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Posted
Aug 25 2008, 08:46 AM
by
Donna Freedman
Rating:
"Snack food" manufacturers make a fortune on things like potato chips, microwave popcorn, granola bars, pretzels, flavored tortilla chips, pudding cups and protein bars. When I was a kid, such things were expensive luxuries and bought in extreme moderation. And yeah, we had to walk through six feet of snow, uphill both ways, in order to buy them. Also, our pudding was not prefab, protein bars hadn't been invented yet and no one knew that you could cook popcorn in the "radar ranges" that were owned only by the wealthy.
When we got home from school, our choices were fairly limited. Usually it was peanut butter on saltines, or peanut-butter toast (made with "used bread," of course). If there were carrots in the fridge, we'd eat them with salt. A jar of dill pickles was fair game, too. If there were home-baked cookies, we could eat only one or two -- my mom kept track of how many should be left. Sometimes there would be a bushel of apples from a local orchard. When all else failed, my brother and I favored catsup on white bread. I get queasy just thinking about that now.
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Posted
May 07 2008, 10:48 AM
by
Donna Freedman
Rating:
We're in awe of the way "HollyM" does lunch. This thrifty reader starts by cooking big batches of soups, stews, stuffed peppers, lasagna, casseroles, enchiladas and other goodies -- all of it made with on-sale ingredients. The entrees get frozen in individual servings because variety is the spice of lunch.
"No boredom. Lunches ready to grab. Saves time/energy/money."
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Posted
May 07 2008, 10:34 AM
by
Donna Freedman
Having raised eight kids, reader "SGW" can make a little bit of meat go a long way. She would buy a chicken on sale and make a huge pot of soup -- but they didn't eat the chicken itself, just the broth with vegetables. Then SGW would cut up the bird and freeze it in one-cup portions.
"Yep, I make chicken enchiladas, chicken chow mein, chicken salads, you name it for a family of 10 using only one cup of chicken each meal."
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Posted
May 07 2008, 10:00 AM
by
Donna Freedman
Rating:
"Frugal-Cook" doesn't skimp on ingredients. Check her shopping cart and you'll find stuff like shallots, fennel, olive oil and fresh herbs. Yet she spends only about $500 a month to feed her family of five-going-on-six -- the mom of three is expecting again -- even though she lives in spendy Chicago.
Frugal-Cook bases her meal plans on weekly grocery specials, viewing the ads online at http://www.centsible.net/groceries.shtml. She also hits smaller markets in ethnic neighborhoods. Then she cooks one and only one type of cuisine per week.
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Posted
Jan 09 2008, 09:22 AM
by
Donna Freedman
Rating:
Americans spend almost half their food dollars on meals and snacks away from home, according to the U.S. Department of Agriculture's Economic Research Division. Sociologists have many theories about why this is so: single parents, two-career couples, after-school activities, the demise of cooking in America. My own theory? When you get home at 6:45 p.m. with a cranky toddler, the last thing you want to do is start peeling potatoes.
Be proactive, the frugal types say. Buy a slow cooker, or prepare and freeze meals on weekends. You might even do these things, at least some of the time. But sometimes you don't. Sometimes life throws a monkey wrench (or a flat tire, or a sick kid) into your plans. And yeah, sometimes you forget to plug in the slow cooker on your way out the door.
Stephanie, a mom of four who writes the Stop the Ride! personal-finance blog, has an ultra-simple solution.
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Posted
Nov 16 2007, 08:52 AM
by
Donna Freedman
Rating:
Want to save a ton of money and enjoy comfort food to boot? Bake some potatoes in your slow cooker. I did this one recent weekend morning and they were done to a tender turn after two hours on the high setting. The aroma was irresistible, even though I'd had a late breakfast, so I split open one of the smaller spuds, glossed it with butter and sprinkled on some coarse kosher salt. Afterward, I realized this was probably the cheapest snack I've had in ages. At 99 cents for a 10-pound bag, the per-spud price was about 4 cents. The butter cost less than 2 cents (loss-leader price plus coupon). The price of the salt was infinitesimal, since it came from a one-pound box I bought at the dollar store . They can make a cheap supper, too, and involve practically no labor. We know that on some nights, we're more vulnerable to the allure of Thai takeout or the fast-food drive-through – maybe Mondays send us reeling, or Thursdays are crunch days at work. So on those nights, plan a spud supper instead
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Posted
Oct 10 2007, 09:23 AM
by
Donna Freedman
Rating:
Seattle is loaded with blackberry vines. The sight of all that free fruit makes me want to forage each summer. My arms get so thorn-raked it looks like I’ve tried to exorcise a cat, but I fill the freezer, make jam, and eat blackberries almost every day for weeks.
On my way to pick berries one end-of-summer day, I saw a dark-purple blob in the dust. A plum had fallen from a tree in a nearby yard. I broke open the windfall and took a tentative nibble from its golden interior. Sweet as the memory of first love.
Peeking through the fence, I could see the tree was loaded. I asked the homeowners if I could trade them a jar of jam for the fruit I’d need to make some. They told me to help myself: “We’re glad someone wants it.”
Two batches of jam later, I posted a thread on the Smart Spending message board: Who else out there “puts food by” each year? Do you grow it? Buy it from a farm? Scrounge and scavenge like me?
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Posted
Oct 09 2007, 08:52 AM
by
Donna Freedman
Rating:
I had a $1 steak for lunch, but it was no one-buck chuck. It was certified Angus beef sirloin, with no hormones or antibiotics, and “minimally processed,” according to the label. In addition, this steer apparently ate only vegetarians: The label also said “100 percent vegetarian diet.”
How’d it get to be a dollar? First it went on sale, then it got old.
Meat department managers keep a constant vigil against meat that’s close to its sell-by date. They need to sell that flesh pronto, so they discount it deeply.
That’s how people like me end up with steaks whose original per-pound cost was one and a half times the federal minimum wage. That same shopping trip netted me a two-pack of sirloins that initially cost $8.99 a pound; I paid $4.07 total. Another pair of steaks cost just $1.24 and $1.52.
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Posted
Sep 26 2007, 02:42 PM
by
Donna Freedman
Rating:
I had a Desperation Dish the other night. It saved me from going out to eat, which is why I recommend the practice. It also helped me clean out the fridge – another point in its favor.
The expression comes from the 1942 memoir "We Took to the Woods,” a delightful tale of living in the Maine backcountry. Author Louise Dickinson Rich described Desperation Dishes as "things we eat when we run out of food."
Rich and her family weren’t completely out of food, but rather down to things like dried beans and cornmeal. But they must have been desperate if they were excited by DDs like "Mock Tripe," made with fish skin and seasoned leftover oatmeal. Yum.
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