Pennies, Pennies Everywhere! Using Your Leftovers

Do you throw out your leftovers? If so, here is a great way to begin saving some money. You might look in the bottom of this pan at these few bits of rice and chicken and say "That's not enough for my family of four!" and dump it into the trash. Oh! It hurt me to even write that! The thought of people throwing out good food and wasting money gives me a pain in my heart. What can you do with what is in this pan? Read on!

I have used our leftovers for many years. For me, it was a necessity. But not only is it a necessity for many, it's very important that as a society we move to be less wasteful. This bit of food would make a great lunch for one. It could be eaten right away or put into a freezer container as an easy to grab lunch. 

Another option: Cook more rice and add it to the mix. You could add some more frozen broccoli and stretch it out for a full meal.

One of the greatest advantages to leftovers, besides saving money, is saving time. It's so easy to throw some leftovers on the table.

I read this article today and was shocked! The article is called "Why Americans Have Stopped Eating Leftovers". https://www.washingtonpost.com/news/wonk/wp/2017/10/31/why-americans-have-stopped-eating-leftovers/?utm_term=.a1739936bd7d People are throwing out so much food! People complain so often about not having enough money to go around but I see these pennies, pennies everywhere! 

I wonder how we have gone to being a frugal and thrifty people to being so wasteful? I don't want to sound moralizing here but our mantra should be Use it Up, Wear it Out, Make it Do or Do Without. We used to be a country of immigrants who understood want. Now people complain about not having enough money while throwing good food in the trash. Inexcusable!

Okay. You got my feelings on that issue. ;) I feel really good when I save money. And eating leftovers and saving money and time makes me feel really good. Over the years, those pennies add up and they make a nice cushion so you don't have to live paycheck to paycheck. We can all be more free when we make freeing choices. 

Happy Savings!

Must-gos: Using up Leftovers So Your Family Will Eat Them

I figured I'd better put the completed leftover meal at the top of this blog or no one would finish reading it! Because you look in the refrigerator and see.......

Some yucky looking old spaghetti sauce and some yucky looking old leftover soup and you think your family would never touch it!  So, how can you use this up?

First, a fresh bowl does wonders for old food. I decided after I put this soup in this bowl to dump it into a pot first and add water and boil. I always boil leftover food pretty hard for a little while. This soup is a couple days old. For a chart of recommendations from the FDA for food safety, please see and follow this link:

http://www.fda.gov/downloads/Food/FoodborneIllnessContaminants/UCM109315.pdf

After boiling and putting the soup back into the bowl, I added some cheese garnish. Voila! Lovely again!

Next, I added water to the spaghetti sauce. I made this spaghetti sauce from my garden tomatoes. If you've ever produced your own food, you have so much respect for it that you do not like to waste ANY of it! Next, I boiled it for a while and boiled some fresh noodles to go with it.

 After boiling and adding the fresh noodles, I sprinkled the top with parsley to give it a nice fresh look!

I served it with some asparagus I bought on sale (and froze) and some rolls I got for half price. 

Last but not least! Creme Cake for half price for dessert! 

Using leftovers makes this meal very low cost and although it began looking like something everyone would reject, it was turned into a very palatable and good meal. There is an old song that goes "Making love out of nothing at all". As I fix leftovers, I often sing to myself "Making lunch, out of nothing at all!"

In my opinion, the key is to not wait until you are in financial trouble to live this way but the key is to live this way to keep yourself out of financial trouble. Some people just will not eat leftovers. I see that as wasteful. There are so many people that are hungry in this world and it costs so much to produce food, not just in money but in irreplaceable energies and fossil fuels. It makes so much sense to me in so many ways to use up leftovers. We call them Must-gos at our house. My family is so used to it that no one ever thinks twice about it!

Happy Savings!

Eating on a Dime: One Meal to Save you Money

Today I made this yummy split pea soup! I used half of the split peas in this bag so the split peas themselves cost $1.10. 

Yesterday, I used up some ham that I had packaged up that I wrote about in another blog. http://simplyfrugalynne.blogspot.com/2015/03/saving-money-on-hamlunch-meat-make.html

I used the meat for sandwiches for 6 people yesterday and then I used the rest of the bone in part to boil into this soup. It was $1.58 lb and this part with the bone was probably two pounds when I pulled it out of the freezer so once the meat was cut off for sandwiches, let's say one pound, is a total of $1.58 for the ham. 

                                     I used old bacon fat to add that I had saved and frozen.

I added celery flakes, garlic, salt and pepper. 

After yesterday's sandwiches, these were leftover so I warmed them up to go with the soup for .45.

 I served them with homemade pickled okra and cheese. The cheese I had gotten on sale $4.98 for 2 lbs and we used it to sprinkle on the soup. We ate about half of the soup tonight and have half leftover for tomorrow's meal! So, altogether, this meal for tonight cost about $2.54 total and it served 4 people which comes up to .64 a serving! Making an inexpensive meal like this every week, if you are used to paying $10.00 per meal can save you almost $30.00 in one month!

Happy Savings!

More Leftover Mashed Potatoes! How We Use Them Up

That big pot of mashed potatoes we had for supper last night, we had for leftovers tonight. I still have what's left in the photo above! We will eat the smaller bowl (I put the quarter in there so you can see the size) for leftovers again tomorrow (good thing we love mashed potatoes but that's why I make so much all at once!). On the right, I took some mashed potatoes and formed them into something my Mom used make called "potato pancakes". These are really good. I froze them and will  make them someday with maybe eggs or waffles. This is a great way to use up some leftover mashed potatoes.

I could also use the leftovers on the left to make a dish we fondly call "Gloop-Glop". Yes, we named this dish ourselves! It is a hamburger casserole. First fry up some hamburger (3/4-1 lb), mix with a can of drained green beans and an 8 oz can of tomato sauce. Add some minced garlic.  Put into 8 X 8 inch casserole dish. Sprinkle with cheese. Put mashed potatoes on top and bake. Yum Yum!