Week 2, it's day 9, Monday February 22 Dumplings!

    Draper Valley veg-fed, no antibiotics-ever, chickens were on sale for $.69/lb today at Thriftway.  I always shop for meat and veggies at Wray's Thriftway.  Their prices are good on fresh foods, they mark down yesterday's meats every morning at 9am which makes meat affordable for us, and they sell local vegetables and fruits at excellent prices. 

     I boiled a chicken with salt and a shredded carrot, then after school, Emily whipped up a double batch of biscuit dough for making dumplings.  Making biscuit dough is just as fun as play-dough, and much more satisfying.  The simple, tasty recipe is in my recipe page.  We slightly modified "Uncle Joe's Country biscuits" recipe from the Mandy Cookbook, if you remember Mandy from your girlhood reading.

     While I was cheering at Mercy's and Charity's last basketball game, Trudy boiled the dumplings in the chicken broth.  As soon as we got home, Charity, Christiana, and I boned the chicken and divided it into portions.  Sarah set the table with a cloth, and we cut a quarter of the meat into bits to add to the dumpling gravy, also adding  about 2 cups of leftover mashed potatoes from yesterday's lunch to help thicken everything.

     Having dumplings was cause for celebration, so another bottle, this time of Diet Dr Pepper, was brought out, and served up for dessert along with the applesauce.  We drank a good five cents of the stuff, and put the rest in the frig for tomorrow.

Today's spending at a glance:

breakfast menu:  cold cereal, oatmeal squares or crispy rice, milk, tea

Breakfast Total: $2.39

cereal: 1.00

milk:  1.39

lunch menu:  mashed potatoes, hamburger gravy, carrots sticks, cucumber slices, pretzels

Lunch total:  $4.04

hamburger meat: 2.00

8 lbs mashed potatoes:  .80

gravy: .33

5 carrots:  .55

10 bags pretzels w/ 16 each:  .60

1 large cucumber:  .50

(I prorated the potatoes and gravy, and it came out to .24 per container.  This sized batch made 13 12oz containers full, plus some extra mashed potatoes I used in the supper meal.  We all packed one portion, except Rodger, who had 2 portions.  So we used .24 x 11 = 2.64 on the main dish today, and I'll cost the rest into whatever day they are consumed)

snack menu:  soda crackers

Snack cost:  $.18

     I found the crackers in a mark-down bin for .75, because one of the corners of the box was smashed in.  We didn't care.  We used up one of the 4 sleeves of crackers inside. 

     I like looking through the markdowns.  You never know what will be there!  I remember once finding cans of coconut milk for 25 cents.  I had always wanted to try coconut milk in a curry, but its price hadn't been worth the risk ever before. 

     I love bargains, but don't go looking all over town for them, because in my big family-sized van, the gas it takes to shop around would totally offset any cents off savings I would incur.  Instead, I shop at stores close to where I live, or stores close to places I would be driving anyway for other reasons, using gas I would have used anyway.  Does this make sense to you?  It does to me. 

      So, no, I'm not a rabid bargain hunter, but I do love a bargain, when it is something I would be buying anyway, and have a pantry stocked with basic and cheaply bought foods to prove it.  

supper menu:  chicken and dumplings with gravy, bit of carrot, applesauce

Supper Total:  $2.82

1/4 boiled, boned chicken:  .99

double batch biscuit dough:  1.32

applesauce:  .40

1 carrot, to color the broth:  .11

Here is a bowl of the dumplings before adding the chicken gravy. Applesauce has not been served yet.

     I do have one thing I remember that I didn't add into today's figures.  I gave Noah a bit of yogurt, because he has such a bad cankor sore that he hasn't been willing to eat any food he has to chew up.  Poor boy.  The mashed potatoes were easy for him, as were the dumplings, but saltines made his mouth sting, so he got some yogurt instead.