Restocking my Pantry

Spending $5 dollars on groceries for the past 2 weeks was so helpful! I was glad that I was able to save money and use what I had on hand. I made pretty much everything that I listed before and a few additional thing, like cookies and fresh bread. The only bad thing about using things from my pantry is that now I feel like I have nothing left! So my grocery budget this week will probably be more like $40 dollars instead of the typical $20. But the way I see it, everything is evening out in the end since I only spent around $30 dollars on groceries in Oct so far instead of the typical $60 dollars that I would have spent by now.

So this week I will be cooking for myself and Jason (yay!). Im glad that he will be home and not have to travel for work for about another month or so. This week I am going to be cooking a bunch of things in the crock pot and continuing to pack my lunch every day. Here is my menu:

Breakfasts: Granola, zucchini muffins, english muffins with peanut butter, and fruit.

Lunches: leftovers, soup from the freezer (which I made last week), hummus with tortilla and carrots, hard boiled eggs, and fruit.

Dinners:

Monday- Crock pot Zucchini Parmesan- I don't use a recipe for this. I just add a jar of sauce, 2 cups of zucchini, 1 cup of ricotta cheese to the crock pot. Then sprinkle it with mozzarella cheese and bread crumbs and cook on low for 6 hours.
Tuesday- Mushroom stroganoff
Wednesday- Pierogie casserole
Thursday- Bean and rice
Friday- Creamy rice with mushrooms and peas
Saturday- Pasta with tomato cream sauce- I adapted this recipe from one I found in a cook book that I found at goodwill- classy I know. The cookbook was from the 50's and it was all about home freezing, it is quite possibly my favorite cookbook ever. Anyway, the recipe is sooo easy..

Tomato cream sauce

1/2 onion, chopped
1 clove of garlic
3 tbsp butter
8 oz can of tomato sauce
1/2 cup dry white wine (or chicken stock)

In a pan saute onion and garlic in butter (Pretty please use butter! I tried olive oil and cooking spray and neither compare to the amazing taste that the butter gives to the sauce) Once the onions and garlic are somewhat soft and translucent add one 8 oz can of tomato sauce and 1/2 cup of dry white wine. cook for about 5 minutes to let alcohol cook off. Next add the heavy cream. Simmer for 5 minutes and voila the best cream sauce ever!