Saving Money By Being Prepared
January 12, 2009 by Karen Weideman
Filed under food, frugal living
Last night I did not want to cook. I was not prepared. Yes, I know that by preplanning you’ll avoid going out and spending money. It was so tempting to say, “Let’s order a pizza.” I almost caved. But then I looked into my cabinets and refrigerator and found some easy items to fix.
Here’s a list of items that I like to keep around:
- bacon
- ham
- eggs
- cheese
- bread
- milk
- cream of mushroom soup and cream of chicken soup
- pancake mix or Bisquick
- canned vegetables – corn, cream corn, green beans
- cake mix, frosting, brownie mix
- crackers or bread crumbs
- rice
- frozen packages of ground beef and chicken
With these items on hand, it’s easy to concoct a variety of meals. It’s also helpful to have some premade frozen meals around, but I only buy those if they’re on sale.
What items do you keep at all times?
image by Karen
Foods that can weather time and be readily used such as cans soups, etc should always be kept on hand. That, of course, would include toilet paper.
Karen, I’m so glad you posted this (and that you didn’t cave)!
Recently I’ve been doing the same thing –stocking up on anything-goes foods so that ordering out isn’t an option.
When I shop, I tend to go overboard on meat, but then I have it stocked in my freezer until the next trip.
Lately I found that frozen chicken breasts are cheaper than buying fresh (which go in the freezer, anyway), and they actually are cut better than the butcher cuts them! (No fat, icky things sticking out in weird places. Hate that.)
Other things I always keep on hand:
–chili mix, beans and tomatoes
–bakery bread that I buy on sale because it’s a day old, and then I put all of it in the freezer and use it same day after it thaws
–”boxed” meals (hamburger helper and also there are cool Asian boxed meals and now Macaroni Grill boxed meals — just add meat)
–And I always keep a bowl full of apples and oranges and a stack of bananas on the counter. They last a full week, and the bananas easily become banana bread when they get too ripe or are put in a blender for smoothies with yogurt and milk and honey.
–Plus, if you buy cheap frozen pizzas (usually there are always sales on one brand, and I stock up) … you can avoid the order-out-pizza temptation for a while!
Thanks for giving us the opportunity to share — this was fun!
Heidi Rafferty
Harrodsburg, KY
Heidi: I did forget to mention tomatoes. I always have a can or two of those.
I try to stockpile things when they’re on sale. I’ve written a lot in the archives about stockpiling sale items to avoid paying full price for them. This weekend I bought about 20 lbs of ground chuck. It was only $1.99/lb at Bi-Lo. I split up the packages up and froze them in 1 lb sections. Tonight we had lasagna. It was so yummy!
Thanks for dropping by!
I’ve found that those steam-fresh bags of veggies are a must-have at our house! My husband has decided that he’d rather eat less meat anyway, and if we’re really in a crunch, I can heat up a few bags of veggies and maybe throw in a box of mac and cheese and we’re set!
My favorites include: pace picante sauce, canned pinto beans, tortellini, spaghetti sauce, peanut butter, jelly, and v8. For the occasional grandchild visits, I also keep bread and waffles in the freezer, along with syrup and snacks for school lunches. With these, I’m good to go for at least a few days