Freezer Challenge Update (plus what I spent and ate!)
Happy Friday to all of you!
Freezer Challenge Update
So, I've been plugging away on my freezer challenge this week.
I:
- made overnight french toast to use bread
- made paninis to use up bread
- made tacos to use up tortillas
- made smoothies to use up frozen fruit
- made stir-fried cauliflower to use up frozen ginger
The bacon, pizza dough, and marinara are all going to be used up tonight when I make pizza.
So, mainly what I have left are some bread odds and ends. Zoe asked for more overnight French toast, so maybe I'll do that and some croutons/bread crumbs.
What I Spent
I did not do a lot of grocery shopping this week...just $74.83.
And I got my produce box for $33.
April Spending
Week 1: $248
Week 2: $108
What We Ate
Monday
I had a pound of ground beef in my small freezer, so I thawed that and grilled some burgers.
Here's the recipe I use for juicy well-done hamburgers. Luckily, it calls for bread, so I used some from my freezer stash.
We also had the stir-fried cauliflower that I mentioned yesterday.
Tuesday
I made easy grilled chicken tacos (salt and pepper chicken breasts, grill, slice, and toss with chipotle sour cream.)
I've mentioned that chipotles are basically manna from heaven, right? SO GOOD.
We had applesauce from the freezer, and of course, I made guacamole to go on the tacos.
(Guacamole is also manna from heaven, FYI.)
Oh, and we ate watermelon from the produce box. So out of season, but so yummy.
Wednesday
I grilled some bratwurst, stir-fried some broccoli, and we also ate cucumber slices and fresh pineapple.
Pineapples are ridiculously affordable at Aldi ($1.49 this week!), which means we almost always have a pineapple in the house. I love that.
Thursday
On Wednesday, I salted a beef roast from my chest freezer and then on Thursday, I slow-roasted it, using a recipe from Cook's Illustrated.
(Are we surprised? No, no, we are not.)
I had some potatoes from my produce box that needed to be used up, so I made mashed potatoes to go with the beef, and I also sauteed some green beans.
I'm a little bit proud of myself for promptly using up the cauliflower, broccoli, AND green beans from my produce box.
I was a veritable veggie-preparing champion this week. 😉
Friday
I'm making pizza, which will use up the frozen pizza dough, marinara sauce, and bacon.
I'm going to keep working on my freezer odds and ends this coming week, so there will be another freezer challenge up date added onto next week's menu/grocery post.
____________________
Here's what we ate.
Monday - kielbasa with black beans and rice, mango and cuke salad
Tuesday - pasta fazool, broccoli
Wednesday - stir fired tofu and green beans, rice, cantaloupe (I kept seeing you serve cantaloupe at dinner and they were on sale this week. It was a nice change.)
Thursday - sauteed pork and broccoli with mashed potatoes (the potatoes were going to go bad otherwise)
Friday - Probably pasta with goat cheese and peas. I am out of almost everything and will be not be able to go grocery shopping today, so we'll just make do. Plus we only ate pasta once this week, and the kids and I are craving it.
I did not do a freezer challenge, but I did go poking around in the depths of my freezer and found some goat milk from last fall (my younger daughter can't have cow's milk and occasionally I buy goat's milk to bake with). So I baked some cookies. I also found one last jar of apple sauce from last fall. That was a pleasant discovery. We bought a pig last summer, and I do need to figure out what I am going to do with the feet, heart, and head. We tried the liver and didn't like it, so now we are a bit shy. If anyone has any ideas, please let me know,
I, too, buy pig by the critter and often have the odd bits. Let me say up front that liver is its own thing. Nothing else has that taste or texture. So it might be that you don't like other odd bits but it won't be because those bits are like liver.
For the heart, I recommend slicing it, dusting it with seasoned flour, and pan frying.
For the feet (and ears, if you have them as part of the head), I recommend smoking and using it in beans and soup. I don't see much value in unsmoked pigs feet - they have little meat and even less taste this way. If you don't have a smoker or grill, you can hack a smoker with an oven, a couple of disposable baking pans, and wood chips.
There are some interesting things you can do with the head, none of which I've actually done myself (never have enough room in the freezer for the head as well as all the meat and bones). One is a bacon-like preparation of the cheek called guarnico (sp!). Another is to skin and clean the head, then simmer it till the meat and stuff falls off and make headcheese. Finally, you can do The Lord of the Flies as a play in your backyard.
Add in with beans to flavor or make bone soup? You could also use it to make a broth to put in the freezer to add to recipes. I freeze broth in cupcake tins then pop all the "broth pucks" into a freezer bag. Someone else may have a better idea than me because dealing with animal body parts freaks me out if I think too much. Silly, I know. HTH!
Hello from Vancouver BC.
This senior citizen & student at Langara College uses a ceramic mug (12oz size), I guess which he fills with homemade soup with noodles or rice. The cover is Saran Wrap. At Langara College, i reheat the mug in the microwave
I plan from reading this blog to obtain a more sturdy lid. Appreciations for the advise.
Cheers,
Richard Zorniak
I would do headcheese. I grew up in Estonia and we'd make that with head and feet all the time. Good on its own, on a bread, with little mustard etc.
http://www.simplebites.net/how-to-make-homemade-head-cheese/
Monday - just my 3 year old and me. We had leftovers.
Tuesday- ground beef tacos with fruit as a side for everyone else, leftover Chinese for me.
Wednesday- spaghetti carbonara, garlic cheese bread made from leftover pizza dough, fruit
Thursday- breakfast for dinner - ham and cheese egg bake, "carrot cake" baked oatmeal, and buttermilk pancakes
Friday- we'll be ordering takeout as a friend is coming over and it was his birthday yesterday. Birthday boy's choice.
I did not do a freezer challenge, but need to. Maybe early May.
Monday - A basic bowl of grits. We can call that "breakfast for dinner," lol. Apparently my husband ate a lot of sweets instead of any of the savory leftovers in our fridge, hm...
Tuesday - bean soup (using frozen meat bones, dry beans, and assorted fresh/frozen veggies), and spaghetti salerno - a CI recipe of pasta in spicy garlic oil with fried egg and breadcrumbs
Wednesday - "sushi burrito" using jasmine rice (cuz that what I have), tinned tuna with mayo + sriracha, and carrot and cucumber strips; served with "clear soup" from a packet because I was curious.
Thursday - leftovers day, including lamb nachos for him, salad for us, and I had a handbell choir party with snacks
Friday - easy button: chips and dip, carrot and celery sticks, cucumber slices, cheese
The freezer challenge is ramping me up to use all the fruit in dessert smoothies next week, and I'm curious to try a fruit salsa for chicken or fish. I took out some applesauce for my lunches next week. I used some bologna I'd frozen to make fleischsalat for my lunches this week, and frozen bones and random veggies for bean soup. I have a lot of sweets in there, though, which makes things difficult - I'm forced to eat homemade tiramisu, the horror! 😀
I was going to buy the pineapple but unfortunately I'm the only one who eats it and I'd rather it didn't go to waste.
One interesting side note: pineapples used to be a sign of wealth and luxury.
Anyway, for this week it's been really low key for us:
Sunday: Had a retro game night with some friends and bought Pizza. Not really frugal per se but we had fun.
Monday: Leftover pizza
Tuesday: Pork chops, tossed salads and rice.
Wednesday: My family came over so we cooked a chuck roast, red potatoes and carrots.
Thursday: Leftover beef for me, pasta for my wife (I hate pasta so when she eats it I am usually eating leftovers.)
Friday: Bringing a loaf of sourdough to our potluck at our weekly Bible study.
Spending wise, I bought some milk and produce at Aldi but that's about it. We have quite a bit of meat stocked in the freezer so we haven't needed to go out buying anything. Plus last week I bought 40lbs of rice so we're really stocked up on that. 😛
Do you ever make smoothies? If I have extra pineapple, I cut it into chunks and freeze it to add to smoothies.
Dehydrated pineapple is SUPERB. Thin slices do best. I have found that keeping pineapple chunks in a glass jar results in them lasting longer. Not sure if there is any scientific reasons for this, but I have not had a pineapple go bad since I started doing that. (Husband will devour dehydrated pineapple, but not fresh...)
I think that if you buy a pizza then eat leftovers ,making it more than one meal, that it is in fact frugal.So good job!
Everything looks wonderful as always! I cannot join in the challenge as my freezer stocks are minimal. This week however I have made a food waste save - some dried dates. This gave me an opportunity to update an old recipe on my blog (which I had posted without photos when I first started blogging! Whaaaat?!?!).
Yeah, pigs will fly before you need to do a freezer challenge! You are so good at staying on top of what's in your fridge and freezer.
🙂 some weeks though better than others!
* Chicken with mix of sweet potatoes and white potatoes
* Mexican rice dish (rice, tomatoes, beans, ground beef, covered with salsa and cheese)
* Cheese-stuffed meatballs covered in tomatoes sauce + spaghetti
* Gluten-free pizza
Tommorow : 1st BBQ of the season! Steaks and sausages + potatoes and carrots. Yummm!!
Husband was out of town for the week, so it was a weird food week for me.
Monday: Grilled cheese and salad
Tuesday: Frozen pizza topped with extra shredded cheese
Wednesday: Baked chicken thighs and salad
Thursday: Mexican food
Friday: Salmon w/ broccoli
I'm trying to clear the pantry/freezer, so I have been opting to not grocery shop. I haven't been to the store in two weeks I think, but that means I need to go get things like eggs, half&half, bread and such. I've started taking cans of soup to work for lunches and honestly, it's probably the best food choice I have made in a while - it can be healthy and includes variety with zero prep work for me. 😀
Husband's week.
Sunday - green chili chicken bowl with black beans and rice (based on a dish from a restaurant we liked-we had to start making our own when it closed)
Monday-pasta with cooked Italian sausage from the freezer
Tuesday-beef fajitas with salad
Wednesday-quinoa spinach salad with broccoli and garlic bread
Thursday-Italian skillet chicken (chicken, mushrooms, red pepper, spinach, pine nuts, served over pasta)
Friday-leftovers
I poked around in the freezer and besides the Italian sausage (two separate bags), I came up with about four or five bags, each with one or two muffins or scones (I usually make one or two batches on a weekend and then we take for breakfast/snacks all week). Will use all of those up in the next few days. Lots of bread, but mostly specialties (olive, cranberry walnut); maybe enough plain bread for a batch of French toast. The best find? Some forgotten frozen chocolate chip cookie dough nuggets, ready for baking!
You could definitely make French toast from those specialty breads.
The cranberry walnut would likely work, but I don't think I'm up for olive French toast. 🙂
Heh-that does sound pretty bad. Tomato-basil bread as French toast would also be gross!
But I bet it would be good in a savory breakfast casserole.
Hmmm...well we are starting a new thing whereby I don't stress Sunday dinner. Hubby grilled sausages and fajita meat and we ate a big salad concoction of meat and romaine and cheese and chips, etc. Tuesday was Buttermilk Baked Chicken with rice, and limas. Tuesday was Burritos with Chili, and corn - super easy - just chili poured over freezer burritos, topped with cheese and onions. Wednesday we had pizza takeout. Thursday was a skillet Lasagna - a Kraft recipe we have had for years. I also made a big salad. Tonight is Tilapia with onions and peppers, and some sauteed squash. I have no idea what Hubby is grilling tomorrow, and Sunday we will play it by ear. Next week we are doing the freezer challenge, too, as I have plenty of food in there that we need to eat before I buy more! Though I am getting some good ideas from the comments above!
Love the quick fix burrito idea, will be stealing that!
Working to clear out the fridge in anticipation of an upcoming extended trip. So, everything I made contained lots of chopped parsley and cilantro as a result!
Mon- Spinach, walnut & blue cheese stuffed portabello mushrooms*, brown rice, salad
Tue- Bean and cheese enchilada verdes, brown rice, salad
Wed- Evening event at a Mexican restaurant.
Thur- Your Chipotle chicken kebabs*, brown rice, green beans
Fri - Veggie fajitas, black beans, Spanish rice**
*ATK recipes & yum!
**Leftover restaurant rice frim Wed 🙂
You did great using up your odds and ends. I am impressed!
Monday-Baked Salmon,boxed organic mac&cheese, and a spring mix salad with lots of yummy add-ins
Tuesday-Baked lemon pepper chicken, baked sweet potatoes, and more spring mix salad with lots of add-ins.Used up a small container of goat cheese and apples that were about to go bad. I also made from scratch vinaigrette salad dressing.
Wed-I am trying to eat healthier so I ate roasted cabbage steaks with turkey bacon while everyone else ate grilled hot dogs and potato chips and dip. It was delicious!
Thursday-Baked pork chops, mashed potatoes, and roasted zucchini
Friday- We are going camping so it will be grilled something, Yay!
This is the first week in a long time that was not a complete fail in the nutrition dept. I have been doing a freezer challenge, kind of. I have been gradually trying to eat up what is in there. Going to take months for me though. I have a lot of food in the freezer. So much that I am probably apocalypse ready, lol!
My boyfriend officially moved in a week ago, and I had been buying groceries haphazardly whenever we needed them prior to that (I didn't know if he'd be eating with me or not). And I ended up spending WAY more than I normally would. We also wasted 🙁
So Sunday I put together a meal plan for the week. I went grocery shopping for ONLY those items.
And guess what? We've stuck to it (one night we ate leftovers instead of cooking more food since I didn't take into account how big one recipe was). He's a nurse at the local hospital, so he works 7 p.m. - 7 a.m. and isn't really around for when I prep dinner. He takes leftovers.
Worked out well... I think tonight I'm making gingerbread pancakes (A weight watchers recipe!) and tomorrow will be a peach and cucumber salad, with leftovers.
We had a pasta and spring vegetables with feta dish, a red curry cauliflower dish, and a pasta and sausage dish (I had the WORST luck with the oriechette pasta! It came in a bag and was mangled to pieces. When they cooked, it got mushy. SOOOO that wasn't our favorite dish this week).
Excited for pancakes though 😀 We spent $50 less this week!
Gingerbread pancakes sound fabulous.
I'm digging out the freezer before inventorying it; I'm either being lazy or efficient.
- Slow-roasted pork shoulder, to a CI recipe. My roommate said it was the best ever; I found it a little salty. Whichever, it definitely should be served warm. It's a challenge to make in that it's roasted for 5-7 hours, then sits another hour. Good for leftover for later
- Made double batch of CI Beef Taco meat[1], which will be enough or 4 meals. So less ground meat, more ready-to-eat meals. That's progress, right?
- Had 1-2 meals of frozen dumplings. Yum!
- Ribs.
[1] I was in a dither because I couldn't remember which book/mag had the recipe I wanted - I could see there were several. Turns out that both Make Ahead and Quick Family cookbooks have the same recipe! One is called spicy, one is not.
I don't have an official freezer challenge going....but I'm a CPA and the last couple weeks of tax season leave little brain power left for meal planning and time for cooking. SO as a result....we've been using up lots of little odds and ends from the freezer. Sauces, breads, taco soup, pulled pork. It's been awesome. And I've been able to keep up on freezing things from the fridge before they go bad, so if nothing else I've been keeping my food waste down. And HOOORAY for tax season being over, and I feel a personal accomplishment that we've had fast food only twice in the last two and a half months of crazy. Double hooray!
That is VERY impressive!
It was so nice to get back into our normal routine this week that I was thrilled to cook. Eating out/fast food gets old quickly!
Monday - Chicken noodle soup and homemade buttermilk bisquits
Tuesday - Aussie chicken, rice pilaf, homemade applesauce (this meal takes so long to prepare I ran out of steam to make veggies....oh well)
Wednesday - Hamburgers on the grill with homemade buns, cauliflower with cheese sauce, and pineapple
Thursday - I-forgot-to-defrost-something homemade pizza Thursday 🙂
Friday - Pork roast, mashed potatoes, and broccoli
Unrelated, but I wanted say I am so thrilled that Aldi's is taking credit cards now. I am so much more likely to shop there now. Our cash position changes based on the date, even if our budgetary position is good so this is nice. Plus, our credit card gives us 3% cash back when we use it at grocery stores!
I find that too! Eating out is fun at first, but I really, really start to miss having lots of fresh produce to eat.
While our freezer is in mostly-good condition, it inspired me to finally go through our pantry spices. My mom has a very different cooking style that involves ALL of the spices, especially spice mixes, and she gives me little jars of things all the time. Then my husband and I merged households, and his bachelor experience meant he had lots of multiples.
We combined spices (cumin + cumin, three different jars of black pepper, etc.), purged things we'll never use, and now I'm on a mission to use what we've got. So far, this has made:
--nachos meat sauce, using a variety of single spices and the last of a little jar of taco seasoning
--homemade chip dip, using a Penzey's premade spice mix
To my husband's joy, we'll need to eat a lot of Tex-Mex and grilled meat to get through what we've got.
I want to come over to help you use up your Tex-Mex food!
Sorry Kristen, but this is for William B.: Lord of the Flies...still chuckling over that...
Thank you.
We had a bit of an interesting week as I didn't do my main grocery shop, so some of our meals got switched around a bit. Luckily I had enough in my pantry and freezer that we managed to avoid take out (although we did have frozen pizza one night).
Monday--I had some brie to use up, so we had bacon, brie, and cranberry panini (using homemade French bread) with fruit.
Tuesday--I had planned to do a baked potato bar, but we ended up having a bit of a hectic night and I didn't want to clean up a bunch of little bowls from all the toppings. This was frozen pizza night--an XL pepperoni pizza purchased for $5.99 at Aldi.
Wednesday--Buttermilk pancakes with sausage and cantaloupe.
Thursday--We tried your Parmesan chicken recipe and it was a hit. I served it with wild rice and broccoli.
Friday--I work until 8 tonight and had planned on preparing enchiladas so my husband could just put them in the oven when he got home, but a teething baby had other plans. Luckily, we still have everything for the baked potato bar.
On the baked potato bar, I usually baked all the potatoes,open them all, put on a cookie sheet, add all the toppings, stick back in the oven to melt a bit and call it done. Just serve family style off the cookie sheet. Put sour cream or anything you want to stay cold on after, of course. When I am serving my whole family I try to make it simple for myself. However, a bar is probably more fun.
I'm curious about the bananas in your produce box? I mostly think of produce boxes as CSA (community supported agriculture) supporting local growers. Do they grow bananas in your neck of the woods??? Or is your weekly "produce box" more of a co-op thing? Is most of it local?
My produce company is definitely more like a co-op. And you have the option of getting a local-only box (which gives you less variety, of course), an organic-only box (which tends to be less local) and a mixed box, which is what I get.
This was a bad week, frugalwise and healthwise. I bought several lunches and dinners out because I couldn't get it together enough to cook. Sigh. Maybe next week will be better . . .
Monday - Picked up a sandwich and chips on my way home from work.
Tuesday - Frozen fish and tater tots.
Wednesday - I grazed. I had a roll, some ice cream, and some cottage cheese and fruit over the span of a few hours.
Thursday - Tacos
Friday - I am meeting a friend for sub sandwiches before going to an early movie. At least this night is frugal. I used a gift card to purchase movie tickets and my friend will be buying the dinner!
Between a stomach bug, a teething toddler and a very weird and stressful work week, I'm surprised meals went so well in our house this week! Sometimes the meal planning can be the saving grace
We ate:
-skillet baked ziti with sausage, veggies, and garlic bread
-tacos
-breaded chicken, potato salad and veggies with a roll
-pad Thai
-thick crust pizza, salad, pineapple and chocolate tapioca
All in all a success and very little waste despite the tummy troubles Saturday-Tuesday. Now it's time to repeat!
I would love the recipe for the stir fried cauliflower.
Okee-doke! I'll work on that.
At one point, I thought you were mentioning your weekend meals as well. I'm just curious, are you still doing the brinner (breakfast for dinner) thing on Sundays?
I did a freezer challenge the last 2 weeks..Mostly because I found great sales on organic meats and had to make room for it before I could purchase it. the challenge went well and I've got a turkey thawing. DH will smoke it on Tuesday. For the past week, here's what we had:
M-Crockpot ham & bean soup
T- pizza
W- baked chicken w/mushrooms
TH- leftover bean soup
F- DH bought a fritatta box mix. I made a fritatta a few months ago and he refused to try it. Go figure.
Sat- Attempted 40 garlic clove chicken & potatoes with chicken thighs in the crockpot. I wasn't impressed although DH and DS ate the whole pot. DS gave it a "8" rating.
Sun- making BBQ chicken pizza from the leftover chicken thighs.
Thank you for blogging about the cauliflower dish from Cook's. You gave me incentive to try it today for a potluck. It was outside the box for these friends and they ended up loving it. Of course following your frugal ways I had to make adjustments to avoid a store run...carrots instead of cauliflower, green curry instead of red and lemon instead of lime. a real keeper recipe even with the changes. Thank you for taking time to share your life with us. You are a very generous blogger.
Kristen - you made me laugh with your veg box comment. I was raised where multiple vegetables were a normal part of a meal, so we eat lots of veg with every meal; my plate is typically 50-100% veg.
Yesterday/Monday: spit chicken with broccoli & feta salad, edamame bean & pea salad, pasta & pine nut salad.
Sunday: chicken enchilada (I had fish) with stir fry veg.
Saturday: pork, noodles with shredded veg, pak choi.
Friday: salmon with spinach, broccoli, asparagus and sweet potato
Thursday: oven roasted butternut squash & tomatoes served on top of cous cous (with courgette & feta), topped with sliced avocado and salsa.
Wednesday: ratatouille on rice (or spinach), corn on the cob
Tuesday: spicy chicken with tons of green veg, roast new potatoes
No freezer challenge here; I barely have anything in it. I work hard to keep ice, peas, fruit for smoothies, ice cream and the occasional few bagels/muffins in there.