Saving Turkey/Chicken Bones for Stock

After you carve away your turkey or chicken meat, don't throw away the bones! If you are not in the mood to make soup/stock with it right away, just store it into a large Ziplock bag and throw it into the freezer. This can store for months.

We usually get a pretty small turkey, and the entire rib cage can fit nicely into a one gallon freezer bag, but if your turkey is larger, simply hack it up into a couple of pieces.

That's what I did with my turkey after Thanksgiving, and this morning I decided to make some stock with it. It's absolutely fine.

I put the entire rib cage into a large pot. It's frozen and so initially, approximately 1/3 of the rib cage was sticking up above the pot. I submerged as much as I could in water, threw some kosher salt into the pot, and began boiling the water.

I brought the water to a boil on high heat, and the turkey softened as the frozen meat melted away. Eventually, the turkey will get enough below the water so the pot may be covered with a lid. At this point, turn down the heat to simmer and just keep it going for a few hours. Keep tasting it periodically and add seasoning and salt to taste.

Finally strain away the bones and you'll have a pot of stock! As mentioned before, you can use this stock to make your ramen noodles a lot healthier. http://frugalmeals-frugaleating.blogspot.com/2009/02/ramens-undeserved-stigma.html

Crepes are French Tortillas!

A simple cheap dessert recipe for crepes. But note that this basic crepe can be used for either savory crepes or sweet! I prefer mine with either dulce de leche or nutella and banana.

2 eggs, beaten
1-1/2 cups milk
1 cup all purpose flour
1 tablespoon cooking oil
1/4 teaspoon salt

1. Combine eggs, milk, flour, oil and salt. Beat until smooth.
2. Grease a medium sized (about 6 inches) skillet with butter. Heat skillet. Remove from heat. Spoon in 4 tablespoons of batter. Lift and tilt skillet to spread the batter until the bottom of the skillet is covered evenly. Return to heat. Brown on one side only (it's important that you don't flip it) and invert onto plate when the up side is no longer gooey. Butter pan occasionally in between crepes. Fill with filler goodness to your liking!

You can store any extras you make in the freezer. Just remember to separate each crepe with waxed paper in an airtight container. Thaw for an hour before eating.

The Mighty Dollar Store

I've become a fan of Dollar Tree, a chain of dollar stores with branches around the Boston area. And the items there are actually $1 or less, unlike some chains that call themselves dollar stores but in fact have items that are mostly above $1.

I have to pause for a moment and amend what I said earlier about shopping with a grocery list. You can't really be strictly sticking to a list at a dollar store, nor a place like HomeGoods/T.J. Maxx/Marshalls (yes, they have a few food items there too, and I'll talk more about that later). I would recommend keeping in mind a general idea of what you need. For example, pasta, sauce, canned vegetables, soup, etc.

I had been shy about buying food from the dollar store until a few months ago when I finally took a look at the variety they have and the dates on the cans. So far, all the dates I've seen are indeed guaranteeing the cans to be fresh. The more surprising, however, are the name brand products I found on the shelves. Among them were Swiss Miss hot chocolate, Healthy Choice soups (which can cost around $2 when not on sale at a regular supermarket). The VanCamp's Chicken of the Sea smoked sardines were actually priced at $.79. I even bought a pack of artist brushes (that's my only taxable item, as all food items are non-taxable in Massachusetts) for a dollar there. Excluding the paint brushes, the bill was under $15. That's 4 cans of soup, 3 cans of smoked sardines, 3 cans of smoked oysters, 1 can of chili, 1 can of beef stew, 1 package of thin spaghetti, 1 can of meat sauce and 1 box of hot chocolate.

Just the spaghetti and the meat sauce alone can provide 2-4 meals for one. Each can of soup, chili and stew can be supplemented with bread (6 meals), Each can of sardine/smoked oysters can be supplemented with rice and vegetables (6 meals). I always try to make fresh green leafy vegetables to add to dinner. Nutrition is important, and we need to be mindful of that. Fresh vegetables can be purchased cheaply as well. More on that in a later entry.

So, I just counted 14-16 meals from the purchases above from our purchases for under $15. Oh, and the hot chocolate, of course, is a little bit of luxury.

To Splurge Or Not to Splurge: Coffee

I'm going to talk a little about lifestyle adjustment. I used to be an IT professional with a decent regular paycheck. Then back in 2002, after the dotcom bubble burst, I decided to pursue my dream to become a full-time visual artist. It was a huge lifestyle change for me. I had never budgeted before, and I was used to having a Starbucks or Dunkin' Donuts coffee every morning. $1.50 - $3.50 (latte) a day didn't seem like much money to me, but what that really amounted to was $47-$109 per month just on coffee – That's $564 - $1308 per year. JUST. ON. COFFEE.

It's mind-boggling. Upon first making this shocking discovery, I swung heavily in the direction of skimping. Buying the cheapest (usually the nastiest-tasting) coffee available in the supermarket. Then I realized how stupid that is. You should not think of saving as self-punishment. There are plenty of great off-the-shelf whole bean or ground coffee choices available. If you really like your Starbucks coffee, you can even buy the Starbucks take-home beans or ground coffee to help you transition.

I think it's still okay to treat yourself to a latte once in a while, but budget for that too. I limit myself to once a month.

I guess I'm lucky that my favorite brand is not exorbitant. It's Yuban (pictured here). I had it the first time when I bought it on sale and then just fell in love with it. Unfortunately, not every supermarket sells it. When not on sale, a 12-oz can is around $4.50 ($.15 a cup) and can last a month. The only other cost is a basket coffee filter for my coffee maker. $3 for 100 count ($.03 a cup).

So, that's $.18 a cup. $5.60 versus $47-$109 per month on coffee.

Eating on $1 a Day?

Two social justice teachers experimented to see if they could eat on $1 (or less) per day. They had some rules:

1. All food consumed each day must total $1 each.
2. They could not accept free food or “donated” food unless it was available for everyone in their area. (i.e. foraging, samples in stores, dumpster diving)
3. Any food they planted, they paid for.
4. They did their best to cook a variety of meals; ramen noodles could only be prepared if there was no other way to stay under one dollar. (Sorry, Ms. FrugalMeals!)
5. If they decided to have guests over for dinner, they had to eat from their share; meaning they don’t get to eat their own dollar’s worth of food.

This is similar (in some ways) to the Morgan Spurlock "Super Size Me" experiment.

Except I don't think these people got fat.

(NOTE: Frugal Eating does not recommend or condone trying this at home.)

Ramen's Undeserved Stigma

Yes, we all wrinkle our noses when we think of our late nights in college when we resorted to instant ramen noodles for a quick bite. But we have to admit that ramen noodles taste good, and it is really okay to eat it once in a while.

If you really need to watch your sodium, you could trade in the MSG packet for broth or stock that you made yourself. But I personally don't think that MSG is really that terrible for you as long as you don't eat it everyday. I seriously doubt that anyone living in Japan can go through one day without any MSG (it's in almost everything they eat), and yet they generally live longer than Americans.

In fact, there are restaurants in Japan that serve instant ramen noodle soup with different toppings. Here's an interesting article from the Cape Cod Times about a ramen noodle restaurant. http://www.capecodonline.com/apps/pbcs.dll/article?AID=/20080716/LIFE/807160301

So, this is what I just had for lunch. A bowl of ramen noodle soup with a poached egg and some leafy green vegetable, with a sprinkle of sliced scallion. Let's do a cost analysis.

I purchased a 6-pack of Nissin's Top Ramen for $.99 from the soup aisle in the supermarket. I used only 1 pack, making it $.17.

The scallion was $.89 a bunch. I used just a few sprinkles. Let's say, 1/30 of the bunch, making it $.03.

I used one medium egg. $1.99 for a dozen medium white eggs. That's $.17.

Leftover green leafy vegetables. In this case, I used an Asian vegetable called Shanghai choy, which was $1.49 a lb. This is about 1/10 of the 1-lb package. $.15.

My lunch was $0.52. The preparation time was 10 minutes. It was filling, warm, and perfect for a cold winter's day. In terms of calories it's about 500. Not ideal, but still better than McDonald's in nutrition and in price.