The Good, The Bad, and the Funny!

Amy:  Ahhh, the joys of feeding a family.  No matter what your budget is or how big or small your family is, let's face it; It isn't always easy.  But I will say, having a list and a plan makes it a whole lot easier...until your recipe totally FAILS!!!  

Let me begin with the good news of the week.  My muffins were, as my son would say, "Awesomalistic!" My family is not huge fans of "whole wheat" breads and such, so I have to find ways to sneak in the whole grains.  This is one of my success stories!  I use whole wheat flour to make their muffins and they couldn't be the wiser!  I barely had enough time to set up the ingredients for the picture before all the muffins were gone! 

Ok, so here's the bad.  I had this pork fried rice recipe that I had tried to make about a year ago, and since we were having pork this week I wanted to make something that used the pork, but in a different way.  My family usually loves rice, so I thought this would be perfect.  When I made the recipe before, I used uncooked rice and when it was done, the rice was hard.  So I figured I must have to use cooked rice. (The recipe that I had didn't really specify which to use)  Needless to say, it was complete mush by the time it was done.  I was really disgusting!!!  Oh well, I think I am done trying to make that recipe! I suppose this kind of thing happens a lot, which is why a lot of people are hesitant to make new recipes because they are not sure if it's going to turn out well or if their family is going to like it.  I totally get that.   So because the rice was a big part of my menu this week, I did have to make a couple of adjustments. Monday we were home because it was a holiday, so I ended up making the homemade pizza that we were supposed to have Friday.  On Tuesday for dinner I had some leftover chicken breast in the freezer so I made homemade chicken nuggets (just dredge your chicken pieces with some milk and bread crumbs, spray with non-stick cooking spray and bake until done) and salad.  Friday night we actually had the pizza again (who doesn't want pizza twice in one week??) 

Jo-Ellen: I have found the recipes easy to make with plenty of flavor, but some of the instructions are a little vague, in my opinion. An example is the vegetable lasagna, the recipe doesn't mention purchasing oven-ready noodles nor does it give information on boiling them before putting together your lasagna. If you have never made lasagna, this could be a problem!
I have made this lasagna recipe for family and friends for them to try. (Not within the budget of this blog) I wanted their opinions on whether they enjoyed eating it, would they make it for themselves or their family and any other feedback they were willing to share. The feedback was favorable for the most part, and the majority of the comments had more to do with how they would adjust an ingredient (no peas, add more spinach, more sauce, less broccoli).
Although I eat fruit daily, I am missing sweets.....sugary, unhealthy treats that I often buy or make to satisfy my sweet tooth. I decided I could make a sweet treat that would be affordable and also give me a little fiber with the sugar. ;-) Why is it, when I have a sweet craving I can justify not only eating it, but purchasing the ingredients and making it! 
I bought sugar, cocoa, margarine, peanutbutter, and vanilla. The recipe also calls for milk and oatmeal but I already had them from a previous purchase. I spent $11.7, but have enough supplies to could make these cookies numerous times. The recipe is below and it is a no bake cookie, meaning you cook it on the stove top, not in the oven.

No Bake Cookies
2 Cups Sugar                                     
3 Tablespoons of Cocoa                      
1/2 Cup margarine (1 stick)                
1/2 Cup milk
Add these ingredients to a pot, bring to a boil and time 4 minutes.
Take off stove and add:
1/2 Cup Peanutbutter
1 Teaspoon Vanilla
2 Cups of Quick Cook Oats 
Mix well. Drop by teaspoonfuls onto wax paper.

Are YOU ready for Week Two?

Amy:  I made my list and I was ready to go!  Grocery store, here I come!  I vowed to stick with my list and it made the trip very easy.  I knew exactly what I needed and I was in and out in a flash!  Here is my menu plan for my second week:

Sunday	Monday	Tuesday	Wednesday	Thursday	Friday	Saturday
B: homemade blueberry muffins, scrambled eggs L: tomato soup and grilled cheese D: Roast Pork, rice, applesauce, roll	B: scrambled eggs, hash browns L: Pork Fried Rice D: Turkey chili, cornbread	B: French toast L: chili and cornbread D: Pork Fried Rice, Salad	B: Breakfast sandwich, banana L: taco salads D: Spaghetti with meat sauce, green beans, roll	B: Bagel with LF cream cheese or PB, banana D: Open faced cheese burgers, salad	B: Dropped eggs on toast, banana L: Chef Salads Dinner:  Homemade pizza	B: eggs, turkey bacon, English muffin, banana/pineapple L: Hot Chicken Sandwiches D: ham steak, baked potato, corn, cranberry sauce, roll

I spent $50.07 on items I needed for the menu items listed above.  I will have to do one more grocery trip this week to get the items for Friday and Saturday.  I did my shopping on Saturday of this week so there were some items I thought could wait until the end of the week so they would be more fresh.

I spent an additional $32.77 on foods not on this list (coffee, milk, waters and snack foods).  Keep in mind this is for a family of three.  The original menu plan is based on a single person with a budget of $6.66 per day.  In the next blog I'll find out how much a family of three receiving SNAP benefits would have for a budget.  Stay tuned!!

Jo-Ellen: The soup for the second week is lentil soup. The recipe is easy, adding 8 cups of water, chopped onions and carrots along with chicken base to the lentils for a hearty, low calorie soup.

My problem this week was I needed to make a vegetable lasagna again. The recipe last week called for a large pan - 12 servings and you were to eat half and freeze the other half to use later during the month. I thought I would make a smaller one and instead of freezing half, make another one fresh, later, when I needed it. On Tuesday evening I was shredding carrots and preparing a vegetable lasagna for Wednesday night. That way on Wednesday I'd just have to bake it.
I went grocery shopping again and spent $57.34 buying seedless grapes, bananas, whole wheat bread, and the few items left on the shopping list that I hadn't purchased previously. I also buy eggs weekly and have that cost added in. My spending to date is $152.78 which leaves me with $47.22 and two weeks, but I have all my supplies bought for the recipes needed for the next two weeks.
A good thing about this past week was lunch being provided at a work function on Wednesday. I was able to leave my chicken rice soup in the freezer and it is now an extra meal. On Thursday night I was also at a function that included dinner so I didn't eat the garlic chicken with a healthy side - that too, will be an extra meal in my freezer.
Looking ahead at next week's menu I will be making minestrone soup and tuna casserole and eating them along with the recipes I've prepared earlier in the month and put in the freezer as suggested.

How Did The First Week Go?

Jo-Ellen: I think overall it was a very good week! Usually once a week I eat out but chose not to as it wasn't in my budget. I saved money and calories! I needed to buy extras....as it states in the 30 days on $200; the shopping list contains the food for making the recipes. You are given recipes for 3 healthy meals for 30 days and the cost estimate was approximately $130. The other $70 was to be used to purchase foods to enhance recipes or for alternative items to meet your dietary or other needs. So the extras I bought were coffee, bananas, cutie tangerines, coffee creamer, saltines, almond milk, 2% milk and canola nonstick spray for a total of $19.41. I reviewed next week's recipes and I needed more brown rice and chicken. I buy farm fresh eggs weekly for $3 dozen. Add the $19.41 I spent earlier and combine it to these groceries and I spent $28.57. To date, I have spent $95.44 and have eaten 3 healthy meals each day. I also bought enough fruit to eat 2 servings per day. I plan to boil eggs to eat as a high protein snack that is low calorie and low cost if I'm hungry and planning to workout.

 










Amy:  My first week also went very well.  The thing I noticed most this week is that I don't always have the "left overs" I plan on.  For example, on Friday night I made a home made pizza and planned on us having leftover pizza for lunch on Saturday.  Well, needless to say, the three of us ate the entire pizza on Friday night, so there were no leftovers.  Therefore, on my menu I would have to make two pizzas in order to have leftovers on Saturday.  It's just as easy to cook two pizzas as it is to cook one, so the effort would not change, although the cost will increase as I would need the ingredients for a second pizza.

What I like the most about my menu is the variety it offers.  I don't feel like I am eating the same thing every day and I like the idea of using things up in my pantry and refrigerator so I don't have to throw any food away.  The more challenging part of my menu is that it is very labor intensive.  There is a lot of cooking.  As I mentioned before, that isn't a huge issue for me most of the time, but I have noticed there are some evenings when I really didn't feel like cooking and it would have been nice if all I had to do was heat something up.

What About The Recipes?

Amy: My family enjoys having a nice, hot breakfast in the mornings.  Cereal just won't cut it for them!  Me on the other hand, I am not really a big breakfast eater until around 9 a.m.  My menu plan includes a hot breakfast every day for the boys.  It's important to have some protein and healthy carbohydrates for breakfast which is why I cook them eggs a lot during the week.  Eggs are a great source of lean protein and very economical!  

Instead of eating the same things over and over I tried to design the recipes so that we are using up leftovers in different ways.  So because we had a baked chicken on Sunday, I used the leftover chicken meat for sandwiches and soup and quesadillas.  My soup recipe is really very easy and can be adapted to whatever you like.  I used a quart of chicken broth and two extra cups of water (this helps to decrease the sodium content of your soup), a bay leaf to season the broth and simmered my chicken, rice and vegetables together for about 20 minutes or so.  I used white potato, sweet potato, carrots, onion and some frozen peas (you can use whatever veggies you like or have on hand).  Using frozen vegetables are a great economical way to get your vegetable servings in during the cold winter months.  Fresh vegetables can sometimes be a bit pricier, so purchasing frozen is a great way to go!  The soup was delish!!!  It was even better today for lunch!

Jo-Ellen: I am following the recipes and the menu plan. I find a lot of repetitiveness in the menu, eating vegetable lasagna 6 out of the 7 days during the first week. The recipes are flavorful and healthy. A note about the vegetable lasagna, it didn't specify oven ready noodles, but there was no mention of preparing the noodles for baking. I bought oven-ready noodles.

The chicken rice soup is delicious! It made plenty of soup and I purchased saltine crackers to go with it. (not on the shopping list but part of the extra funds not spent in the menu but to be used for the extras)

The Shopping Trip

Jo-Ellen: Saturday I gave the shopping list, the daily menu, and the recipes for the 30 days on $200 a good look to see what the next month was going to look like in terms of purchasing groceries and preparing meals. I work full time and have activities scheduled for most evenings so I know from experience that I need to schedule the time for meal preparation. 
I decided to purchase my groceries locally for the most part, as I know transportation is  limited for a lot people. The shopping list estimate for the month's menus total about $130, leaving the shopper money for alternative items to meed dietary needs or other necessities. I didn't purchase everything on the list,instead, buying what I needed for the week's menu and sale items. I was unable to purchase a rotisserie chicken but I did find boneless skinless chicken breasts on sale and bought this healthier option for less cost. I spent $66.87. 

I  contacted WAGM about the 30 days on $200 and what Amy and I were planning to do.  You will see the interview on your local news this week!

Amy: My first week of shopping was fun, I was really excited to try out my new menu.  Here is a peek at my week one menu: 

Monday	Tuesday	Wednesday	Thursday	Friday	Saturday
B: scrambled eggs, hashbrowns L: Chicken sandwich on ww bread, tomato, cucumbers with ranch, pretzels D: Chicken soup, roll/bread	B: French toast L: Chicken soup, roll/bread D: Chicken quesadillas, peppers/onions, rice	B: Breakfast sandwich, banana L: Egg salad sandwich, canned fruit, pretzels D: Spaghetti with meat sauce, green beans, roll	B: Bagel with LF cream cheese or PB, banana L: Spaghetti with meat sauce, cucumber with ranch D: meatloaf, potatoes, peas	B: Dropped eggs on toast, banana Lunch: chicken soup, roll Dinner:  Homemade pizza	B: eggs, turkey bacon, English muffin, banana/pineapple L: Pizza, carrots/cucumber with ranch D: chop suey, roll, corn

 I already had quite a few items in my pantry which was nice.  Unlike Jo-Ellen, I have more time to fix dinner in the evening when I get home.  My son typically will sit and do his homework and talk to me while I fix dinner, so I don't mind having a meal to fix a few nights a week.  Cooking is also very relaxing for me and I really enjoy it, so it's something that I look forward to at the end of a busy workday.  Don't get me wrong, there are some evenings when the last thing I want to do is cook, but for the most part, it's a welcomed part of our routine.  

I decided to shop at my local Hannaford store and did in fact find it more economical to purchase a lot of store brand items, which you will notice from my receipt. 

 Many foods with a store brand label are actually made and packaged at the same manufacturing plant as other brand named foods, so the products are very good quality but the prices are cheaper :)  So this week I spent a mere $56.09 on our main ingredients for meals.  I'll be honest, I did spend a little extra (about $25) for snack foods for my son's lunches and on beverages (milk, water, etc).  Keeping in mind, this is for a family of three.  I'm excited to get cookin'!!

The Backstory

A couple of months ago Healthy Aroostook received a document from one of our funders titled "30 Days on $200".
http://www.hannaford.com/30dayscookbook   This menu plan was created and designed to be used by a single person.  It's intent was to offer four weeks of healthy, simple and budget friendly meal ideas for people who receive SNAP (formerly known as Food Stamps) benefits. 30 Days on $200 - Cooking Guide is also on facebook. Jo-Ellen and I both had the idea that we should try the menu plan out and blog about it to our community.  We wanted to see if the meal plan really would cost less than $200 and if we would actually enjoy the recipes.  (We also like any reason to eat, so this was a perfect project for us)

In order to keep it interesting, I actually decided that I would re-write the menu with some of my own healthy meal ideas that would fit for me and my family.  I still want to keep the cost to $200 or less but I wanted to be able to offer more variety on the menu ( The original menu plan repeats a lot of meals).  I think many people don't mind eating "leftovers" or eating the same thing a few days in a row, but for me and my family, I knew that wouldn't work.  So I thought I could try to re-create the idea with still low cost, healthy, but less repetitive menu ideas.

So in the coming weeks you will see blogs from both Jo-Ellen and myself.  She will be blogging about the original "30 Days on $200" menu plan and I will be blogging about my own revised version "Amy's 30 Days on $200".  

Here is to happy and healthy eating!