2011 Week 4- Lesson in Budgeting

This past week was a very busy week as I knew it would be which is why I had the simple menu plan. I do have three recipes to post but I’m back logged due to limited computer time. I’ll get to them promise.

This week, I was inspired by helping a friend out with her budgeting and menu planning by doing an inventory of what’s on hand and planning around that to limit grocery expenditures. It was fun and something everyone should do periodically. This time of year, it’s typical to feel the need to clean out the stores of food as you prepare for Spring fever and want to get all the heavy holiday leftovers out.

It won’t be long before I’m preparing frozen meals to get us through the first few weeks of being new parents without requiring great effort from me in the kitchen as I just don’t know how well I will recover from the birth. So in order to make room, I need to clean out my freezer anyway. I was surprised at what all I had in there and will be eating out of it with limited purchasing for at least two weeks. This week I’m focusing on getting some of the main ingredients and bags of soups out. This helped reduce my budget since we went a little splurge happy on décor for the nursery anyway. Next week I will focus on supplementing main dishes with sides from the freezer as I have quite a bit of fruits and veggies frozen. I may do some baking too so you can look forward to that. Orange and blueberry scones anyone?

National Foodie Holidays This Week:
National Meat Week as well as National Irish Coffee Week

Sunday: Rhubarb Pie day
Monday: Peanut Butter Day
Tuesday: Irish Coffee Day
Wednesday: Pistachio Day
Thursday: Chocolate Cake Day
Friday: Blueberry Pancake Day
Saturday: Corn Chip Day

Menu:
Beef Stroganoff with a side salad (Uses sour cream, leftover diced tomatoes and salad fixings from Fridge, Egg noodles from pantry, Green Peas from Freezer)

Chicken Mozzarella Skillet (Uses Boneless Skinless chicken from freezer, Rice from Pantry)

Spaghetti (Uses hamburger from freezer, cheese from fridge, noodles from pantry)

Chicken Soup (uses chicken Quarters from the freezer)

Leftovers (as these dishes all make a LOT)

Chili/Bean stuffed baked Potatoes (Uses leftover chili and Bean soup to top fresh baked potatoes)

Purchased ($40.00):
Can of Cream of chicken Soup
1 Bag of Mozzarella
1 Bag of Frozen Broccoli
1 lb beef stew meat
1 lb Macaroni Noodles
Celery
Carrots
Potatoes
Onions
And odd and ends like apples, milk, soft drinks etc.