A Month of Meals: Your Questions Answered

Welcome back! Today I am answering your questions about my series on planning your menu on a monthly basis and on a budget. If you missed one of the posts, you can find them here:

Intro and Monthly Menu Planning

The Recipes

The Shopping List

Freezer Cooking Day

 

Were you able to get the BBQ sauce stain out of the table cloth?

Ha ha, yes! We finished all of our food prep after wiping off what we could. Then I coated the stained areas with my Norwex dish soap. I let it sit while I gathered up some other laundry to put in with it. It all went into the laundry with some homemade laundry soap. In the end you can't even tell it happened. I started freezer cooking at 5:00am on the weekend so it was all back to normal before my parents even got up.

What was your menu like on $100 a month?

I relied heavily on the dollar a day meals website. Unfortunately, the site is no longer up. We had soup 4 nights a week and nearly every meal was accompanied by homemade bread or biscuits. I spent a lot of time cooking in those days. We also weren't gluten free then and that made a huge difference.

Were all the recipes a hit with the family?

All but one went over well. The Italian chicken with potatoes and green beans was not our favorite. It was a bit sour, like eating an entire bag of salt and vinegar chips, which I love. It won't be making it onto another menu. The rest were fantastic.

Have more questions? I would be happy to answer them!

A Month of Meals: Freezer Cooking Day

We have our menu, our recipes, and have done our shopping. Now it is time for food prep. What I love about this particular menu is that the food prep is so incredibly easy. Most of the items are already frozen. All you have to do is put the ingredients in the bag and you are ready to go. I did my freezer cooking in just under 2 hours from beginning till the last hand washed dish was dried.The first thing you will want to do if you are following my menu is cook your ground meat. This is the only actual cooking involved in our freezer cooking day. You will want to drain it and also let it cool before putting it into the bags. While you are waiting for the meat to cook start writing up your bags. I label them with their name, special instructions like adding water or what to serve it over, the date, and cooking instructions.

Once you are ready to put the food in the bags you want to do two things. First puff up the bag and zip it shut. gently squeeze to make sure there are no holes in the bag. We had a major mess on my mom's white table cloth because half a bottle of BBQ sauce gushed out of a hole in one of our bags. You live and you learn, right. Second flip the zip top out. This helps the bag to stand on it's own and hold the mouth of the bag open.

Now it is just a matter of tossing the ingredients in the bags. This menu is well designed for freezing. With just a bit of work you will have those quick and easy frozen meals we all love the convenience of using. In this 2 hours you will have 26 meals done for the month, just heat and serve. Okay, some of them will be served on rice or pasta, but that is quick and easy to whip up.

Now is the time for your questions! Ask in the comments or where ever you have seen this series. Tomorrow I will answer all your questions and link back to all the posts in case you missed one. See you then!

You can find the rest of the series here.

A Month of Meals: The Shopping List

So far we have our menu and our recipes. Today it is time to go shopping. It is good to plan the menu a bit to the shopping. If you know that a recipe calls for half a bag of frozen veggies you might as well make it twice or select another meal that will use the rest. You can't buy half a bag after all and it keeps costs down if you buy 1 bag instead of 2 bags in which only half is used.

A few notes on my shopping list. We generally buy Kraft because their company is always upfront about gluten in their information. You can certainly get some of these things for less if you do not need gluten free. Also, I don't have milk on my list. I didn't even think about it. My mom does daycare and always has a ton of milk on hand. We have bought maybe 2 gallons of milk since we moved in. You can save by buying dry beans and rehydrating yourself. We just don't have the option for so much cooking. I also bought my pesto in two small jars. You could save a lot by making it yourself or doing a pesto sauce mix. Let's dive into the list now.

A Month of Meals Shopping List

 

Can Aisle

$1.58 Can Tomatoes and Peppers (Rotel) $.79 X 2

$1.58 Can Black Beans $.79 X 2

$6.36 Can Pineapple Tidbits $1.59 X 4

$1.58 Can Tomato Sauce 15 oz $.79 X 2

$6.16 Can Tuna $.77 X 12

$1.99 Sweet and Sour Sauce $1.99 X 1

$1.99 Ranch Dressing $1.99 X 1

$3.96 Italian Dressing $.99 X 4

$2.98 BBQ Sauce $1.49 X 2

 

$28.18 Can Aisle Total

 

Dry Goods

$5.98 Small Jar Pesto $2.99 X 2

$4.76 Box Au Gratin Potatoes $1.19 X 4

$5.97 Box Pasta $1.99 X 3

$7.98 Fritos Corn Chips $3.39 X 2

$4.09 Sushi Rice $4.09 X 1

$2.99 Parmesan Cheese $2.99 X 1

$2.69 Soy Sauce $2.69 X 1

$6.36 Corn Tortillas $1.59 X 4

$11.16 Box Cereal $2.79 X 4

$24.00 Oatmeal $6.00 X4 (We buy our gluten free oatmeal on Amazon)

$1.49 Jar Spaghetti Sauce $1.49 X 1

 

$84.25 Dry Goods Total

$112.43 Total so far

 

Cooler/Deli

$11.97 Hamburger (or other ground meat) $3.99 X 3 lb

$3.98 Cream Cheese $1.99 X 2

$4.99 Shredded Mozzarella 16 oz $4.99 X 1

$8.89 Shredded Cheddar (fine shread goes farther) 32 oz $8.89 X 1

$2.99 Cottage Cheese 24 oz $2.99 X 2

 

$32.82 Cooler/Deli total

$145.25 Total so far

 

Freezer

$20.97 Bag Frozen Chicken Tenderloins $6.99 X 3

$3.87 Frozen Green Beans (2 cut, 1 sliced) $1.29 X 3

$3.98 Frozen Corn 32 oz $1.99 X 2

$5.96 Frozen Stir Fry Veggies $1.49 X 4

$1.99 Frozen Broccoli $1.99 X 1

$23.96 kinnikinnick Donuts $5.99 X 4

 

$60.73 Freezer Total

$205.98 Grand Total for Meals

If you are eating 3 meals a day you are done for a grand total of $205.98 for your month! This leaves plenty of room in our family's $300 budget to add some of our favorite snacks. On our snack list we have the makings of meat and cheese topped rice cakes, veggies and dip, and apples and peanut butter. I also added in a head of leaf lettuce each week to add to our meals and use in taco salad the days we make our taco filling. So here is the rest of my shopping trip with our snacks included.

Snacks

$8.00 Rice Cakes $2.00 X 4

$9.98 Deli Meat (to be frozen in 4 bags) $4.99 X 2 lbs

$11.98 Sliced Deli Cheese (to be frozen in 4 bags) $5.99 X 2 lbs

$9.96 Fresh Cut Broccoli $2.49 X 4 Buy Weekly

$9.96 Fresh Cut Cauliflower $2.49 X 4 Buy Weekly

3.98 Dressing as Dip $1.99 X 2

$11.92 Apples $1.49 X 8 lbs Buy 2 Lbs (roughly 4 apples) weekly

$5.36 Peanut Butter $2.68 X 2

$5.16 Leaf Lettuce $1.29 X 4 Buy Weekly

 

$76.30 Snack Total

$282.28 Grand Total

Our grand total with snacks is $282.28. We are still $17.72 under budget. I am more than willing to admit that our snack costs are quite high. You could probably cut that back a lot but I am not worried about splurging because we are under budget.

It took me about an hour to wander around getting all these prices and doing the math. Now that I have my prices I can refer to them later to make my budgeting faster in the future. I will probably add these items and prices into my grocery app to make it even easier as I can make up my shopping list in it and it will add everything up for me and even sort by food type making my shopping trip super fast.

[caption id="" align="alignnone" width="230"] Mighty Grocery Shopping List Free I have the paid version but they have a free version now![/caption]

What are some of your go to snacks? I would love to see that go down a bit.

You can find the rest of the series here.

A Month of Meals: The Recipes

Yesterday we looked at planning the menu. Today I am sharing all the recipes I am using for my menu. I love getting recipes from Pinterest and many of these recipes are from there. You can follow me on Pinterest here.

The first 6 recipes can be found at Stacy Makes Cents. I used chicken tenderloins instead of breasts and did one for each of us in each bag. We aren't big meat eaters. It would be easy to swap out chicken for other types of meat as well. There is no cooking involved in the meal prep and we have loved 4 out of 4 of them that we have already tried.The Hawaiian BBQ Chicken comes from Six Sister's Stuff. They have fantastic recipes! I have tried several of them. We will be serving this dish over rice in our monthly menu.

Baked Ziti is from Amusing Foodie. I half the recipe for our family and use gluten free pasta of course. I also use cottage cheese instead of Ricotta.

That last 3 are family originals. I haven't made them in a long time so I don't have any pictures. They are super quick and easy though.

Corny Chicken

Ingredients (all to desired quantity):

Chicken

Corn

Salt

Pepper

 

In a sprayed casserole dish put chicken. Top with corn. Season with salt and pepper. Bake on 350* for 30 minutes or till chicken is done. Enjoy!

For freezer cooking simply toss everything into a bag and freeze.

 

Beef and Broccoli with Pasta

Ingredients:

1 lb cooked hamburger (I will be splitting 3 pounds between the 4 freezer bags that require hamburger)

1/2 bag frozen broccoli

2 T olive oil

garlic to taste

1/2 box of pasta

 

Toss everything but the pasta into the bag to freeze. Bake at 350* for 30 minutes or till hot. Cook pasta and toss with a bit of olive oil and season with salt and pepper if desired. Toss pasta with the broccoli and beef and serve. Great with parmesan cheese sprinkled on top.

 

 

Mermaid Hair Casserole

Ingredients:

1 lb cooked hamburger

1/2 bag frozen sliced green beans

1/2 jar spaghetti sauce

Pasta or rice to serve over

 

Toss the hamburger, beans, and sauce into freezer bags to freeze. Bake at 350* for 30 minutes or heat on the stove top. Serve over rice or pasta. This dish is named for the stringy green hair of the mermaids in Harry Potter.

 

Our lunch and breakfast meals don't have recipes. We really just wing it on those. Tomorrow we put together the shopping list, see the prices, and take a look at the grand total.

Have any questions? Feel free to ask in the comments or share some of your favorite recipes on a budget.

You can find the rest of the series here.

A Month of Meals: Intro and Monthly Menu Planning

Welcome to the first of a week long series on menu planning and grocery budgeting. Today I am going to give an intro and share how I go about planning our meals a month at a time. Tomorrow I will be sharing the recipes I will be using for my 4 week menu. Thursday we'll focus on the grocery list and shopping. Friday is all about freezer cooking. Saturday I will be posting a review, answers to questions in the comments section, or social media, and a link back to all the posts in case you missed one.

Our food budget has been low for a long time. Our budget is currently at $300 but has been as low as $100. Some things to take into account if you want lower your food budget:

• Don't buy boxed or frozen meals. They are costly, filled with junk, and also wastefully packaged


• Be prepared to cook from scratch.


• Stop serving "family" style. By dishing the plates in advance you can make sure everyone has appropriate serving sizes and you can pack up leftovers if you intend to split a meal into two or more meals.


• Is someone still hungry? Instead of adding seconds, add a salad or apple slices with peanut butter.


• Don't plan a different meal for each day of the month.

Right now our family has some unique needs. Yes, we are gluten free, but that is not what I am talking about. We are living with my parents while we wait to go on mission in Montreal. My mom is a bit territorial over the kitchen so we need to be able to get in and out as quickly as possible. There is limited food storage space too. Plus my mom usually cooks dinner for us but when she doesn't I end up finding out at supper time. While it is true that we personally won't be using all of this month's meals this month, we will keep them stored in the freezer for the month or two that Adam will not be working before our leave date. All these things I kept in mind as I began looking for meals to add to our menu. So, let's get started planning the menu!

I planned a 4 week menu for September. For us it starts today and goes to the last day of the month. That means we need 28 suppers, 28 lunches, and 28 breakfasts. That sounds a bit daunting, I know. When you stop trying to think of 28 different meals for each, it gets better. Variety is great but it is also expensive and time consuming. On a normal basis, I would make a new menu each month. We keep the meals that we aren't tired of to the next month and add new ones. We'll start with supper because it has the most variety. You will notice that some of the recipes make enough for 2 meals for our family of three and I have taken that into account.

Supper

 

Make 2 of each.

 

Pesto Chicken and Green Beans: 2 meals

Mexican Chicken Taco Stuffing: 4 meals

Pineapple Chicken Stir Fry: 4 meals

Ranch Chicken and Potatoes: 2 meals

Italian Chicken Stir Fry: 2 meals

Italian Chicken and Potatoes: 2 meals

Hawaiian BBQ Chicken: 4 meals

Corny Chicken: 2 meals

Baked Ziti: 2 meals

Mermaid Hair Casserole: 2 meals

Beef and Broccoli Pasta: 2 meals

 

All but the ziti will be included in freezer cooking.

 

 

Lunch

 

Onigiri (rice balls) 3 days per week: 12 meals

Tuna Quesadillas 3 days per week: 12 meals

Leftovers once per week: 4 meals

 

Leftovers may include left over, reheat, meals or any food that is close to date. Mix and match and turn it into something new.

 

 

Breakfast

 

Donuts once per week: 4 meals

Oatmeal 6 days per week: 24 meals

Cereal 6 days per week: 24 meals

We are not huge breakfast people. We usually add peanut butter or fruit to our oatmeal. Lunch is a busy kitchen time here so I tend to do onigiri, which can be made in advance or quesadillas which are super fast to make. Donuts with hot chocolate are a special treat on Friday mornings. It is important to budget in something special. This isn't some crazy diet and it shouldn't be a punishment. We really look forward to Friday mornings and we make it a special family time.

That seems to be it. We have all the meals planned for the whole month. The next step is to get all of our recipes together and I will see you tomorrow for that!

Have questions about planning the menu? Ask them in the comments and I will make sure to get them answered!

You can find the rest of the series here.

Half the News

We came back from a 3 day vacation on Wednesday and the house and our routine are mostly back in order. The highlight of our stay in the Twin Cities was visiting the EFCA headquarters in Bloomington where we were able to meet our ReachGlobal rep in person. Yes, the Como Zoo and science museum were fun, but this was a big deal.

These past 6 months we have done all of our communications through phone or computer so getting to see our rep face to face was great. The most exciting, of course, was finally getting to talk to him about our acceptance. It was the reason we went to visit him after all. I will stop stalling now and get to all the nitty gritty.

ReachGlobal is very excited to have us on board and wants to send us out on a 1 year mission trip. The position that we are going into the field for is quite new and 1 year gives everyone a chance to feel out how it will work. There will be a possibility of a 1 year extension which we can apply for toward the end of our stay, any longer and we will be looking at making the transition from short term to long term missionaries.

We do not have our "official" acceptance yet. For that we need our location to be finalized. That is taking a little longer as Jay, the Montreal lead is just getting back from Haiti...possibly helping to translate for our own church's mission trip. How crazy would that small world connection be. We are meeting with Jay on Wednesday to chat and just start building a relationship with him. It is also a time for him and us to see if we will mesh well on the same team.

There is a lot on our minds right now. We are planning a trip back to the headquarters in August for orientation and training. With our trip being only 1 year we have to make a decision about what to do with the house. In the coming weeks we will be determining a shop closing plan for The Crazy Elephant, how and when to get our wordpress blog up and running, what technology needs we will need filled, and a plan of attack for how determine what to bring, leave, or get rid of as far as stuff in our house goes.

It is all a bit overwhelming right now to look at all there is to do and plan. We will be turning to the Lord to help us in all of this. It is a comfort to know that He will be guiding us in this journey. We want to thank everyone for your prayers over these months. Please continue to pray for us as we begin making huge life changes in preparation for our trip. We look forward to seeing how God uses us to change the lives of those we will be serving and those who will be serving with us.

Tasty Menu for Outsmarting Diabetes

Ever since having gestational diabetes I have diabetic meal planning in the back of my mind. It really caught me off guard when I got that diagnosis and someday it could happen again and I don't want to go into it with no knowledge of what to eat. I found some fantastic information on prevention.com and it had a fantastic menu. We have tried many of the meals listed and they have been a hit for the whole family! I especially love that the ingredients needed are available at my normal grocery store.

This is one of my favorites from the menu. It really surprised me! I did baby spinach and it has chicken, honey mustard, and sliced grapes.

A Big New Year

Happy 2013! This is a big new year for the Morgan family. We have been talking about missionary activities nonstop for a few weeks now. We may not be leaving for a good 2 years at least, but there are a lot of things to consider and it will take a lot of time to figure it all out.

Tomorrow morning we will be doing our hour long phone call with the ENGAGE team at Reach Global. We will be getting the nitty gritty details of the application process. There are references to get, forms to fill out, and doctors/specialists to visit. We should also get a chance to ask some important questions. We need to know if we can homeschool and if we are able to bring our doggie.

In the mean time we are diligently picking away at our material possessions  of which there is still a large amount. I think we could almost supply the local thrift store on our own. I am just waiting for them to ask us how we are able to bring a stead supply of baskets headed their way. We bring one to them at least once a month plus continue to make donations at Savers. The majority of our things will not be coming with us. We plan to pack a few totes to store with family, but the rest we will gradually purge.

Another hot topic for us has been The Crazy Elephant Boutique. I spent the whole last year focusing on long term growth with the ultimate goal of making it a career for both myself and Adam. With the looming mission trip, we have been discussing what to do with it. We know that the closer we get to leaving, the more we will have on our plate. It will getting increasingly difficult to continue running the shop. We made the decision to keep it going till we are out of core material. I have 10 yards of the heavy absorb and 10 yards of the medium absorb. It should last 1-1.5 years by my estimation. Also we are streamlining the process by putting all energy and resources into Etsy solely, with the goal being higher short term sales verses our original goal of long term growth. Our customers have nothing to worry about for quite a while as we will still be up and running for a long time.

It sure has been an exciting new year so far...and it is only 3 days in! I will leave you all today with a shot from our new year's eve party. We had a lot of fun playing board and Wii games. We will have to plan to do this again next year.

Minecraft and flying chicken on the Wii.

August Menu

I just finished up our August menu. I haven't really shared over the summer since we already lost one computer to the heat, I was not going to push it with the last working computer in our house. This menu is also starting on our first month of school. The quick and easy method of many of the recipes will be great as we get the swing of kindergarten.

SundaysHay Stacks (All Recipes App)
Hamburger Casserole (Quick and Easy Crock Pot Recipes Kindle book)

Mondays
Tuna Cheese Quesadillas
Pasta

Tuesdays
Cold Cut Spirals
Beef Salad

Wednesdays
Brats
Soup

Thursdays
Cheeseburger Quesadillas
Chow Mein (Jayne has decided this is his fave)

Fridays
Cold Cut Spirals
Cheese and Veggie Casserole (Quick and Easy Crock Pot Recipes)

Saturdays
Pizza Quesadillas
Baked Spam

March Menu

It seems that sharing my menu last month was a big hit! So, I will keep on sharing. This month Adam wanted us to go mostly gluten free. This means big changes to our menu this month. I also decided that it might be a good idea to stop having supper type meals for both lunch and supper. That means more of a pack it to go friendly lunch. Here is what we are having...

Sundays
Lunch: Beef Salad (from my diabetic cookbook, no I'm not but I did have gestational diabetes)
Supper: Slow Cooker Chicken and Veggies

Mondays
Lunch: Soup
Supper: PB&J (Adam closes, so we have our "lunch" meal in the evening)

Tuesdays
Lunch: Tuna Cheese Quesadillas
Supper: Honey Sesame Chicken

Wednesdays
Lunch: Slow Cooker Lasagna
Supper: Corn Dog Muffins

Thursdays
Lunch: Cheeseburger Quesadillas
Supper: Slow Cooker Sausage and Potatoes

Fridays
Lunch: Cold Cut Spirals
Supper: Poor Man's Meal

Saturdays
Lunch: Pizza Quesadillas
Supper: Baked Spam (great recipe from our last trip to the Spam Museum)

A little recipe link up for you...

Six Sister's Stuff:
Honey Sesame Chicken

Thank you Pintrest!
Corn Dog Muffins

Depression Cooking With Clara
Poor Man's Meal
(Clara has some great frugal recipes and you learn a little about the depression while you watch her cook)

September Goals

It is a new month again! I love the fall, even if most of the month is "technically" still summer. We have a lot of big changes happening this month and it is going to mean a lot of work and planning. So here are my big 3 for the month...

* Research some new recipes to add to our menu planning to help get our food budget down, we have worked our way up to about $175 each month. We would like to get it back down to the $110 mark that it was at last winter.

* Start planning holiday gifts. We will be on a tight budget again this year, but we will be able to spend time with our families this year becasue I will no longer be working and that will be a great gift for us all!

* Begin work on the holiday season at The Crazy Elephant. With me being a work at home mom very soon, I need to put a huge focus on my shop as a source of income. I will have more time to work on it now and can treat it like my job, something I have wanted to be able to do for a while now. I will be working on Etsy's holiday boot camp toward the end of the month and I want to work hard to make it successful for me.

In case you have not caught it by now, I will be staying home very soon. We have been working on this goal for 5 years now and it is comming up. Our car's brake line broke on Saturday. We can't fix it till tomorrow at the earliest, but the cost of fixing it and time we can fix it will have a big impact on when I am done at work. In the meantime I am going to focus on my goals and look forward to personal success!

What are your goals this month? Share in the comments and inspire someone!

Goals for August

This month is a little short. We still have a lot going on. Jayne's and The Crazy Elephant's birthdays are both this month and it is bound to be exciting. I am still working with the itemized goals from last month and will continue to do so. I am mainly concerned about these 3 overall items...

*Get more exercise. That is a whole family effort. We have put a daily 30 minute dog walk into our routine and plan on having another hour of outside time, when we can, for Jayne as well. We spend too much time staying cool/warm in our house year round. It doesn't help that Adam and I are very much inside people as well.

*Check off my planner. I have gone through the entire month of august and written down all I want to accomplish. I can check off each item as I go. The items include household chores, Crazy Elephant work, and blogging. I am hoping to check off every single item on my planner.

*Finish getting ready for school. If I can get 2 weeks of school prepped per week, I can get the whole school year planned out before school starts. Of course there will be changes over time, but the groundwork will have been laid.

I am really excited for this last month of summer! How are you going to spend it?