Affordable Bread

Bread - We all eat it. Unless you're gluten free and have given up trying to eat gluten type foods. 

Here are the problems with bread...

healthy verses cheap

time verses convenience

I have friends who make their own bread. Some of them have their bread day and the spend the day making bread and that is their bread for the whole next week.

When you make bread- cheap bulk yeast, flour or wheat with a wheat grinder bring the cost lower and lower. But it takes lots of time. Also if you're bad at bread making, like myself, it can be less affordable when you have loaves that aren't edible. 

In all my blog reading of those trying to save money I remember one mom said she gave up on buying the organic super healthy thick bread. Instead she just went to stocking up when on sale and never spent more than $1 per loaf.

A few years ago my sister introduced me to Alpine Valley Bread. She is a huge fan of Whole Foods and Sprouts- and like stores. She had found Alpine bread there and fell in love with it. Their bread is healthy and hearty. It has the weight to it like homemade bread. Then someone introduced her to the bread factory and the discounts of buying the bread at the factory.

They are located in Mesa Arizona on Southern east of Country Club.

On Wed. and Fri. at 1pm all fresh made that day loaves are discounted to $1 a loaf limit 5 per person until all the loaves are sold (they close at 3pm).

But in addition to those sales and that going in and buying fresh loaves is cheaper and more fresh then the specialty stores, irregular loaves and day old loaves are 50 cents a loaf. Considering we bring our loaves home and put them in the freezer, day old is the least of our cares. The 50 cent loaves aren't the most exciting. They tend to be the less popular breads (ie multi-grains breads or cracked wheat). Sometimes they have specialty breads, buns, rolls, and desserts for great deals.

When we go, I have found going in the morning is best. The store section opens at 8am. If you wait to until the $1 deals (best way to get the specialty breads) the 50 cent loafs are all gone.

We don't live in the Phoenix Valley. My sister lives in Mesa, almost down the street from the factory. They don't have a huge box freezer. Since she didn't have the freezer space for a lot, she would go once a week and get their family's bread for the week. For us I go every other month or every three months. It depends on if we can get up on a week day before they close.

This last trip I had $15 of our grocery budget. So I was looking at about 30 loaves that would need to last us about 3 months. When I got there they has some boxes filled with 15 loaves each. I asked the cashier about them. My first thought wasn't a discount for the bulk but instead I was thinking if they were already in a box and wouldn't get smashed on the ride back home. She said that if I bought the whole box (unopened) they were $5 a box (would be $7.50 when 50 cents a loaf). Done. 45 loaves for $15 that will make a huge difference when it comes to making our bread last for 3 months till the next time we come up.

Showing up at the right moment to places like this makes getting great deals a matter of luck or in this case I don't see it as luck- I see it was a huge blessing. Yes we are going to be eating 9 grain bread and nothing else for the next 3 months, the point is we have enough bread for 3 months and it only cost us 33 cents a loaf. We were blessed.

There are places like this all over. Do some searches make some calls.

What are some things ya'll do to make staples like bread cheap and affordable?

Cheap Meals: Thai-Style Fried Rice

A huge portion of the world eats rice for every meal. Part of that is because rice is cheap.

My favorite way to eat rice is Thai-Style Fried Rice
I make this for dinner and every once in a once in a while I make it for breakfast
Need:
3-4 cups cooked rice (Jasmine is best but any rice works)
4 eggs
1 TBS minced garlic
1 small onion
1/4 c. oil
1/4 c. soy sauce
1 TBS brown Sugar
Chicken or ham- 1-3 chicken thighs (you can use breast but it is a good      opportunity to use that cheaper chickens) or 1 cup chopped ham
optional items
   -green onions, bell peppers, tomatoes, cucumbers, peas, carrots
   -breakfast: pineapple or mangoes

Heat the pan with the oil. To the hot oil add the eggs (whisked) and your meat. Once your eggs are scrambled and chicken cooking add onions and garlic. When mostly cooked add rice. Let cook for a couple minutes before adding the soy sauce and brown sugar (tip-mix/dissolve them together and pour over the rice). Cook until the rice is starting to stick and fry to the pan. Serve.

Downloadable and printable recipe card (right click and save as)

Making Holiday Meal special but Affordable

We all have our favorite holiday meals.
Turkey, mashed potatoes, cranberry sauce, and pumpkin pie on Thanksgiving are universal musts.
But what about other holidays? Birthdays? Special days?
Some meals we aren't willing to compromise cost over not having our special meals. Most of that has to do with our memories. Creating memories can be just as important and it doesn't have to be expensive memories.
What made me start thinking about this is the 4th of July. Today in fact. It has been my tradition to make homemade ice cream. This year when we started being serious about keeping to a budget and I realized I had agreed to keep to $80 grocery budget for the month and that had to include my homemade ice cream supplies and grilling for the 4th. It was hard to accept. We already had some hot dogs and Turkey patties in the freezer. I reserved those for grilling on the 4th. (With the cost of low-fat beef burger patties, turkey patties are a great alternative for saving money). I made sure I bought buns and cheese for the burgers. But there was the matter of the ice cream. How was I going to make homemade ice cream on a budget.
Then I saw this video from Buzzfeed. Around the time the video came out I had 2 friends say they tried it that night and their ice cream turned out awesome. So I thought this 2 ingredient ice cream was the answer to still keeping tradition. Not my normal recipes but sometimes you have to change it up to still keep what is important to you.
1 pint of Heavy Cream and 1 can of Sweet Condensed Milk
So I added about $1.50 for a pint of Heavy Cream to keep a tradition.*
What about other special days?
ideas- consider breakfast as a special meal.
Breakfasts are a cheap, nutritious, and there are so many options that are probably not apart of your regular breakfast rotation.

suggested breakfasts:
Omelets
Eggs Benedict (if you have difficulty with the sauce, I recommend the Korrs brand sauce mix)
homemade muffins
waffles (to make them extra special use fruit as toppers)
Rice Pudding (can be made in the crock pot and makes a great Christmas morning breakfast)
Bread Pudding
Quiche
Scones/fry bread/donuts
Hot cocoa with toast
Crapes
German Pancakes
cinnamon rolls
biscuits and gravy
Breakfast Pizza
Apple cobbler

What are some of your families' favorite special breakfasts?

For Father's Day we made my husband a massive omelet. Twice a year (first weekend) in Oct and April are the General Conference of the LDS church. I made Eggs Benedict those mornings. Our ward (local church congregation) has a huge pancake breakfast on the 4th of July. We have Cinnamon Rolls for breakfast most Sunday mornings. Create some of your own traditions. It doesn't have to be one of the big holidays, and it doesn't have to hurt your wallet.

Don't forget that breakfast food can be used to make special meals for non-breakfast meals too. Breakfast food isn't just for breakfast.

What are some of your families' favorite tradition foods and how do you keep them affordable?

*Follow up story for the 4th of July: when my in-laws learned that the amount of ice cream this year was going to be decreased, they offered to buy the cream if I would make full batches. We took them up on the offer, after all who doesn't love lots of ice cream. That can be another tip. If the budget isn't going to allow for your favorite dishes, if others participate in the joy ask if they wouldn't mind adding to the pot. I did still make the Buzzfeed video recipe and it turned out really good.

Avoid our Pitfalls of Credit Cards

Credit Cards are the worst type of debt. I fooled myself for years into thinking having "revolving debt" was the way to go. I got into the habit of convince back in college and have continued those bad habits.
I realized in college that if I used my card for my every purchases instead of my debit card. I didn't have to pay attention to what was in the account at that moment. I didn't have to worry if my paycheck was deposited today (and was available) or if it will show up tomorrow. So I used my card to make the everyday purchases and then told myself I would pay it all each month.  Sometimes it worked out just like that. But then there were the months I was unemployed or didn't have as much income as I normally did for my spending. Or I straight up over spent. As life got even crazier and I paid even less attention those numbers added up even more. There are a lot of people who get into lots of debt because they impulsed bought, often big ticket items. We aren't bad at that. We have had our moments, but that is not the bulk of our debt. And to compound it all is the compounding interest. Once you have that carry over balance getting rid of that balance again is almost impossible only making payments.

So here is a warning to you.

All debt is bad debt. Revolving debt is still debt and the easiest pitfall get trapped into. Sure I thought it was making my life convenient (and it was convenient) but I was also ignoring the responsibilities to my finances. I was addicted to my credit cards. Not exactly to the overspending but to the easy non-accountable way I didn't have to worry about every penny. But that isn't good for our pocketbook nor is it good for the soul. God's plan is for us to be accountable.

Now we are paying the price of our non-accountable actions. We are now being held responsible for all the actions we have taken.

Learn before. Don't use credit cards. If you're in the same boat as I am. Cut up those cards, go cash, and force yourself to learn to be accountable. It is possible. We can do it.

No debt is good debt.

Metal Lunch Box for under $5

Hey everyone, today we went and let my son pick up a new metal lunch box for taking to school. I only allow him to take metal lunch boxes because he is so rough on them. Last year, we bought him a really nice thermal bag.

this is what happened to it on the first day of school. I took it back to the store.

After that he is only allowed to have metal lunch boxes. For his birthday my dad asked what he should get him and we recommended a new lunch box. After going to 3 stores my dad called and asked "Where do you buy metal lunch boxes?" I didn't know what to tell him. His one that we had (before it was lost) I had bought on the internet. I mentioned this to a friend and one day I get a text that she saw a bunch of metal lunch boxes at Hobby Lobby.

Awesome. Today we went to there, with the coupon on my phone we went to Hobby Lobby to let my son pick his lunch box for this next year.

All the metal boxes at our local Hobby Lobby are $6.99 each.

My son picked the Avengers box

$6.99 with our 40% off coupon total with tax came to = $4.52 YAY!

For under $5 we got our son a new metal lunch box. We had budgeted $20 to get something our son would be happy with and we only had to spend $4.52.

WE did it! One full month!

We did one full month. Our first month.
accomplishments:

• In our first month we were able to put aside our $1000 emergency fund.
• Pay off my student loan
• Pay on our Van's loan
• Spend less than $80 on groceries for the month
• managed to use cash for everything that is not on automatic withdraw

I know I should see this as a HUGE accomplishment. But I have to constantly remind myself of that. I have to look at this list and say "look how much we accomplished in only one month". Otherwise, I look at all the changes we have made in our lives and feel depressed that this is our new life for a while. 

So I choose to look at the list and remind myself we are making progress!

Cheap Meals: Po'Man's Meal (skillet)

I got this recipe from "Great Depression Cooking with Clara" it is a series a family made so that would have it before their Mother/Grandmother was no longer with them, of her memories and recipes from growing up during the depression. She is so sweet and has great memories to listen to.  I have tried most of her recipes now. This is one that has become a family favorite, I have also adjusted to to fit our tastes more. She calls it "Poorman's Meal"

Need:
6-8 potatoes diced (I always leave my skins on)
3 hot dogs sliced/diced (can be substituted with ham, pork, chicken chunks, or bacon if that was cheaper for you at the time)
1 small-medium onion diced
2 TBS- 1/2 c. Pasta Sauce
1 cup water
*optional various veggies (suggestions- bell peppers, zucchini, green beans, broccoli, summer squash, carrots, celery)
Salt to taste (it always takes more than I think it should, pepper to taste


How:
Skillet the potatoes in an oiled pan. Add the onions let them start to become translucent, add any veggies that aren't previous cooked at this point. Add your hot dogs (idea is use the cheapest meat available to you).  Add your pasta sauce. Clara's recipe is 2 TBS. I find we like it better around 1/2 c of sauce. At this point add the cup of water and let sit for a while (3-5 minutes). If you want the "sauce" to thicken a little you can add a tablespoon of flour/cornstarch. If you are adding left over veggies add them now and let sit over heat for a couple more minutes. Serve.

*Clara's recipe doesn't have any veggies but the onion and potatoes. I like to add lots of veggies. I add whatever we have on hand. If I have leftover veggies from another night- they all go into the pan. If we have zucchinis or peppers then at least a small portion we have into the pan.

downloadable and printable recipe card- just "save as" the image

Meal Cost Breakdown:
.69 potatoes+ .75 of hot dogs+ .43 of onions+ *.75 of various other veggies+ .62 of pasta sauce= 3.24 for the meal +whatever sides you choose