Clearance Score!

Grabbed these 5 cans of powdered milk at Walmart on my last trip there. These are 3.52lbs/1.6kg cans. These went straight to my stockpile for future use.  These were marked off 50%, so each can came to $7.74!  With milk prices going through the roof and a gallon of milk hovering around $3.50 or so, regular milk has been relegated to drinking and morning cereal only.  I used to use evaporated milk for cooking, but I am down to my last can out of the stash I had on hand.  Last time evaporated milk went on sale for $0.50 a can, I think I purchased around 40 cans?  Since then, I have not seen them go on sale.  Regular price for them now is around $1.30 or so a can, so you can see what a good deal these canisters of powdered milk were!

I have been using powdered milk in baking and cooking for about a year now. It is convenient to have on hand. No last minute trips to the grocery store because I don't have milk to use in a recipe.  Taste wise, I think powdered milk is no different than regular milk in cooking.  I have to admit I have not tried to actually drink the stuff mixed with water.  What I have read is that if you do want to drink it, one must mix it in a container and chill it in the refrigerator first.  Otherwise, it is my understanding that it tastes like yuck!  I hope I never get to the point of having to resort to that!  I have used powdered milk in Southern biscuits, milk gravy, pot pies and cake recipes with success.  So if you come across deals like this, I recommend that you grab it! Unlike regular milk, these don't go sour on you!

Random Thoughts

Well, it really sucks when you get used to doing something, and then can't. Still no luck with the Blogger app for my phone, so I guess it's back to getting the photos off of my camera.  I just hate that extra step I have to take. . .

The vegetable garden is really taking off, and I made some home made marinara sauce with the bumper crop of tomatoes the other day.  Just chopped tomatoes, a splash of balsamic vinegar and a teaspoon of sugar and I let that cook up until the tomatoes started to fall apart.  I then put that through a food mill to get the skin and most of the seeds out and simmered the remaining liquid until it had reduced by about a third. Salted to taste, and it was really, REALLY good.  My husband commented how the taste does not compare to store bought spaghetti sauce.  The only downside was that I did not have enough to can, so next time, I will wait until I have a large stash in the freezer.  I had been reading up on tomatoes in my copy of The Encyclopedia of Country Living, and I saw that you can freeze whole tomatoes until you have enough to make a big batch. I will give that a try.

I got dinner going rather late yesterday as I had a migraine for much of the day.  I saved dinner by cooking a whole chicken (purchased for $2.50 when on sale) in my pressure cooker with a splash of lemon juice, several dashes of dried minced garlic, pepper, some Montreal Steak Seasoning and a bit of soy sauce.  Cooked that under pressure for about 30 minutes while I chopped up several zucchini from the garden and pan fried that with garlic powder, salt and pepper and some Italian seasoning.  The chicken was falling off the bone at the end of cooking.  My husband is on a low/no carb diet now, so that's all he had.  The boys ate it along with some leftover mashed potatoes from the other night. So the total outlay for dinner was only $2.50!

I realized yet again that I need to utilize my pressure cooker more often.  It makes tough cuts of meat tender AND cooks it faster than conventional cooking. If I remember to do that, it will help reduce our electric bill.  Our house is all electric, so it adds up after a while.  Need to find more recipes. . .

The food mill was a splurge item for me a while back.  I had been coveting one for a LOOOOONG time.  I had a $50 gift card from Williams Sonoma, but the All Clad mill I wanted was over $100.  That's more expensive than any of the pots and pans I own. Do I get it or a cheaper model that was mostly plastic?  I decided to go for quality because I knew I would be using it a whole bunch once I had enough tomatoes to can the surplus.  Though I still cringe when I think of the cost, I have not regretted the purchase. It is a joy to use, and has 3 interchangeable disks. I made some vegetable cream soup with it when I first got it, and it was so velvety smooth without the addition of cream.  My husband taught me that if you need a tool, one should always go for the best you can afford so you don't have to replace the item over and over.  In the long run, it's frugal.  That's my story and I'm sticking to it!

Cheap Thrills

I have seen this not-so-little guy hanging out in our backyard three times in the past week, always right before dusk. I know it's not exactly a good picture, but I just so happened to have my phone with me when I took this photo from inside the house. Since I always see him (or her, how does one tell?) on the fence or on top of the shed, I suspect his roost/nest must be close by. My husband and sons think it's a hawk, and I agree, but I couldn't figure out what kind, although I looked through the field guide we have in the house.

Goes to show you don't have to spend any money to be entertained. We have two large undeveloped tracts of land on two sides of our neighborhood as well as a state park on the other side of one of those tracts, so we do get our share of wildlife around here. Certainly a far cry from what I was used to growing up in Tokyo, Japan, which was nothing more than an asphalt jungle. I do miss it sometimes, but glad I don't live there anymore. The most I saw of wildlife back then were some sparrows, crows and pigeons.

Yesterday, I was at a loss as to what to make for dinner, so I threw some chicken bones I had in the freezer from past chicken dinners with some water and boiled that for a while until the broth turned a beige, murky color. I then strained the bones and other bits, added about 4 diced carrots, 2 stalks of celery, an onion and a bell pepper with some chicken bouillon granules and let all that simmer until the carrots were cooked through. In the meantime, I took out a pound of ground pork from a pig our neighbour raised but we shared the cost of upkeep and mixed in an egg, some grated Parmesan and tamale flour (my husband is on a low carb diet right now so can't use bread crumbs). I made little meatballs with that and dropped them into the soup to cook. My version of Italian Wedding Soup.  I know it needed some greens, but the rest of the family won't eat it if I had put any in there.  Everything was already on hand, and it was cheap. Best of all, everyone seemed to enjoy it, even the picky eaters of the family who shall remain anonymous... I wonder if the hawk would eat any of it if I put some outside?

You might enjoy taking a look at a live feed of nesting eagle chicks @ www.ustream.tv/decoraheagles. This morning, they were off the air but there are links to when the chicks hatched. My son told me about this site which he viewed with his class at high school live. He said while they were watching, the mother bird brought back a fish and the father bird brought back a rabbit for the chicks to eat.  Free fun is everywhere, if you care to find it!

Coeur a la Creme

We're not big into celebrating Valentine's Day, but here's the coeur a la creme I made for my husband and my two sons that we had after dinner. I found the porcelain mold at the thrift store some time back for 99 cents. Quite a bargain compared to what the large molds go for in stores like Williams Sonoma or Sur La Table, which is around 35 dollars. I've been wanting to make this for some years, but was too cheap to fork over the full retail price! BTW, it was divine with the raspberry sauce I made. Oh, and the glass serving platter was another find, but I forgot how much I paid for that, probably a couple of bucks.

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Soup For Dinner

Inspired by Frugal Queen's soup yesterday, vegetable soup for dinner tonight! I needed to clear out some vegetables in the crisper compartment of my refrigerator, anyways. Four carrots, one red bell pepper, one onion, two stalks celery were all chopped up and sauteed for a bit in the frying pan. Tip it all over in a pot with water with a can of Northern beans and leftover marinara sauce. Salt, pepper to taste. Then I added diced acorn squash... A pinch of hot pepper flakes, and it was done! My husband is on a vegetarian diet for the foreseeable future, and it has been hard coming up with a menu everyday.

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Making it from scratch

It was reaffirmed today what a difference it makes making your meals from scratch. Around 10 a.m. my husband was asking, "what's for lunch?" I had no answer. But he said, "I wouldn't mind some chili!" I put about 2 cups of dried pinto beans in my pressure cooker with some water and put it to boil.   It had been a LONG time since I used the pressure cooker. One hour later, the beans were all but done. I  adjusted the seasonings and let it simmer for a bit longer. I could not believe I made chili from DRIED beans in under two hours! I really need to remember to use my pressure cooker more often. Aside from the savings in time, think of the savings in energy costs!

After we were done eating lunch, I was trying to relax reading the supermarket fliers.  I complained to my husband how the price of Ranch Style Beans had come up over the price it used to be sold on sale (used to be 4 for a dollar, now about 78 cents for one can). He told me that the beans I cooked ( in the chili) tasted better than the canned ones, so don't even sweat over trying to find it at a sale price.

Goes to show, when you are used to buying it canned, you tend to forget how easy it is to make it yourself from scratch.  The chili tasted better than the stuff we buy canned, and it cost pennies per serving.  Note to self, don't forget to make things from scratch when you can, because the savings are astronomical. 

Once our supply of store bought chili is used up, I will start making a big batch and canning it at home in the future.  My chili tasted way better than those from the store, and it didn't have mysterious ingredients in it. I will be using my pressure canner that I invested in last year for just such projects.  If you are canning anything with meat or low acidity content, you must process the bottles properly under pressure. Safety first!

Don't Throw Away That Turkey Carcass!

With Thanksgiving right around the corner, most of us will be roasting/frying/smoking turkeys. When you are done with your family meal, don't throw away the bones but make soup stock with it.  If you do not have the time right away, do what I do and put all of the bones in a Ziplock bag and throw it in the freezer.  You will thank yourself, I promise!

When you have a free couple of hours, throw in the bones in a stock pot and cover with water.  You can throw in some carrots, celery, garlic and parsley for more flavor, but I usually do without.  Some die hard chefs might frown, but I feel that when the time comes to use it, you will more likely than not use those same vegetables anyways, why waste it to throw away?

After you have simmered it for a couple of hours, let it cool to room temperature and then strain the bones and other gunk in there from the golden liquid. Put the liquid in the fridge overnight and skim off the fat that rises to the top if you are health conscious as I am.  What I do at this point is to ladle the now cooled and gelatinous liquid into Ziplock sandwich bags and lay them on its side on a cookie sheet in the freezer until frozen. This amount is approximately 1 cup, and you can then pull them out when preparing recipes that call for stock, or you can replace it for water to add additional flavor to a recipe that calls for water.  It is amazing how much flavor comes out of the bones! The best thing is that it was free!

I do the same with chicken bones, but you need the bones from 5-6 chickens to make it worth your while, so definitely keep that Ziplock bag in the freezer and keep adding to it until you have enough!