Monday Meal Planning and a Recipe for Taco Pasta

 Boy I tell you, if you Google "How To Eat On A Budget" or anything similar, you will find all kinds of news sites telling you the same things. Meal plan. Make a list and stick to it. Eat meatless a few times a week. Buy in bulk. Skip name brands. Sites who have never run stories like that before are now touting frugality to the masses. That really says something about the state of a lot of people's finances. So of course I read through them, hoping to find new tips, but came up empty. I guess when you have had to be frugal for a long time, you run out of new ideas. Have you discovered a new tip? Any strategies you have started implementing? My biggest saver so far has been using different strategies to reduce the amount of meat we eat. I guess there are families who can go entirely meatless, but we don't want to be one of those families, haha. We love all forms of meat, so I work towards keeping meat in the plan as much as possible. To make this happen, we have meatless meals also in the plan and really enjoy meat when we get to have it. 

The recipe below is based on a recipe by My Heavenly Recipes. Her original recipe called for a whole pound of meat. In this recipe, I reduced it to half a pound, we still get the flavor and save a little money. It doesn't always work to halve the amount though. In those cases, even cutting back to 2/3 or 3/4 of a pound might work. You might wonder what to do with that little meat you saved, but the answer is easy, put it in soup or a casserole! If we are saving small amounts of ground beef, I save it for chili or tacos etc. I have even used the 1/4 pound of hamburger I saved and made a burger out of it for someone to take in their lunch! Creativity is the lynch pin of frugality. 

 At some point, there will be nothing left to cut from the grocery budget and we have to turn our cost cutting efforts to other categories. One of the categories I spend a lot of time thinking about is transportation. There is a definite minimum amount of gas we use to get back and forth to work and kid activities. I try to combine as many trips as possible so that I am not going out for just one reason. I grocery shop on the way home from church. If I need something from the pharmacy, it waits until I take a kid to practice. We don't "take a drive" anymore. If I discover we are out of something, I text someone who is already out and ask them to pick it up, or just do without. (except toilet paper! If I somehow mess that up, I will make a special trip, haha!)

 

 It takes a lot of mental power to keep trying to find ways to save, and diligence. Last week, after going through the register, I checked my receipt to find they didn't take off my discount for grapes. So off I went to the customer service desk. It was annoying, but I got $4.21 back, so it was totally worth it! It shouldn't be this hard, but we are becoming adept at working the angles, watching every penny that flows out and coming up with creative work arounds. There is so much mental effort to being frugal, but what choice do we have? 

Here is my made over recipe, still filling but using half the amount of meat. Feel free to add some canned black beans to bulk up if you like.

Cheesy Taco Pasta

Ingredients:

8 oz. pasta (such as fusilli or penne)

1/2 lb. ground beef

1 onion, diced

1 red bell pepper, diced

1/2 tsp garlic powder

1 packet taco seasoning

1 can diced tomatoes, drained

1 cup water

1 cup shredded cheddar cheese

Salt and pepper to taste

 

Instructions:

1.  Cook pasta, drain, and set aside.

2.  Brown beef in a skillet.

3.  Add onion, red bell pepper, and garlic. Cook until softened.

4.  Stir in taco seasoning and cook for another minute.

5.  Add tomatoes and water. Simmer until the sauce thickens.

6.  Add cooked pasta and shredded cheese. Cook until the cheese melts.

7.  Season with salt and pepper.

 

 Here is our menu plan for this week, pork chops, grapes and tortillas were on sale this week, so working with those ingredients. Hope your week is a good one!

 

Monday-

• Breakfast- Leftover pancakes, banana
  
• Lunch-  Salami and cream cheese roll ups, crackers, grapes
  
• Dinner- Breaded and fried pork chops, microwave baked potatoes, peas, bread and butter
  

Tuesday-

• Breakfast- Fried egg, toast, mandarin orange
  
• Lunch- Thai Ramen, crackers, carrots and celery
  
• Dinner- Spinach and Mushroom Quesadilla, Butter Beans over Rice

Wednesday- 

• Breakfast- Peanut butter toast, banana
  
• Lunch-  Tuna Pinwheels, crackers, carrots and celery
•  Dinner-  Cheesy Taco Pasta, green beans, Jiffy corn bread muffins
  

Thursday-

• Breakfast- Scrambled egg, toast, mandarin orange
  
• Lunch- Sandwiches, crackers, grapes
  
• Dinner- 4 Layer Burritos, corn, chips and salsa

Friday-

• Breakfast- Oatmeal, banana
• Lunch- Leftovers, grapes
  
• Dinner- Frozen Pizza, pretzels, veggies and dip
  

Saturday-

• Brunch- Frittata, toast, mandarin oranges
• Dinner- Honey Mustard Pork Chops, oven roasted potatoes, applesauce, biscuits
  

Sunday-

• Brunch- Pancakes, homemade pancake syrup, scrambled eggs
• Dinner-   Tacos made with ground beef and lentils, corn
  

 Have a good week!

~ Sarah