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One Hundred Dollars a Month

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.


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How to Get Free Food Week # 18 – Reclaimed Food Show and Tell

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The pickin’s were a little slim this week.  But I’m not complaining.  With the kids getting ready to head back to school, the garden, the chickens, and having to get ready for a quick trip to Boise, I was a bit relieved to see only 3 boxes when I picked up our “chicken scraps” this week at the local produce stand.

Some weeks I love having a bunch of free produce to sift through, and some weeks it’s a chore. But I’m in it to win it, and I just have to remind myself that I am getting FREE FOOD, and no one should ever complain about free food. Ever.

This week I was able to reclaim-

Over the past few months I received emails from people who have been both successful and unsuccessful in getting their local grocers to allow them to pick up free “scraps” from stores.

In the end, I think it boils down to what the individual store policy is.  Some are afraid of giving away produce because of lawsuits, some stores already have a program in place for local charities to pick up the “old” fruits and veggies, and others are just happy to give it to someone so it doesn’t go to waste.

So if you’ve already asked all your local grocery stores for their seconds and have been turned down, maybe try a local farm, fruit stand or CSA and see if they are willing to give your their blemished produce {or let you purchase it for ultra cheap}.  The worst thing anyone can ever tell you is no.  And if you don’t ask, you won’t know for sure.

Peace Out Girl Scouts, I’m headed out to the garden to pick some veggies!

♥ Mavis

Would you like to see what else we have brought home over the past 4 1/2  months?

Head on over HERE to read all the past stories and to see all the pictures.

Have you read the The Complete Tightwad Gazette by Amy Dacyczyn?  This was the first book I ever read on frugality.  Not only is it a great read, but a huge eye opener.  Amazon has it on sale right now for $15.61 and it’s worth every penny.

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.

Recipe – Biscuits with Brown Sugar and Bacon

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I saw this recipe for biscuits on Joy the Baker and decided to give them a try.  I mean how can you possibly go wrong with biscuits, bacon and brown sugar?  I don’t even think it’s possible.  Even though you can totally serve these with supper, I served them this weekend to the Handsome Husband for breakfast alongside a plate full of fresh eggs.

To put it mildly, he love them.  And so did the rest of my family.

Here is the {slightly adapted} recipe –

Ingredients

For the Bacon

8 slices of bacon
1 1/2 tablespoons brown sugar
1/2 teaspoon coarse ground black pepper

For the Biscuits

3 cups all-purpose flour
2 tablespoons brown sugar
3 teaspoons baking powder
1 teaspoon baking soda {15 Cool Uses for Baking Soda}
3/4 teaspoon salt
1/2 teaspoon coarse ground black pepper
3/4 cup unsalted butter, cut into small pieces
1 large egg, lightly beaten
3/4 cup buttermilk {How to Make Buttermilk}
2 tablespoons chives, chopped

Directions

Preheat the oven to 375 degrees F. Line a baking sheet with parchment paper {or a silpat}  and lay the bacon on the baking sheet in a single layer. Grind pepper over the top of the bacon and sprinkle with brown sugar. Bake the bacon until it is nice and crisp, about 15 to 17 minutes. When the bacon has finished cooking, remove the baking sheet from the oven and using tongs place the bacon on a plate to cool down.  When it’s cool enough, chop into bits and set aside.

Increase the oven temperature to 400 degrees.

In a large mixing bowl combined the  flour, brown and white sugar, baking powder, baking soda, salt, and pepper and mix well.

Add butter bits to the flour mixture and using your fingers, rub the butter and flower together until it resembles a coarse meal.  Make a well into the center of the coarse meal. Add the buttermilk and lightly beaten egg.  Mix well until the dough is nice and sticky.  Fold in the bacon and chives and then turn the dough onto a well floured surface and roll the dough out to about 1 inch thick.

Cut the dough with biscuit cutters {mine were 3″ wide} and place the biscuits on a parchment lined baking sheet {or use a silpat} and bake at 400 degrees for 11-13 minutes.

Serve warm with butter.   Makes 9 biscuits.

*The next time I make these I think I’ll make a double batch.  They were THAT GOOD!

Amazon currently has the Joy the Baker Cookbook on sale for only $12.38 and it rocks, and  you should check it out.

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How to Glean Free Fruit and Vegetables – Plum Crazy

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Yesterday as I was driving home, I passed by a sign that read FREE U-Pick Plums. I hurried home as fast as I could, hopped out of the car, ran into the house and yelled at The Girl…

“FREE PLUMS!

Hurry, grab some baskets,

Let’s go before they are all gone!”

Turns out, the people who were giving away the plums had lived on their land for over 25 years. They had 3 plums trees and had a bumper crop this year {1 was 80 years old and the other 2 were 20+ years old}.  The trees were so heavy with fruit, the homeowner had to prop the heavy limbs with fence boards to prevent the tree limbs from breaking.

As they sat outside in their lawn chairs, people started pulling into the driveway to pick the free plums.  Even teenagers stopped by to pick.  It was awesome! They even had an extra fruit picker for people to use.

After giving the husband and wife a container of some of our own heirloom tomatoes and fresh eggs, we learned the reason they had placed the Free Plums sign alongside the road. Mr. Plum’s wife had just finished canning 86 jars of plum jam and declared her plum picking days were over for the year. So Mr. P grabbed a Sharpie and put the sign out alongside the road because he didn’t want the ripe fruit to go to waste.

Pretty cool if you ask me.

In the end, The Girl and I ended up with about 30 pounds of free plums and a jar of plum jam.  The owners encouraged us to take more, but we wanted to make sure other people driving by had the same opportunity to glean some free fruit as well.  So we went ahead and told them we would come back in a few days and pick whatever went unpicked for them.

Free Plums.  You sure can’t beat that!

Here are a few of my favorite gleaning tips –

    • Always ask first, even if there is a sign out saying FREE, U-Pick ________
    • Thank the people profusely for letting you glean the fruits of their labor
    • Try to offer something as a token of your appreciation
    • Don’t be greedy, leave plenty for others
    • If the owners encourage you to PLEASE, TAKE IT ALL, then go ahead and take as much as you know you’ll be able to use

Now, I just have to figure out what to do with all these plums.

Does anyone out there have any good plum recipes?

~ Mavis

Looking for a fruit picker basket?  Amazon has several to choose from right HERE.

 

 

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Mondays With Mavis – How to Feed Your Family for $100 a Month

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Yesterday on the Dirty Dash race course, we came across a bunch of day hikers on a guided tour.  Jokingly, one of my teammates {Mrs. Idaho; who was covered in mud}, spread her arms out really wide and started to approach the day hikers. Both a man and a woman opened their arms, and smiled.

Mrs. Idaho smiled back, put her arms down, and let out a little giggle.

But I didn’t.

I ran up the man {whom we dubbed “Random Guy” and jumped into his arms…

IT. WAS. AWESOME.

Note to self: Never miss a Kodak moment.

P.S. I think Random Guy works out a lot.  His grip was pretty tight.  Either that or he’s totally used to mud covered ladies wearing black underwear over pink tights constantly jumping on him.

As for last weeks shopping trips?  Well, they weren’t quite as exciting.

But here’s what I purchased.

Fred Meyer – $6.00

Last week Fred Meyer had 1/2 gallons of milk, chocolate and orange juice on sale for a buck a piece so I stocked up.  As you can see Monkey Boy drank some chocolate milk on the way home from the store.


Albertsons – $2.70

I stopped by Albertsons on my way home from the airport and did 5 simple transactions using double coupons.

Here are the coupons I used –

$1/1 Ken’s Dressing Coupon 08/12 SS
$.60 Chex Mix Printable Coupon
 $1/1 Kikkoman Soy Sauce Printable Coupon 
 $.30/1 Chobani Printable Yogurt Coupon
 $.75/1 Quaker Baked Bars Printable Coupon
$1/3 Better Oats Oatmeal Printable Coupon

Talk about an easy peasy week.  Feeding your family for only $100 a month is a breeze when you have plenty of fresh fruits and vegetable to make meals from.

Total Spent This Week $8.70
Total Spent This Year $868.42
Total Spent This Year on Garden Seeds/Supplies $496.58
Total “Seed Money” donations received $51.00 

So how did YOU do this week?  What did you buy?  Or more importantly, did you hug any strangers this past week?  Do tell!

14,000 Things to be Happy About $8.95 ~ Amazon

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Mavis Butterfield Etsy