How to Eat on $65 a Week (and Not Develop Scurvy)

I keep running across all of these "how to save a bazillion bucks" blogs these days. 

We have a love-hate relationship. 

The blog's author always posts a picture of herself in a sidebar looking like the all-American girl. Their peaches and cream complexions are probably because, with all of the wholesome recipes and money saving tips they offer, they can go to the spa each morning, leaving the kids with nannies. And they can then hit the gym before lunch. I hate them all. 

happymoneysaver.com...this woman gave us our recipe
for homemade laundry soap at $.02 a load. And she
manages to look stunning while doing it. Damn her.

keephomesimple.blogspot.com...I love this woman's
one-hour French bread recipe. She raises kids, cooks
wholesome meals, and looks like June Cleaver. Every day.

fivehearthome.com...thanks to this woman we have
healthy, no-cook granola bars until the kids find them and eat
them all (their new record--three hours). In case you haven't
figured it out yet, her name is Samantha. Her life is perfect.

Their houses always abound with love. They describe their kids as "sweet, loving, energetic, beautiful," and their past-times usually include reading something (like home-making magazines, but never smutty novels), baking, church, and servicing her husband who is, invariably, her soul mate. *Retch*

And yet, for all of my animosity, I need to thank these blogging ladies because they are the reason we are not eating oatmeal every night for dinner. And they are also the reason, in part, that our grocery bill is so low.  They just have so many darn good ideas on saving a buck. Gotta pay for those facials somehow.

I was talking to my sister this week and she was so impressed at how cheaply we are eating but then, when I explained how we are eating so cheaply, she was repulsed which, of course, means that these tips must be blog-worthy.

How to Eat on $65 a Week (and not develop scurvy)

1. Eat cabbage...lots of cabbage.

. 

Cabbage is frickin' cheap. And you can turn it into cabbage soup, cabbage rolls, cabbage salad, cabbage fritters, cabbage meatballs, cabbage curry. The downside is that it is hard to disguise as anything but cabbage. 

The bite out of our budget: 85 cents apiece. 

Meal value: 3-5 meals can be squeezed from a single cabbage. 

Complaint level: 8/10 due to its gaseous qualities.

2. Use TVP as a filler anytime you serve ground meat.

I know, it looks like breakfast cereal...or cat vomit...depending on your age and level of tact. But it is in fact some kind of dried stuff that, when you add it to meat, makes your food budget go a long way. Like little dried flakes of magic. 

The bite out of our budget: Infinitesimal

Meal value: Seemingly infinite

Complaint level: 0/10 if they don't see it going into their food, 10/10 if they do. TVP gets an 11/10 if they fail to make the cat vomit connection.

3. Sop off the government.

I know, I know...the dole is naughty. But my kids eat a lot. So T and I sat down and calculated that we could save approximately $100 a week if we would just sign them up for government lunch at school. So we did. 

The bite out of our budget: There is free lunch. Thank you US taxpayers.

Meal value: 15/week

Complaint level: 0/10. They like free lunch because it guarantees pizza once a week. We will deal with the resulting obesity later.

4. Sop off the neighbors...then make stuff.

Man, everyone here has fruit trees that they don't pick. Right now, it is don't-pick-your-apples season with a few hangers-on from don't-pick-your-pears season. It looks like we will soon be heading into don't-pick-your-crab-apples season.

The fruits of our latest sopping.

Apple jelly made from the neighbor's apples

The bite out of our budget: Thanks to child labor, nada.

Meal value: 5/week...there's apple fritters, apple jam, apple sauce, apple pie, apple crisp, apple cake, apple slices for snack... 

Complaint level: 1/10. No one complains about dessert, but there have been some complaints about the occasional worm and the rot level encountered when picking. It will come out later in counselling.

5. Shop at Aldi and eschew organics

Not as good as Walmart for entertainment value, but
darn cheap so long as you keep your expectations low.

I know, you're going to say that we are probably setting ourselves up for chronic diseases later while simultaneously destroying the planet, but buying conventional saves in the short run, and right now we are all about the short run. On top of that, Aldi, according to a number of hardcore, money saving bloggers, is nothing less than the devil's work. 

But Aldi has my heart because, if you are not overly picky about labels, the mountains of pre-packaged foodstuffs that you have to navigate around to find the bargains, and the fact that you have to USE YOUR OWN BAGS **gasp** it is cheap.

Signing off from the world of "ain't got no money"...

Povertingly yours,

Rachel