100 DOLLARS A WEEK - Day 14 (Early Shopping Day)...

I'm both sad and happy to report that I've half given up on taking the recyclables to the recycling center. As I drove up to the recyling center for the second time in a month and saw a line of 5 or 6 people, all waiting to insert their cans and bottles, can by can, bottle by bottle, into the machine that tallies and calculates your total refund at 5 cents a can or bottle, I decided for the second time in a month that it wasn't worth my trouble.

What started out as a summer project with my kids (who were here with me during the week when the line was less congested) to not only show them the value of recycling, but to teach them that they shouldn't be too proud to do something honest and decent, anything honest and decent, if need be, to earn money, if need be, has become a casualty of my good fortune - the luxury of deciding that 20 minutes of my time is better served writing this blog post than getting $2.50 back from the recycling center for a month's worth of recycling.

As I write this, I am kicking myself for not leaving my recyclables with one or more of the people who have decided, for any number of reasons, that it is good and/or necessary to stand in that line and get that refund, but I know there's a lady who combs through the neighborhood recyclables early on Friday mornings before the trash truck comes round. And I think I'll save them for her.

Why not let Waste Management take them if they're all just going to get recycled in the end? Because I'm pretty sure the bigwigs over at Waste Management make shitloads of money with all their government contracts and such and don't have to even think about waking up at the buttcrack of dawn to dig through other peoples' trash to scrounge up a few dollars.

On a separate note, the Man took the day off from work today and had the pleasure of watching me do the kitchen towel salad spinner thing on the spinach that ended up in our omelettes today, which really is a very small and efficient motion that looks more like the Hooker Purse Twirl than anything else. When I walked back into the house, he said "So THAT'S what it looks like. When I read that post, I thought it looked more like THIS." <wildly cranking his entire arm so it looks like a giant ferris wheel in very fast motion>

It made me laugh to the point of tears to think that I might have inspired anyone to walk outside in plain view of their neighbors and do that, all the while getting water splashed on their faces.

Remember folks: it's all in the wrist. Just like a hooker twirling her purse.

And on to the take...

$35.74 spent at Fresh & Easy...

$40.30 spent at Earthgrown.

As I said before, it's an unusual couple of weeks around here between helping my parents to move and attending weddings two weekends in a row. So between having the kids hang out with their grandparents two Friday nights in a row, and then eating dinner at weddings two nights out of two weeks, we've spent a little less on and of our groceries than we normally would.

This week, between Fresh & Easy and Earthgrown, I spent $79.08 as follows.

PRODUCE: For avocados, cantaloupe, broccoli, green cabbage, cauliflower, carrots, Fuji apples, collard greens, cilantro, Bartlett pears, Crimini mushrooms, cucumbers, red leaf lettuce, jalapenos, green onions, Roma tomatoes, green and red bell peppers, garlic, white onions and mung bean sprouts, I spent $27, about 34% of the total.

MEAT: For a pound of salmon, a pack of chicken drumsticks, and a pound of bacon, I spent $14.00, about 18% of the total.

DAIRY: For a gallon of milk, a pound of unsalted butter, a small block of cream cheese, a small block of mild cheddar, 18 large eggs, and a 32 oz. container of yogurt, I spent $18.00, about 22% of the total.

PANTRY: For a large can of whole tomatoes, a pack of yakisoba (yahkkeesohbah) noodles, half a pound of brown sugar, a packet of curry powder, 3 whole nutmegs, a pack of granulated onion, and 4 packages of Sapporo Ichiban ramen, I spent $9.00, about 12% of total.

GRAINS: For a 6 pack of plain bagels on clearance, I spent $0.70, about 1% of total.

INDULGENCES: For 1 brownie mix, a box of Fresh & Easy Oreo-type cookies, and a bottle of cheap, CHEAP rose (rohZAY), I spent $6.00, abut 8% of total.

MISC: For a bottle of Suave men's body wash (which is less than half than the bottle of AXE that we would normally buy, and, as it turns out, quite effective, so we'll probably stick with it) and a box of gallon freezer bags, I spent $5.00, about 6% of total.

What I've got in mind so far...

- a Tandoori chicken dinner using those drumsticks along with an aloo gobi using this week's cauliflower  and a couple of the white rose potatoes left from last week

- Gala apple and cheddar cheese snacks

- a pan-seared salmon with homemade tartar sauce and a cucumber, tomato and red onion salad of some sort

- a pernil (pehrNEEL), which is just Spanish for pork roast, using that bone-in, skin on picnic shoulder I bought last week, marinated in some citrus garlic concoction (I still have a lot of citrus left over from the past couple of weeks), along with some collard greens and, if they're ripe enough by then, also the platanos (PLAHtahnohss) or plaintains I bought last week

- If I buy fish sauce and shrimp at the Vietnamese market in OC as planned, then I'll probably use some of that shrimp, some rice noodles bought months ago, some cilantro, sprouts, green onion and egg to make pahd thai as well. That grocery trip will probably cost us an extra $10.00, bringing this week's grocery total to just under $90.00, but I'm not sure that I will. I may just end up making a chicken pad thai. We'll see.

Back later with the meals,

shinae

100 DOLLARS A WEEK - Day 12...

So I finally threw it away.

After almost three months, I chucked the dish sponge. The dish sponge that has washed every last pot, pan, plate, bowl, fork, spoon, knife, younameit, that has passed through this kitchen. I'm pretty sure I personally know and like a lot of people who think it gross that I kept it that long, but this is one expression of my brand of conservation, and I promise that even if it didn't look clean, it was washed, rinsed, dried and occasionally bleached between uses.

Some people like to practice conservation by buying things that are supposed to be green from companies who are supposed to be green, and I think that's great. One way I practice conservation is by just buying less and using less. Because whether or not a company says it's green, a factory is still a factory. It still takes resources and creates emissions to produce a manmade sponge, whether that sponge is made of post consumer materials or not.

This isn't to say that there aren't a lot of really honest companies out there doing the best they can to do the least amount of harm to Earth, but the truth is there are a lot of companies that create green products just so they won't be left out of the money there is to be made by participating in this small but growing revolution.

And while some really dedicated people do, I don't care to spend my time doing the very deep research it takes to find out what every last company I patronize really does behind and beyond the marketing image, so I do what I believe can and does have real impact: I use less. Or actually, if you look at it another way, I use a thing more before I hand it off to the landfills. And I believe that if each of us used a disposable yet reusable thing even just one more time than we normally would before we discarded it, it would make a worthwhile difference in the amount of non-biodegradable waste we produce.

So if I use a paper towel to wipe up something innocuous like water or black coffee, I push it off to a corner to use later in the day when I spill fish sauce or oil on the kitchen floor, or to kill a spider, or even wipe the toilet bowl rim, before throwing it away. If I use a straw to drink clear liquids, I give it a rinse and reuse it (but don't worry, if you're ever a guest in my home, you'll get a new one) until it gets worn or damaged. I save unmarked jars (or remove the labels) and containers for storage and reuse them to store kimchi or pickled jalapenos. (As you can see, my aesthetic preferences and anti-branding quirk are sometimes stronger than my conservationist streak.) I fill the sink and soak the dishes to wash them rather than leave the water running as I'm washing. Stuff like that...

I think other methods of conservation are just as important, but what I think is most important is that we make some conscious effort every day, even if only just one, to waste less. Like taking just 2 packets of ketchup if that's all we're going to use instead of mindlessly grabbing 5 and throwing away 3. Or taking just what we can eat at a buffet, knowing we can always go back for more. I believe in the quiet but powerful critical mass that can be created if we each made these small and easy choices within our own spheres of influence each and every day.

And I also believe I'd better stop being so damned preachy so many days in a row. I think tomorrow I'll talk about something totally apolitical like chocolate.

Wait. Chocolate comes from the Rain Forest... :/

BREAKFAST

I think I mentioned that the corn tortillas in this barrio come in packs of no less than 80, so I have to come up with lots of uses, or we'll end up throwing 40 of them away. This morning, it was corn tortilla quesadillas topped with the very last cup of the leftover gumbo from Saturday.

   6 corn tortillas @ $0.20
+ 5 slices of cheese @ $1.25
+ 2 cups of coffee @ $0.40

= BREAKFAST: $1.85 total, $0.95/serving

LUNCH

Lunch for the Man is a raw veg bibim bahp with a fried egg on top, veg packed separately as he'll have to nuke his rice. Oh, and a Gala apple on the side.

There's seasoned gochoojahng under that egg...

Veg for the bibim bahp...

I'm not in much of an eating mood, so I'm having some steamed rice with some of the leftover nuoc cham with deep fried onions in it from last night's fried fish dinner. That and more coffee (which I didn't drink yesterday but already accounted for).

   Misc. raw veg $0.40
+ 1 fried egg @ $0.20
+ 1 Gala apple @ $0.20 (all else accounted for yesterday)

= LUNCH: $0.80 total

As many of the good people on the chowhound What's For Dinner thread have been talking homemade ravioli, and as I've got this packet of wonton skins that the Man had me buy months ago to make him cream cheese wontons that I didn't, and as it's one of those overcast days that infuses me with energy to make a somewhat labor intensive dinner, dinner will be wonton skin ravioli stuffed with a sweet potato and cheese stuffing, sauteed in brown butter and accompanied by some of the sweet Italian sausage I bought last week.

Braised or sauteed kale on the side.  We'll see what sounds good as I'm cooking...

Should be about 5 bucks for dinner, but I'll be back later with pics and the full breakdown.

Off to eat real quick and roast some yams...

shinae

@8:53 PM - Sweet potato ravioli as planned using up that packet of wonton wrappers that's been haunting my deli drawer for 2 months. I was going to serve the ravioli with the sausage, but decided that the sausage went better with the kale, so I sauteed the kale with the sausage, a quarter of a white onion, a few cloves of garlic, and a handful of those raisins I made for Mads.

   1.2 lbs. of yam @ $0.83
+ 1/4 wheel of queso fresco (which worked a lot like ricotta salata when brought up to room temp) @ $0.50
+ 1 egg @ $0.15
+ misc. seasonings (dried ginger, cinnamon, black pepper) @ $0.20 max
+ 2 bunches of kale @ $1.58
+ 1/4 of a white onion and 3 cloves garlic @ $0.20
+ 3 links of Italian sausage @ $1.80

= DINNER: $5.30 total, $1.75/serving (for 3 very generous servings)

And that was dinner. But then I got one of those salty, fatty, generally anything and everything bad for you cravings that I didn't feel like cooking for, so I sent the Man out with a $1.99 coupon for 2 pieces of Church's Fried Chicken plus a biscuit and mashed potatoes. The Man and I shared the chicken, and I learned that Church's is good in a PMS pinch. A little too salty for my liking even given my salt craving, and I'll pass on the biscuits and mashed taters every time from here on out, but it's hard to beat 2 bucks to satisfy a salt and grease craving with almost no effort.

That plus a Diet Coke (because I'm also craving bubbles)...

= SNACK: $3.25


Saturday:  $15.00
Sunday:  $23.00
Monday:  $8.00
Tuesday:  $10.00
Wednesday:  $11.00

$67.00 spent so far with 2 days left to go. I already know dinner tomorrow will have something to do with them pig trotters, and the Man's lunch of leftover ravioli and kale is already packed.

Slim pickins on TV tonight. I think I'll try to write some more...