Need help with a 2 week menu.

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Originally Posted by DrDooLittle

You should raise some layers too! Eggs are always handy to have around. Egg salad sandwiches, hard boiled eggs to snack on, quiche, omlettes...

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I actually have 4 layers

Another easy and inexpensive meal is macaroni and cheese with keilbasa sausage in it. If you like acorn squash, cut in half, seed, and bake, then turn them flesh side up and put some cooked sausage links, brown sugar and butter in, cook a few more minutes to warm through. I also have a good recipe for a grilled eggplant and portabello sandwich, not the cheapest though. If you want recipe I can post at home tonight. :)

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I make a mean tator tot casserole that is super cheap. Just cook a bag of tots, brown 1lb of hambuger then layer it in a casserole dish. Tots, burger, (16oz) sour cream, bag of cheese. Sometimea I get crazy and add bacon.

Also, my sisters meatball "recipie" is great. 1 bag of frozen meat balls (italian), 1 can of beer and 1 small box of brown sugar. Toss it all in the crockpoy until the meat is done. These are great alone or over egg noodles.

I make big batches of "baked potato salad" in the summer and keep it in the fridge. 5lb of red potatoes, quartered and boiled until soft, then cooled. Top that with1lb bacon, 2 bags shredded cheese, 1 bottle of ranch dressing and 2 bunches of green onions chopped up. Mix it all over the potatoes when they cool.

I made an accidental chicken and veggie soup with 4c of frozen mixed veggies, 8oz of mushrooms and 4chicken breasts. add 2c of water and a packet of french onion soup mix. (you can add noodles or rice after)

Oh and my cheesey, chicken, broccoli bake. 2c White minute rice, 1 can cream of chicken, 1 can cream of cheese, 1lb of frozen broccoli and 4 chicken breasts. pour rice in bottom of pan with 1c water. Put down chicken and broccoli, cover with both cans of soup and bake at 400 until chicken and rice is done.

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Yum, who could forget tater tot pie! ^^^ I use cream of mushroom, or cheddar soup instead of sour cream, and I brown hamburger with some johnnys seasoning salt. I put it in casserole dish top with tots, then cook to tot requirements(I don't precook tots).

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All these recipes and ideas I'm not gonna eat the same thing twice for a year! Keep em coming.

Cheap recipe:

I like to have something "special" about every meal, it's just how I am. So, here's one of my special things--homemade noodles.

2 cups of flour (about 1/2 lb, or $0.15 where I buy it at Aldi's)
3 eggs ( <$0.40, also bought at Aldi's)
salt (if you can manage to get a penny's worth of salt in there, you're going to be choking)

Scramble (but don't cook!) the eggs with the salt (about 1 tsp) and make a dough with the flour then work it out thin on a floured surface. (another couple of cents worth) Roll it up like a jelly roll then cut it into thin strips. Drop into boiling water and cook until done, a few minutes, test with fork.

I can take a couple of lbs of $0.99 cent chicken thighs, cook them down with chopped celery (uh, maybe 10 cents worth?) then pour off most of the fat and thicken the broth from the thighs (couple more cents worth of flour) to make a gravy. Take the skins off of the thighs and pick out the bones, chop the meat and toss it in the gravy and pour over the noodles. I usually pair that up with a pound of steamed frozen vegetables.

Noodles cost arround 0.75 or less. Thighs and celery and gravy, maybe 2.20. Bag of frozen vegetables, around a buck at Aldi's. The whole shebang for four comes in at under $4.00 for homemade noodles, nice big hunks of chicken, and a vegetable. And that's with plenty of room to spare for adding a few cents worth of whatever kind of seasonings you want. The cool thing about it is that the thing that makes it "special" is the cheapie ingredient--less than a buck worth of eggs and flour.

I cook the chicken and celery and make the gravy in one microwave dish. The time I save there kinda justifies the few minutes I spend making the noodles in terms of economy of time and effort. Simple as it is, it comes out nice if you like comfort food.

Homemade noodles are one of the cheapest "special" things I can make and they go well with a bunch of things.

It's funny how cheap "special" can be. It costs me less than 10 minutes of hands on time and less than a buck to make fresh homemade corn bread. Same with pancakes from scratch. Homemade iced tea is cheap as heck, I can make a gallon of it for under a buck and it's a great alternative to soda and saves money too.

Got a kid? Hot dog roll ups. I'm not a big hot dog fan, but I go to Trader Joe's and buy the all beef ones, or the Hebrew nationals from safeway. Tube of pilsbury Cresent rolls, and slices of cheese. Cut a slit in the hotdog, stuff a piece of cheese in, and wrap with a Cresent roll. Then bake at 350/375 depending if your pan is nonstick, for 15-17 minutes.

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You can usually eat cheaper on a home cooked from scratch than eating out (a meal, not burger/fries) or buying frozen dinners.

Tips from me are buy dry pastas on sale(10 boxes for $10), buy LARGE bags of rice(get a electric rice steamer for fast and easy rice cooking), and buy bags of potatoes. Not much is better than home made mashed potatoes.

I buy beef in large cheap roasts and cut it up myself into steak pieces, stew meat sized parts or smaller roasts. Watch for sales, I just got a large bone-in roast for $1.69/lb... cheaper than the cheap ground burger meat! Yes, it had bones, but I cut into manageable chunks and fit it into the crockpot with a bunch of cut up potatos, carrots, onion and whatever veggies you like(frozen are cheap, canned on sale). Serve that over rice to make it go way further than eating it by itself.

Don't forget EGGS EGGS EGGS. Eggs are great protein and fairly cheap. Add them to salad, make omelets one night, make quiche... gotta love eggs. Also, dry beans... cook them in your crockpot all day with a little leftover ham pieces and then serve over rice. If you make your own batter from scratch(it's super easy) you can have pancakes or waffles for dinner... do a "breakfast for dinner" one night.

You can have a really good meal with cooked dry pasta(try different shapes for novelty in textures) with a little butter, whatever frozen(warmed) or canned vegetables were on sale and a dusting of parm cheese. Add in things like olives, tomatoes, etc to add variety and fancyness.

Remember you can add salad to any of this. The key to spending less is to NOT get pre-prepared food. A 10 lb bag of potatoes will cost you $3-5. A box of flake mashed potatoes cost about $3. You can see how much further the raw taters go compared, and they are more versatile. That's how it is normally. The less that's done to it... the less it's going to cost you.

(and I make KILLER meatballs from scratch. I cook up hundreds of them in the oven on a sunday or day off, freeze them in small batches and have them as sandwichs, in sketti, or however I like.. NOTHING beats a homemade meatball!)

My Favorites Cheap meals are:
I make home made Mac and cheese and add salsa and chili to it. You can even add Doritos and more cheese on top and brown it it the oven. Oh yes!
Or
Heat oven to 425.f
Spray a baking sheet with cooking Pam
Take a corn tortilla put it on the Pan
Mix up a can of refried beans, left over rice, salsa in a bowl
Spoon the mixture out on top of the tortilla and make a hole in the middle with the mixture. (so it looks like a donut on top of the tortilla)
Put on egg in the hole
Bake for 15-20 or until the egg is cooked through.
Cheese, more salsa, and sour cream in top.
Eye chihuahua! Those are a couple of my favs. You cant tell at all that I'm of Spanish decent. I love my spicy food.



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Guys btw! There are some great recipes in here. I'll be using some of these.


Check out what's new on my website... www.Homegrownscales.com