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In my blog, My Top 10 Tips for Thrifty Living, I discussed my sneaky tips to living inexpensively. One of the tips that seemed to resonate with my readers was about cooking big meals from scratch for $12-$15 that will last for two or more meals. I’ve had requests to share in more detail some of those recipes, so here you go!
First of all, cooking is an art, and baking is a science. You have to have your ingredients perfect for baking, or you’ll end up with a flat cake. Not so with cooking. With cooking, you have to adjust your spices based upon how big your cut of beef is or how many vegetables you decide to add, etc. Let’s face it: there is no standard size for potatoes, carrot, onions or chickens! Because of this, I have become what I call a “shake-over-the-pot” seasoner. My measurements will seem vague, because… well, it just depends!
The first step is to make sure that you have the basic seasonings on hand. The most common seasonings that I use are salt, pepper and garlic. Next you need poultry seasonings: parsley, sage, rosemary, and thyme (just like the song!). If you’re making beef, simply omit the sage. I also like to keep onion flakes on hand for when I’m in a hurry and don’t want to chop an onion. It’s good in a pinch, but not as good as fresh onion.
Hint: Buy your spices in bulk. Spanish sections of many grocery stores, like Market Basket, sell bulk spices for a fraction of the cost. Check that isle first! I purchased three of these carousels and they have been amazing! I alphabetized the spices, so finding the particular spice that I need is a snap. These units are stackable and are easy to refill. With this organizational system in place, finding your spices is a quick and easy!
The next thing that you’ll need is either a large crock pot or a dutch oven. I use a 7 quart dutch oven because I can fit up to a 17 lb. turkey in it, or a 8 lb. chicken with 4-5 lbs. of potatoes and 1 lb. of carrots. I am cooking for a 7 person family, however, which is atypical. For a smaller family, you can probably use a smaller crock pot or dutch oven, but you won’t have as many leftovers. This is very similar to my dutch oven.
One advantage that I appreciate with a dutch oven, is that you can braise your meat in it, before putting it in the oven. Once your stew is cooked, you can put it back on the stove-top and make your gravy/sauce in it as well. It just saves having to wash extra pans.
The next step is to buy your meat. This is where the bulk of your money is spent, and it’s easy to be intimidated by the price. However, remember that this isn’t a one-night meal, so you can afford to spend a little more to have the meal stretch further. I wait until the meat is on sale, then buy several roasts. For chicken roasts, I can usually get it for anywhere from $.99 lb to $1.29 lb. Beef roasts are more expensive, but I can usually get them anywhere from $2.49-$3.99 lb. A 3 lb. roast is enough for me to make a large stew that will feed our family for 2-3 meals. An 8 lb. chicken will do the same.
The vegetables are your secret weapon to stretch the budget because they add so much bulk to a recipe, yet are inexpensive. A 5 lb. bag of red potatoes usually goes for $2.69, and a 5 lb. bag of carrots is a similar price.
Just so you know, all of my recipes are MSG free. I have a child with an allergy to MSG, so this is a big part of why I had to learn to be a from-scratch cook. It was the best thing for our family, though! The recipe’s below are very similar, so if you learn one, it will be much easier to learn the others. Happy cooking!!
Laura’s Chicken Stew
- Melt 1/2 stick of butter in a measuring cup in the microwave (cover it… it splatters!)
- Shake salt, pepper, garlic, parsley, sage, rosemary, and thyme into the butter. Be liberal with salt and parsley, but careful with the other spices. You can always add more later, but too much will be hard to fix.
- Pull the gibblets out of the chicken, and place the chicken in your crock pot or dutch oven breast side up. I like to rinse my chicken in the sink, just be careful not to run the water too quickly and splatter chicken juice all over your kitchen!
- Take a knife and separate the skin away from the breast, trying hard not to pierce the skin.
- Pour the butter and spices under the skin and spread it around the breast as best you can. Use any butter residue left in your cup to paint the outside of your chicken.
- Fill the pot with chopped potatoes (go for a thin-skin potato like a red or white so that you don’t have to peel it!) and carrots. Use a 4-1 ratio of potatoes to carrots, so if you use 4 lbs. of potatoes, use 1 lb. of carrots.
- Add water to the pot. Enough to see the water from the surface, but not enough to cover everything.
- Set the oven to 350 degrees, or place your crock pot on high.
- Cook for around 2 hours, or 20 minutes per lb. The temperature in the middle of the breast should read 182 degrees on a meat thermometer.
- Pull the roaster out of the pot using two large serving forks, and place on a cutting board. Pull off as much of the usable meat as you can. (If you want to be extra thrifty, you can save the dark meat to make chicken soup!) Dice it up, and put it back into the pot.
- Check the water level and make sure that you have enough for there to be a decent bit of gravy. If not, add some more!
- Next, we make the gravy portion of the stew. Take a small tupperware and place about three-quarters of a cup of very cold water in it. Spoon 2-3 scoops of flour in, place the lid on the tupperware, and shake it up. You want the consistency to be slightly thinner than pancake batter, so tweak the ingredients by adding either more water or flour if the consistency isn’t right. Use a whisk to break up any clumps, or pour it through a strainer.
- Place your dutch oven on the burner, and set it to medium heat. Pour the mixture into the stew and let the stew simmer. It should thicken in just a few minutes into a gravy-like broth. If it doesn’t, make some more flour and water mixture and add a bit more to the stew.
- I like to add a splash of Gravy Master for extra flavor and color, but this can be omitted. See link below if you’re unfamiliar with this product.
- Now’s the time to taste-test! If it doesn’t taste like much, see if you can figure out what it is lacking. It might just need a bit more of everything, if your tongue can’t really detect any of the spices. Salt and garlic tend to add the most flavor, so try those first if you’re unsure.
The recipes all look yummy! I think I’m going to try the Beef Stroganoff first! Thanks! ????
Happy cooking!!
Great and helpful articles. These ideas will really help a lot of families. I am going to try the Stroganoff recipe this week. Keep up the good work!
Glad you liked it! Snap a picture of your creation and add it here!!
Great article! Thanks for the advice!
I love the spice rack–very organized. I’ll be sure to purchase it from this site if I do buy it.
I LOVE mine too! It makes finding my spices so efficient not just for me, but for everyone in the house! No more “Mooooommm! Where’s the cinnamon? I can’t find it anywhere!”