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I have been wanting a slow cooker for a long time. DH has been wanting a deep fryer for a long time. However, since neither of these items were "necessary," we'd dithered about getting either one. Of all things, our friend recently told us about a wondrous machine that works both as a slow cooker AND a deep fryer. We found one yesterday, then negotiated the price down by about $25 USD, then used our store discount "club card" to get another 7% off.
Our friend also told us how to buy "Number 6" beef (in Israel each cut of beef is assigned a number, rather than a name), so I can start making yummy slow-cooker stews. This is great news, as DH and I are both working evenings now, and frequently both of us are working random hours between 2 and midnight, so neither of us has time to cook anything, much less eat at the same time. With this new machine, I can do the "cooking" in the morning, and then things will be ready for a quick plating whenever either of us gets a break.
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Fab, Selah! Enjoy the new purchase.
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Operation Clean Out the Fridge & Pantry is underway!
Made a huge pot of cabbage soup this morning...have been meaning to do that for about 10 days now and finally got it done. Used up a whole head of cabbage and a bunch of carrots from the fridge. We'll be eating cabbage soup for the next few days, but I plan to freeze several meals worth for later consumption.
Just whipped up a batch of chocolate chip banana bread. For some reason the bananas I had a few weeks ago that were turning brown wound up in the refrigerator instead of the freezer. I didn't seem to think this was a big deal until I opened the container with them in it today. Oh boy, fermented bananas! Banana wine, anyone? LOL Fortunately, they weren't too far gone so I just tossed them into the mix. Added an extra egg because it was the last one in the carton (with a "best by" date of December 5th, oops!) and used a chunk (yes, quite literally a chunk!) of brown sugar that had hardened in the less-than-perfectly-sealed package instead of using white sugar, which is what the recipe called for. I figure with all these random modifications this could turn out to be the weirdest banana bread ever, but the batter tasted pretty good so I figure it won't be inedible!!! I'll let you know when it comes out of the oven!
My dearly beloved is now baking bread for tonight's dinner. Wow, full day of cooking and baking here!!!
Not much else happening on this rainy Saturday. All in all it should turn out to be pretty frugal. Good thing, too, as last night's trip to the emergency vet clinic with the nearly 18 year old cat came with a hefty price tag. But he's so darn cute he's worth every penny!!!
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Nice score Selah! We have a virtually unused crock-pot, and I'm thinking we should be able to get some value from it now that DH is going back to work full-time.
Cdttmm: Banana wine sounds downright scary! I have found that eggs are good long beyond the date on the carton. Hope your banana bread is yummy!
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I had some cheap fun yesterday when my friend came to watch the kids so could go to the Well Read Mom book club conference, which was held this year at my own church. It was lovely. The entrance cost was $16, but it was 3 hours of interesting, engaging speakers, tea and biscotti, time spent with good friends talking about good literature and I got a free journal included with the free.
I got an email that Barnes and Nobel had a sale this week on classics, buy two get one free, so I decided to get a few books that I needed for this month and future reading. I got The Odyssey, Jane Eyre (one of my favorites) and Oh, Pioneers for $15 after my membership discount. Technically, this isn't the most frugal choice I could make, since I could get those books for free on my kindle app, but I am making a point of reading mostly hard copy books. I find it less distracting and I think it sets a better example for my kids to see me reading an actual book instead of staring at my iPad. It is also educator appreciation week, so the other books I got were 25% off with my educator discount. There was one book Barnes and Nobel didn't have, so I called an independent Christian bookstore owned by a friend of mine and ordered it through her. If I'm going to pay full price for something, I'd rather give the money to a friend. :) The money I spent today was out of my own Christmas money from my dad, so it didn't affect the budget at all.
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Dinner tonight was a spinach-tortellini soup made with gifts I received for Christmas and stuff we already had on hand anyway. I had to make some volume adjustments to the recipe I used, but it's tasty and will feed us at least twice more. It's one in a continuing series of meals designed to use up items in the freezer and cupboards.
We had a slow cooker with a crock insert that had cracked long ago and, this week, finally cracked to unusability. We have another slow cooker in the house because we do use them enough for entertaining, but that still left the old tub/cooking element and cover. One for-free ad on craigslist and two hours later, three people asked after it and it was gone. :cool: Must be other frugal folks out there, huh?
I think that's about it for now...
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Bummer - I somehow managed to forget to add December house payment into my check register. Now I have a lot less money than I thought I did ...sigh
I hate it when I do something stupid like that. The refund from U/M should about cover it, though.
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Same old stuff here. Nothing fun or glamorous or even interesting... we did buy three different kinds of porch lights for the next few holiday seasons half-off the already cheap OddLots price so that will be fun next year, to have different lights to choose from. We use LEDs and they replace the normal porch light. We don't see any appreciable increase in our electric bill at the holidays so I guess it's a frugal display, lol. I have two loads of laundry hanging in the house to dry- I'll do another tonight. Mostly cooking at home, taking lunch, coffee etc to work, not buying extras, groceries from ALDI, etc... Got a small raise, so I'm going to try to add that to savings.
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Selah, I'm not enamored of my slow cooker for much beyond beans. For me, the "stews" that have meat then cook the veg to death. I admit it, I don't use it much. But it IS really nice for beans and bean soups. The only thing that turns out perfect every time for me is split pea soups: hambones or ham shanks, onions, dried split peas.
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rosa, the banana bread turned out great! I suspect the entire loaf will be gone before tomorrow... :)
The cabbage soup turned out great, too. We ate it for dinner last night and will have it for dinner again tonight. And I froze enough for six future meals, too.
Watched a movie via Netflix yesterday and we're headed to the gym this afternoon so that's providing us with some frugal entertainment. And, of course, the trip to the gym is good for our health, too!!!
Otherwise, not much happening today. Going to hard boil some eggs for lunches/snacks this week. Doing a *full* load of laundry. Too bad I can't hang it on the clothesline to dry this time of year. The weather is warmer, but not sunny or dry enough. The good news is that our heat has not kicked in all day.
