If there ever was a budget-friendly, have a good time with the girls' kind of party -then, this is it!
Each year I invite my family, friends, and even co-workers to my Christms cookie party. The first year, I baked like a demon, baking 17 different kinds of holiday goodies, invited everyone over for sampling - it was a BYOC party (Bring Your Own Container). The goodies were a huge hit, but much to my surprise - everyone was a little disappointed: the ladies wanted to learn how to make the treats, not just eat 'em. So, the next year, I decided to pick out 5-6 favorite, versatile recipes and invite over the gang. The recipes for Cranberry Chocolate Bars, Luscious Lemon Cookies, and Diane's Amazing Almond Cookies were born during that party. Last year, our new creations included Dark Chocolate Orange Bars (Sunny's idea), Holiday Cranberry Biscotti (Diane's idea - my advanced student), and (my personal favorites) Cranberry Rum Walnut Biscotti (Madelyne's idea).
The girls and I laugh while drinking sweet tea and wine (Arbor Mist - got to love it), the guys watch football and offer assistance by being our voluntary taste testers, and if the kids come, we teach them (and let them taste test), too.
At last year's party, with my mother, and my husband's mother, aunt, and grandmother - along with my friends Sunny & Troy, was one of the best times I can remember having in the kitchen. I might go for fewer recipes - 8-12 got a little confusing, but what I find worked great was using 2-3 base recipes and allowing each of the girls to do their own variation. My main base recipes are Basic Bars, Basic Biscotti, Basic Oatmeal, and Basic Cookie (vanilla flavored). With each of these, the girls got to pick their favorite flavor of spice and extract, and also add in their favorite stir-ins like nuts, fruits, chips, and more.
Each girl brings a basic ingredient or two, I supply the spices, extracts, and stir-ins. We get to have a variety of goodies, have fun making them, and caught up, too!

I had some catalina's that were about to expire last night, so I went shopping - I didn't need much, but figured it's always better to shop with someone else's money. I had 21 catalinas for $2 OYNO and a $5 off $25 purchase. With what I can remember, I got:
2 dozen eggs
2 spice jars - $.99 each
6 boxes Rice-A-Roni - $.90 each
5 boxes Betty Crocker Potatoes $1.00 -$.40 Q's for each
1 bag no yolk egg noodles $1.97 -$.50 Q
2 lbs. margarine $.63 each
1 Parkay Butter Spray $1.69 each (I love that stuff!)
6 cans mushrooms $.50 each
4 cans diced Italian-style tomatoes - $.50 each
3 cans organic tomato paste $.89 each -$1.00/3 organic items Q
7 pkgs. Betty Crocker pizza crust mix $.89 each (they have the boxtops on them)
1 66 ct. garbags bags (got something off the have-to list) $4.69
2 cans Libby's Pumpkin Pie Filling (28 oz.) $1.98 each
2 bags of flour $1.86 each
2 pkgs. instant pudding (meijer brand) $.50 each
10 cans tomato soup (ValuTime brand) $.44 each
1 jar olives (14.5 oz.) $2.99

# of items purchased - 57
Tax $.84
Savings - $62.74
Total OOP - $.29

For all that, I paid about 1/3 of the tax. The coupons paid for the rest.

Wow - the $1 a day challenge, I was amazed at how tough that was. Even for someone as frugal as me, I don't think I could keep it up indefinitely. What it has shown me is how to streamline some of my meals and tighten the budget - especially going into the holidays and all the holiday entertaining I'll be doing. Some of these meal plans will be graet to expand on for feed a group. I noticed dairy is my biggest budget buster while rice and pastas really help the financial diet I'm on. For entertaining, I'll expand on some basic rice dishes, look for deals and steals on meats (of any kind!!) and just keep doing what I've been doing.
I need to find more free items to stock up on, which is a challenge considering that no stores within 100 miles double coupons on a regular basis - only Kmart and they double coupons sporadically.
I've been spending some time organizing my pantry - it makes meal-planning and grocery shopping much easier. It feels great each time I check an item off the list knowing that I won't have to shop for it for quite some time. If I find free - or darn close to it, I try to buy enough to last 3-8 months at a time. What ever extra I can grab, I typically share with family and friends, though I'm actively trying to hound more stuff simply for donating to the local food pantry and soup kitchen.
Now, I'm off to hunt up some cereal coupons - though I have cereal, it's all the kind that DH likes, so I'd like to hound some for myself!

The goal is to spend $1 a day (per person) on food. Here's what my week looks like:
Monday
Breakfast: granola bar ($.16), yogurt ($.20) and glass of iced tea ($.03)
Lunch: salad ($.99 lb. bag broken down into 6 servings $.16) topped with chicken (free) and salad dressing (free)
Snack: Pretzels (1 lb. bag = $1.00, 24 pretzels = $.08)
Dinner: Roasted chicken drumsticks (.11/lb. serving = 1/2 lb. = $.05) chicken rice ($.50 a box - 1/3 box = $.16) and applesauce (free) and 2 brownies ($.11)
Total - $.95

Tuesday
Breakfast: yogurt ($.20), granola bar ($.08) and water (free)
Lunch: salad ($.16), dried cranberries (.09), dressing (free)
Snack: granola bar ($.08)
Dinner: boneless skinless chicken breast, cubed and pan-fried ($.99/lb. $.15 servings) with mashed potatoes and gravy ($.18/servings), corn ($.39/can - $.10)
Total: $.99

Wednesday
Breakfast: cinnamon raisin bagel (pkg of 6 for $.79 = $.13), butter spray (free) 1 banana = $.11
Lunch: leftover chicken ($.18), 2 sliced of bread ($.05), mayo (free), brownie ($.06)
Snack: Brownies ($.05), raisins ($.11)
Dinner: french toast ($.21), turkey bacon (free), applesauce (free) syrup ($.08)
Total: $.98

Thursday
Breakfast: yogurt ($.20), banana bread (.10)
Lunch: mexican rice ($.06), refried beans (.08), chicken ($.10),
Snack: tortilla chips ($.10), salsa (free)
Dinner: spaghetti (free) with meat sauce ($.26), 2 brownies ($.10)
Total = $1.00

Friday
Breakfast: english muffin ($.16) banana ($.08)
Lunch: bread - turkey and cranberry sammich ($.22), crackers ($.11)
Dinner: roasted chicken stuffed with rice ($.17) salad ($.16), green beans ($.10)
Total: $1.00

Saturday
Breakfast: 2 eggs and 2 slices toast ($.15), banana ($.08)
Lunch: spaghetti (.20) 3 cookies ($.20)
Dinner: pork roast with potatoes(free), carrots (free) ($.30)
Total: $.93

Sunday
Brunch: Ham and swiss sammie ( $.23) with chips (free), pickles ($.11)
Dinner: Red Rice ($.10), beans (free), tortillas (free), and ground turkey ($.25), lettuce ($.10), black olives ($.15), tomato (free)
Total: $.98

As you can tell, it's that time of year again - time to bake. And there's no time to do any "proper" baking, so you'll see a lot of recipes for quickie cookeis and throw-together bars (I love any recipe where I can dump everything into a bowl and mix.). I'm listing some of my favorites - all recipes here have been taste-tested on family, friends, co-workers, etc.
This recipe was born out of frustration and lack of better planning. What my mom used to call an Iff 'N' recipe. If and she had the right ingredients - it would have been something else. My mother-in-law and I invented them, and I must share the credit because they are simply too yummy.

1 box chocolate cake mix, any kind but devils food
2 eggs
1/4 C. unsweetened applesauce
1/2 C. brown sugar
1/4 C. water
1 tsp. rum extract
1 C. dried cranberries, roughly chopped
1/2 C. chocolate chips (anything but white chocolate will do)

Preheat oven to 375. Grease a 13x9" baking dish.
Mix well all but final 2 ingredient. Stir in remaining ingredients.
Spread evenly into prepared pan.
Bake 25 minutes.
Dust with powdered sugar, cool, and cut.
Yield = not enough with one batch, typically. I had to make 2!!

1 box coconut cake mix
2 eggs, minus one yolk
1/3 C. brown sugar
1/4 C. unsweetened applesauce
1/4 C. water
1/2 tsp. rum extract
1/2 tsp. coconut extract
1 C. coconut, divided

Preheat oven to 375. Grease a 13x9" baking dish.
Mix well all ingredients, except 1/4 C. coconut. Spread evenly in pan.
Bake for 15 minutes, then top with remaining coconut and bake another 10 minutes.
Cool and cut.
Yield = 36 small bars or 24 medium sized bars.

1 box german chocolate cake mix
2 eggs, minus one yolk
1/4 C. dark brown sugar
1/4 C. unsweetened applesauce
1/4 C. orange juice
1/4 tsp. nutmeg
1 tsp. rum extract
1/2 C. chocolate chunks (or 3 dark chocolate bars broken into small pieces)

Preheat oven to 375. Grease a 13x9" baking dish.
Mix well all ingredients. Spread evenly into pan.
Bake for 25 minutes. Cool and cut

1 box french vanilla or classic white cake mix
2 eggs, one yolk removed
1/4 C. milk
1/3 C. brown sugar
1/3 C. unsweetened applesauce
2 T. honey
1 tsp. vanilla extract
1 C. vanilla chips

Preheat oven to 375. Grease a 13x9" baking dish.
Mix well all ingredients.
Spread evenly into prepared pan.
Bake for 25-27 minutes.
Dust with powdered sugar.
Cool and cut.

There have been a few variations of this going around, but the challenge is to spend only $1 a day per person on food. So starting Monday, I'll list my meal plans - including the cost of each ingredient and the number of people I'm serving. I'll continue this (with the exception of Thanksgiving dinner) for the remainder of the month: a kind of meal-planning, budget watching all in one.
To make this easier, I'll start with a break-down of my pantry basics - factored out by cost per serving - kind of a quick reference guide. I'll list by where I got the ingredients/coupons for anyone wanting to give this a try.
If anyone else has any ideas to help me meet this challenge, I'd love to hear them!

It isn't often enough that a deal comes my way that I do a "rinse & repeat" on, but with one this good, I just keep coming back for more.
The basic premise: buy 3 Jello at $.50 each. Use $1.50 off any 2 Jello (grab 3 though, I've heard they don't give overage). Now you're paying only tax for the Jello. Then a $2 OYNO coupon prints.....so $2 profit off each order. The only downside: you only get 1 $2 OYNO coupon per transaction. I've run more transactions this week than I can count! I have 20 $2 OYNO coupons at home. I'm going to grab more of them today. If you want to sweeten the pot, buy a pkg. of Taco Bell Taco Shells (the crunchy kind) that are 20% off, use a $1.50 off any Taco Bell Dinner Kit coupon and get $.10 back per box! Yep, Dh did that last night and made money.... there's more to him than just good looks and charm! That sweetie has brains, too. My hope is to use the $2 OYNO coupons to help pay for Thanksgiving dinner. Especially since I'm hosting it and having family come in from out-of-town. I'll be at it again tonight, shopping til I drop. I'm hoping to have $50 in coupon-money (I love those OYNO coupons) to use for the holidays. Hmmm....wonder what else I can get for $2 - you'd be amazed how much shopping you can do in ridiculously small increments.
I have added 195 free boxes of Jell-O (to be split with my sister, inlaws, and food pantry), 15 boxes of Taco Bell Crunchy Taco Shells (to be divided between family and food pantry) - for a profit of $.10 per box, 16 jars of salsa (half are mine, half to give away) - $.22 a jar, and ended up with more than $100 in cats by the time the sale was done, plus the miscellaneous $/$$ purchase. Which added in another $30+ in free spending. I also played coupon fairy and gave away enough Jell-O and Taco Bell coupons to people to help them save another $25. I love, love, love coupon-karma!

Well, the count is finally in - I currently have 23 $2 cats, so $46 in shopping for the big Turkey Day. And sis from MN is going to bring potatoes, so scratch another item off the list. Just need the price of canned veggies to go down, grab some yams and egg nog, and find a way to score as free turkey and I'll be pretty much set! This is the year of the hounded holiday!

I've been tagged by one of my favorite hound-pals over at centralillinoisian - Life is Hard - Just Keep Swimming. Ok, so the challenge: tell random 7 things about myself.

1. I love the smell of coffee, love the flavor of coffee....just don't like to drink coffee. I'm sure that's beyond odd, but maybe that's part of my charm. P.S. absolutely love Vanilla Cappuccino Bars!

2. I love to read - will read nearly anything....I might draw the line at Dickinson, but that's because everytime my DSis and I have tried to read the same book at the same time, she finishes first! One day I'll have some quiet time, re-read Tale of 2 Cities, because it's one of the books I've struggled through and still remember (many years after the fact).

3. When no-one is in the car with me, I love to blast 80's tunes, country, anything I can sing to loudly. Very loudly....then I start laughing at how ridiculous I must sound/look. It's a mood picker-upper for me.

4. I can never go anywhere without...COOP. COOP is an invention to keep my coupons organized. I feel naked leaving the house without it.

5. I don't like.....bugs. I keep telling myself every spring that there really aren't that many bugs in the ground, otherwise I'd never get my mini-garden in. This year I grew tomatoes.....more than 20 plants of them. That leads me to #6-

6. My favorite meal is spaghetti. You'd think I was Italian with all the pasta I eat. I've got some sauce, a Creamy Marinara, simmering for dinner right now. I'm hoping to learn how to make a good Puttanesca Sauce next.

7. I've just discovered..... the joys of walking in the grass barefoot. growing up, it wasn't allowed (bad neighborhood, and neighbors would leave rusty nails, shattered bottles, etc. everywhere...even toss them in our yard.) I felt so decadent walking around in the perfectly manicured grass at the Chicago Botanical Gardens without my sandals on. It was my favorite part of that outing! I'm also a glutton for tourist-y things.

Meijer's has Jello on sale starting Thursday 5/$3 or $.60 each. They're also offering a coupon online (through mealbox) for $1.50 off any 2 Jello items, and there's also a Catalina coupon to print with it. Being discreet, (ha!) I've printed 20 of those coupons. I want to stock up on Catalinas to help pay for Thanksgiving dinner. (I may be a little crazy, but at least I have a plan.)
The plan is to buy 3 boxes of Jello on sale for $1.80 -$1.50 Q = $.30 OOP and a $2 OYNO Q prints out! For $1.70 profit - love it!
To add in some variety, I'll see how low the OOP is on the Taco Bell Salsa, which also has a $1.50 Q.
To change it up, there are Q's for $2 off any 2 Kraft Mayo and Miracle Whip, which are on sale....2 for $4. That equals $1 for me! I'm lovin' it!
I try to make sure I don't run too many identical transactions, even though I use self-checkout. I still miss the days of free pasta. I loved loading 26 boxes of pasta into my cart along with a few miscellaneous items and paying for my order with spare change. Ah, the good ol' days...

4-6 lbs. chicken, bone-in works best (dark or white meat)
3-4 cloves garlic
1/4 medium onion

Put chicken, onion, and garlic into crockpot, cover with water and cook until meat starts to fall off the bone. (About 6-8 hours on low).
Drain off water into large bowl (and save to use in place of store bought chicken stock/broth), remove skin and bones. With 2 forks, gently pull the chicken apart.

Meal Ideas:

Add BBQ Sauce and serve as Pulled Chicken (great for sammies).
Add in some tomato sauce, garlic salt, onion powder, and taco seasoning for Chicken Tacos, Chicken Enchiladas, Chicken Quesadillas, and Chicken Burritos.
Serve over pasta.
Mix with cooked, diced potatoes as a hash
Use in place of lunchmeat
Add to broth, with noodles and veggies for homemade chicken noodle soup
Add into boxed pastas/rices/potatoes, for an entree on a side-dish budget!
Make mashed potatoes, make packaged gravy mix and add in chicken. Serve chicken in gravy over potatoes.
Makes a great pizza topping.

This freezes very well, and helps out in a pinch when you didn't plan dinner or forgot to thaw something. Instead of buying pricey cans of chicken breast meat, this is a great, cheap substitution.

1 box dark chocolate or german chocolate cake mix
2 eggs, minus one yolk
1/3 C. brown sugar
1/4 C. unsweetened applesauce
1/4 C. milk
1 tsp. rum extract
1/2 tsp. each cinnamon and almond extract
1/4 tsp. coconut extract
1/2 C. white chocolate chips
1/2 C. mini-chocolate chips
1 C. sweetened flaked coconut (optional)
1/4 C. macadamian nuts (optional)

Preheat oven to 375. Grease 13x9" baking dish.
Mix well all ingredients, spread evenly into pan. Top with additional coconut and white chocolate chips, if desired.
Bake for 25 to 27 minutes.
Cool and cut.

This recipe is great if you're on a tight budget, and want the taste of lasagne, but not too heavy of a meal. Feel free to scale back the portions - I make this once or twice a year (several pans at a time) and freeze it. It's a healthier take on frozen food - much more nutritious, too!

2 boxes lasagne noodles, cooked and drained, then rinsed in cold water
32 oz. container low-fat cottage cheese
1 C. bread crumbs
8 oz. can parmesan
6-8 quarts spaghetti sauce or 4-5 jars sauce
2 lbs. ground turkey, seasoned with garlic and onion, and browned, drained, added to sauce
1 lb. fresh mushrooms - chopped/sliced, sauteed with ground turkey
*optional 1 medium red bell pepper added to meat mixture, very finely chopped
3-5 bags 8 oz. mozzarella or Italian blend cheese, shredded
Basil

Mix cottage cheese with bread crumbs, 1/2 C. parmesan, and 1 T. basil.
In crockpot, add spaghetti sauce, browned ground turkey, mushrooms, red bell pepper. Add garlic and basil to taste. Cook on high for 2 hours or til bubbly.

In 13x9" baking dish, layer noodles, sauce, mozzarella, cottage cheese mixture, repeat this once, and top with mozzarella and parmesan.
Bake at 350 for 45 minutes.
To freeze - once cooled, cover tightly and place levelly in freezer. Partially thaw before cooking - reheat will take 1 hour 20 minutes on 375 in oven.

DH & I just got back from our anniversary trip to Milwaukee. For a smallish city, it has some amazing attractions and great shopping stops for foodies. First up, the Milwaukee Public Market: an indoor food market with specialty wines, cheeses, meats, a spice shop, 2 bakeries, organic produce, and several different lunch counters. Thinking ahead to the holidays, I picked up some specialty cheeses (to put out for hors d'oeuvres) and grabbed a small sack of cookies. Next we were off to the Spice House. There I added Indonesian Cinnamon and some fancy toasted onion salt to my spice collection. Next we headed across the street to Usingers Sausage, they've been in business in the same location for over 100 years! An amazing find - chicken sausage with tequila and black bean - $.99 pkg. (20 oz. pkg). Along with BOGOF on the some of their other sausages, we returned home with 5 packages of chicken sausages and brats for less than $8.50!! On our return trip home, we stopped at JellyBelly and bought 5 bags of JellyFlops (the misshapen beans) for $27. Not a bad hounding - some of the jellybeans will go as stocking stuffers for nephews, and for the children of some friends, and split the bags with DM - she's a jellybelly fanatic, too.

1.5 lbs. ground turkey, browned with 1 T. each garlic and onion, 1 tsp. cumin
8 oz. shredded cheese (I use cheddar, Mexican blend, or whatever's in the fridge)
1-2 cans (8-10 oz.) enchilada sauce (or 16 oz can tomato sauce with 1/2 tsp. chili powder, dash of cayenne, 1/4 tsp. onion salt, and 1/2 tsp. garlic powder)
15-20 corn tortillas

Warm tortillas in microwave or on griddle pan until soft. Preheat oven to 375.
Dip each tortilla (both sides) in enchilada sauce. Place one heaping spoonful of ground turkey in tortilla, roll up and place seam side down on greased, 13x9" baking dish. Repeat until you run out of ingredients or someone whines, "I'm hungry." (Typically this is me whining.)
Bake 10-12 minutes or til cheese is melted.
Serve with beans, Mexican rice, shredded lettuce, and sour cream.

To make the meat stretch, you can add favorite veggies (finely diced) while browning the meat. I have used mushrooms, red bell peppers, sweet banana peppers, celery, and onion. You can also make this ahead of time and pop in oven for a reheat when you're running short on time. This can also be frozen - make in an aluminum pan, cover tightly. You can store this up to 1 month (if someone doesn't eat it first.)

3 cans (14.5 oz.) diced Italian style tomatoes
2 cans (6 oz). tomato paste
2 cans tomato sauce (8 oz.)
2 cans cream of mushroom soup (condensed)
1 (4 oz.) can mushrooms
8 oz. light sour cream
1/2 small red pepper - finely chopped
2 T. basil
1/4 tsp. fennel seed
1/2 tsp. onion salt
1 1/2 T. dry minced garlic
1 1/2 tsp. chili powder

Add all ingredients to crockpot. Heat on high for 1 1/2 hours. Turn heat down to low, cook additional 2-3 hours. Let stand 30 minutes before serving. (Sauce will thicken upon standing.)
Serve over pasta, over meatballs (for sandwich), or use as pizza sauce.
Servings = 10-12