Oil Cleans!

So, totally by accident, I discovered that oil (mine was canola) will take sticky oil-dust-grime off of surfaces. If your kitchen is spotless, you will not have this problem. Mine is not, and my tea kettle is usually coated in aforementioned stickiness. Plain soap does next to nothing to this substance.

I went to wipe off a splatter of oil from my kettle (see, I'm trying to reform my cleaning ways by paying attention to spills and wiping them up promptly), and the oil took with it the layers of previously-splattered-oil-covered-in-dust goo. Maybe this is a common-knowledge cleaning trick, but I was certainly unaware. After I buy some more oil and have some I can spare from the needs of cooking, I'm going to do this on purpose to the rest of the kettle!

The End of the Month

I have come to the end of my first four-week period in which I withdrew all (or most) of our spending money in one lump sum. I think it has been a success: there was only one instance where I used the debit card to use money for which I hadn't budgeted (I bought a large pack of baby wipes for about $10 which I will subtract from next month's grocery allotment). I have $70 remaining for this week, which is not unexpected. I actually had the same amount set aside for last week, but used a few dollars of my spending money for a couple of luxury purchases (I fell for a limited edition peaberry coffee and some Turkish Delight).

Usually when I plan my menus, I begin by thinking about what we have that I can use up and then I look through cookbooks or my Menu-Mailers. Finally, I list all of the items I'd like to purchase and estimate what they will cost, making creative substitutions when something has to be scratched off of the list. This time, I think I listed the necessary items and things we have run out of first and estimated the prices of those items before researching menus and recipes. And my preliminary total (before crossing anything off determined unnecessary): $61.30. That leaves a grand total of $8.70 for the ingredients for our dinners for the week! Now I may go back and remove some items from the initial list, but this menu should be interesting!

Some Menu Notes

• I am currently trying to keep my weekly food, diaper, toiletry budget (for our family of four -- two adults, one toddler, and one baby) to $100 or less.  We'll see if this is possible or not.
• Normally, Wednesdays and Fridays are fasting days, which means no meat, dairy, or alcohol (or olive oil).  I also try to avoid meat (or at least meat-heavy) meals on Monday for purely thrifty reasons.  (Although, this week there is no fasting at all.)
• Sundays I list lunch because we don't eat breakfast and are at church all morning.  We often have at least my brother for company (if not others as well), and I am exhausted from chasing my two-and-a-half-year-old around the church, so I like to know what we are having.  I also try to make it something slightly special, so I want to make sure I have ingredients for the "special" part on hand (bacon, muffins, syrup for pancakes, etc.).
• Sunday dinner, then, is something incredibly easy.  Think frozen pizza, frozen leftovers, take-out if we have the money, or anything else that requires little brain power or cooking-by-me time.
• I make all our bread in a bread machine.
• I use my Crock Pot most days.  Most recipes need about four hours on high to cook a main dish, so I aim for getting the recipe finished and Crock turned on by 2PM.  That way, dinner can be ready by 6PM.  I also make a lot of use of a rice cooker and a smaller Crock Pot that can be used to steam veggies or boil potatoes.  I haven't had a lot of experience adapting my own recipes to the slow cooker, but I am willing to try.  I think especially this Lent I will be attempting to convert some of Leanne's Vegan Recipes to Crock Pot ones.
• My menus can be used with your own favorite recipes for whatever dish I list.  If you'd like a specific recipe I haven't posted, please email me: perelandracbc@yahoo.com.  I can't pass on entire Menus from Leanne, though, so don't ask.  You need to subscribe to one of her MenuMailers for that.