Tuesday, December 18, 2012

Food Spending DECEMBER Week 2, Meal Planning Week 3



 Yes, be sure to exercise your wine muscle this Holiday Season!
 
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And here is what actually got served last week.... 
Sunday--Rigatoni w/Meat Sauce, Salad
Monday--Chicken Parmesan, Mashed Potatoes, Beets
Tuesday--Halushki and/or Leftovers
Wednesday--Leftovers
Thursday--Daughter's Birthday Meal Out
Friday--Beef Pie with carrots, green beans and cornbread
Saturday--Leftovers or Breakfast for Dinner
 
 
Wednesday's fish didn't get served as well as Thursday's hot dogs.  Everything else was as planned.

The food spending last week was pretty average.  $70.66 in 4 trips to the grocery stores plus a trip to the Carvel store for an ice cream cake.  So $52.71 for groceries and $17.95 for the cake makes $70.66.
2 weeks and I have spent $236.04 of the month's $400  food budget. 

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Going into this week, I have leftover Beef Pie

This week's menu....
Sunday--Burger King Whoppers(BOGO 55cents Deal), Broccoli
Monday--Beef Pie leftovers
Tuesday--Salmon(Crab Cakes for #2 son),Green Beans
Wednesday--Stuffed Shells, Tossed Salad
Thursday--Hot Dogs, Beans, Potato Salad
Friday--?
Saturday--?
 
I've moved the 2 meals not served last week to this week.  Thursday has to be an easy meal as we have the Concert Band and Jazz Band concerts that evening.  The stuffed shells are in the freezer already.  Friday and Saturday I have no clue yet, but it will be something I have in the freezer already.  Since I'll be buying some of next week's goodies this week, I'm giving myself $70 for food shopping.  Daughter and I are baking later this week so that will have to include any supplies we need that I haven't already picked up.  We'll be doing fudge, maybe brownies, Hubs wants choc. chip cookies with butterscotch chips, and Daughter wants to make Cake Balls.  I'm not doing the large number of cookies this year because they end up sitting around too long.

What I need to buy for this menu so far?  Salad Greens.  Also some fresh fruit and milk.
I hope to get through this week cheaply.  I have $10 in free food vouchers for the Shursave market(from buying gift cards there last week) but there is little I want that's on sale this week there, so I'll hold them until next week's ad to use.

Not only can't I wrap my head around a menu plan for Fri. or Sat. but I can't seem to settle on what to serve on Christmas day.  Ya see, while we do the traditional turkey thing at Thanksgiving, we never really settled on a Christmas Day meal tradition.
Hubs grew up in NJ, in a family with a 1st Generation Italian father and a German/Dutch ancestored mother who only learned to cook after she married, so mostly she made Italian food.  Their holidays always involved pasta in some form....ravioli, lasagna, spaghetti mostly.  They never really did the 7 Fishes type meal.  That was probably due to the expense, as Hubs family was not well off when he was growing up.
I grew up in VA, with a Yankee father(with a very narrow food palate) and a Southern mother from a long line of Southern cooks who defined herself by her cooking ability, so we ate many traditional Southern specialties as well as a lot of meat(for my father).  Thanksgiving was all about the turkey(though it was surrounded by Southern dishes like Rutabaga and Tomato Bread Pudding, etc.) and Christmas was all about salt-cured Smithfield ham.
While Thanksgiving has been easy, It's been difficult marrying these differing Christmas traditions.  And after 30+ years together, we still don't have a routine down for Dec. 25th vittles.
 
We always go out to the Chinese Restaurant on Christmas Eve(our tradition)and family comes here on Christmas Day for dinner.  Many don't like ham, and I don't serve turkey again so close to Thanksgiving.  Hubs would be happy as a pig in mud if I just served Ravioli with Meatballs and Sausages(he grew up eating Italian food for every holiday), but I just don't find pasta "festive" enough. ;-)
I'm thinking about blowing out the food budget bigtime and serving a standing rib roast, seriously expensive carnivore fare!  $50 for a hunk of meat.  And I KNOW it will be devoured instantly. 8-))

If I do pasta and a hunk of meat it should cover all the bases.  And then I need to make Aunt Lula's rolls....pecan pie.....maybe pumpkin pie(again).....and I'll buy a cheesecake or cannoli.  This is turning into a production, isn't it?
A part of me is thinking maybe just serving snacks we can pick at all day.....platters of this and that--cheeses/deli meats, a fruit tray, deviled eggs, ham biscuits.

What are your menu plans for this week?
Heck, what are your menu plans for Christmas while we're at it?!

Sluggy

5 comments:

  1. The husband is out of town (AGAIN), so it's another easy week:
    Tuesday - I'm going to make lentil soup
    Wednesday - leftover soup + chicken
    Thursday - kids are going to have tacos, I'll probably have soup
    Friday - Chicken florentine (from the freezer)
    Saturday - Chicken enchiladas (from the freezer)
    Sunday - leftover of anything left in the fridge, as we're heading out of town

    Christmas Eve - I'm bringing Maggiano's to a family event
    Christmas - We do the traditional turkey/sides fare

    After that, we're heading to the beach!

    ReplyDelete
  2. One thing I cannot fathom even though I am a Southerner is the tradition of okra or macaroni and cheese as staples on all holiday meals. Pasta at Christmas just seems wrong from my perspective, wrong for me.

    The only pasta we ever ate was spaghetti and not on Christmas. We never even ate macaroni and cheese at any time! Meat was central to all meals that Daddy ate.

    It's interesting what other people consider "normal." Thanks for all the traditions. I like the way your plans evolve from simple to a blowout.

    Right now, my meal plans this week include things I have already cooked--chicken, navy beans, slaw, tangerines, apples and bananas and pecans. My Christmas Day plans will involve turkey, dressing, gravy and a jello salad.

    ReplyDelete
  3. We are having a last minute thrown together Christmas get together this Saturday. What's for dinner you ask?? I don't know yet. Yikes...

    Maybe Olive Garden. :)

    ReplyDelete
  4. I'm thinking of doing a Turkey breast for Christmas this year (for the first time) since we had a Pot Roast for Thanksgiving! We also don't have a "standard" Christmas meal in our family, and there are a LOT of NBPR or NWPR turkey rebates out there right now.

    ReplyDelete
  5. We are backwards! We go to a Chinese restaurant on Christmas day. We lay around and eat food from our containers and that's it. It is Heaven!

    ReplyDelete

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