Frugal Forward

Here’s what we ate from Monday, February 10th through Sunday, February 16th:

Breakfasts

As per usual, Mr. Frugal Forward is the only one who ate breakfast this week. He had either oatmeal with homemade almond milk or yogurt with homemade granola.

Lunches

I pack Mr. Frugal Forward’s lunch for him every day. Otherwise, he will eat out and, more often than is reasonable, he gets glutened from cross-contamination. When he ingests gluten it is BAAADDDD. He could be sick for a week. So, we are very cautious. Also, it’s less expensive and better for his health.

His lunches are pretty simple. They essentially follow this pattern:

• Salad
• Sandwich or leftovers from the prior night’s dinner
• Fruit (usually an apple, banana, or berries)
• Sometimes I’ll include an extra snack like nuts, yogurt, chia seed pudding, or a homemade treat

Dinners

For this week, I made:

Pasta with Meat Sauce

I made this with a pound of grass fed, grass finished ground beef from my freezer. I previously bought this for $5 on a Black Friday sale from Butcher Box. The pasta was the Banza chickpea pasta I wrote about here from Thrive Market. I had a jar of pasta sauce from Whole Foods that I’d bought on sale last year.

I cooked the ground beef and onions, then split it into two. One for the pasta dish and one for the next night’s meal.

Vegetable Soup with Ground Beef

Using the remaining ground beef and onion mixture from the previous day, I made a quick soup in my Instant Pot. I used up the rest of a head of cabbage, an onion, a bag of frozen mixed vegetables in my freezer, chicken stock I made the previous week, some tomato paste and a can of diced tomatoes.

I’ve been practicing baking my own gluten free bread at home. In our area, a loaf of gluten free bread is anywhere from $8-15, depending on where and the size of the loaf. I bought a new gluten free bread flour from Azure Standard, which I tried. One recipe made 2 loaves of super soft, spongy bread. I estimated the cost of the ingredients to be around $1.75 per loaf, which is way better than $8-$15. I toasted some bread in our toaster oven. It was perfect with the soup.

Sablefish with Roasted Brussels Sprouts and Potatoes

I had a 1.5 pound package of sablefish from Butcher Box from a pre-election purchase. It was a nice splurge meal. I won’t be getting these again, not because they aren’t absolutely delicious, because they are. But they are too expensive to buy at full price.

I made roasted Brussels sprouts and potatoes for the side.

Spicy Thai Basil Pork (Pad Krakow Gai) Over Rice

I *generally* followed this recipe. I subbed ground pork for the ground chicken, since that’s what I had in my freezer. I also didn’t have oyster sauce, so I subbed hoisin sauce. I used the chicken broth I made at home and since I didn’t have fresh basil, I just used one of those refrigerated tubes of pre-minced basil. I added gochujang and spicy chili sauce.

This was a big hit. Mr. Frugal Forward and Miss Frugal Forward both asked for me to make this again. It really was so good.

Shrimp Fried Rice with Roasted Sweet Potatoes and Broccoli

This looks, well, not very good. But it was pretty tasty. I used the broccoli I bought from Costco. The shrimp was from a Butcher Box Black Friday deal where I was able to get wild caught shrimp for $5/pound. I actually bought 10 packages since it was such a good deal.

Steak and Broccoli Casserole

Our last meal of Week 4 was steaks and broccoli casserole. This was really good. There was enough left to put in Mr. Frugal Forward’s lunch.

What are you making for dinner? Do you have any favorites? What are your go-to frugal meals?

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