So this meal involves a little vegetable chopping.

Okay, Fine. A LOT of chopping.

But it is worth every second. I promise.

We all loved this…including the boys.

Ingredients

1 green pepper (I used some from the freezer…$.33)
1 medium eggplant ($1.50)
1 medium yellow squash ($.75)
1 medium zucchini ($.75)
About 2 cups cherry or grape tomatoes (from the garden)

Fresh herbs from the garden – basil, oregano, and thyme
About 2 Tbsp olive oil ($.20)
Salt and pepper

Directions

First chop the eggplant and season with some salt. Place in a strainer or colander in the sink and let the juices out while you chop everything else.  When you are ready to throw it all together, rinse off the salt/juices and pat dry.

Then chop every else into 1/2 or so size pieces. Chop the herbs.  Toss everything into a large bowl with the olive oil and season with some salt and pepper.

Spread it out onto a single-ish layer on a cookie sheet and roast at 400 for 35-45 minutes, stirring once.

Roasty. Toasty.

Serve as is, over bread or over pasta.

**Note: I had the leftover ratatouille cold over cold leftover noodles.  Perhaps the best lunch I’ve had all summer!

Cost $3.53

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Alrighty friends…I’m a little stressed!  It’s only Monday of Back to School Week and my tail is getting kicked already! (Mind you, school doesn’t start until Wednesday!)  Not only is it back to school with new routines, I’m hostessing a church event, AND I have to get my cookbook edits returned BY Thursday.

Needless to say, we’ll be lucky if we eat this week! Jesting.

I had every intention of sharing my Summer Garden Ratatouille recipe tonight, but in an effort to maintain my sanity and keep myself out of the asylum… I leave you with this recipe from Rebecca.

Ingredients

2 c. chopped cooked chicken – Great way to use up the shredded chicken from batch cooking!
1 (8 oz.) pkg. cream cheese, cubed
1/2 cup of canned diced tomatoes
1/2 tsp. ground cumin
1/4 tsp. garlic powder
1/4 tsp. onion powder
8 (6 in) flour tortillas
1 lg. can green enchilada sauce

Directions

Stir chicken, cream cheese, tomatoes, and seasonings in a saucepan over low heat until cream cheese is melted.

Spoon 1/3 c. chicken mixture down center of each tortilla; roll up. Place seam side down, in a lightly greased 12×8 baking dish.

Pour enchilada sauce over all, cover with foil. Bake at 350 for 20 min. or until heated through.

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Breakfast for dinner…a smart way to reduce your grocery budget…simply incorporate 1 of these meals into your weekly meal plan and be on your way to spending less!

Making pancakes from scratch has been something I have done for many years!  I had lots of fun coming up with (and tasting) a bunch of different pancakes for my Breakfast and Lunch Cookbook.  This is not a recipe in the cookbook, but will give you a sense of the pancake recipe goodness that awaits you in the next book!!!

Here’s the trick. And you must do it this way.

Toss some blueberries, fresh or frozen, with some lemon juice…then sift some powdered sugar over the top before folding them into the batter!!!

Gives plain old blueberry pancakes an extra burst of lemony sweetness!

Ingredients

2 eggs
1/3 cup oil
2 1/4 cups milk
1/2 cup sugar
2 cups flour
2 Tbsp baking powder
1 tsp salt

About 1 1/2 cup blueberries (I was planning on using 2, but *a child that shall remain unnamed* kept stealing them from my measuring cup!)
2 Tbsp lemon juice
About 3 Tbsp powdered sugar

Directions

In a mixing bowl, whisk the eggs, oil, milk and sugar.

In a separate bowl, mix together the flour, baking powder and salt.  Pour into the wet ingredients and whisk until batter is smooth.

In that same dry ingredient bowl, add the blueberries and toss with the lemon juice.  Sift some powdered sugar over the top and then fold into the pancake batter.

Make the pancakes on whatever griddle you’ve got.

Pour maple syrup over the top (free, using Amazon credit from Swagbucks!)

Cut.

And eat!!!

Hello Mr. Burst of Lemony Sweetness!

(And if there are any left to freeze, these are totally freezable. Is that  word?!)

Makes 20 1/4 cup pancakes.

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No recipe from me.  I spent the day in rental cars, buses, trains, planes and automobiles. There is nothing happening in my kitchen tonight!

(But it’s nice to be home.)

What budget recipes do you have to share this week?!?!

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I made these the other night…I made an extra trip to the store to get the ingredients needed for this morning’s news segment…and spotted some $.99 whole mushrooms.  I see them often for $.99 in the mark down basket in the produce section. I found more this morning…sliced this time. I don’t typically buy extra food when I’m getting food for news segments, but I couldn’t pass these up!

(Gonna have to change the menu plan to incorporate some of the marked down goodies I found this morning!)

This is simple.

• Stew beef.
• Whole mushrooms.
• Green peppers.
• Steak seasoning.

That’s it!

Simple…but oh, so yummy!

Ingredients

About 1 lb. stew beef ($2.48) Manager’s Special
1 box whole mushrooms ($.99) Manager’s Special
2 green peppers, seeded and cut into 1 inch pieces ($.60) Part of the loot from the farmer’s market
Steak seasoning (free) Used $1 coupon with $1 sale price
1 large yellow squash ($.50) From the farmer’s market the other week
1 cup rice ($.20)

Directions

1. Wash and dry the mushrooms.

2. Cut the green peppers.

3. Skewer the meat, mushrooms and peppers. Sprinkle with steak seasoning. (Or marinate with a favorite beef marinade.) Grill for a few minutes on each side, or until beef is cooked to your liking.

4. Steam-saute the yellow squash.

5. Cook the rice as directed while the kebabs are chilling on the grill.

6. Serve Beef and Mushroom Kebabs over Rice with Steam Sauteed Yellow Squash.

Cost $4.77

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On the 4th of July, I had a bag of red potatoes and needed to make a “dairy-free” red potato for those of us who are not having dairy products these days, as well as a dairy-filled something or other.  I made the Grilled Red Potatoes for the guys and me, and this for Steve and my MIL.  It’s a grilled spin-off of the Roasted Red Potato Salad that I made this winter.

Ingredients

About 2 lb. red potatoes, quartered ($1.50)
2 Tbsp olive oil ($.20)
1 garlic clove, crushed ($.05)
2 rosemary sprigs (free from the garden)
Salt and pepper
About 1/2 cup sour cream ($.25)

Mix-In Ideas: Other Garden Herbs, Chives or Green Onions, Bacon Crumbles, What else?!?

Directions

1. Wash the potatoes and rosemary and pat dry.

2. Add the olive oil and crush garlic to a mixing bowl.

3. Add chopped rosemary and some salt and pepper.

4. Add in the quartered red potatoes and toss the potatoes with the oil and rosemary.

5. Place a few spoonfuls on a piece of foil.

6. Wrap the potatoes into packets.

7. Grill the potato packets for about 10-15 minutes, or until they look like this.

8. Transfer the potatoes to the mixing bowl and mash gently.  Stir in the sour cream, and any other mix-ins.

9. Serve Grilled Red Potato Salad warm or cold.

Makes 4-6 side dish portions.

Cost $2

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On Friday night we grilled chicken and kebabs and there was quite a bit leftover chicken. So I sliced it and added it to a salad, as I still had some of the $1 lettuce bags from last week’s trip. (We are now waiting for more lettuce leaves to grow in the garden after the first round of picking. I have been using a few leaves at a time for wraps or sandwiches too.)

As I went foraging for toppings for our dinner salad, I ended up with an all green salad.

Green Peas.

Green Granny Smith Apple.

Green Onion Slices.

Green Romaine lettuce.

Because I was adding apple to the salad, I thought a homemade apple vinaigrette was in order.

And guys…you should know that Steve really liked this!  I know what he was thinking when I put this salad in front of him, “A salad. Really? This isn’t man food.”

But here were the phrases that I heard uttered after the first bite, and every after every third bite that followed.

• Whoa. This is good.
• Hang on. This is really good.
• Wow. I didn’t know a salad could be this good.
• Honey, you out did yourself again. (He is easily pleased!)

So guys…give those salads a chance! (I think it was the dressing that got him this time.)

(Note: Recipe written below for 4 adults, even though our kiddos didn’t eat the lettuce…they had everything else.)

Ingredients

1 1/2 grilled chicken breasts, sliced or diced ($1.34) Perfect recipe to use up that batch grilled chicken
1 bag of Romaine lettuce ($1)
1 granny smith apple, chopped ($.25)
1 cup peas ($.40) Recent $.88/bag sale
2 green onion stalks, sliced ($.17) $.50/bunch sale this past week

Dressing
1/4 cup oil ($.10)
1/4 cup white wine vinegar ($.20)
2 Tbsp apple juice ($.03)
1 tsp sugar ($.01)
1/2 tsp garlic salt ($.01)
Few dashes of pepper

Directions

Throw all ingredients onto a salad.

Shake dressing in a sealed container. Pour over salad.

And eat.

Cost $3.51

Hope y’all had a superb July 4th weekend!!!

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While foraging yesterday, I found some Smokehouse Maple grill seasoning hanging out amongst the other spices in the spice cabinet. Hmmm….let’s try this with some chicken. And I just so happened to have picked up a few packages of chicken at the store this morning.

This could not have been an easier chicken to make. It went something like this…

Sprinkle.

Grill.

Eat.

Seriously Simple. And it was oh-so-tasty! The chicken had a smokey, sweet, and savory flavor to it…but it wasn’t too sweet nor too smokey. It was perfect!

Ingredients

3 chicken breasts ($2.42) I grilled some extras too!
Smokehouse Maple spices (free) Match coupon with $1 sale price

Salad from the garden
Homemade Dressing ($.25)
Sweet potatoes ($1.29)

Directions

1. Bake the sweet potatoes.

2. Sprinkle the seasonings onto both sides of the chicken.  Then grill (until cooked through).

It really was that simple. And so much flavor for not really doing much other than sprinkling on the seasonings!

2. Meanwhile, prepare salad with greens from the garden.

3. Serve the Smokehouse Maple Chicken with Sweet Potatoes and Salad.

Cost $3.96

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Tonight we are having this Eggplant Focaccia bread, among other things, at an impromptu “Italian Dinner Party” with the Once A Month Family. Tricia is bringing a Mozzarella Tomato Salad, some chicken pot pie..and I’ll throw some grilled chicken into the mix too.  Nothing fancy…a free for all dinner with friends!

I’m sorry I don’t have time now to get the recipe up…I took a-l-o-t of photos (123 to be exact…see why I don’t have time to post them tonight…but I promise not to share all 123 either) and want to give it the attention and justice it deserves.  I shall share le photos (and the recipe) tomorrow.

Friends are on their way…

(Did I use to many of these “…” ???)

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No recipe from me tonight.

My head is buried in the sand on the beaches of Manuscript Deadline.

I have no idea what we’re having for dinner tonight. And I’m OK with that.

Please leave your links for us. After a week of gritting sand between my teeth and dreaming about Tyler crawling around in my editor’s office in the Flatiron Building in New York, I’ll be in need of some recipe inspiration!

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