that if you just pitch in or get started it gets done faster and I am not sure I am instilling this by doing the work all myself.  I always feel bad asking but I really think it is our jobs as parents to give chores so kids realize that when your a family you work together.

  Kids get overwhelmed by cleaning their rooms cause they do not know where to start but if you break it down and make it several jobs, maybe one a night it will get done by the end of the week where normally you would ask all week and it would still not be done by the end of the week.  I send my girls in and tell them to bring me 10 things to donate and hang up 35 things on hangers.  When they come out I tell them to bring me the dishes or cups.  I then send them in to put away 35 individual possessions that are on the floor.  Then we do the same thing the next day.  They will gain to the point where they see the light at the end of the tunnel.

 Off to cook (and start laundry every 45 minutes!).