Things I've Learned from The Tasty Cheapskate

Hello friends!

This post was supposed to be written in January. I'm a wee bit behind.

I've been crazy busy with writing and life which is why The Tasty Cheapskate will be slowing down. From here on out, I may post an amazing recipe, or a group of favorites for you, but I won't be posting regularly. With any luck, I will have a Kindle version of my favorite recipes for you to purchase sometime next year.

For now, I wanted to share with you what I've learned from writing this blog. When I started, it was our goal as a (young) family of six to eat on $6/day. We came pretty close! The second half of the year, that figure moved up to $10/day. We could do that pretty handily. Now I sometimes spend more than that a day (closer to $13/day), trying to keep our food budget at around $400/month. Below you'll find a few of the things that I still cling to to keep our food life cheap while still eating as naturally and healthfully and deliciously as possible. Cheers!

1. Cook most of your own food. I mean, somebody shut the door, right?  Earth-shattering advice happening right here. But, seriously, it's the biggest and best tip I can give you. Food will almost always taste better, be better for you, and be CHEAPER if you make it at home. You don't have to go crazy (unless you want to). You don't have to make your own yogurt or kimchi or grow your own tomatoes for sauce or bake all your own bread (unless, again, you want to). But make dinner at home and life will be cheaper. Take a sack lunch and life will be cheaper. Skip the drive-thru for breakfast and life will be cheaper. No guarantees here but your waist might get smaller too.If you have to cheat, cheat. Buy a bagged salad (cheaper than even a fast food salad). Buy applesauce in the little cup things for your kids. Buy breakfast cereal for heaven's sake if you want to. But don't go out all the time (do go out sometimes if you're exhausted or want to--just not all the time). Even expensive food is cheaper and usually tastes better if you make it at home (hello triple layer chocolate cake). There are so many resources these days from food blogs to allrecipes to pinterest to everywhere. You're not stuck with grandma's cookbook. You can find a million and three good recipes with a million and three reviews to boot.

2. Don't eat more than your body wants or needs. I just can't stop with the earth-shattering revelations here. But one of the most expensive things we can do is eat (and cook) more than we need. Yeah, I know it's easier said than done. I feel you, people. Just don't cook and eat like it's a holiday every weekday. Keep your portions small.

3. Don't waste food. Try not to over-buy food (especially perishables). Try not to overcook and end up with things people won't eat for leftovers. This takes a little trial and error, but if you care about it, you'll get it and it will save you TONS of money. Americans waste 50% of their food every month (that's not all home waste; it's grocery stores and farms too). But we easily throw away a good 10-20% of our food budgets every month. You do the math. That's a lot of money that just went into the bin. It's a carbon footprint. It's a budget slap in the face. Sometimes I'm a little crazy about this and I am trying to be more moderate so we don't wind up with a fridge full of odd little bites of leftovers all the time. But if it's a serving-size leftover, I keep it. And then I try to remember to eat it.

4. Speaking of... Eat your leftovers. I try to have leftover nights and bring out all the stuff we've got to eat. I eat leftovers for lunch. And it is AMAZING. Why would anyone NOT want to eat leftovers for lunch??? They're delicious and cheap and take NO time to prepare. If you're not doing this, you are missing out on one of life's great delights, time-savers, and indulgences. Yeah, I just called leftovers an indulgence. I'll do it again if I have to. You're leftovers are better than most restaurant food. Eat them.

5. Along these lines...Keep the refrigerator clean. Because if you really don't eat all your leftovers, it's okay. You're sill human. I know sometimes we have good intentions, but just don't get to those leftovers. It's okay. Clean them out of the fridge, make adjustments to your cooking or shopping, and try again. Keeping a messy fridge (or freezer) with rotten food won't reduce your food budget. It'll just make your crazy and maybe sick if your weird kids go and eat that rotten food.

6. Eat less meat. If you don't eat less meat, eat it with cheap side dishes like rice or potatoes. We're not writing about diet ideas here, so if you just can't stomach potatoes, or you're on a keto diet, so be it. But meat is cheaper if you pair it with something inexpensive.

7. Breakfast for dinner. We did this back in our cheapest days. And we still do it. It's fun, it's easy, it's time-saving. Your kids will probably eat it.

8. Quick foods. Have some quick foods on hand, even if they're cheats. Pull out the pasta, the croissant rolls (to wrap meat or cheese into), the bagged salads, the tortillas, the beans and rice if that's your jam. Easy things to make when you're about to order a pizza. Try not to eat these every night or you'll grow hopelessly bored, but they're really nice in a pinch. And the truth is that every time I almost order food and then drag my butt into the kitchen and whip something up, I end up relaxing and feeling better about life and the night. Try it.

9. Have a plan (ish). Even if it's just a sloppy Pinterest board. Kind of knowing what you'd like to make for the week saves you money and makes cooking more fun and makes life less crazy.

10. Clean up together. When your kids are old enough, cook together. This isn't cheap necessarily, but it keeps you from slavery, which is nice. It makes it more fun to cook and eat together if you are not the family servant.

BONUS! Have fun and give yourself a break sometimes. Eating cheap is a great way to slim your budget (and maybe your waistline), but don't let it become an unhealthy obsession. Let it be fun. Let it be freeing.

Long live cheapskatery!!!

How I Do Lazy Meal "Planning"

Yeah. You see those quotation marks around the word "planning." There's a reason for that. It's called "laziness." No, wait, it's just called laziness. 

We all know, if we happen to think about these types of things at all, that meal planning is very important for our budgets and to prevent food waste. The problem(s) with me and meal planning is(are) that I often find that on Tuesday when I'm supposed to be making lasagna, that I just don't want lasagna. Or that on Monday when I go to the store, the mushrooms for the stuffed mushrooms were way too expensive, but the kale was on sale. In short, I'm just too irresponsible impulsive and fun for traditional meal planning.

But then again, a proper cheapskate who gets bored eating the same four foods over and over must have some level of meal planning. Here is what I do.

When I do meal "planning" there are no calendars, no calculators, no fancy pants apps. There's just my Pinterest board and maybe a to-buy list if I remember that part. And this works for me. I hope that if you're feeling "lazy" lazy, it will work for you too.

1. I look on Pinterest for yummy things.
2. I pin them onto my board labeled "Recipes" and then, if they make the cut, I put them on my board labeled "This Week's Food" board.
3. I look at the ingredients if I remember.
4. I write the ingredients that I need on my to-buy list. If I remember.
5. I shop and buy those things unless they are really expensive. (If I remember to look at the list on my phone or the Pinterest board or anything at all.)
6. I make those meals. Sometimes. Maybe.

You will notice, if you look at my board labeled "This Week's Food" that there are too many recipes for one week. That's because I either forgot some key ingredient, or I didn't feel like making it. Or I totally ran out of time because I was procrastinating making dinner, so we had scrambled eggs on toast (again). #momwin.

But seriously, this little method actually helps me. It gives me an idea of what I'd like to feed us and what ingredients I'll need to do that. Once we've got the ingredients, I can make it sometime in the next couple weeks and call it good. And I usually do.

One other thing that kind of helps is the Walmart grocery site that you can use to order groceries and then have them brought right out to your car (#thejoy). One thing I like about this if it's available in your area is that you can add the things you need for recipes right into your cart as the week goes on (so you won't forget your list or to look at your list or whatever it is we forget when we forget stuff), And then when you're ready you can schedule a pick up and all your stuff is already there and you didn't have to remember what it was you remembered you needed last Tuesday. The other great thing for a cheapskate is that by not going into the store, you can save yourself from impulse purchasing (#notthatIever).

Happy "planning."

Ebates: A Reminder Before You Get to Your Hardcore Holiday Shopping

If you don't use Ebates, you should (if you shop online). It's free money and I like free money.

For more details, have a look at my post from last year right HERE. (The promotions are slightly different right now, but the gist and the setup are the same.)

So suppose you spend $500 this year for Christmas in online shopping and earn a measly 3% back (it's often more), well, then you'll earn $15 for doing ABSOLUTELY NOTHING, except what you would have done anyway.

Want to try it? Use THIS LINK and then you and I both get free money when you make your first purchase.

Review of Walmart's Free Grocery Pickup

Walmart, ah, Walmart.

When I first heard about Walmart's Free Grocery Pickup--where you can order your groceries online and then you go to the store and stay in your car and they bring your groceries out to you, I felt like I was living in the future. And a glorious future it was. When my kids were young and I would drive to the store and someone would fall asleep and I would sit there in the car thinking, "Do I wake my kid and go in, or just go home, or just sit here in the car for 30 minutes not doing anything so they get a little nap in?" At that time in my life, I remember thinking that if there were drive thru groceries like there was drive thru fast food, all the problems in my whole life would dry up and go away. 

Well, folks, now there is in reality drive through grocery pick up just like drive through fast food.

And the truth is that I really do like it. But I'm going to start this review with a tiny vent because there was a learning curve to ordering and they seriously almost lost me as a customer and a promoter of this whole thing. If you want to skip the vent, hop down a few paragraphs.

There are a few glitches. This is a review and I'm going to be honest. The first time I did this on the computer, I HATED it. I was like, "Seriously, Walmart, how can you muff this up and make me still hate you?" But they did. I'd tried to use a friend's code, but it wasn't working. I had to call. They didn't have a bunch of stuff that I was sure they had (like, they only offered me organic bananas; where were the regular bananas?). Then when I went to use the groovy feature where I can change my order before pick up, it looked like it charged me again, so I had to call (it didn't; it just looked that way). Then there weren't pick up times I wanted. I seriously just hated Walmart with my soul. Until I sat in my car at that pick up and a polite young man brought out my groceries and loaded them into the back of my car. It was like small town 1950's market meets the future. And it was awesome.

Since then I've learned the ropes a bit and become a convert. You will too.

What I hated: 

1. Glitches, glitches, glitches. The website is surely a work in progress, and it just needs to be refined. And I feel like certain things aren't clear. After a few orders you know the ropes, but at first certain things seem confusing.
2. Sometimes it's hard not to see an item. The first time I accidentally got a small applesauce just because it looked big in the picture and I didn't read it closely enough. Not really their fault, but something to be aware of as you shop with thumbnail pictures instead of actual products.
3. There is not, as near as I can tell, a way for your to use regular clipped out coupons for cereal or Tide or whatever. You can use Walmart type promotions, but no newspaper type coupons.

What I loved: 

1. Have I mentioned the pick up where a polite Walmart worker comes to your car and puts your groceries in the back. And you don't have to do anything and could stand there catching Pokemon if you wanted to.
2. The other feature I just really love love love is that you can start a grocery cart just like you might start a grocery list. So if I'm planning to shop on Saturday, I can just start adding things to my cart on Monday. Oh, we need pasta and vinegar and olives. Then Wednesday I realize that we need toilet paper and peanut butter. Then on Thursday I look in the fridge and realize we're completely out of ketchup and that won't do. Etc. I just keep adding things to my cart instead of a shopping list. And it's wonderful and glorious because then they won't be forgotten when you forget your list, or remember your list, but mysteriously forget some of the things on it, or whatever frazzled people do when they shop. I love using it as my grocery list.
3. You can change your order. So if you decide you're not making pizza for dinner, take that pepperoni off the list. Note that when you do you have to re-check out, but they're not re-charging you (unless you add more and then they charge you the difference).
4. Even if you're late for your time, they'll hold your order till 8:00 (or whenever your Walmart stops doing the pick ups). I don't recommend abusing this, but it's nice to know.

What you need to learn to navigate their not-always-as-user-friendly-as-it-should-be website Walmart:

1. Sign up by clicking through the link if you want the promotion ($10 off your first purchase of $30 or more). If you're using the code I post below to get $10 off your order, you have to click through that link. If you don't, and sign up on your own and then try to use the promo code, it won't work. You have to click through the link to get the promotion.

2. Add stuff to your grocery cart. I actually think this is mostly a great feature. It's easy to add, easy to remove, easy to put that you want more than one item of something.

3. Choose a pick up place.

4. Choose a pick up time. You can choose the time early in the week if you want, even if you haven't checked out. This is nice because some of the slots go kind of quickly, so you can get them early if you'd like--even before you've officially checked out.

5. Give them your credit card info. Then add promos if you have them.

6. Know that if you change your order (which you can, which is nice), you have to "Place order" again. This threw me off the first time because I'd taken things out of my cart and I was worried they'd charge me for both transactions. They didn't, and they won't for you either.

7. Call and complain if something is awful. They answer quickly and try to resolve your concerns and are really trying to make this work and make you happy.

8. If something glitches and it won't let you place your order, just go back a few steps and try again.

HERE'S THE LINK. Remember to click through it if you want to save $10 on your first purchase ($30 minimum).

How to Make a Lot of Buttermilk from Just a Little Buttermilk

There are ways in this world to actually make buttermilk (originally it referred to the thin milk left after making butter, but that's not what the thick, acidic milk is that we now refer to as buttermilk). We're not going to mess with that. Today we just have a simple tip for making more buttermilk when yours is almost gone. Because buttermilk is much more expensive than milk. And because it's so yummy in all those baked goods.

Here's what you do:

1. When you have a few inches of buttermilk left in your jug, you pour milk in--just regular milk. (Shoot for a 1:4 or 1:5 ration. One part buttermilk for four parts milk)
2. Let it sit on your counter for 24 hours.
3. And then, magically, you have buttermilk. It's kind of sort of like making yogurt because that's kind of sort of what buttermilk is.

It's not rocket science, but you do have to trust me a little because I did just tell you to let your milk sit with your old buttermilk on the counter for 24 hours. And I would tell you that again. It works, and makes perfect buttermilk.

I usually do this two times before buying a new jug of buttermilk.

Pasta Salad Bar

My kids are picky. One weird thing about some picky kids is that they might like all the parts of a meal, but then when you put it together, they won't eat it. For example, my kids just started eating tacos as tacos. Even though they like hamburger, cheese, salsa, and olives, (and corn chips of course) when I would combine these items into a taco, they would refuse to eat it. It made me super crazy. And then I gave up (yes, I'm weak). I started putting the different taco items in bowls on the table and they would eat their tacos ingredient by ingredient. Le sigh. But now they eat them normally, so yay.

A few weeks ago when I was craving pasta salad, I was bummed because I was like "No one except Kip will eat it." And then I realized: My kids like pasta, my kids like olives, some of them like pepperoni, some of them like cheese, some of them like broccoli. And I realized that a pasta bar could meet my grown up craving and their picky kid needs (or wants as it were).

The truth is if you're a parent of picky kids and you don't necessarily want the battle of the century at all your meals, it's often a good idea to break some meals down into their individual parts, especially when you introduce new foods.

Try it. It's a party.

For our pasta salad, I combined the salad with the dressing (and actually even the broccoli because I wanted mine dressing soaked), but left the other ingredients separate.

I'd love to give you a killer dressing recipe, but mine was only so so. The toppings we used were broccoli, cheddar cheese, olives, pepperoni, and sausage. I desperately wanted artichokes as well, but we were out (the horror). They were a fantastic combination of toppings that made up for the lame-ish dressing.

How to Send Apples in Your Kids' Lunches: A Tip

For many years I've sent apple sauce in my kids' lunches. I haven't even done it easy style (those little containers of applesauce from the store). No. I've done it cheapskate style. I've taken a generic jar of applesauce and I pour some into Tupperware containers for my kids' lunches. It's kind of annoying and not a whole food, but it saved time and gave them something healthier than a fruit roll up to nosh on.

So, why, you're asking, don't I just send an apple for Pete's sake. Well, because for a long time my kids would not eat the peels off of anything, so if I sent an apple, a nice, untouched apple would come home. These days my kids will sometimes eat an apple like an apple was meant to be eaten (although they still like it peeled by me if they can fanangle that). But at school they have all of 15 minutes (maybe on a good day) to eat their school lunches. Biting their way around an apple is just too slow.

And don't ask me why, but eating a sliced apple seems much much faster. I'm not even kidding here (though I realize I sound ridiculous). But it's true: eating a sliced apple takes my kids half the time. Also, they don't have to eat the peels if they don't want to.

Yet I could never slice my kids' apples because, yuck, what kid would eat an apple slice that's been sitting in a lunch box oxidizing for the past 3 hours. Not mine, I assure you.

Some moms slice apples with a bit of lemon juice or another type of acid, but my kids always noticed the taste and disapproved (you remember they're the pickiest kids ever, right).

And then, finally, one day Pinterest came to the rescue. If you cut your apple with an apple cutter and then rubber band it, It doesn't oxidize--well, barely at all. Genius. Pure genius. I've been doing it all fall and haven't gotten a complaint yet. (Note: I do put the rubber-banded apples in a baggie, so they don't get the lunch box all a mess.) So I thought I'd pass it along.

See how that front one is cut. You're going to rubberband it up like the back ones.

This is one I left on the counter from 7 am to 2 pm. This is how it looked when I un-banded it. Not bad.

Chocolate Chip Cookies: A Tip

(And, and P.S., these are enormous. They were for Mark's birthday party and he didn't want him any tiny Mommy-style cookies.) 

I'd all but given up on chocolate chip cookies made from all butter. They just never turned out as well as their part-shortening brothers (which are, for the record, shockingly delicious). The problem with the all-butter cookies was their texture--the cookies came out sort of airy (for lack of a better word). They weren't as dense as the part-shortening counterparts. Also, the tended to come out a little flatter (by which I don't exactly mean flatter, but without the shape that dense cookies have--those folds of dough that just seem to sit there after the cookie has cooled), and they would dry out much more quickly (airy--like I said).  It didn't matter if the butter was cold or fully melted. It didn't matter if we beat the sugar in or mixed it by hand. Resting the dough helped, but not enough to make for a perfect, dense, chewy cookie. Nothing seemed to matter and I gave up. And then all the sudden, Kip's all-butter cookies just started to come out right. Every single time. The difference? He started rolling them into balls before baking (also, he got the butter super softened, but not melted--which I do think is helpful as well, though we've occasionally accidentally melted it and the cookies still come out okay if we roll them). I thought this was too easy to be an answer. But it's been several months now and every time we roll the cookie dough before baking, they come out RIGHT.

Hopefully my photography is good enough for you to see the difference between these cookies (you've got to look kind of close).

from un-rolled dough plops

from rolled dough balls

The one on the bottom was rolled; the one on the top was not. Both were from the same batch and baked at the same time. But you'll notice that they rolled one (bottom) has fewer airy-type holes. Also, the non-rolled one (top) almost seems to have its top layer sort of disconnected by air from the rest of the cookie. Also, the non-rolled one (top) is somewhat flatter.

I assume that the process of rolling the dough into balls simply compresses all that cookie goodness and sort of sticks the ingredients together better than they otherwise would have been. How's that for scientific talk?

So if chocolate chip bliss is alluding you, try rolling the dough before baking. You might be surprised.

Five Small Changes that Can Save You Hundreds Each Year

You know those articles Yahoo occasionally posts about changes you can make to save you money (you could save thousands every month if you fire your housekeeper!!! You don't say...). Yeah, I hate those. They're changes for rich people. Here are a few to try if you are a little less than rich, but still looking to save some money. I should tell you that these ideas are fairly easy and that I tried to make even trades. However. However, there is going to have to be some change made if you'd like to save a little money. Some of these require a small bit of extra effort or time. Some require a small sacrifice or the changing of habits. Some require the threatening of children. I've tried to keep things reasonable, but I recognize that we all have limits. My mom used to wash out her generic Ziploc bags. That's my limit. I just don't do it. Below are some things I usually do do (though I still give myself permission to splurge or slide sometimes).

1. Do not buy individually packaged things. From GoGurt to GoGo Squeez apple sauces to Cup o' Soup, it's going to save you a lot of cash to do your own packaging. Let's take yogurt for example. If I splurge on an Aldi GoGurt-style yogurt, I get 8 two-oz servings for $1.99  or $.25/piece. Yes, it is convenient for my kids' lunches. But if I get a 32 oz. carton of yogurt from Aldi, it is also $1.99 (often; it varies a bit) and I have gotten twice as much. If I get one yogurt item each week, I could save $8/month. Or $96/year. From switching up just one item. Do that with all the packaged foods in your family's lunches and this could add up.

2. Eat oatmeal instead of cereal. For a box of Aldi cereal, I pay $1.99 for 15 servings. For 30 servings of oatmeal, I pay $1.99. Even when accounting for an addition of brown sugar ($1 for 30 servings and we are pretty generous), the oatmeal costs about $1.50. But the real kicker is that my kids inevitably eat at least 2 servings of cereal every morning (and sometimes even more than that), but usually one (or even 1/2) serving of oatmeal fills them up. So you're looking at a food that in reality ends up costing about half as much. Yes, we eat cereal too sometimes. Yes, it's convenient and easier for my kids to get for themselves. But this is a blog about saving money and eating good food, and making oatmeal is actually only going to cost you 5 extra minutes each morning. If you eat  4 boxes of cereal/week, you'll save $4/week by switching to oatmeal or $16/month or $200/year. Even if you only change it out half the time, you'll save $100.

2 1/2. Even if you are dead set against changing your cereal habit, make your kids drink their cereal milk or pour less milk into their bowls. Recently, I measured out the amount of milk my son had left in his bowl after he was done with breakfast (a whopping bowl of cereal as usual). It was a generous cup. That's $.10-.15 every day if you eat cereal every day. If all my kids did that (they don't; Mark's the main perpetrator), we'd be spending an extra $.40-.60/day or $3.50/week ($14/month; $180/year). Just down the drain. I saved my son's milk, showed it to him and told him that he was going to pay me $.15 every morning he left that much milk. We came to an understanding. Ah--understanding.

3. Cut junk food in half. Literally. My mom used to divide the packages of Little Debbies in half in our lunches--I got one; my sister got one. We never got a full package of 2 Little Debbies. I know, it's pretty much child abuse. And, yes, a little part of me always yearned for that full package like my friends. But, really, not all that awfully much--I didn't even need counseling later in life. Truth be told, I was fine with my treat. I even learned to eat it slowly (nibble of the ends of the Swiss roll, then roll it out and lick off the "cream," then eat the cake part. Still a fond memory after all, even though I bet those Swiss rolls would make me gag these days--maybe. Now I'm having an urge to go out and buy some.) Also, I was a skinny kid who grew into a thin adult. I can't complain about that. So thanks Mom. And the fact is that most of us wouldn't be hurting too much from cutting most of our treats in half and saving the other half for another time. Using our Little Debbie example, you'll save about $1/week or $50/year per kid (an estimate--I remember Little Debbies from childhood only; I've never bought them as an adult; except that now I have to go buy some Swiss rolls). It's not a super ton of savings, but this is just the savings from one treat and it's money saved off of food that we could all benefit from eating less of. (So, go ahead and figure some health care savings into that mix too.)

4. Cut out soda or juices (or coffee or booze or cigarettes--please, you'll be loaded by the end of the year). Who even needs them (I said need, people)? If you do want to splurge, try the 2 liter bottles of soda or the 1/2 gallon jugs of juice or even cheapter the frozen concentrate juices. Occasionally, my kids beg for juice in their lunches. Occasionally I give in. But I pour a couple ounces into their water bottles instead of buying the juice boxes (usually--I even splurge there occasionally). The kids don't seem to care and their friends don't seem to either. I realize that sometimes it's the box (aka some kind of social status thing) to bring a box of juice and if it is you'll have to decide what to do about that. But if it's really just the drink your kids are wanting, you can save some money by skipping the packaging. And of course you'll save more money by just sending them water (and the cycle of abuse continues to my kids--wow--thanks a lot Mom). If you give your kids water (yup, I take it from the tap) instead of juice boxes you'll save $1.25 per week per kid. That's $5/month/kid. Or $60/year/kid. What if you just gave that money to them at the end of the year instead? I bet they'd like it better. What about your drinking habits? Let's say you drink 7 sodas a week at $.50/pop (this strikes me as moderate soda drinkage among soda drinkers btw). You've saved $3.50/week or $14/month or $180/year. Would you rather someone just gave that to you at the end of the year? It's a question worth asking. If you drink a glass of wine each night instead of a soda, then that cost has multiplied by at least 10 (that's $1800/year--would you like to have that?). Please don't write me nasty emails about how I'm trying to take away your favorite, most relaxing habits. This is just here for you to think about.

5. Leftovers. If you eat leftovers for one night a week instead of throwing them out and you do this for every week of the year, and if you normally spend $5-10 for your family's dinner (a modest estimate), you could save $20-40/week or $240-480/year.

Bonus:

6. Develop a habit of making your own "bagged" salad or whatever it is at the beginning of the week. Eat it throughout the week. Yes, it's a small lifestyle shift, but if you were thinking this post was going to be about how to save money without doing or changing anything, well, I'm sorry because it's not. So whatever food it is that you want to have on hand every day and you find yourself buying so you'll just eat it, make a batch at the beginning of the week. This could be salads, soups, prepared breakfasts, or even smoothies. The internet is full of ideas for salads in jars and overnight oatmeal, so if you want to do this, you totally can. And in style too. Let's use a salad as an example. At Walmart, a head of lettuce will cost about $1.20. A bagged salad (which is really just lettuce) about $2.50. So every week you'll save $1.30. Every month $5.20. Every year $60.

Fast and Perfect Pie Crust

Pies have a bad reputation for being hard. It kind of makes sense. There's a long baking time and a longer cooling time. There's a filling that can puddle and a crust that--to talk to any foodie--seems as ripe for disaster as global warming itself. We are told that crust must be flavorful and flaky, but it can't fall apart upon eating. It should be golden. It should be tasty. It shouldn't shrink. It shouldn't shatter.  Blah blah blah. And because of all this fuss, there's a whole slew of internet suggestions for making your pie crust just so. Your hands can't touch it. You've got to chill it. You need shortening. You need ice. You need cold butter. You need alcohol (because it supposedly evaporates and leaves spaces for flakiness in case you were wondering). You need to take frozen butter and grate it in a cheese grater. You need a marble slab for kneading. You need to not add too much flour when rolling or it will be tough. You need to not roll it too long or it will be tough. You need pie weights. You need milk and sugar to be brushed on to it. You need a bloomin' anti-depressent, that's what you need.

But you see, the thing about making a pie--at least for me--is that it can be kind of therapeutic. The counter dusted with flour, the rolling of the dough, the peeling and slicing of the fruit, the methodology, the seasonality, the ritual as old as your great-grandmother herself. It's like yoga to me, um, minus the calorie burn. But it's not like yoga if you make it miserable. So in keeping with my lazy-but-good cook desires, here are some guidelines for making it as painless as possible.

You will need:
A food processor (although you might be able to get away with a blender)
Frozen butter
Cold water
flour
salt or sugar (depending on whether you're making a savory or sweet pie)

It doesn't hurt to have:
a pie crust shield (one of those thingies you put on the pie crust to keep it from burning while the rest of the pie finishes baking--like this:


Here's how you do it.

1. Add 2 1/2 C flour to your food processor. Add 1 Tbsp sugar for a sweet pie (or 1 tsp salt for a savory one).
2. Pulse.
3. Cut your frozen butter(1 C) into squares with a nice sharp knife. (I find that cutting it leaves bigger chunks that are more likely to withstand imperfect crust-making skills.)

Toss those squares into the food processor and pulse several times. You want to get your butter into pea-sized bits (or so they say). If they get smaller than this, don't stress; you're fine. the fact that it's frozen will keep it from melting and completely incorporating into your dough. Ideally, you want little butter chunks, so that as the pie cooks you'll have a nice flaky crust with all the buttery flavor. Frozen butter chunks are the easiest and best way I know to accomplish this.
4. Add 1/4-1/2 C cold water in a stream as the processor runs until the dough starts to come together (not until it's a mushy mess). I usually use about 1/3 C water, sometimes with a couple extra tablespoons thrown in. It doesn't have to come together completely; it can look a little crumbly, but it shouldn't look like just a flour mixture anymore. It should look kind of like this:

5. Dump it out and form it into two balls.
6. Generously (as in GENEROUSLY) flour your surface. Ignore your too-much-flour fears because if you don't use enough here, your dough will stick and you'll have to re-roll and that means more flour and can't you just feel your blood pressure rising from the stress. It's still okay (see #8), but it'll stress you out and you don't need that.

(If you look closely, you can see the bits of butter still in this.)

7. Roll out one of your balls. It won't be perfectly round. That's okay. Patch as you need to. Reflour your rolling pin as necessary.

8. Fold it up and put it in your pan. Do some more patching if you have to. No biggie. If it happens to stick to your counter, don't cry. That butter's still cold and all is not lost. Just re-flour everything (GENEROUSLY) and roll it out again.
9. Fill your pan with fillings. P.S. While you do all this, you probably want to put your other ball in the fridge.
10. Then when your pie is filled, take out your ball of dough. Roll it out and flop it on top.
11. Cut off the overhanging pieces of pie crust and crimp the dough together somehow. It doesn't have to be perfect. If you like perfection, go online and find a few tutorials, but don't blame me if you get a headache. I just sort of pinch it together. When I was a kid, I used the tines of a fork to smash it and make a lined pattern for the crust.
12. Cut vents into your pie.
13. Line the bottom of your oven with aluminum foil. Your pie is going to bubble sugary stuff up and there is a decent chance some of this will bubble onto your oven. So give yourself a break and line it with foil first. [Note: This step should be somewhere above--it should be done BEFORE your oven is hot, okay.]
14. Cook your pie. Cover the edges with one of those pie shield things if you have one. If not, you can use aluminum foil. Or you don't have to do anything; life won't end; your edge crust will just get a little dark.

Now let's say you're doing an open-faced pie, such as a pumpkin pie. You can still make the full recipe of dough and save half. You can just freeze the ball (this is what I usually do), but if you've got a little extra energy you can roll it out and freeze it and have a ready-to-go pie crust for yourself. Here's how:
1. Roll it out.
2. Put wax paper on half of it and fold it in half over the wax paper.

(Here, there's wax paper on all because I wasn't quite thinking; it works too)

3. Put wax paper on half again and fold again. 

4. Wrap it in plastic wrap.

5. Put it in a Ziploc bag and put it in the freezer.

6. Before using, you'll need to de-thaw it a bit so you can unfold it easily. 

Ideas for Making Meals Ahead of Time

You know those ideas you wish you'd had a few years earlier because then you'd be rich (and also brilliant, forward thinking, etc.)? Yeah, I have a lot of those.

One has to do with making food ahead of time so you have something to eat on those cramped nights that pop up in this thing called life.

A quick google shows plenty of blogs about make-ahead meals. I do wish one was mine because a meal in hand--in the freezer or refrigerator--is a great way to save money in that it keeps you from eating out or taking in or (horror) running to the store to buy those pesky things you don't have (and, if you were unwise and sent your husband or took your kids, also buying 17 other things that you didn't need until you got into the store and saw them and realized you needed them desperately). When I read books and blogs about how to eat cheaper, they often sing about making your meals ahead.

It also keeps you from the puddle of tears a night with a stressed/late/rushed/messed up dinner can bring. Not that I speak from experience or anything. We would never eat a starved, haggard, haphazard meal at 7:00 o'clock, especially not tonight, nope not us.

Do-ahead meal preparation also saves you time in that you can combine your prep times (i.e. chop all the vegetables you'll need in one session) and that you don't have to make dinner every night of the week. As the start of school approaches with soccer and homework and piano students at my house a couple nights a week, this sounds even more appealing. Did I mention a puddle of tears earlier? Good.

Since I am not exactly brilliant at this myself, I offer you Some options for those who want to start planning ahead. My sister (always a step ahead of me in these things) has tried several. Here are a few she recommends:

The Fresh 20. You have to pay for this one, but it is fairly cheap and it saves you money in that it's built not to waste any food (i.e. you'll buy a head of cabbage and use half for one meal and then half for another, but in completely different and delicious ways). This is the idea I wish I'd most thought of. It's not so much making your meals ahead as perfect meal/shopping planning put out in front of you so you don't have to think. My sister really liked this--she said the recipes were delicious (and whole foody) and they didn't waste stuff.
Once a Month Mom. Freezer meals for a month. The idea is appealing, but I found the site a little daunting, but then I find the idea of making 20 meals at once a little daunting too. A little time on the page and I'm sure I would have been soaring along.
Five Dinners in One Hour. According to my sister it was more like 1 1/2 hours, but still. Also, they tend to use some processed ingredients (canned soups and the like), but it's still more wholesome than Denny's. By a long shot. Can I get an Amen?

As for me, I'm not quite ready to jump on the wagon just yet (at least not completely). Whah? After all that build-up? Well, I can't entirely pretend that laziness isn't a factor. Preparing your meals ahead takes some thought and planning. But it's not the only factor. My kids, have I mentioned it?--they're picky. As is my husband. That makes a lot of these websites tough for me to use because I'm the only one who would eat the food. Which means I'd have to plan my stuff my self.

Furthermore, I have no problem with a casserole here and there, but a casserole every night is not my thing. I realize that that not everyone is doing casseroles for their plan-ahead meals, but casseroles (and their canned chicken soup components) still often play a significant role.

Yet perhaps my biggest reason for dodging the do-ahead meal is that I kind of enjoy the ritual of preparing my meals every day (except, of course, for those puddle-of-tear nights). You can call me crazy if you want, but the process of whipping out the skillet and chopping some stuff to put in it relaxes and centers me in a way that whipping something out of the freezer and plopping it in the oven does not (and in a way that spending 2 hours to 1 day preparing all the week/month's food also does not). I notice that many of the people who advocate freezer meals or plan-ahead cooking don't always really like to cook. They just want it done so that they can save money and eat healthier. I have no problem with that, but it's not me. That said, there are days when it's 4:45 and we need to eat at 5:00 and I'm not ready. A few eggs and a salad can save the day, but not, you know, every day. And not when you're out of eggs and salad. And school and soccer and dance and 2 nights with piano students--it's coming. Sometimes, when I don't take deep breaths, it's enough to make Burger King start to look appealing.

Thus, there are a few planning ahead things I've determined to begin doing. (Especially after tonight; did I mention that it was a bit rough?) They're lazy things. They're just the type of thing I think I can actually pull off because they don't require too much thought. Things that will actually make it so that eating at home really does seem more appealing, delicious, and easy that going out.

1. Doubling stuff. Wow, that's pretty brilliant. I mean, why don't I have my own blog about prepare-ahead meals? And yet. This is kind of hard for me. I tend to undercook. In a way this is a method of controlling my portions and not overeating. In a way, it's a form of denial (do we really eat that much butter in one week?) that can't be avoided if making 5-7 breakfasts or dinners at a time. Nevertheless, with a little teeny forethought, doubling a meal should be pretty easy. You don't have to plan and coordinate meal components and be really brilliant with your food planning. You just have to do twice as much. And so, undercooking be darned, I've determined that if I make something that can be kept in the freezer, I'm going to make twice as much. This goes for breakfast cookies, casseroles, soups, breads, etc. I gave it a whirl tonight with the cornbread I made. It felt kind of nice.
-To make this work, I need to stick the to-be-frozen parts somewhere besides the countertop, lest it be eaten by me or the minions before it can be frozen in order to avoid the overeating-of-the-food-that-is-to-be-saved-for-later issue.

2. A salad or some vegetables for the week. I can easily prepare my own "bagged" salad mix (kale and romaine anyone? yum) so that we can have a quick one when we need one. Even better if I also cook a little bacon and hard-boil some eggs. A friend of mine sometimes preps dippable veggies for her kids for the week--carrot sticks, broccoli, cauliflower, etc. (which could also be plopped into grown-up salads as well). And Tamar Adler roasts and sautees vegetables enough for a week. I can do it too.

3. Make extra parts of meals: browned meat, sauces, bacon bits, or whatever. To me, this is the riskiest type of pre-prep since parts of meals are the easiest forgotten. Nevertheless I think it's worth a try. These bits can be thrown onto pasta, bread, tortillas, or stuffed into vegetables to make a meal so much quicker.

So while I don't know that you should expect to see a meal plan for an entire week from me anytime soon, I'll be working to be more efficient and prepared. Take that tear-puddle nights.

Food Essay Friday: Produce That Will Last a Month or Longer

Ever since the money suck known as December, I've been trying to shop less. I don't actually even enjoy shopping, but I'd gotten into a bit of a habit or going here or there to get the very best deal. Truly, I think it's generally a lousy way to save money (there's always something else there that you or your kids desperately need/want that is not on sale) and it's an enormous time commitment, which--unless you're a super couponer--is not worth it. Yet, somehow it is sort of addicting. I'm not entirely sure why this is. Perhaps it's the draw of those super deals. Perhaps it's some double empowerment you feel by both spending money and saving (or thinking you're saving) it. My personal theory is that by going to a different store several days of the week, you can avoid doing your laundry. I'll do almost anything to avoid my laundry. Unfortunately, going to several grocery stores is no longer on the list. It was costing me too much money; it was costing me too much time; it was costing me too much life energy.  

Lately I've been doing one major shopping day. It's kind of painful (3 hours at Aldi and Walmart with two small kids), but it seems to be paying off because I have a fully stocked house most of the month, which leads to less last-minute running around. I've had more free time and it's made it a lot easier to enjoy spring, my house, and my children. But not my laundry. 

My laundry woes aside, however, you're probably wondering how I shop for produce only once a month. Well, I don't. I usually get it a few times a month. And I do a milk run to a cheap nearby store once a week. However, I have noticed that there is quite a bit of produce that lasts for quite some time, especially if refrigerated, but sometimes even if it's not. We'll start with the most obvious and move down the list. 

Produce That Will Last a Month or Longer

1. Potatoes. These can be left out and they'll last even longer in the fridge. 

2. Sweet potatoes. These do best when NOT refrigerated, but kept cool and dry. I often buy lots when they're cheap at Thanksgiving time and keep them most of the winter long in our cool basement. 

3. Onions. The bulb onions are a classic storage produce item, but even the green onions will have a very good run if you refrigerate them. Even when they start to look a little sketchy, you can peel off the outer layer and usually have a very good green onion underneath.

4. Winter squash. Pumpkins, acorn, butternut--all the stuff with a thick skin will last a very long time. I buy butternut when it's on sale and keep it all winter in our basement too. 

5. Carrots. Refrigerate and they'll last longer than a month.

6. Cauliflower. Refrigerate.

7. Broccoli if it's fresh. If not, it'll only keep a week or two. 

8. Celery. Keep it well-wrapped in your fridge. Even if it starts to get a little wilty, it's perfectly good in soups and with roasts.

9. Apples. Buy them when they're in season. If you're already eating last year's cold storage apples, they won't keep too long, but if you buy seasonal apples, they'll keep a month or much longer, especially if refrigerated. Be sure there are no rotten ones spoiling the proverbial barrel. 

10. Oranges and other citrus fruit. Again, if these are seasonal (winter is their season), they'll keep for a while on the counter and they'll give you an easy month if they're kept refrigerated. Do make sure there are none already rotten or broken open. These will rot and ruin the good fruit around them too. 

11. Cabbage. Keep it wrapped in the original packaging or some tightly wound saran wrap of your own and they're good to go for a long time. 

12. Beets. Wrap or seal in a bag and refrigerate.

13. Lettuce. Okay, it might not make it quite a month, but you'd be surprised how long a wrapped head of lettuce will last you. Iceberg probably does the best, but I haven't bought it for year. I usually buy romaine and I've had lots of success with it. Generally speaking, the tighter the head, the longer it will last. Loose or cut leaves will go quickly (though putting them in a bag or tupperware with a paper towel will keep them going over a week too). 

Five Great Foods to Plant in Pots

(No, no, my plants don't look like this yet. This picture is from a couple years ago. Isn't it cheerful?)

You don't have to start thinking about your garden yet if you don't want to. Honestly, I don't know what my problem is. Even with storms whipping around us all day, I've been dreaming of pretty lettuces in pretty pots. Maybe it cheers me up. Maybe I just have an obsessive compulsive disorder. Maybe both.

Regardless of the variety of mental illness(es) I suffer from, however, it really is kind of fun to dream a little garden dream. Even if you're not ready to start gardening in March, it's nice to sit at home on a rainy day and think of the things you might be able to do when the weather cheers and warms just a bit.

But the purpose of this post isn't only to get you dreaming. The purpose of this post is to present some really easy ways to make those dreams a fairly inexpensive reality (does that just kill the romance or what; please forgive). Of course, if you've got the space, time, money, and inclination, you can dig up a garden plot and plant yourself a victory garden. If you do this, you might be sick like me. Not that there's anything wrong with that. We're healing the earth, my children, healing the earth. Except for when we spray pesticide on those super grody cabbage lopers that infest our kale every year.

If you have limited space or want to make your life a little easier, you can always do the ever popular square foot garden. However, these still take a little time and a decent chunk of change to get started (though after that I hear that they're pretty self-sustaining).

But this post isn't for those with time, money, or gardening knowledge. It's for those who want to get their little pinky toe in the water and give this whole gardening thing a whirl. Or those who really can't afford much. Or who have limited time. It's about a few cheap pots, some dirt, and some seeds. It's easy and surprisingly fulfilling. Go ahead, dip that ol' pinky toe in.

Note: For dirt, I recommend a mixture of compost, top soil, and peat moss in equal portions. And now...

Foods That Are Easy to Plant in Pots

1. Lettuce. Lettuce is fun because it's really quite pretty in a pot and if you want you can plant several varieties in a broad pot and it's super lovely. It's easy to grow. Lettuce can be started now if you wish although you can wait to April if you're not quite ready. It can be sown from seed straight into the pot. After that sprinkle a little dirt on and you're good to go. You don't need a deep pot for lettuce and you don't even need a big one. However, if you want to do the whole pretty pot with many lettuces thing, you'll want a pot that is somewhat broad. If you want to get heads of lettuce, you'll plant them 6-8 inches apart. However, if you plant loose leaf varieties (it should say on the package of seeds), you can plant them just 4 inches apart. Oh, and here's the other fun part. You can let them grow until they're about 4 inches high and then cut them off leaving about an inch on the bottom. You'll make your little salad and then the lettuces will grow up again. When they get to be 4 inches high, you can repeat this until the weather gets so hot that they bolt (grow up fast and begin to go to seed/flower and get bitter).

2. Herbs. Yeah, pretty much any herbs, except, like a mustard or bay bush or something. Again, if you have a large enough pot, you can plant several varieties of herb in your pot and it's very pretty. If you have small pots, you can plant a little row of different varieties of herbs, which is also really pretty. You can do a pasta herb pot with basil, oregano, and rosemary. Or a turkey herb pot with thyme, sage, and rosemary. Or a salsa pot with cilantro and a lime tree. Ha ha. Just a little joke there, but you can do cilantro and onions. Have a look at this post for information on herbs.

3. Tomatoes. I hear that you can plant any tomatoes in pots if you've got the right pot and know what you're doing. I prefer not to know what I'm doing and so I recommend planting bite-sized tomatoes in pots. I just have more success with the smaller varieties like Sweet 100's, cherry tomatoes, or even Romas. You'll need a fairly large pot. And you'll need to remember to water them as pots tend to dry out quicker than the ground. I recommend using starts from the store if you're new to gardening. They're only a few dollars each and will make your life much easier.

4. Peppers. These are also super pretty in pots. Especially those hot red varieties, although I never plant those because I am weak and can't eat many hot red peppers. However, I do like to plant regular red bell peppers. They're just so pretty. As with tomatoes, you'll need a larger pot and I recommend a start for beginning or even intermediate gardeners.

5. Strawberries. Talk about pretty. Also, strawberries can be susceptible to mold and prey to slugs. Planting in pots will help you keep those things under control and give the strawberries nice drainage. Of course, by planting in pots, you're not going to get enough to make jam or anything, but you can get enough for some pleasant snacking. You must plant strawberries from starts as they don't grow well or true or usually at all from seeds. They will produce in their first year, but they will produce more in their second year. After their third year, they'll start to wane a bit in production and you might want to replace them.

Now for a few I plan to try this year...

6. Yellow Summer Squash. Okay I totally haven't tried this yet, but I'm going to. They are supposed to be incredibly beautiful in pots and the pots will give the squash better drainage. Here in southern Indiana, it tends to be hot, humid, and wet and my summer squash plants tend to reflect that with bug problems and rotty problems and other problems I don't really understand. We'll see how the pot thing treats us.

7. Potatoes. Okay I haven't tried this one yet either. But after our flooding last year, I bought a big pot. Actually, I bought a big thing that people use to put ice and beer/soda into because it was way cheaper than a pot would have been ($6 vs. $25). I'll have Kip drill some holes in the bottom and then I'm good to go. To plant the potatoes, you put a shallow layer of soil on the bottom. Then you just lay your seed potatoes (little potatoes you buy to plant because they haven't been treated with anti-sprouting stuff like the grocery store potatoes have been) on the dirt. Then you just cover them with dirt. Talk about easy and lazy, but wait, it gets better. They'll begin to grow and as they do, you'll keep piling the dirt on top of them. So they'll grow up to 4-6 inches and you'll put on a bunch of dirt so there's only an inch or so sticking out of the soil. Then they'll grow some more and you'll do the same thing. Eventually, they'll flower and then they'll begin to die back. When they die or begin to die, you just take you big pot and dump it out and hunt for potatoes. How fun is that. Yes, I can't wait. It'll be like Easter egg hunting all over again.

Join us tomorrow when I take pictures of some cheap, um, "pots" that I've got. It's not quite Martha Stewart, but it's fun and colorful and useful and that's good enough for me.

How to Make Oat Flour

Ready for some rocket science? Hmm, well, you might have to look elsewhere then because this is way easy.

I use oat flour in several of my recipes and thought that it deserved its own little page. Homemade oat flour doesn't come out quite as fine as store bought, but it certainly comes close. It takes 3-5 minutes and it costs only about $.90/lb. I didn't find anything even close to that cheap online, even without shipping costs.


How to Make Oat Flour

1. Dump oats in a blender. They can be old-fashioned or quick (or probably whole and unrolled if you've got a decent blender, though I've never tried the unrolled variety). If you blend 3 C quick oats, you'll wind up with about 2 1/2 C flour.

2. Blend until smooth and flour-y. You may have to scrape down the sides here and there. And you may want to stop the blender once or twice and dig around in the bottom with your spatula to be sure there aren't any oaty pockets down there that you're blender is missing.

3. Use. If you have a lot, you can put the rest in a freezer bag and freeze it. Note: It's fine stored at room temperature for about 3 months. For longer storage, freeze it. Also, if you're looking for a nifty site about the storage of different flours, have a look here.

Fresh Ginger: A Tip

Cheap Eat Challenge, Part 2: Watch as our family of 6 eats on less than $10/day.

We've been doing a lot of work, cleaning, project finishing around here (and a little less cooking due to the enormous amount of leftovers in the fridge).

If you happen to have some leftover ginger root from those batches of gourmet ginger cookies you were making... Or perhaps from the soup you made in order to heal yourself from the batches of gourmet cookies you made...And you're not quite sure what to do with it except to let it sit there and rot in a baggy in your fridge, at which point, you'll get an intense urge for more cookies and/or soup and have to run out and buy another ginger root from the Asian store, which we all know means an extra errand, which we all means know means your kid will try to shop lift some Asian candy at the check out and then we may also know that you just might not have cash and that the Asian store won't take a card for your $.30 of ginger root, which we all know means you'll have to give up or wander around looking for $10 (plus or minus the not-quite-shoplifted candy your kid is whining for even though you know she'll hate it) of stuff to buy so you can use your card , and then you'll finally get out of there, but by then you'll be way too tired to make soup or cookies and will end up using a bit of the ginger over a hot compress on your eyes, and--frankly--I have no idea what that will do, but hopefully it will help.

Or you could just take your leftover ginger root out of the fridge and chop it up nice and small and put it in a freezer bag for later and then when you need a tablespoon of it at some random time, why, you'll just whip it out and it will be done and all will be well and right with the world--no hot compress needed.

Peel it, chop it small, freezer bag, label, freeze. Done.

How to Save Yourself from Your Christmas Cookies and Have Some Left to Give

Cheap Eat Challenge, Part 2: Watch as our family of 6 eats on less than $10/day.

This time of year, I like to bake a lot of cookies. I'm not even opposed to eating a couple. The problem is that we have way more than a couple hanging around.

Additionally, I want to have enough leftover to give away. That's over half the reason (did you hear that, friends, over half the reason--wow, you should feel very special) I'm baking them. But I don't want to be running out each day to give a batch to so and then the next day to so and other so. I want to go as a family on a (somewhat) convenient day with plates of different varieties of cookies.

How to save yourself from your Christmas cookies and have some leftover to give?

1. The day you bake them, let them cool, have one or two if you wish. Then, cut them and bag them up in Ziploc baggies.

2. Take your bags and label them if your cookies are different, but look similar. Then put them in the freezer.

3. Don't panic, you can still eat one if you have an absolute hankering. They're just in your freezer. But what won't happen is that you won't end up eating them just because, gee, there are 17 varieties of cookie sitting on your counter. Happy breakfast to you. Furthermore, by freezing them up nice and tight the first day, you'll keep them surprisingly fresh.

4. When cookie giving day comes, you can pack up plates with different kinds of all the cookies you bake. I just love this. That way I get the fun of making and tasting the different kinds of cookies. And the receiver gets the fun of not making and tasting the different kinds of cookies.

5. As a bonus tip, I like to put the cookies on a plate tightly wrapped with foil or cellophane. And then I like to put that in a gallon sized Ziploc freezer bag. It's not the prettiest presentation in the universe (you guys should know by now that that isn't my strongest suite). But it is incredibly practical. This way if your friends are completely cookied out by the time you get to them (and let's face it, cookie overload can happen), they can just throw your plate of cookies in the freezer and enjoy them later when they're ready, like some dreary day in January. The cookies are not exactly vacuum-packed like this, but they will keep well for a couple of months in someone's freezer. Want to go even further? Individually wrap each cookie in cellophane and then put them in the Ziploc bag for further freezer protection. That way any cookie-saturated friends can take one out of the bag when the whim arises and the rest will stay fresh even longer.

Happy baking.
Happy giving.
Happy not weighing 17 trillion pounds.

What to Do When Good Cookies Go Wrong

Cheap Eat Challenge, Part 2: Watch as our family of 6 eats on less than $10/day.

(This is a not a picture of the cookies gone wrong. It's a shot of the beauties created from the cookies gone wrong. Now, how can a person scoff at atonement?) 

Maybe it's just the sheer volume of cookies baked at this time of year, but we generally have a batch (or few) that get messed up: overdone, or weirdly flat (about that baking soda...), or missing a vital ingredients (like the gingersnaps without the ginger). It's not the end of the world, especially if the cookies are intended for a class of 3-year-olds or something. But it is annoying. It's really annoying when you're planning to give cookies to your dearest friends as gifts.

"Dear Dearest Friend,

Here is a batch of some of my favorite spice cookies. I overbaked them and forgot the ginger, and heck, you don't really want more cookies at this time of year anyway, but I hope you enjoy this gift as a symbol of our friendship.

Love,
Me"

Yeah, I'm just not feeling it. So when I screw up my Christmas cookies, I generally just make another batch.

But what to do about that edible, but imperfect pan of cookies sitting there on your counter.

Well, friends, when life hands you edible, but imperfect cookies, you make a wicked good pie (or cheesecake) crust, that's what you do.

Here's how:

1. Let your cookies dry out a bit (unless of course, they're fatal flaw was overbaking, in which case you should be good).

2. Put them in a blender or food processor (I found that for still slightly moist cookies, the food processor worked best) and blend them into crumbs, just like you could do with graham crackers for a graham cracker crust.

3. Make something with them this moment. Or put them in a Ziploc bag and freeze them until you need them. (Do yourself a favor and label them lest you forget what they are and end up thinking they're bread crumbs and use them on your next crusted chicken breast or casserole or stuffing).

4. And how exactly do you use them? Use them as you would graham cracker crumbs in a graham cracker crust.
a. A typical crust uses 1 packet or about 10 graham crackers. This comes out to 1 1/4 C crumbs. So if you want to sub in your cookie crumbs, sub in 1 1/4 Cto 1 1/2 C cookie crumbs.
b. Add in half the butter you would for a graham cracker crust and then add more butter if necessary. (You do this because your cookie crumbs tend to have more fat and moisture than graham crackers, so using as much melted butter as you normally would in a graham cracker crust would yield too wet of a crust.)

This year, I made a rather too dry batch of speculaas. It saddened me deeply, as speculaas is already a risky and misunderstood cookie in that people look at it and see a) a cookie they don't recognize as normal Christmas fare and b) a cookie sans chocolate.

Last night we made Seven Layer Cookies/Magic Cookie Bars. We used the standard graham cracker crust for some, but for another batch, we used the speculaas. I thought it came out pretty awesome. I'm thinking to use the rest as a crust for cheesecake. It would be especially delightful for a pumpkin cheesecake. Oh, yes, it would.

How to Make Your Own Colored Sugar

Cheap Eat Challenge, Part 2: Watch as our family of 6 eats on less than $10/day.

For years I sort of gawked at the colored sugars of Christmas, passing them up with Scrooge-faced determination while my kids begged for them in the aisle. I was not paying those prices for an itty bit of sugar with color. "We can make colored frosting," I'd tell my kids, "and it'll taste better and be cheaper."

Of course, they minded and respected such a level-headed response, usually in the form of leaning back and moaning, "But we want to put the sprinkles on the frosting." And so it'd go until one year I heard a rumor that you could make colored frosting with sugar and a few drops of food coloring.

I was sure it'd clump or be funky or be ugly or be whatever was not a perfect Christmas thing.

And I was wrong.

1. You put some sugar (let's say 2-4 Tbsp under the assumption that I had had the foresight to actually measure--don't worry you don't need foresight or measurements) in a Ziploc bag.

2. You put a few drops of whatever food coloring you want in the bag (just a few drops).

3. You seal the bag and then rub the sugar around with the food coloring.

4. And then you get this.

And then you get this.

And then you get this. (Told you I had a lot in store for Katie' perfect chocolate sandwich cookies.)

And then you are happy. And you are still cheap. But you may not be skinny anymore. Merry Christmas.

Linked to Sweets for a Saturday and Fusion Fridays