What I Spent, What We Ate | It's starting to feel like summer!
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We are mostly finished with school, the weather is warm, and we had watermelon this week.
So, basically summer. 😉
What I Spent
I got a $25 Hungry Harvest box, and $45 at two non-Aldi grocery stores.
(What's Hungry Harvest?)
And then at Aldi, I spent $90, except that I used the Sixth Continent gift cards I'd bought when they were having their 30% back promotion. So, that $90 of gift card money only cost me $60.
So, my spending is at $130 for the week.
(Here's how to save on Aldi gift cards from Sixth Continent.)
May Spending
Week 1: $119
Week 2: $191
Week 3: $181
Week 4: $130
Year to Date Grocery Spending
I'm averaging $153 a week so far.
January: $619
February: $485
March: $702
April: $791
May: $621
What We Ate
Saturday
Mr. FG and I had a date night and the girls had chicken tikka masala with naan (naan and jarred sauce from Aldi.)
Sunday
I grilled chicken sausages, which we ate on buns along with some chips and watermelon.
It's early in the season so it wasn't the most amazing watermelon ever, but it still tasted amazing to us. After a watermelon-less winter, the first spring/summer one always is so good.
Monday
I tried a corn and bacon pasta recipe from the latest Cook's Country magazine and I would say it was just ok. I feel like corn in a pasta dish is slightly weird.
The bacon was just fine, of course. 😉
Tuesday
I made pulled turkey sandwiches with white barbecue sauce, a Cook's Country recipe.
For this recipe, you smoke the turkey by putting a foil package of soaked wood chips under the grill grates and it smells SO GOOD.
Wednesday
I made ricotta gnocchi from Dinner Illustrated, topped with pink sauce and fresh basil. We had fresh fruit and veggies on the side.
Thursday
I tried a mojo chicken recipe from Cook's Country. The marinade was kind of a pain to make, and I didn't think the resulting chicken was remarkably better than chicken with easier marinades.
So, I probably won't make it again.
We ate the chicken over salad greens with toasted French bread on the side.
Incidentally, I got one of the pieces a little too crispy. Ha.
Luckily, burnt chicken skin can just come right off. 😉
Friday
I think I'll make some pan pizzas topped with fresh mozzarella.
Your pizzas looks great - I think we may do some grilled pizza for Saturday dinner, which is never planned, almost always "last minute". Here's what we ate:
Monday - Lemon Garlic chicken breast cubes, roasted red pepper quinoa, shredded and sauteed brussel sprouts
Tuesday - White beans with ham and no complaints*, corn muffins
Wednesday - Salmon with scampi splash seasoning, red bell peppers and corn
Thursday - Tacos al Pastor with all of the fixins', maybe some leftover beans
Friday - Heat and Eat Green Chile Chicken Rice Bowls (using up leftover veggies, too)
*Hubby wasn't on board with having beans as a main dish once a week, so we are compromising. Every other week we will have sammies of some sort - tuna, chicken salad, grilled cheese and turkey...just something I don't have to slave over.
I hoped to keep my grocery spending down, but yeah, it's going to be over this month. I'll keep trying!
We had a weird week, because we were going through some odd drug reactions with my husband, so I'm not too sure I can remember what I put on the table, but here goes.
I roasted a spatchcocked chicken over veggies again earlier in the week, yum, then made a chicken pot pie last night using the leftover chicken. I experimented with my new enameled Dutch oven -- I cooked the pot pie vegetables and seasonings in broth in the Dutch oven, thickened the broth with a little arrowroot, added the chopped chicken and brought it back to a simmer, then made a pie crust, laid it on top of the bubbly filling, and put the whole pot in the oven at 400F until the crust was done. Except for the difficulty of fitting a crust down IN a Dutch oven, it worked great. I'll have to work on the crust thing some more.
I used the last of the Easter ham that had been in the freezer -- the bone made ham n' (dried) bean soup in the pressure cooker, and the meat was served just as the protein with green beans and spiced pumpkin. The last of the ham meat was ground up and made into deviled ham, which we had with crackers, fruit, and um, something.
There was something else this past weekend, but it escapes me. I remembered more than I thought I would.
It definitely is starting to feel like summer as the garden is all planted and we're doing cookouts and stuff.
Monday: Barbecued chicken, corn on the cob and homemade biscuits.
Tuesday: Pork chops on the grill, tossed salads and homemade laugenbrötchen. Okay, so they weren't totally authenic because I used a baking soda bath instead of a lye bath but they were really good.
Wednesday: Meatloaf, mashed potatoes and vegetables.
Thursday: Cleaning out the fridge.
Friday: More leftovers tonight but I'll probably get some more corn on the cob to go with it.
Monday we had taco salad to use the last of the ground beef I bought on sale.
Tuesday and Wednesday we had Lo Mein which used up some of the free pasta I got when several of my daughter's college friends packed up to head home. Yay for free food!
Thursday was pizza--ham and mushroom--with a salad.
Tonight it's honey mustard chicken with carrots and probably mashed potatoes.
with tomI shopped yesterday and by the end of the day I had spent nearly $250 Australian. My meat purchases were eight chicken sausages and a kilo of bacon. So not a lot of meat there but there is plenty in the freezer. I am trying to shop fortnightly with top ups for fruit, vegetables, bread and milk.
There has been a concerted effort to avoid waste so leftovers are being used as a basis of the next meal. This week we have had rissoles with vegetables, sausages with tomato and onion gravy and other vegetables, bulgolgi beef with fried rice, rissoles again and I have forgotten what else graced our plates.
We had ricotta gnocchi this week too, but I used the mark bittman recipe (with a sage butter sauce). It was so rich! DH and I liked it, but oddly our cheese hating DC2 liked it fine and our cheese loving DC1 refused to eat more than one. AND this week DC2 decided she didn't like chicken sausages anymore, so DC1 (who is generally meh on chicken) ate hers in addition to his own.
It is surely a good thing nutritionally that their tastes change, but it makes it so hard to predict what they'll like or not!
I didn't really eat anything I planned on this week, but we still ate pretty well. Benefit of so many years of experience in the kitchen: The ability to wing it and end up with a tasty result.
Monday: Tacos made with leftover pot roast and homemade corn tortillas, because now that I've started making them, I can't stop. And pinto beans.
Tuesday: I meant to make beef bourguinon (definitely had to look up that spelling), but my stew meat wasn't thawed in time. So instead I made beef and vegetable soup with the last of the leftover pot roast. as well as some lamb's quarters from our excessively weedy back pasture. Also a cheese omelet, garlic bread, and cheese.
Wednesday: Still didn't use the stew meat because we were gone much of the day. So instead I cut up some quickly thawed pork loin steaks into chunks and fried them in bacon grease with paprika, diced onion, and some of the immature garlic my husband started harvesting. We had that with roasted potatoes, roasted bell pepper/onion/sweet potato and green salad (yes, still my lettuce, with the addition of my arugula and kohlrabi thinnings HOORAY)
Thursday: Again I failed with the stew meat, because we had to drive almost 200 miles to take the boys to the dentist. We got home in the late afternoon and I hadn't thawed any meat. Luckily, there was quite a bit of pork left, so I fried diced potatoes in bacon grease and butter, added the leftover pork and more garlic, paprika and salt, and served that with frozen peas.
Tonight: Beef bourguignon, with well-aged beef. 🙂
I love corn in anything! Your chicken skin looked good to me; I like it cooked like that.
Our house is being renovated and we are in the Hilton Home2 suites, so eating their breakfasts; I eat mostly oatmeal and fruit with juice. Lunch is usually Zoe's Kitchen or Panera Bread salads. Dinner is something nice and healthy.
Frugal? Yes, actually...since we had a leak, our renovations, food, hotel, laundry, etc are all being paid by our insurance. Since we have a kitchen in our suite, we are able to eat some microwaveable foods, also. Although foods in a microwave? Not our favorite!
We normally only eat out for date night on Fridays and after church on Sundays. This is definitely getting old!!
I get weary of eating out too if I do it for long periods of time. I hope your home is ready to move back into soon!
I had to look up White BBQ sauce - I had never heard of it before. I asked everyone in the office if they had heard of it and no one else had either. I'm in MN so it's not too surprising that white bbq sauce isn't a 'thing' up here. I consider myself a bit of a foodie so THANK YOU for adding a new food into my world!
I hadn't heard of it before I read this recipe in a Cook's Country issue! Definitely a southern thing from what the article said.
Here is a super fun song about regional bbqs in the US. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=6ubTQfr_tyY
Let's see...
Saturday my mom spent the night and we ordered pizza using a $10 off a $20 order from Pizza Hut that I got for simply taking a survey the last time I ordered pizza. Hubby's return from his work trip was delayed a day so he wasn't home for dinner this night.
Sunday I had stew at Mom and Dad's after doing a gnocchi and gnudi class at Sur la Table. The stew was good but the gnocchi and gnudi were the best! I'll be making them on my own soon I'm sure! Hubby didn't get home until I think after 10 PM from his trip and I think he ate on the road.
Monday it was burrito night with ground turkey breast and refried beans in the burritos for me (only turkey for the hubby) with all the fixings.
Tuesday we did egg roll in a bowl which could have used MUCH MORE veggies! I used a prepackaged coleslaw mix and should have gotten at least another bag, if not 2. This ended up being a very meat heavy meal with the ground turkey breast!
Wednesday it was chicken sausages with peppers, onions and mushrooms that we ate in pita pockets. So delicious and the sausages were made in house at the grocery store where I got them. It was my first time trying them and they were delicious!
Thursday we did chicken and rice made in the instant pot. It turned out OK. I added carrots, onions and some frozen chopped spinach to it which was good to get some veggies in. Just didn't have as much flavor as I would have liked and I'm finding this to be true more often than not when I make things in the instant pot.
Tonight who knows! We're currently dealing with a forklift that's stuck in our muddy yard from the guys who put our hot tub we ordered from Costco in place and I have no idea how long it will take them to get it out! Needless to say I'm hoping to make something quick and easy. Maybe the orange chicken sausages I got last weekend (also made in house at the grocery store) and big salads are in order today!
Ooh, that forklift problem sounds like a nightmare. I hope it's resolved soon and that you can start enjoying your hot tub.
Our oven has been broken since before Easter waiting for a part to arrive, so it looks like it will work just in time for summer... 🙂
Saturday: grilled sea bream, eggplant and zucchini caponata & grilled corn
Sunday: grilled pizza with homemade dough and scape pesto; salad
Monday: vegetarian tacos with all the fixins’
Tuesday: broccoli calzone with leftover pizza dough and homemade sauce
Wednesday: ate at work
Thursday: sandwich and popcorn in the car on the long drive home
Friday: salmon Niçoise with garlic-herb dressing (from Saveur)
Sunday, Monday, Tuesday- pulled pork and baked potatoes
Wednesday and Thursday- baked chicken, roasted green beans, and fried rice
Friday- hamburgers and more baked potatoes
I keep wondering if Joshua's moving out is having much effect on your food budget. Teenage boys are known for being a challenge to the food budget.
I haven't noticed a HUGE impact, but that's probably because toward the end of him living here, he was barely around for meals. Also, he's kinda built like the opposite of a football player, so that's a factor too. If I'd been feeding a linebacker I'd probably notice a bigger drop!