BEND AND STRETCH

Old Mother Frugal is so old that occasionally there is a flashback to an old favorite TV show called “Romper Room”.

The show comprised of a hostess and she had lots of children on her TV show.  There were props like Mr. Do-Bee, Mr. Music and the Magic Mirror. There were lessons to learn, songs to sing, activities to play with the hopes that your name would be announced at the end of the day.

At some point during the show, the children would all get up from the floor as the hostess began to sing “Bend and Stretch”.  Kids at home would also get up off the floor and participate in the activity too.  “Bend and stretch, reach for the stars….There goes Jupiter, There goes Mars”.

This was a time before Sesame Street.  Yes, Old Mother Frugal is just that old.

So how does ‘bend and stretch’ fit into our lives today? 

If you are frugal, like Old Mother Frugal, you bend to be flexible.  You stretch where you can to save money.

Recently, the local Kroger grocery chain was offering a free box of Annie’s Organic Pasta and (Made with REAL) Cheddar Cheese to loyalty card customers.  

When preparing this boxed macaroni and cheese, only half the cheese packet is used for the recipe.  The remaining half is transferred into a snack-sized, Ziploc bag and returned to the box. This stretches the macaroni and cheese into two meals.

“Bend and stretch, reach for the sky, standing on tippy toes oh so high”… grabbed some elbow pasta from the pantry pouring 12 oz or a generous cup worth of elbow pasta into the box to complete the ingredients for the second meal.  Taped shut, it is returned to Old Mother Frugal’s pantry.

Stretching one meal into two and having two meals for the (free) price of one. Then stretching leftovers into a third meal.  

The leftover ham with mac-n-cheese dinner transformed into a Cream of Potato-Cheddar Broccoli soup to be served with grilled cheese sandwiches.

Bend and stretch!

SOUND THE BUGLE! Today’s tip:  It’s never empty when it’s empty.  Before you dispose your plastic container of coffee creamer or laundry detergent, get all that you can out of it.  Add a little water to the coffee creamer and laundry detergent bottles and shake the bottles.  You’ll get more cream for your coffee and more detergent for your laundry. It may be diluted but still good to use.

EGG ON A MOTHER'S FACE

Easter Sunday has come and gone but the hard boiled eggs still remained.

At some point, you may have done this too…boiled a dozen or more eggs in anticipation of decorating said eggs for an egg hunt that never happened or to have as an activity to keep the children busy while the adults prepare dinner.

Old Mother Frugal stocked up on large eggs right before Easter this year.  The prices were amazingly low.  With an overabundance of eggs that can be frozen, Old Mother Frugal had no qualms about what to do with so many eggs.  If need be, they would go into the freezer.

In advance of the Old Mother Frugal’s Grand Little Helpers visit, a dozen eggs were boiled and left in their shells awaiting dye and glitter.  The Grand Little Helpers were so busy with each other that time came and went while the eggs remained in the refrigerator. 

Slowly but surely, the eggs found their place in a variety of recipes.  Sliced hard boiled eggs on a tossed salad or hard boiled eggs made into deviled eggs.

Towards the end, the remaining eggs were transformed into an egg salad for a sandwich lunch.  A little mayo mixed with a little relish and a squirt of mustard topped with fresh ground pepper.  Viola! 

Ready to smear the mixture between two slice of soft, white bread so that with one bite it would stick to the roof of the mouth in need of a glass of milk to wash it down. 

But there was no bread.  No bread?  No bread.  No one was around to witness the figuratively “egg on the face” embarrassing moment. Phew!

There were crackers. When craving an egg salad “sandwich”, crackers were not an appealing option.

A scavenger hunt ensued in the freezer and refrigerator. There they were….a stack of pancakes. The light bulb was not only on in the refrigerator but also in Old Mother Frugal’s head.  Why not make a pancake sandwich!?!

Why not indeed!

It was a little messy. There was little room for spreading the chunky egg salad on silver dollar-sized pancakes.  But in the end, the egg salad mixture was salvaged into a uniquely delicious lunch sandwich.

Bread, on the other hand, can now be found on Old Mother Frugal’s shopping list.

SOUND THE BUGLE! Today’s tip:  If you have a surplus of egg , consider freezing them for a later time.  The “Incredible Edible Egg” website is a wonderful resource for such an idea.  Check it out at http://www.incredibleegg.org/eggcyclopedia/f/freezing-eggs/.  It contains eggs-actly what you need to know about freezing eggs!

THE UN-FAJITA FAJITA

Old Mother Frugal’s freezer is overrun with sliced peppers.  There are green ones, orange ones and red ones because whole peppers were on the “Manager’s Special” clearance table at the local grocery store.

It didn’t take long to slice, bag and tag them. They sit as the top layer of my deep freezer chest in the garage. Found a recipe for crispy chicken fajita wraps and what a perfect use of these discounted sliced peppers!  The peppers now have purpose.

Needing a fajita seasoning recipe, Google provided several from which to choose and all the ingredients were in Old Mother Frugal’s pantry.

It took some searching, but there was a rotisserie chicken breast in the freezer too.  No cooking required, just defrost and dice into cubes for this recipe.

An unopened package of flour tortillas lay in wait on the pantry shelf.  Twelve to be exact.  Twelve crispy chicken fajita wraps ready to be stuffed.

As each tortilla wrap was warmed, stuffed and folded into a rectangular burrito shape, it was becoming evident that the yield was not going to be twelve.  By the time six were made, the total was going to be eight wraps. 

Was there too much filling in the wrap?  Why wasn’t the yield twelve?  They looked lovely, all eight of them but they weren’ twelve.  Twelve.  What went wrong?!

And then there was the answer…the sole reason for undertaking this cooking project, the sliced peppers.

None of them made it into the recipe.  All those beautiful, colorful sliced peppers just became a forgotten ingredient.

Old Mother Frugal no longer had the expected “crispy chicken fajita wraps” but in its place were eight chicken and cheese burritos.  How frustrating!

Too late to un-wrap eight burritos and add peppers.  Instead, they were wrapped for the freezer with a memo to self.  Cook peppers and onions.  When ready to serve for dinner, the peppers and onions will be placed on top of the burritos. 

Instead of hiding these colorful sliced bell peppers inside the tortilla wrap, they will now be on full display outside the wrap making for a beautiful presentation when serving the meal.

The cooking project didn’t end as originally planned but it did have a happy ending!

SOUND THE BUGLE!  Today’s tip: The meal had a projected yield of 12 wraps and the yield was short. A side dish of beans and a salad can be added as healthy extenders to make this a meal to feed 4-6 people. Three adults/teens will each have two wraps and younger children can have one each and a side dish.

THE YEAR-LONG PANTRY CHALLENGE 2016

The freezers and pantries were full and restlessness about meal preparation began to brew within.  How to make meal prep more interesting? It was December 5, 2015 when Old Mother Frugal made the commitment to a year-long pantry challenge. 

The concept of the “pantry challenge” was to not be wasteful and use what’s on hand, only purchasing those items that were “must have” to the shopping list.  Some pantry challenge participants shop weekly, others shop monthly.  For Old Mother Frugal, always on the prowl for a great sale, shopping took place more often than weekly.

Items considered by many as “must have” could include perishable items such as fresh fruit, vegetables, eggs, bread, milk and orange juice.  Some omit bread from the list and bake their own. With an ample supply of canned or frozen vegetables (either homegrown or purchased from the store), participants omit fresh vegetables from their shopping list.  As you can see, the “must have” list becomes quite personalized based on a variety of factors.  Time and pantry items on hand were two most popular determinates to the challenge.

Reflecting on the year, it has been a series of culinary challenges.  Dusting off an old bread machine, a loaf of bread was made for the first time in twenty years.  It had flaws but was edible. Homemade flour tortillas made its way into the meal prep rotation.  Some delicious homemade burritos came from this culinary pantry challenge. Yet to be conquered… pizza dough, but it’s on the list.

Another component to a pantry challenge was nothing went to waste.  All leftovers get used in some capacity, even if that means carrots were pureed and added to waffle batter.  A little cinnamon and nutmeg, raisins if desired, and suddenly carrot cake waffles were on the breakfast table!

Old Mother Frugal tried yet again to grow a summer vegetable garden.  Results were mixed.  Half dozen zucchini were harvested from the little plot of land.  Teeny-tiny potatoes, a dozen cherry tomatoes,  half dozen mini-eggplant, maybe three edible larger tomatoes.  Deer and squirrels were my albatross.  Old Mother Frugal could not survive on her home grown garden. 

It seems that zucchini flowers, those beautiful large yellow blooms were edible.  An online search pulled up a mixture of cheeses that one would use to make stuffed shells. Harvesting five blossoms, they were stuffed and baked for a light yet delicious lunch one summer afternoon.

If Old Mother Frugal thought she was frugal before, the budget just tightened up a bit. Unless food was at rock bottom prices as in “haven’t seen it in years” kind of sale, it was not purchased. Meats were only replaced once there was nearly none left in the freezer or met the criteria of the aforementioned sale. This philosophy carried throughout the entire year. A bonus of this pantry challenge was that the monthly food budget began to shrink. 

The monthly budget at the end of 2015 was $160/month for two adults.  At the start of the New Year decreased to $148 each month.  As months went along, it became evident that the budget could be slashed yet again to an average of a little over $100/month for two adults.  Some months were more, some months were less.

It was shortly into the New Year when “ugly” produce and fruits were actively and intentionally added to the grocery cart.  That would be those items tagged and bagged for quick sale and heavily discounted in price.  They were usually ripe and ready to be used or frozen.  For Old Mother Frugal this not only saved money but kept some good food out of landfills.  The year didn’t begin with saving food from the landfills but it is a shopping practice that will continue for Old Mother Frugal.  Food doesn’t have to look perfect when bought to taste wonderful at the table.

At mid-year “Feeding the Nations” put out a global initiative for another type of pantry challenge. Could one eat rice and beans for one meal Monday thru Friday during a specified week?  Money was donated to the organization in the amount of what one would have spent on groceries for that meal by eating rice and beans.  Up for the challenge, lunch became the “rice and beans” meal.  A few days of soup; a couple days of black bean burgers and before long the week of rice and beans lunches had come to an end.

There is an organization in England called “Love Food, Hate Waste” which has a world-wide community of followers.  Their mission is the name of their organization.  Nothing more need be said, right? An educational resource of being not wasteful with food, it kept this one person accountable to the task at hand and food out of landfills. 

Due to a variety of special dietary considerations, one may read this and think it not possible to eat frugally.  If one does not waste the food that one has, one has successfully eaten frugally.  Old Mother Frugal looks to the New Year to continue the journey of frugality with food.

With a series of “new to me” cookbooks purchased at local thrift stores, new culinary themes with a frugal bent are in store for next year.  And maybe… just maybe… that homemade pizza dough that has eluded Old Mother Frugal will finally be conquered, at long last.

SOUND THE BUGLE! Today’s tip:  During this holiday season, save bones from your turkeys, your lambs and your hams to make broth.  Ham bones can be used a second time mixed with beans and water for flavor. Before you discard food as trash, give it another look.  If you can’t use it now, store in the freezer for use at a later time.  Broths freeze well and can be used to make soups or to cook rice or beans for added flavor.  Once a week, empty out your refrigerator, place leftovers into a pot of water and simmer it down for a soup.  As it cooks along, add salt or pepper as needed. You’ll never eat the same soup twice!

                                      CARROT CAKE WAFFLES

                                          LEFTOVER PICKLE JUICED CUCUMBERS

                                         BREAD IN THE SHAPE OF A TURTLE

                                         APPLE SLICES DRIED IN THE OVEN

                                         POP TART made w/LEFTOVER PIE CRUST

                                         REFRIED BEAN w/CHEESE BURRITOS
                                     

                                                   PIZZA TURNED CALZONE

                                         PICKLED WATERMELON RINDS

                                          HOMEMADE POTATO PEROGIES 

                                      

                                     STUFFED ZUCCHINI BLOSSOMS

                                         CRUMBLED CAKE BECAME TRIFLE 

                                                   CHOCOLATE ZUCCHINI MUFFINS

                                                    HOMEMADE NOODLES
                                 

             
                                          REGROWING CELERY

                                         HOMEMADE KETCHUP AND BBQ SAUCE

                                          FRUIT FLAVORED WATER

                 

                                     LOAF OF BREAD FROM BREAD MACHINE

                                     

                                      HOMEMADE RICOTTA 

 

                                     HOMEMADE FLOUR TORTILLAS                       

 

EASY AS M-Y-O

Several mornings a week, Old Mother Frugal has oatmeal for breakfast. 

It’s not the oatmeal that one would grab from a brand name box and pull out a pre-made envelope of oatmeal goodness.  It’s the “from scratch” kind of oatmeal cereal. 

Buying in bulk from the wood barrel is more economical than the cardboard round canister boxes or the boxes containing 10 envelopes. Bulk oatmeal goes on sale for .50/lb and the landfill is spared the waste.

On those several mornings, the same activity is repeated as days before, beginning with "where is the 1/2 cup measuring cup". Invariably, it's never the first one to be spotted in the drawer.  Several measuring cups are flipped over in the drawer until there are no more cups to flip.

Next, grab the oatmeal and measure ½ cup for the pot.

Now, hunt for the cinnamon on the spice rack. Round and round the spice rack goes.

Much like the measuring cup, it’s never the first spice to be spotted on the carousel of flavor.  There is pumpkin spice…apple spice…all spice…nutmeg….finally, cinnamon. Some mornings, those other spices are quite desirable.  This particular morning, it was all about the cinnamon.

Walk over to the pantry for walnuts or pecans or slivered almonds.  Decisions, decisions. Next, brown sugar.  Lastly, decide on some type of dry or fresh fruit or no fruit at all to add to the oatmeal

At this point, the pedometer registers 10,000 steps from walking in circles and battle fatigue has set in from too many decisions executed for a bowl of breakfast. 

Time to stop reinventing the wheel.  Time to implement a “make-your-own” oatmeal packet for breakfast and stop this insanity!  Today is that day.  Armed with five small containers and a small pot, it’s time for MYO Cranberry Cinnamon-Pecan oatmeal cereal.

Into the pot…

-       1 cup water*

-       ½ cup oatmeal

-       Sprinkle cinnamon

-       Chopped pecans

-       Dried cranberries

-       Pinch brown sugar

-       Optional 1tsp vanilla*

Fill the pot and the five containers with the dry ingredients.  When ready to cook, add the remaining two liquid* ingredients and enjoy an insanely relaxing bowl of breakfast cereal.

Sound the Bugle! Any container can be used for a MYO project such as this….Ziploc bags, jars or plastic containers.  Use whatever you have in your kitchen. This will save you time and save you money from purchasing pre-made cardboard boxes containing 10 envelopes of oatmeal cereal.  

                                  Cranberry Cinnamon-Pecan Oatmeal

A SHORT KITCHEN CONVERSATION

When Mother’s Little Helpers were young, we frequently had leftovers from dinner because stages of appetites varied back then.  It was hard to project whether any given night would be that “eat me out of house and home” night.

Old Mother Frugal had her challenges feeding her male offspring. Keenly observing them, their habits reverted back to infancy.  The males fed every 2 hours and then slept for 4 hours. Awoke, fed and slept. Such was the circle of their life.

In an earlier blog post, there was “Some Assembly Required” because there was never anything to eat in the house.  Food was there…it just wasn’t being handed out through a drive-thru window, all nice and tidy and ready to eat.

At times pre-assembled meals did appear in the refrigerator for snacking, however repulsive the process was to one of the Little Helpers.

You see, Old Mother Frugal could not discard any seasoned meat.  Secretly rinsing off the seasonings under cool water, the now unseasoned meat would become the ingredient to a different recipe.

One day, my secret was out as one of the Little Helpers witnessed the transformation of last night’s dinner into today’s pre-assembled snack for the refrigerator. Taco meat was being rinsed under running cool water.

“GROSS”!!!!

[Mother’s Little Helper spoke few words; nothing’s changed to this day].

“Well then don’t look”.

[Old Mother Frugal spoke more words; nothing’s changed to this day].

Mother’s Little Helper walked away. Upon opening the refrigerator door several hours later, lasagna roll-ups had made their appearance for consumption.  Nice and tidy and ready to eat.

SOUND THE BUGLE! Tip: Avoid food waste. Even the smallest amount of leftover food can find some usefulness in another recipe. If you are not going to transform leftovers or use them within 2 days, store them in the freezer. Below is how one pork chop and small amount of leftover chopped broccoli became a pork fried rice dinner!

A MODERN DAY MS. MUFFET

Do you know Little Ms. Muffet?  She was the little girl in the nursery rhyme of the same name.  The origin of Ms. Muffet remains unclear, with a few urban legends chronicling her authenticity back to the 1600s.

Although Ms. Muffet’s origin may remain an unknown, the two knowns in this nursery rhyme are “curds” and “whey”.  Curds are a solid cheese-like substance and whey is a milky liquid.

Over the Labor Day weekend, Old Mother Frugal channeled her inner Ms. Muffet.  After a little bit of research…the internet can be a wonderful thing….she got off her tuffet and into her kitchen for the creation of a milky solid and a liquid by-product.

Yes, the creation of butter and buttermilk! 

Having used heavy cream to make homemade whip cream for a chocolate cream pie the week before, an inch or more of heavy cream remained in its container.  Like the internet, boredom can be a wonderful thing. 

The pantry contained the two key ingredients for butter: a hand-held mixer and the aforementioned carton of heavy cream.  In a matter of minutes, a solid was appearing and a liquid began to formulate in the same bowl.  It was butter and buttermilk.

At the completion of the mixing process, 2 generous tablespoons of butter remained at the base of the bowl immersed in one-third cup of buttermilk. The two were then separated at birth: one in a square of cheese cloth, the other into a measuring cup. 

The butter was molded and pressed into a small finger bowl while the buttermilk remained in the refrigerator until used in a batter of blueberry pancakes.  Old Mother Frugal had indeed become a modern day Ms. Muffet.

SOUND THE BUGLE!  When using heavy cream to make whip cream, place a metal bowl in the freezer for 10-15 minutes. If you don’t have time, you can still successfully make whip cream by skipping this tip.  To one cup of heavy cream, add 2 TBS of sugar.  Using a whisk or hand-mixer, begin to mix.  Be careful not to over mix or you will make butter. If you make butter, the liquid by-product is buttermilk. This can be refrigerated and used within a few days, in any recipe calling for buttermilk.