Preserving the Garden - Day One

My pretty garden earlier this summer - by now it's looking rather ratty but still producing

I'm working on putting up tomatoes for the freezer today.   I already have some roasting and have just started boiling water to skin the remainder.   I also hope to get some zucchini shredded for baking and some sliced, blanched and frozen for frying.   There are some cucumbers in the fridge as well as a few more in the garden that are going to turn into freezer pickles.

It was a productive week around here.   I managed to get my desk aka 'command center' under control as well as getting the kids outgrown clothes removed from their dressers and closets.   Now I need to pull out the nicer items and take them to consignment.   I do still have mountains of clean laundry to put away and more to wash as well.  

Next week I'll share my results of preserving the garden.   Wish me luck!!

March Freezer Cooking - The Results

I've completed most of what I set out to do on my March Freezer Cooking Plan.  The following items are being stashed into the freezer today:

3 Containers of Spaghetti Sauce with Sausage and Meatballs
2 Containers of Turkey Stock
1/2 Turkey Breast

In addition the items I made from scratch to help stretch my pantry this week are:

Macaroni Salad
Banana Chocolate Chip Mini Muffins
Cake Mix Cookies
Homemade Bread (1 loaf)
Turkey Pot Pie (dinner on Thursday)

I'm sorry I don't have photos but the battery in my digital camera has died and I haven't had the time or cash to get it replaced this week.   Payday is tomorrow so that's an item on my list for the weekend.

Next month I'd like to try to attempt more freezer cooking along the lines of what Crystal at Money Saving Mom and Fishmama at Life as Mom accomplish.   I think it will require a bit of advance planning and shopping on my part.   Not sure how well this month's grocery budget is going to support that but I'm going to give it a shot.  Check out both of their final freezer cooking results here and here - as well as check out the links and comments from others for great ideas.

Grocery Planning and Still Cooking

I'm still not done with my freezer cooking.   Yesterday I made a turkey for dinner and today I'm making stock.    I'll post later with the results of what I managed to accomplish and link it up to the host blogs Money Saving Mom and Life as Mom.

Yesterday brought a wonderful taste of spring to our home.  I got two loads of laundry to dry on the line, did a little bit of yard cleanup, took a huge load of items to Goodwill and another load to the dump.   Of course today wouldn't you know it's snowing....sigh....oh well such is March in New England.

My goals for today are to get my grocery lists planned with coupons, balance my finances and finalize our March budget.  In addition to making stock and posting my cooking accomplishments, I'd like to tackle cleaning the layer of dust off my living room (a pellet stove is lovely for warmth but wow it puts out more dust than we realized).

Hope to see you back here a little later....

March Freezer Cooking

My March Freezer Cooking is really a necessity to get through the next two weeks with nothing left in my grocery budget until the next payday. My goal is to prepare things that will make easy, inexpensive meals and keep me out of the store and away from restaurants and take out. I need to accommodate breakfast, boxed lunches, snacks and dinners from my pantry. I think that by doing some freezer and advanced cooking I can achieve tasty healthy meals for my family without entering the grocery store.

Here’s my plan for cooking over the next 3-4 days:

Spaghetti Sauce with Meatballs and Sausage (I have some canned tomatoes and ground beef, ground turkey, sausage as well as some tomatoes in the freezer)

Banana Chocolate Chip Mini Muffins

Blueberry Bread

Cake Mix Cookies (with blue and red sprinkles – Go USA!!)

Roasted Turkey (leftovers to be used for sandwiches, pot pie, stock and soup)

Turkey Stock

Turkey Pot Pie

Macaroni Salad

Homemade Bread


My Menu Plan for this week springboards off my freezer cooking efforts. See my Pantry Challenge Menu Plan Monday post for details.   For more Freezer Cooking ideas check out the March Freezer Cooking posts at Money Saving Mom and Life as Mom.

I'll be posting on Wednesday with the results of my freezer cooking.