Chez Robinson

I made biscuits from scratch! I've never made biscuits before, but I wanted some kind of bread, and had a few baking ingredients in the pantry. They turned out pretty good for my first time. I probably overworked the dough a little, but they were fine and tasted really good with butter and grape jelly.

Breakfast for me was egg salad made from a hard boiled egg from the fridge. DH took yogurt and granola bar to work. He has a stash of frozen dinners for lunch at work, and he ate one of those. I won't count that as coming from our freezer. For lunch I ate a portion of a boxed pasta mix. The remaining pasta was eaten with the leftover chicken casserole for dinner.

It was a stressful work day for me, and DH had to work late, so it was nice to have leftovers to heat up quickly when he finally made it home.

Total food cost today: $0

Food from the refrigerator:
yogurt
1 hardboiled egg
mayo
milk
1 egg
leftover chicken casserole
butter
grape jelly

Food from the freezer:
ice cream

Food from the pantry:
trail mix
granola bar
boxed pasta dinner
flour
sugar
baking powder
salt

For dinner tonight I made Broccoli Chicken Casserole. We really liked it, and I'll be adding it to my list of known good recipes. Along with dinner we finished off the leftover cornbread. We didn't eat the cucumbers in sour cream today, so we'll have that with lunch or dinner tomorrow.

DH took a frozen dinner for lunch, along with yogurt and a granola bar. I ate the last flour tortilla for breakfast (as a quesadilla). For lunch I ate leftover Brown Rice and Lentils, along with fruit salad made from the last apple and orange. This didn't amount to much, and I ended up eating a small frozen burrito for an afternoon snack.

We shared microwave popcorn and ice cream for dessert.

Broccoli Cheese Casserole (adapted from 101 Things to Do With a Casserole)
Ingredients:
2 cups chopped cooked chicken
1 can cream of mushroom soup
1/4 cup milk
3/4 cup Cheddar cheese
1 10 oz package frozen broccoli, thawed
1/2 teaspoon black pepper
2 small cans sliced mushrooms

Preheat oven to 350 degrees

In a large bowl, mix all ingredients together. Spread mixture into a greased 9x13-inch pan. Bake 35-40 minutes, or until bubbly. Makes 4-6 servings.

The original recipe called for 1/2 cup green onion, but I didn't have any on hand. This was really good. I think it would also be great with cooked pasta as a chicken noodle casserole, and would be even better with bread or cracker crumbs on top.

Total food cost today: $0

Food from the refrigerator:
milk
yogurt
flour tortilla (last one)
cheese
sour cream
leftover lentils and rice (finished)
fruit salad (finished)

Food from the freezer:
chicken
chopped broccoli
beef and bean burrito
ice cream

Food from the pantry:
granola bar
2 cans sliced mushrooms
cream of mushroom soup
microwave popcorn

Menu Plan Monday at I'm An Organizing Junkie is a great source of inspiration and ideas for meals and menu planning. Menu planning is going to be a big part of my challenge - so I thought I'd start posting my Menu Plans too!

Monday - Broccoli chicken casserole and cucumbers in sour cream

For breakfast I made pankcakes from a boxed mix in the pantry. These were served with butter and maple syrup from the fridge. DH heated up a few pieces of bacon from the fridge to go with his pancakes.

We had lunch out with my Mother-In-Law. We went to a local Chinese Buffet, and she picked up the check (she always does when she invites us out to lunch). The buffet serves a cabbage casserole that is delicious! I've searched and searched but have never found a recipe that looks close to it.

For dinner I made another batch of brown rice and lentils, along with the last of the frozen pierogies. We also had a few of the leftover corn muffins. Of course, DH had his nightly cup of ice cream.

I spent some time organizing and making an inventory of the chest freezer in the garage. I can't believe how many boneless, skinless chicken breasts I have! Looks like we'll be trying out chicken recipes in the coming weeks. :) I also took the time to write out a meal plan for this week. I'll share the meal plan later today. It includes a few new recipes, and I'll probably post those if they turn out well.

Total food cost today: $0

Food from the refrigerator:
milk
1 egg
butter
maple syrup
bacon
sour cream
grated parmesan cheese

Food from the freezer:
pierogies
ice cream

Food from the pantry:
pancake mix
lentils
brown rice
red wine vinegar

For breakfast I toasted the last bagel, spread it with cream cheese, and shared it with DH. DH also made coffee from ingredients in the pantry.

For lunch we ate at the Flowertown Festival. For $22 we sampled a variety of things from local restaurants. I planned to take water bottles along with us, but we rushed out of the house and I forgot them. We ended up spending $3 on 1 bottle of coke and 1 cup of sweet tea. We sampled BBQ pork sandwiches, coconut shrimp, shrimp cakes, a beef gyro, mahi mahi bites and a large cookie. All of the food was quite good. The mahi mahi looked like grilled chicken, and DH confirmed that it tasted as it looked.

It was hot and humid at the festival. There had obviously been a rain shower before we arrived, and we left shortly before another thunderstorm rolled through. I've lived in Charleston my entire life, but that humidity still gets me every year.

For dinner I tried a new recipe for Brown Rice and Lentils (inspiration here). DH rarely eats a meal without meat, unless it's a Friday during Lent, and then he has fish or shrimp. He's really not interested in vegetarian meals, regardless of health or economy. I could tell he was not looking forward to this experiment, and a few times he asked for chili and cornbread. I didn't have the ingredients for the chili he likes, so Brown Rice and Lentils remained on the menu. I offered to make him the rest of the Pierogies if he really didn't like it. I also made corn bread using a mix from the pantry and some frozen corn.

The Brown Rice and Lentils were amazingly good. I've never cooked (or eaten) lentils before, so I didn't know what to expect. The dish came out slightly creamy, and we ate all of it. We also finished the pasta and tomato sauce leftovers.

Total food cost today: $22 (eating out)

Food from the refrigerator:
Milk
Cream Cheese
Butter
Grated Parmesan
Leftover Pasta and Tomato Sauce

Food from the freezer:
Frozen corn
Ice cream

Food from the pantry:
Bagel
Coffee, splenda, creamer
Brown rice
Lentils
Corn bread mix
Mini microwave popcorn bag

My husband surprised me today. In an e-mail he told me he's interested to see how much we will save by eating out less for a month. I wasn't sure how happy he was about my new project, and I'm glad he's on board.

Everything we ate today came from our refrigerator or freezer. Lunch for both of us contained leftover pasta & tuna salad and fruit salad. Dinner was leftover pasta and tomato sauce and frozen pierogies with sour cream from the fridge (DH doesn't like pasta and tomato sauce as much as I do). DH had his usual ice cream for dessert, and I ate a SF Jello Pudding from the fridge. Luckily we have a small stockpile of ice cream in our chest freezer - DH eats a small cup every single night.

Total food cost today: $0

Food from the refrigerator:
Yogurt
2 Eggs, Cheese, Tortilla (breakfast burrito)
Leftover pasta and tuna salad (finished)
Leftover fruit salad (finished)
Leftover pasta and tomato sauce
Sour Cream
SF Jello Pudding

Food from the freezer:
Pierogies (1/2 box)
Ice cream

Welcome to my new blog. I'm starting this blog to document a challenge I've suggested to my husband - to spend as little as possible on food for one month. We will start this challenge on April 4, and the last day of the challenge will be May 4th. I've wanted to do a challenge like this for a while, but a holiday or a birthday always pops up, or for some other reason it wouldn't be a good time. Today I read through The (Organic) Thrifty Food Plan Challenge for at least the 3rd time, and I decided there's no time like the present.

Unlike Rebecca's challenge, I will not be following the food stamp guidelines, or calculating the cost of items already in my pantry or freezer. Instead I'm just going to eat as cheaply as possible, by eating what we already have, and limiting purchases. I'm also hoping to limit eating out during this time. My husband is a big fan of eating out, so we'll see if he stays on board.

I know we will be eating out at least three times this month. This weekend we are going to the Flowertown Festival in nearby Summerville, and we plan to sample the offerings from the local restaurants. On May 3rd we are heading to Beaufort for the annual Taste of Beaufort festival. Sometime in between we will get together with our best friends to celebrate a birthday. We have gift certificates to two restaurants, so I'm going to suggest we eat at one of those.

I'll try my best to post every day from now until May 4th to track our progress. We leave for vacation on May 5th, which to my mind is just another reason to eat frugally and save our money for the trip!