How was your week? My week was pretty good, pretty frugal. I am proud of myself and my frugal accomplishments this week. Some of them were easy, but some definitely took a lot of self control, and that’s where I am most proud of myself.
Sunday–
Acquired some kitchen utensils (soup tureen, a metal tea kettle, a few trays) and a small cupboard for free from a neighbor who moved away and didn’t want to take them with her.
I felt really nauseous and the only food that appealed to me, that I was craving, was super expensive- either steak, beef with broccoli, or cashew chicken. Chinese restaurant food, mainly. I nearly sent someone to go buy the stuff for me to make them, expensive as they are… but in the end, scratched that, and made my own “Chinese takeout” style meal with cheap stuff I had in the house already- chicken hearts and broccoli from the reduced rack stall.
Dumpster dove this cute partitioned container, and a pot for plants.
Set up chicken scrap soup in the crock pot to cook overnight, using the water left from my making pasta earlier.
Set buckwheat, chickpea flour, chocolate pancakes to soak overnight for breakfast the next day.
Monday–
Made pancakes for breakfast!
Used chicken scrap soup as the basis for a legume based (and therefore cheap) minestrone that was cooking in my crockpot all morning.
While in the park with my daughter, foraged some hollyhock leaves and wild mustard to go in the minestrone.
Went to the second hand store to buy some materials for some projects I’m making.
Worked on making some thing my kids need from scratch using the things from the second hand store instead of buying it ready made.
Needed to get one ingredient from the store. Walked in and out with ONLY that ingredient, not giving in to any temptations to splurge on extras.
Tuesday–
Had a party to go to, everyone was asked to make one or two dishes to contribute. I was going to make one dish- and then someone offered me that if I’d make 2 dishes instead of her, she’d arrange rides for us there instead of needing to pay for the bus, etc. So I did the extra work, which didn’t cost me much extra money since I used cheap items I already had in the house… and saved money on transportation.
When making a lettuce salad, I found some leaves that, while not spoiled, weren’t so appetizing to use in a fresh salad, so I put them in the freezer to use for a soup.
Made homemade Italian dressing, and homemade honey mustard dressing to use for two of the salads I made.
Unfortunately, the pasta salad that I made… the noodles didn’t taste good, because I didn’t cook them long enough. Instead of tossing the salad, I took it home to repurpose.
Wednesday–
Went to a sale and bought things we use anyhow at incredibly cheap prices.
When cleaning my freezer and refrigerator to make room for these purchases, I took odds and ends that I found there, combined them with some of the pasta salad from the party, and made a soup. (Rice with chicken, frozen pumpkin that I chopped up and froze when it was a second away from spoiling, the wilted lettuce leaves, broccoli leaves, some chicken broth, a drop of leftover lettuce salad with some onions and honey mustard dressing, and the pasta salad.) Soup tastes great!
In my freezer, when cleaning it out, I found some almond pulp left from making almond milk a few months ago…. Also found a few gluten free muffins that weren’t such a hit, because they were too dry and not sweet enough, as well as some apple scones that weren’t sweet enough. Also found a bit of crumbled buckwheat crepes. Had some leftover peanut butter craisin rice krispies that I tried making into granola bars but were too crumbly, sitting on my shelf. I blended up the “granola bars” with 3 overripe reduced rack bananas, some of the almond pulp, a little date syrup and a drop of water, and baked them as cookies. They came out terrific! Then blended up the dried out muffins, buckwheat crepes, scones, and the rest of the almond pulp in the food processor, added oil, water, baking powder, cocoa powder, coconut, ground flax seeds, and sugar, mixed them with some white chocolate chips, and baked them as cookies.
Set up some sunflower seeds to soak to make sunflower milk.
Thursday–
Made yet another soup from other odds and end leftovers in the kitchen for lunch. (It was mainly what was left of the pasta salad, a green pea salad, and a few other things.)
Foraged redbud blossoms and snacked on them.
Foraged chickweed and wood sorrel and eryngo and sow thistle and passionfruit for a salad.
Made homemade sunflower milk, and used that to make a vegan cheese sauce for my ground turkey moussaka, which tasted (and looked) very cheese like, and was much cheaper to use than store bought vegan cheeses…
Finished making my projects out of the cheapo stuff I got from the second hand store.
Friday–
Steamed sweet potatoes, and with the liquid left from steaming, I used that to flavor a red lentil curry which I made for lunch, together with some sliced fennel bulb stalks which are often too fibrous to eat plain, but worked fine in the curry.
Made some homemade ketchup.
Saturday–
Served a salad that was practically free- foraged greens and flowers, onion greens (that sprouted themselves from my onions sitting on my shelf), and with a foraged passionfruit based dressing.
Used up leftovers in the fridge for supper instead of cooking new.
So, what were your frugal accomplishments this week? Do you feel this was a “successful” week for you in terms of frugality, or are there things you wished you did differently?
