One Hundred Dollars a Month - Page 1451 of 2143 - I am your typical housewife living in high maintenance suburbia. I have a handsome husband, 2 kids and a flock of pet chickens. I try and feed my family with $100 a month. With the help of coupons, gardening and bartering I am able to squeeze the most out of our grocery budget and still manage to have a little fun along the way.

Potato Tower Update and Harvest

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By Mavis Butterfield on September 27, 2013 · 82 Comments

Yesterday I headed out the the garden with high expectations of harvesting a bumper crop of potatoes from our three potato towers {I’m saving the ones we having growing in the compost pile for this weekend}.

I tried growing potatoes in towers and burlap sacks last year, but failed miserably because I had them in bad spot and did not water them regularly.

But this year, I gave them plenty of water.

I planted potato tower #1 with 6 inches of dirt and added additional dirt {but no more potatoes} as the potato leaves began to pop through the soil. Final Harvest – just over 5 pounds. Boo!

I planted the potatoes in potato tower # 2 with 3 layers of dirt and potatoes.

Lucy the puggle dog helped.

Final harvest – about 8 pounds of potatoes. Double boo!

And last but not least, potato tower #3.

This tower was planted with alternating layers of potatoes, dirt, potatoes, straw, potatoes and dirt.

What do you see? I see a duck.

Surprisingly, potato tower #3 had over 12 pounds of potatoes in it. I thought for sure tower #3 would yield the least amount of potatoes because when I had planted it, I packed so much dirt and straw in the wire cage, that I assumed the potatoes wouldn’t produce much. Boy was I wrong. Final Harvest – about 12 pounds of spuds.

Final potato tower tally – 25 pounds of potatoes. Not bad, but not great. Now the question is, should I try this again next year, and if I do, how am I going to change things up so I get a bigger yield?

Any suggestions?

~Mavis

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Autumn Beef Stew with Vegetables

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By Mavis Butterfield on September 26, 2013 · 8 Comments

I’ve been kinda obsessed with my Dutch oven lately. If you’d been at my house tasting all the creations I’ve made in it lately, you’d totally understand why. It’s awesome! So I thought the next logical thing to try in a Dutch oven is beef stew. I love stew and with the weather getting cooler, it gets me in the mood for fall. Cooking stew in a Dutch oven did not disappoint. Man was it good. Go dust off your Dutch oven and give this recipe a whirl. I think you’ll be hooked.

Ingredients

2 tablespoons olive oil
1 tablespoon butter
3/4 cup flour
1 pounds beef stew meat, cut into 2-inch cubes
1/3 bottle dry red wine {optional}
1 tablespoon fresh thyme sprigs
3 garlic cloves, minced {The best garlic press ever!}
1/2 orange, zest removed and cut into 2 (1-inch) strips
1/8 teaspoon ground cloves
Salt and pepper to taste
1 bay leaf
1 1/2 cups beef stock
3 carrots, peeled and sliced
1/2 pound white mushrooms, cut in 1/2
1 tablespoon fresh flat-leaf parsley, chopped, for garnish

Directions

Over medium-high heat, add oil and butter to a Dutch oven. While it’s preheating, season beef with salt and pepper, and toss with flour to coat {toss pieces to shake off excess flour}. Add the beef chunks in a single layer to the Dutch oven, and brown on all sides. Set aside.

Pour wine into Dutch oven and bring to a simmer, scraping bottom of pan with a wooden spoon. Add the beef, thyme, garlic, orange zest, cloves, salt and pepper, bay leaf and beef stock. Bring to a boil, reduce heat and simmer, uncovered for about 20 minutes or until the liquid thickens. Add remaining ingredients, cover and cook on low for 2 1/2 hours or until meat is tender. Garnish with parsley and serve.

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Travel Tips – Getting Around London

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By Mavis Butterfield on September 26, 2013 · 12 Comments

The Girl Who Thinks She’s a Bird and I have been dreaming about taking another trip to London just as soon as we get enough points to earn a pair of free plane tickets again. One of our favorite parts about the city {besides all the cool museums, shops and food} is deciding how we are going to get around the city each day.

Even though getting around London can seem like a daunting task, they have a FANTASTIC transit system, and with a little planning, renting a car is completely unnecessary {plus who wants to navigate the left side of the road in busy traffic?}.

Here’s what I have found works best:

Coming in from Heathrow Airport – I totally recommend taking the tube. We usually stay in the Knightsbridge area and it takes only 45 minutes to get into the city. If you are going to stay longer than a day or two, an Oyster card is totally the way to go. You can get them at any Tube or major Rail Station. They are 5 pounds, which is just a deposit, so long as you return the card at the end of the trip, and they offer pretty substantial discounts on the Tube, Railways, and buses. You can load them in the station with cash or credit card. Here’s a link for more information on the Oyster card. If you are there less than a day or two, just purchase your ticket.

If you’re a Harry Potter fan, you can stop at King’s Cross Station for a photo opp at Platform 9-3/4 {We did last time we visited London}.

Inside the city, the bus system can pretty much take you anywhere you need to go, plus the double decker red buses are iconic, so at the very least, do it for the experience.

If you plan on taking a spin through Hyde Park {which, in my opinion, is a must not miss}, renting bikes is a great option. You can also venture into the residential streets fairly easily this way. I love to see how people really live, so winding up and down the streets makes for an awesome afternoon.

And last but not least, the official Taxis in London are called Black Cabs. There is a minimum charge of 2.40 and it is metered from there. They are a great option if you need to get somewhere quick on your own time frame, rather than waiting for the next bus or taking the underground and walking. Plus London cabs are just plain cool. 😉

If you get lost, just ask for help! The people are so incredibly friendly here.

Cheers!

Mavis

P.S. Have you been to London before? What was your favorite part about the city?

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New Chipotle Ad Takes a Poke at Food Standards in America

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By Mavis Butterfield on September 26, 2013 · 25 Comments

Have you all seen the new Chipotle ad? It is dark and disturbingly telling. It exaggerates {kind of} the state of our food system and how removed we’ve become from our food–and HOW we get it.

Whenever ads start to reflect a grass roots trend, I always take notice, because it seems like it’s an indication that the mainstream on a whole is starting to change their mindset.

Watch it, tell me what you think. Do you think the message of whole, responsibly produced foods is finally taking off?

~Mavis

This post may contain affiliate links. These affiliate links help support this site. For more information, please see my disclosure policy. Thank you for supporting One Hundred Dollars a Month.