​Last week was fantastic. I feel like I accomplished a lot with the time that I had. One highlight of the week was recieving my proof copy of The Housewife's Guide to Menu Planning. This is a book I've been working on revising for the last several months (it was previously called Pizza Night) as a companion guide to The Housewife's Guide to Frugal Food. 

To those of you who are interested, I will be giving away copies of the ebook version FOR FREE in order to get as many Amazon reviews as possible. When the book is published and available, I will send out my July newsletter with a link to the free ebook. If you want to download the book to your Kindle/device for free, be sure you are signed up for my monthly newsletter. You can do that here.

1. Shopping: I didn't buy any groceries last week. BUT, the week prior I did make a trip to our not-so-local Amish discount store. I spent $29.47; you can watch my haul below:

​Some meals we had this week were: rice/cheeseburger helper, taco salad, hash, baked potatoes, leftovers and fajitas on the grill. Yum! We did a lot better this week not going to restaurants. I packed a lunch for one day trip, which saved $5.00-$10.00. On Friday I spent the afternoon babysitting, and by the time I got home Hubs had already left to pick up pizza. Lol!!! We enjoyed the pizza anyway, and had leftovers the next day for lunch.

2. Garden: harvested red raspberries, lettuce, lavender, and calendula.

3. Froze 16 quarts of green beans. My mother-in-law will be out of state for a few weeks, and said we could pick what was ripe from her garden. She specifically mentioned green beans and squash, which is awesome because I didn't plant any green beans OR squash this year. We ate some summer squash fresh, and I was able to put about four month's worth of green beans in the freezer.

4. Cooking: Made yogurt and French dressing from scratch. I used the recipe in my book, The Housewife's Guide to Frugal Food, (affiliate link) except I cut the amount of sugar in half. It was remarkably similar to the Aldi French dressing I bought several weeks ago. The recipe is also available in The Tightwad Gazette (I don't remember which volume- affiliate link is for the all-in-one edition) for those of you who have that book at your library or at home.

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French Dressing from Scratch: Worth the Effort?

Was the homemade dressing cheaper than my Aldi dressing? Even with free onions, garlic and vinegar, my homemade dressing cost $1.14 to make four cups. The Aldi dressing was $1.29 for two cups. Therefore, I saved $1.44 by making my own dressing instead of buying it. It took just 15-20 minutes to make (including washing the blender), which put the hourly wage around $5.00. I think this is probably worth my time to do again.

I didn't have enough red wine vinegar for the dressing recipe, so I used some strawberry wine vinegar that I made several years back. It worked like a charm! I refilled the store-bought vinegar bottle with my homemade vinegar for next time.
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5. A friend gave me several boxes of used clothing to pick through. I found a whole box full to keep, along with some DVDs and a few other miscellaneous items that will come in handy over the next year.

6. Borrowed three books and one audio book from the library. I ordered one paperback and the audio book through our state's interloan system. The interloan system (it's called MELCat in Michigan) gives library card holders access to books at every public library in the state. I've saved hundreds of dollars by borrowing niche books not available at my local library instead of buying them on Amazon.

Audio books are an even better deal, because instead of saving $4.00-$5.00, you save $15.00 or more for each book you listen to. 

7. Line dried ALMOST one load of laundry. It rained on laundry day, so I dried most of the load (socks and underwear) in our kitchen beneath the ceiling fan. The pants and jeans, however, didn't dry completely because our house is SO humid in the summer. So I had to finish off those in the dryer.

8. Made soap.

9. Sold a used book on Amazon. After fees, I earned $7.01. Amazon charged $5.00 in seller fees for an $11.00 book. If you don't purchase their special seller membership, the fees are very high. After the book sold, I removed all of my other listings because they were just not worth selling. Instead, I will try to sell them on Ebay or just donate them to Goodwill.

10. Collected recyclable cans on various walks.

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Youtube Videos:

I uploaded two videos (besides my grocery haul) this week:

1. How I Do Menu Planning (ANNOUNCEMENT!)
2. Selling at a Farmers Market: Calculating Net Profit

I hope you are having a fantastic and frugal week!
-Bethany

Hi everyone! Today I wanted to let you know that I'm expanding my Youtube channel. I have been working on some improvements over the past few days, and added a few non-grocery-haul videos that you may be interested in.


For All You Visual Folks...

My goal over the summer is to upload as many videos as possible in order to add a visual element to my blog. I'm certainly no TV personality, but some of the concepts I discuss here are just better seen in person than read about. I'm also hoping to expand on concepts and techniques that I talk about in The Housewife's Guide to Frugal Food.

If you are a Youtube viewer and enjoy watching my videos, please don't hesitate to "like" and subscribe to my channel. Thanks!

-Bethany

Hi everyone! As I was doing research for a book on buying produce, I decided to see how my state, Michigan, ranked in terms of grocery costs. This excellent study shoes the 2016 cost of living in each state- not only overall, but also in terms of groceries, housing, utilities, health, and miscellaneous costs. If you get a chance to look, I would encourage you to check it out!

Using the information from that study, I made a spreadsheet of estimated grocery costs for each state. You can see the state in the left column. "Percentage of Average Grocery Cost" beside each state shows how that state ranks according to average (not in terms of spending, but cost of living in the food department). I was surprised to see that Michigan (highlighted yellow) came in fourth place as the cheapest state for groceries! South Dakota (highlighted orange) is about average. 

$10.00 Per Week: Is It Enough?

The next two columns had to do with my own $10.00/wk grocery budget. It's unfair to hold Hawaiians and Alaskans to my $10.00 per week standard, but what SHOULD their grocery budget goal be, if not $10.00 per week?

Even though Michigan is the fourth cheapest state to grocery shop in, it is only 10% below average. I set my average budget, then, at $11.00 and punched in that formula for all of the other states. The cheapest state, Idaho, came out at only $9.39 per week. The most expensive state, Hawaii, came out to $17.05 per week. So technically, Frugal Food should have a different subtitle for each state. "How to Eat for $9.85 per Week in Texas" or "How to Eat for $15.08 per Week In Alaska".

The sad news (something I didn't realize when I published the book) is that $10.00 per week is probably a touch too low for 95% of the states, according to cost of living alone. "How to Eat for $13.00 per Week" would have been more accurate, and covered all states except Connecticut, Alaska, and Hawaii. Those states would still need their own book. :)

The GOOD NEWS is that most while most people might not make it on $10.00 per week, they could make it on a few dollars more using the same principles and techniques I talk about in my book. If I can do it, I know that others can as well.


Produce for the Non-Gardeners

My last column, "Additional Produce" had to do with a new book project; how to buy produce for $5.00 per week. This is a little booklet I'm working on for all of the non-gardeners* out there. Again I plugged in the numbers according to each state's ranking. Again, my Michigan standard was a bit below most of the other states. A more accurate estimation would be $6.00 per week for a majority of the states. $7.00 would cover all states except the three I mentioned before.
​

Where are you from? Do you think the chart and/or study is accurate?

*The word "garden" does not imply 100% free produce. Even though I do have a garden, my $10.00 per person spending still includes carrots, potatoes, and onions. It also includes the occasional purchase of other produce items I don't grow. Just wanted to clarify that! Some people seem to think that $10.00 per week does not include any produce, which isn't the case. However, my new book project is for people who must purchase ALL of their produce and aren't interested in gardening or foraging in order to lower food spending.

**Another note: most of the time, higher cost of living comes with a higher average income. This should cover the few extra dollars required for higher cost of living states.

We also stopped at Kroger after church to pick up a few things I need for the week. It ended up being a bigger trip than I planned. We spent $6.76 on routine grocery items (sour cream, yogurt starter, milk, onions, frozen corn), $6.90 on items I needed for a special recipe, and $3.28 on impulse purchases. Lastly, the cheese was still on sale for $2.50 a pound, so I bought five more pounds of pre-shredded cheese for the freezer (total cost $12.50).

In the end, we spend just under $29.44 (after two rebates) at Kroger. Yikes! Considering the fact that I keep a $20.00/person/week budget, and the fact that I already spent $18.00 at the bent 'n' dent, $30.00 is way to high. While looking over my receipt, I noticed a few things.

A) No plan. I walked into the store wanting to buy onions and sour cream. To that list I also thought I needed more milk and yogurt starter, although those purchases probably could have waited another week.

B) Shopping while hungry. So, that $3.28 of impulse purchases were completely unneccesary. Even though I knew we wouldn't eat those things right away, the hunger after church made it really tempting anyway.

C) Buying ingredients for special recipes. I do my best to buy ingredients BEFORE I need them (that way I can get them when they are on sale), but this time it didn't work out. I love meal planning as much as anybody, but a major problem with many meal plans is that you have to buy "special" ingredients each week (that is, anything that's not on sale). One of my "special" ingredients was cream cheese. Four packages at $1.50 each is $6.00. I could have got the cream cheese cheaper on sale (often there have been sales for $1.00 per package) or I could have spent less by getting a large chunk at the restaurant supply store. By purchasing the cream cheese ahead of time, I could have saved a dollar or two, easily. But I needed it this week and didn't have time to shop around. Another way to reduce this cost entirely would be to not make the special recipe.

Total spent on groceries this week was $48.29.

2. Cancelled my Audible membership. Boy, have I had a time with Audible! After my first paid month in February, I decided that membership wasn't for me, due to the price as well as the fact that most of my "to read" list is not on Audible. My exit strategy was to save up one unused credit (to keep in case I found any interesting books later) and then cancel. Well, after recieving my credit on Wednesday, I went to cancel on Friday. I saw that they were running a sale- 3 credits for $32.00- so I bought them. That was a good deal, since I've been paying $15.00 per credit for the last two months.

Well, I went to cancel my membership with four unused credits, and I got a message that said, "Are you sure you want to cancel? You will lose all of your unused credits."

What?!?! Boy, was I mad! I guess it was my oversight and failure to read the rules that caused my angst, but don't you think that's a little decieving? Selling extra credits to me and then telling me I have to stay a member or lose the credits I JUST bought? So, I had an emergency book-buying session where I picked some interesting books on my list and spent all four credits. Then I canceled my membership.

So now I have enough audio books to last a long time. And I am done with Audible for a long time, because the library is free. And because there are too many free podcasts and very cheap ebooks to be paying $15.00 each for books that are not on my reading list.

3. Ordered a free (actually $8.00 with shipping/etc., but still cheap!) photo book while Shutterfly was running a promotion.

4. Spent a few hours "fixing" my serger. It's still not perfect, but at least the needles are moving now (they weren't before). For those of you who don't know, a serger is a sewing machine that sews around the edges of fabric so it doesn't unravel in the washer. If you look at the hem of your T-shirt, it probably has a serged edge. My hope is that having a working serger will encourage me to do more sewing.

5. Sold a used book on Amazon. Unfortunately, after fees I only made $0.03. I had listed the book long before Amazon changed their fee structure and never update the price. For those who are wondering, it's pointless to sell any book for less than $2.34 because that is their minimum fee for any sellers who are not "members" (part of the special book selling club). On top of that, Amazon charges 15% of the listing price. I had my book listed for $2.50, so you can see where I went wrong. The only profit I made was because the book was thin and didn't cost a whole lot to ship.

6. I used a $15.00 Ebay coupon. While reviewing my listings, I noticed that I had a coupon available. I'm not sure WHY I had the coupon, but the code worked and I was able to buy some orchid pots that had been sitting in my cart for a long time. Total cost for the pots was $0.50, shipping included.

7. Made granola. I tried using Truvia and honey to sweeten instead of sugar, and the result was less than tasty. I might try making granola bars with it, or just force myself to eat it anyway.

8. Made bone broth and soup from a rooster carcass.

9. Listened to a free audiobook on Amazon Prime's "channels". It is called No Excuses by Brian Tracy. Enjoying it. 

So, those were some frugal things that I did this week.

What were some of our frugal accomplishments?

Wow- spring is just around the corner! I've got little seedlings and things growing all over the place, and it makes me so happy. There's just something exciting about new growth after cold, dull winters. Here are some frugal things I did last week:​

1. Line dried two loads of laundry.

2. Shopping: we went to Kroger this week and spent $11.83. You can watch my grocery haul on Youtube!!

We also went to Walmart and did a non-frugal trip (I promise it just started out with carrots and mayo) that included brand-name barbeque sauce, gelatin powder (which is like $1.00 per oz... what?!) and chipotle pepper powder. The only chipotle pepper they had, by the way, for $5.00. It was for a recipe. And I was hungry for cookies, so we bought some $2.50 cookies. At the checkout, I had forgotten to put something in my cart. So I ran back and got it. By the time I got back up to the checkout counter, Hubs had scanned a candy bar for himself. LOL! I can't blame him, though, because my cookies were more expensive. So that trip was another $20.00+.

3. Used a 10% off coupon at TSC to buy goat feed, a flower bulb, and something that Hubs wanted. I got three bags of feed, which will last at least 6 months. I decided to buy it all at once, since I had the coupon anyway. 

I also found a narcissus bulb-forcing kit (after Christmas sale!) for $2.70. It came with the pot, dirt, and bulb. I planted the bulb in its pot right away. Even if the bulb does not bloom this spring, I'm hopeful that it will flower next year. I am always looking for flowers to grow indoors during the winter months.

​4. Started herb seeds. I used little pot-pellets that we got at Menards; I think each pot cost between $0.10-$0.20. I was just curious to see if they worked. Anyhow, one of the herb seeds is already beginning to sprout!! I also transferred some lavender seedlings into an egg carton to grow in individual cells.

​6. Listed some stuff on Ebay. I am hoping to have sales to report next week!

7. Made sugar-free no bake cookies. They were SOOOO good. Even Hubs thought they were decent. The recipe was basically identical to the sugar one, except instead of butter it used coconut oil, and instead of sugar I used honey and Truvia (stevia). I think it would be cheaper and just as healthy to use butter, so I am going to try that before posting a recipe. I thought the honey/Truvia blend worked well. There was only a slight hint of stevia aftertaste that I noticed. I don't think Hubs would have noticed either, had I not told him. 

8. Uploaded some Youtube videos. One of my blog goals this year was to do some "real" Youtube videos in order to get my message to a new audience. I have uploaded videos before, but mostly just so I could have video clips on my blog.

I spent one day this week, therefore, learning how to edit videos from my phone to make them 'tube worthy. First I tried downloading an editing app (that didn't work), then I tried editing them on my phone before uploading. Finally, I found that the easiest thing to do is take the video on your phone, and then do the editing on the computer (Youtube Editor) after the clip has uploaded to Youtube. I found which fonts I like the best for titles and also figured out how to add music, links, and stuff like that. It was a long day, but time well spent.

Right now I have this week's haul on my channel, plus a clip on pantry shopping vs. grocery list shopping, and a clip on how I use my grocery store comparison chart. If you're interested, subscribe to my channel! If all goes well, I will be uploading at least one video every week.

And that's all, folks! Til next time,
-Bethany

​After the splendid weather we had during the second week of February, last week was kind of a downer for me. February is definitely the most "blah" month of my calendar year. With not a whole lot to do, I kind of lose focus and get lazy. I did a lot of cleaning this week, plus some reorganizing and de-cluttering. That's what you call being busy, but not actually accomplishing anything. I also did quite a bit of reading, which was nice.

1. Shopping: I didn't do any shoppping this week, except I bought some lard for a recipe (and now that I think of it, I probably have some lard in the freezer). We ate a lot of freezer food. 

One little shopping tidbit I've discovered recently is utilizing expiration dates and not buying stuff like milk and yogurt every week. Until recently, I was haphazardly buying milk wherever we were shopping that week. However, by purchasing certain items at certain places, I can shave spending little by little. Consider the scenario below.

One Month of Milk Shopping:

Week 1) 1 gallon Aldi brand @ $1.60
Week 2) 1 gallon Kroger brand @ $2.00
Week 3) 1 gallon Walmart brand @ $1.70
Week 4) 1 gallon Kroger brand @ $2.00
Total milk spending: $7.30

Week 1) 2 gallons Aldi brand = $3.20
Week 3) 2 gallons Walmart brand = $3.40
Total milk spending: $6.60 (savings of $0.70)


Week 1) 2 gallons Aldi brand = $3.20
Week 3) 2 gallons Aldi brand = $3.20
Total milk spending: $6.40 (savings of $0.90)

I can do the same thing with sour cream, yogurt, and other perishable dairy items we buy. Purchase enough to last until the item expires; not buy a new container every week. I love shopping Kroger for reduced fresh produce, reduced bacon, and other "Manager's Special" items, and I think Kroger has great sales. However, if I need to buy something on a shopping list, at retail price, it is better to do so at Walmart or Aldi. That is why staggering my shopping trips- one week here, one week there- is probably a good idea. 

Also, I have discovered that if milk is close to expiring (a day or two before), I can extend the life of it by making yogurt or cheese. I'm not 100% sure why this is, but it might have to do with re-heating the milk. At any rate, the cheese or yogurt will last at least another week that way. So the  milk that I bought on February 15 will probably last a good three weeks, in one form or another.

2. Returned aluminum cans: after the massive can hauls of last week, we had to empty the recyclables box. After all was said and done, we made $12.30 off of the cans. I left the plastic and glass bottles at home, so this was JUST the aluminum cans.

3. Started vegetable and herb seeds. Last year I tried buying a fancy seed starting tray, and it didn't work much better than my homemade versions. So this year I saved some plastic cookie containers (the ones that snap closed) and I will be using those as miniature greenhouses to germinate seeds. Some of my wormwood seeds are already beginning to sprout!

4. Pruned fruit trees. I also saved some of the cuttings, hopefully to start new plants in gallon jugs. Then I used some more cuttings to make a spring centerpiece for our kitchen table.

5. Watched free Amazon Prime movies. I know, watching movies is more wasteful than frugal. But at least they were free! We also played a new-to-us game this week that we got for Christmas. It's called "Score Four", and is actually a vintage 3D version of Connect 4. The game is easy and quick to play. It would also be a great travel game, I think.

6. Hubs made me a new set of cabinets!! This project has been going on since November, but with the accident, funeral, and our being gone a lot in January and February, it was only completely finished this week. I just had to paint the doors, and then Hubs put the hardware on and I helped him attach the doors to the front of the cabinet.

Because I do so much canning, and because of my various cooking tools, the pantry was overflowing into the storage room and even under the bed. With the new cabinet, I was able to move ALL of the canned food and kitchen implements (dehydrater, both canners, etc.) into the kitchen where they actually belong, and now we have more space in the storage room.

​As I have probably mentioned before, I am a recovering hoarder. I try not to accumulate too much stuff, and sell or give away what I don't need. But unfortunately, you need a lot of storage space if you do canning or stocking up on sales in order to cut down on grocery costs. The storage space is what saves us a lot of money. 

So yay for that project being done! While not exactly "cheap" (the wood and hardware cost about $100.00), the cabinets were custom built to our own specifications and to fit our apartment, matching the existing cabinets that were there. They are very sturdy and will last for years- definitely not Ikea cupboards. Custom cabinets done by a professional would not even be an option for this apartment; we will be moving out in a few years, and don't want to invest too much money into it. Hubs built the set of cabinets in his free time, so labor costs were minimal. He keeps saying he is in construction and not woodworking, but I think he did a fine job. If you want to be frugal, marry someone with a lot of skills!

I have had a lot of fun slowly making our little house into a home. Home decorating and interior design are NOT my strong suit (um... that's why you never see pictures of my house), but I think anyone can learn, and I am trying to, little by little. It's fun.  

Til next time,
-Bethany

As you can see, the Diamond almonds were purchased at my favorite bent 'n' dent store for $0.35, or $2.48 per pound. The Kroger almonds were purchased at retail for $1.99, or $14.15 per pound. and are nearly identical. Ironically, the only difference is that the Kroger nuts expire sooner.

An $11.67/lb. savings is what can happen when you are not picky about where you shop.


Disregarding Types to Save Money

The $0.35/package nuts are pretty common when I shop at the bent 'n' dent. The only problem is that I don't have a choice in what kind or cut of nut that I get. Usually there are only one or two options.

Below is a comparison photo of $0.50 worth of pecans. The large pile is pecan chips bought from the bent 'n' dent. The small pile is pecan pieces/quarters bought at retail from Kroger.

Which pile would you rather have? I'd rather have the big pile! This holiday season, I will use my $2.48/lb. pecans for cheese balls, cookies, and candy. They will work exactly the same, if not better than the more expensive pieces purchased at retail.

​
Should You EVER Buy Nuts?

Before I discovered a local-ish (within an hour) bent 'n' dent, I almost never bought nuts. Why purchase such a luxury when the same amount of money could buy ten-fold of a more useful staple like rice?

Living a nut-free life can have many financial benefits. I love nuts just as much as the next person, but there are enough other yummy foods to choose from that I do not even miss having them around. Saving nuts for holidays, birthdays and other occasions (instead of using them on a weekly basis) will save a lot of money in the long run.

-Bethany

*Note: Part of this nut analysis was motivated by my secret plan to overthrow the diet food advertising barons that have drained so many wallets dry of grocery money. Having a nut-based diet (replacing real milk with almond milk, replacing real flour with almond flour, etc.) is so much more expensive than eating a variety of different food groups. For most people, I don't believe there is anything wrong with consuming wheat or dairy products. People who are allergic to these foods can go gluten free by simply not eating bread. Those allergic to dairy can stop drinking milk and drink water instead. No milk for cold cereal? Stop eating cold cereal for breakfast and start eating eggs. The nut-based diet should only be used for a) those who are gluten-, dairy-, AND egg-free (but apparently not allergic to nuts) or b) those who are willing and able to have a high grocery bill every month.

Even at $2.50 per pound, nuts are still more expensive than produce, grains, beans, white meat, and even some red meat and cheeses. Instead of a handful of nuts, you could buy a dozen eggs, a gallon of milk or a pound of meat. That one snack of nuts could be traded in for a week's worth of rice or two boxes of pasta. Even though I've found a "cheap" source of nuts, I still only use them on rare occasions. I would rather spend my grocery dollars on foods that stretch.

If you are still set on eating nut-based replacement foods for wheat and dairy, consider shopping at a discount store, buying expired or otherwise "imperfect" gluten free / dairy free ingredients or products to save money.

Do you use nuts? Why or why not? What is your favorite frugal tip for buying nuts?

It's deer season here in Michigan. Hubs is an on-again, off-again hunter, and I've shot exactly one deer in the last six years. "I like hunting when I get something," says Hubs. Otherwise we are not crazy about sitting in the stand waiting for the right doe or buck to come into our sights.

Today I'm going to do a little exposé of how frugal (or not) hunting really is. I'm going to use actual numbers from our actual hunting experience this year. Then at the end, I'll go over some things you can do to save even more money on hunting.


Tallying the Cost

First, we'll add up all of our financial investment into this little project.

Gun: $0.00 (Hubs borrowed my dad's shotgun)
License: $23.00 ($11.00 base license + $12 antlerless tag)
Slugs: $1.82 (2 shots at $0.91 per shot)

Total cost: $24.82


How Much We Actually Saved

Hubs and I would normally pay about $2.00/lb. for red meat (ground beef in a 20 lb. roll). This is the price I will use to calculate our savings.

Savings: $82.00 (41 pounds x $2.00)
Savings minus $24.82 = $57.18


Hourly Wage & ROI

This is where things get fun. Our return on financial investment was 130%.

To calculate the hourly wage, we must divide the savings ($57.18) by the number of hours spent hunting (3) and processing (6.5). 

$57.18 divided by 9.5 = $6.02 per hour


How to Make Hunting More Frugal

There are a few things you can do to improve your return on investment and hourly wage here.

1. Shoot two deer instead of one. While a tag must be purchased for every deer you shoot, the base license only needs to be purchased once. For every deer you shoot, the cost will go down. 

First deer: $24.82 ($0.61/lb.)
Second deer: $19.32 ($0.47/lb.)
Third deer: $13.48 ($0.33/lb.)

2. Be a better shot. Someone who shoots and kills the deer with one shot is getting a better deal than the guy who shoots all over the place and only gets one deer, or worse- doesn't bring home anything at all. Plus, shooting a deer in multiple or incorrect locations (like the butt, for example) will just make it harder to butcher and ruin good meat, to say nothing of making the deer miserable.


3. Be faster at processing. Hubs and I are not the fastest butchers ever. For every hour of processing time that is eliminated, your hourly wage goes up.

10 hours processing: $5.72 per hour
8 hours processing: $7.15 per hour
6 hours processing: $9.53 per hour

Note: Hubs pointed out to me that some people actually enjoy hours spent in the deer stand. Not every hour is equal in value. If you hunt on the weekends, for example, it might be worth $5.72 per hour when you would otherwise just be sleeping or watching TV. If you have to give up a morning of work, though, it is probably not worth the time to hunt.

Note #2: If you pay someone to do the butchering, you might as well buy your meat from the store. In our area, butchering facilities charge between $70.00 and $80.00 for a single deer. This would easily drive our cost over $2.00 per pound.


Is Hunting Worth It?

For us, it is still worth it. In November Hubs' business has started to slow down, so his time is worth less than it would be in April or September. I value my time at $4.00 per hour, so the processing was an improvement on my average hourly wage.

Lastly, venison is probably a healthier choice than run-of-the-mill ground beef from the store. That is because deer are free range and/or grass fed, although they like munching on GMO corn and other non-organic foodstuffs. The health factor alone may be enough to convince some families to hunt, regardless of savings, ROI or hourly wage involved. 


Thoughts About Killing Animals

Some of the worst feedback from Frugal Food has been about butchering. I guess not many people are willing to do it. "You would kill an animal with your own bare hands, just to save money?" Susie Homemaker looks at me with wide eyes as if I were involved in prostitution or drug dealing. She would keel over at the thought of killing an animal. But let's admit it- it's almost impossible to include red meat in a very tight budget. I have never seen red meat on sale for $0.40 per pound, ever. The skill of animal processing- whether that be something as small as a chicken or large as a cow- can provide families with good quality, affordable meat. I don't think it is anything to be scared of or freaked out at. I don't think it is anything to be ashamed of.

People who butcher animals are not weird or evil. It's not like we take delight in the process- it's just a part of producing your own food. I believe every meat eater should butcher at least once in her life, just to realize where her food actually comes from... and HOW it comes. Then if she wants to be a vegetarian, she can call it cruel.

Are you part of a hunting family? Would you consider doing it to save money?

I don't know about you, but we've been eating a lot of soup lately. I love making soup because it's warm, tasty and inexpensive. Inexpensive, that is, unless you're a cracker fanatic like I am. I could crush a whole sleeve into one bowl of soup. Seriously.

Bread bowls are a fancy, creative, filling and not-so-expensive replacement for crackers. If you can make bread, you can make bread bowls. I'll let you find your favorite recipe. Personally I like to use a no-knead bread dough because artisan bread comes out so nice and crusty.

How to Make Bread Bowls

1. Shape your bread dough as if you were going to make dinner rolls, but place them 3 inches apart so that the rolls will bake separately. This will give your bowls good, hard sides. If the rolls smoosh together while they are baking, the sides won't be sturdy enough to hold soup.

One of my first mistakes was making the bowls too big. The bowl you see in the photos is far too large. The size of a normal dinner roll should be perfect.

2. Cut the very top of the roll off, as if you were about to carve a pumpkin.

3. Dig out the insides of the bread roll (again, as if you were carving a pumpkin!).

And there you have it! A bread bowl ready to be filled with soup. Though they will work with any soup, I've found that bread bowls are more helpful to thin, watery soups that need more substance. Not only does the bread enhance the soup, but the soup soaks into the dry bread and makes it taste SO good when the soup is gone.

Some Tips:

1. You can save the bread bowl insides. These can be used for croutons or bread crumbs in recipes. You can also put them back into the soup, like crackers.

2. Because there are only two of us, I like to make a big batch of bread bowls and then freeze all but two. Then whenever we have soup, I pull out two of the bowls and we eat them little by little that way.

Til next time,
-Bethany

​ 1. Line dried one load of laundry. I am doing almost all of my line-drying indoors now. I normally do two loads per week, and one load (shirts, socks & underwear, etc.) can be dried indoors. The jeans and sweatshirts take to long to air dry, so I will air dry them for one day, then put them in the dryer for a half cycle (or a full cycle on low/air dry).

2. Sold 1 dozen eggs.

3. Made pumpkin pie in Vitamix blender. It was very easy, and the pie turned out wonderful! The pumpkin was from cleaning out the freezer, and I had an old can of sweetened condensed milk in the pantry to use up. Other ingredients were just eggs, spices, and the pie crust. It was a pretty frugal dessert, with the exception of the crust, which cost $1.10 to make from scratch with lard. I was able to freeze half of the crust, though, to use for another pie.

While I was reading the instructions, I learned that you can substitute a 14 oz. can of sweetened condensed milk with a 12 oz. can of evaporated milk ($0.45 at the bent 'n' dent) +3/4 cup sugar ($0.14). $0.59 is pretty cheap for sweetened condensed milk!   

4. Cut tree hay (raspberry canes) to dry for goats.

5. My sister-in-law and I helped a neighbor clean and cut up carrots to freeze (these were from her garden). It was quite the process! The carrots were dug up first and put on a plastic tarp in the garage. Then the very large chunks of dirt were rubbed off by hand. Next the carrots went in a sink of water to further loosen dirt. The last step was to put the carrots through a rinse cycle in the washer. We were able to put two five-gallon buckets in the washer at a time. After they went through the washer, we cut the carrots using a French-fry-type cutter, blanched, and then put them in freezer bags. I had never processed carrots like that before, so it was quite the education for me. Plus I got to bring some carrots home!

6. Went for two bike rides this week. For those of you who don't know, this is part of my "free gym membership". I also like picking up recycle-able cans and bottles during my rides for a little extra cash. Biking is a lot more fun if I have an incentive like the cans.

7. Made a trip to the bent 'n' dent store. I spent a total of $43.78. That's over half of our November grocery budget! Here is a breakdown of what I got:

52% Pantry/baking ($22.70): 1 boxed dinner ($1.50), curry powder (1.75 oz. for $1.25), vanilla beans ($1.25 for 2), cloves (1.62 oz. for $1.25), 3 boxes of jello mix ($0.35 ea.), cooking spray ($1.50), creamed corn (two 14.75 oz. cans @ $0.45 ea.), cream of mushroom soup (two 10.7 oz. cans @ $0.65 ea.), evaporated milk (two 12 oz. cans @ $0.45 ea.), 14 oz. cranberry sauce ($0.75), tomato paste ($0.20 for small can), herbal teas (three 20 ct. boxes @ $1.25/box), no-sugar fruit pectin (4.7 oz. @ $0.50), cake mix ($0.75), cookie mix ($0.75), cheesecake mix ($1.75), pie crust mix ($0.75), pecan chips (six 1/2 c. bags @ $0.35 ea.), chex mix seasoning & chili seasoning ($0.25 ea.)  

29% Junk food ($12.58): 1 bag Reese's (1.50), 5 energy bars ($1.00), 3 boxes cold cereal ($1.57, $1.57 and $1.79), fruit roll ups (box of six- $1.15), fruit snacks (box of 10- $1.15), chips (2 bags @ $0.75 ea.), Pringles ($0.75), ramen noodles (4 packs @ $0.15 ea.)

9% Bread ($4.00): four packages tortillas ($1.00 ea.) 

3% Prize box ($1.40): Candy (3 @ $0.30 ea., 1 @ $0.50)

7% Other ($3.10): Citronella candle ($0.50), cough syrup (4 oz. $1.75), paper plates (60 ct. $0.85)

My best bargains during this trip were vanilla beans (normally $8.00-$10.00 for 2) at $1.25, and flour tortillas (normally $2.48 per package) at $1.00 each. The tortillas were only 40% off, but they are something I do buy on a regular basis, so I saved about $6.00 on those alone.

I have never made pie crust with a mix before, but the $0.75 box will make four crusts for $0.19 per crust. If you remember, my homemade recipe cost $0.55 per crust. We will see which one tastes better.

8. Made garlic/kale soup. This was my new recipe of the week, adapted from Don't Waste the Crumbs. I used 1 cup of home-canned navy beans, 1 pint of chicken broth, 1 bay leaf, 1 cup of chopped kale from the garden, 1 TB olive oil, 2 TB butter, four garlic cloves, 1 tsp. dried oregano, and two small tomatoes. Because the kale, broth, garlic and tomatoes were free from the garden, it was pretty frugal at $0.40 for the entire recipe. We did use some homemade cheese with the soup flavor. The first bowl was really good, but the second bowl was harder for me to get down. It tasted too beany for some reason. I think this would be a good soup to repeat, but maybe with a medley of different beans/grains or some meat to add variety and calories. Hubs and I had leftover pumpkin pie to go with the soup, but if not for the pie we probably would have still been hungry.

9. Printed new planner pages. My DIY planner helps me keep track of things and plan my day.

10. Downloaded the Stitcher app to my phone. I have been trying to streamline my internet activities so they take less time. Several weeks ago I started using an RSS feed to read blogs. Another activity that was distracting and taking up time was finding podcasts to play from my computer while I did housework. Now I can just take the phone wherever I am working, and the podcasts keep on playing. I don't have to stop my work and run to the computer to find another one. I've realized that often times I get sidetracked "finding podcasts" and end up doing something completely unrelated on the internet. This sucks up a lot of valuable time, so I'm happy to have started using a phone app for my podcasts.

11. Used a TSC 10% off coupon for goat mineral and a chain for Hubs' chain saw.

12. Kroger had a sale this week. Not only were many items on sale, but if you bought in quantities of 10 for those items, you could get an additional $0.50 off per item. I was able to buy butter for $2.00/lb. (I bought 10 pounds... should last a while!), and sour cream and cottage cheese for $0.70/lb. Seventy cents for a pound of cheese is the cheapest I have found EVER. If I could use the cottage cheese to replace our use of regular $2.00/lb.+ cheese, that would be cool.

Usually we are Walmart shoppers, but Hubs has found a way to use his credit card rewards for any purchases- not just gift cards that the credit company offers. This means that I'll be able to do my shopping at other places besides Walmart. In addition, our local Walmart has stopped price matching. Bummer! Just a few months ago I wrote about why we love Walmart so much, and now I find myself excited to be shopping elsewhere. Never say never!

My problem with shopping sales is that I spend more money on things I wouldn't normally buy. For example, I spent $5.60 on cottage cheese when I normally spend $0.00 on cottage cheese. Plus, the cottage cheese expires a month from now! That means we will be eating not one, but TWO containers per week for the next month. It's only $1.40 more per week, but imagine if I would have shopped ALL of the sales at Kroger. It would be so easy to spend more than $20.00 per week in the name of sales.

Between the bent 'n' dent and Kroger shopping sprees this week, I'm left with $6.22 for the rest of November. It will be interesting to see if I can come in under budget or not! I still have a lot of food in the pantry that needs to be eaten, so it's possible.