Search Results for: blog when your family is tired of chicken

How to Spice Up Your Holiday Party

Tired of the same ol’, same ol’ Christmas parties that feature tone-deaf Uncle Jack singing karaoke in the corner and Aunt Lucy forcing you to try her latest tofu creation? Then, consider hosting your own holiday fiesta this season with a spicy theme. If you don’t want to go whole hog by hosting an extravagant costume night (think elves, reindeer and Christmas movie characters), then go simple by decorating in a single color and having guests dress in red and green. Other theme options include: Hawaiian Christmas I was born and raised in Hawaii, and while we don’t typically greet … Continue reading →

Frugal Family Meal Ideas

Whether you are cooking from your pantry or just trying to knock down your food budget, it helps to have an arsenal of some great frugal family meal ideas. And while beans can certainly be part of your recipe book, it doesn’t have to be the main part. Here are my favorite ideas for frugal family meals that both the kids and your wallet will love. Kids love pasta. That is a given. So one of my favorite frugal family meals uses it, but with a twist. Everyone enjoys eating this slightly more sophisticated (notice I said slightly) and much … Continue reading →

When Your Family is Tired of Chicken

You know that I love cooking with chicken. It is a relatively inexpensive protein source, it is lean, and it is versatile. This week, however, I think we have hit a big wall, a chicken wall so to speak. (Boy, I bet that conjures up all sorts of funny imagery, huh?) Anyway, it started out innocently enough. Our local grocery store was offering whole name brand fat chicken roasters for $.79 a pound. Around here, that is a very good thing. I like the roasters because after cooking them, I can also make homemade gravy, chicken stock and have plenty … Continue reading →

Get Creative With Your Food Storage

If you are tired of having the same type of meals every night you can utilize your food storage to change things up. You should have a lot of food on hand, and you may want to try something different and unique. You can do a recipe search online to find a variety of different recipes for the ingredients that you have on hand. This can save you a trip to the grocery store, as well as some time. If you do this once a month, it will help your family become accustomed to trying new foods. If you are … Continue reading →

The Easy Way to Cook from Scratch

Cooking from scratch is a great way to reduce your overall food bill. Eating out can cost three or four times as much as cooking at home, on average. Faced with the reality of the savings, why don’t we all cook more and eat out less? Well, one of the main reasons is that the idea of cooking every meal at home when our lives are so busy can seem daunting. Guess what, though? Eating at home can actually be less time consuming than going out in many cases. Plus, if you follow the following advice, you will see that … Continue reading →

Easter Funnies

My 6-year-old is the joke queen in our home. When she tires of repeating her favorites (What kind of cheese is not yours? Nacho cheese!), she makes up her own (Why did the penguin cross the road? Because there was a fish he wanted to eat on the other side!), and it’s hard to tell which are funnier. During the holidays she excitedly adds to her joke collection thanks in large part to the dozens of greeting cards she receives from family and friends. In addition, she is a huge fan of kids’ websites that feature a seasonal riddle or … Continue reading →

Scrapping Everything

How much is too much when it comes to scrapbooking? I know a dear lady, who, bless her heart, has made layouts that include staples in her pantry and refrigerator. She thought it would be a fun idea to take photos of her family’s favorite snacks and other treats, and then journal about each. Her layout also included sample shopping lists, receipts to show how much she spent or saved (depending on the number of coupons she used during a particular trip to the market) and notes about special meals that were made with the ingredients she had in her … Continue reading →

Meal Planning and Freezer Cooking

Well, it looks like this week I’ll be concentrating my freezer cooking on breakfast staples again. Having breakfast in the freezer has really been working out for my husband lately, and it as shaved a bit off of our daily expenses. I was planning on preparing a bunch of split chicken breasts in different marinades and freezing them for the upcoming months of outdoor grilling, but unfortunately, my grocery store was all sold out of the chicken. I’m not surprised, it was an amazing deal. I did get a rain check for the maximum limit and will pick up the … Continue reading →

Taking the Desperation Out of Dinner: Organize a Meal Plan

Dinner can be a desperate time. If you work outside the home, it’s a rush to get everyone home and fed while you are cranky and tired … and so are they. If you are home with your children, then dinnertime is a time when the house is a mess and you’re trying to recover from the day. If you or your children have specific mealtime needs and wants, that makes mealtime even more difficult. Sometimes, the short-order mealtime cook feels ready to give up and order delivery, day after day. We’ve been going through one of those periods recently. … Continue reading →

Preparing Meat to Save Money

Meat can take a big chunk right out of the grocery budget, but unless your are vegetarian or vegan, chances are that you want to have at least some meat in your diet. The type of meat you choose and how you buy your meat, as well as the way you prepare or cook it can save you money in this area. You don’t have to be resolved to tough fatty cuts of meat, either. Just use the following tips to save money on your meat purcahses. Tougher cuts of meat cost less money. But you can have delicious, tender … Continue reading →