peppermint bark

Have any leftover candy canes from the holidays? Even if you don’t, you may want to find some: peppermint bark is too inexpensive–and delicious–of a treat to miss!

What you need: chocolate (I prefer a big block of dark, from Trader Joe’s) and candy canes. Yes, that’s it!

Directions: Put the candy canes in a plastic bag and crush with a hammer. Melt the chocolate in a double boiler. Add the candy canes to the melted chocolate, removing it from the heat. Pour the mixture onto a greased cookie sheet. Refrigerate.

Give it an hour or so, pull out the cookie sheet and break the bark into chunks. Voila: there you have it!

There are a million variations you can try, but the results will be spectacular.

For inspiration: Paula Deen,
Simply Recipes and epicurious. Enjoy!

healthy addiction

A long time ago, I read that making your bed improves your room’s look by 70%. So I started doing it, kept doing it and it stuck. Now, every morning, I roll out of the covers and, before putting in my contacts or brushing my teeth, I make the bed.  It’s routine, habitual, without much thought. So it is with my daily lunches: basically every night, I get home and eat dinner. Then, before I do anything else, I pull out my folded brown bag and make my lunch with leftovers or PB&J or whatever I can find right away. It’s quick, it’s easy, it’s habit.

It works for me.

What are some frugal habits you’ve developed, and how did you do it?

Christmas Gifts You Can Bake

I have half a mind to run out and buy the ingredients for these recipes. I’d love to do an all-night baking fest sometime soon. So far I’ve tried the pecans… the others are on my list!

Toasted Pecans

Chocolate Pretzels

Peppermint Bark

Hazelnut Crunch

Frugal Lunch #1: Salad

Most of my work lunches are repackaged leftovers of a dinner the night before. Sometimes though, I eat something for dinner (scrambled eggs? cereal? hot dogs? chocolate cake? yes, embarrassing) that just doesn’t package and/or reheat well. When that happens, I have a growing arsenal of other ideas that are easily made with things we usually have in the house.

Yesterday and today? my salad, special blend.

Ingredients:
Lettuce
Leftover meat (chicken or turkey)
Dried cranberries
Nuts (walnuts or pecans)
Cheese (optional)
Dressing (Briana’s Blush Wine for me)
Side: bread (pecan raisin, Italian, crostini, crackers)

Directions:
Grab a tupperware container and put in freshly washed lettuce (I especially enjoy romaine). Top with chopped leftover meat, nicely chopped as you like it. Add the berries, nuts and cheese; then top with dressing. Snap on the lid, and you’re good to go.

I usually also pack some toasty bread, along with whatever sides I can scramble up.

Enjoy!

Awkward Situation: Restaurant Etiquette

If this were you, what would you do?

We were out for dinner Friday night, at a new Chinese restaurant we’d read rave reviews about. It was classy, elegant, with streamlined decor and square white plates. The neighborhood wasn’t the greatest, but the food made up for it: delicious, super-fast, beautiful.

Our waiter was available, but not pushy. He gave advice honestly, not in that way where you know they are just saying it.  We liked him, we liked the food, we were very satisfied.

The check came: $28-something. We paid in cash (two twenties), and they brought us back change: a $10 bill a $1 bill and change.

We had no other cash to tip with.

We went up to the counter, asked if we could get the $10 broken, and they said no. I don’t remember why now. So what could we do?

$2 is a very small tip, and $10 is ridiculously high. I mean, the food was good and we liked our waiter, but $10 on a $28 meal?

Before I tell you what we decided, tell me: what would you do?

Ethnic on the Cheap: Bohemian Food

The Background

Imagine. The six of us sitting at the round table, covered with a wiped-clean plastic pink tablecloth, O telling a joke, flirting with the waitress. In the midst of our glasses and plates, a small white vase works as centerpiece, with a carnation and baby’s breath inside. There are people all around the restaurant, many in their 60s or older, with a few children running around here or there. There’s a salad bar, I think, 1970s-style decor and a waitress dressed in the quintessential server garb: a collared shirt tucked into a skirt that hits just below her knee, suntan nylons, white gym shoes. Her arms are strong, experienced. O learns her name and will use it throughout the meal. He orders cow tongue, says it just like that, and we kids grimace. This, if you don’t recognize it, is my childhood. We’re eating out with family friends, an older couple who were like grandparents to my brother and me.

These friends of ours, no longer living, were originally from Czechoslovakia. They introduced my parents to a lot of things: summers in Wisconsin, fishing, supper clubs, Bohemian restaurants. Mostly, I remember the svickova.

A Lost Cuisine

I can’t understand why so many people today will do Japanese, Greek, Indian, Thai, Chinese—all in the name of ethnic—but have never tried Bohemian. It’s a tragedy, for sure.

Bohemian food is delicious—can I even explain? It’s cheap—under $10 buys you an entree, a soup/salad, coffee, and a dessert. The atmosphere isn’t much: you’ll probably feel a little time-warp when you see the pastels or wood-paneled walls in a lot of these restaurants; but the quality more than compensates.

What You Must Try

1. Svickova (pronounced Sveech-ko-vah): Pickled beef in the most delicious sauce. So tender, so soft, so completely delicious. Get it with bread dumplings to mop up the extra sauce.

2. Koprova (pronounced Ko-prah-vah): Similar to svickova, koprava is also pickled beef, but in a sauce that resembles a dill flavor. Again, go with the bread dumplings, not the mashed potatoes or anything similarly familiar.

3. Kolachkys (pronounced Ko-lah-ch-key): Remember, dessert will be included with your meal. They’ll probably offer you other choices like apple strudel or chocolate pudding, but try the kolachky. It’s a pastry-type cookie with jelly instead. There are all sorts of flavors; I prefer apricot or raspberry.

Where to Find It

I can’t speak for areas outside Chicagoland, though a quick Google or Yelp search should get you answers, but in my neck of the woods, do try:

Bohemian Garden (this link even takes you to a coupon)
Bohemian Crystal
Little Bohemian Restaurant

waste not, want not: cooking by numbers

(This is weekly post #2 in the Frugal Foodie Thursday series.)

Personally, I think there’s a lot of satisfaction in using things up. When I squeeze the last drop of shampoo out or force one more bit of toothpaste from the tube, I take joy in knowing I used it to its fullest; it wasn’t wasted. I’m like this with a lot of things (brown lunch bags included) but with nothing more so than food.

A few weeks ago, my parents were out of town. They’d left food in the refrigerator and pantry (there’s always food in the refrigerator and pantry), so I figured with a little planning, I’d have enough to get me through the week. The first thing I did was clean out the fridge. I took everything out, figured out what was expired and tossed it (I hate throwing away food. If I could figure out a way to control the over-purchasing habits of certain unnamed members of the household, I would. The biggest problem we seem to have is our not knowing what we have. I’ll organize, but it never lasts).

Then I started deciding what I could make/eat. Right away, I made myself a shmorgasboard of cottage cheese, cheddar cheese and crackers, and iced juice. I had fruit for my lunches and recently expired milk I’d boil into pudding. Once things were neatly organized, using food up was easy. If/when I get my own kitchen, I would love to be OCD about using up what I buy; I’d love to stockpile main ingredients and be uber-organized about knowing what other things to get weekly. I’d love to know how to really stretch the food I buy, rather than wasting it.

Just last week, I came across a cool site that makes pantry/refrigerator-raiding easy: Cooking by Numbers. The way it basically works is you check off the items you have to work with, and it provides all the recipes that correspond. It will give recipes that ONLY use your ingredients, if at all possible, and it will provide recipes where you’d just need to pick up one or two things. Sounds like a dream come true to me!

brown-bagging it

Finishing another chapter of my latest read, I spooned the last bit of raspberry yogurt to my mouth and put the container down. One final honey-wheat pretzel stick, and I bunched up my plastic baggies, coupled them with my used plastic spoon and threw them in the trash can. Then I picked up my library book and neatly folded my brown lunch bag—I would use it again tomorrow.

I bring my own lunch to work every day. This isn’t new; I’ve been doing it since I started my job back in June.

What is new is the saving of the brown lunch bag. I buy these disposable bags in packs of 200 from the grocery store, for a price I don’t even remember off the top of my head. It couldn’t be more than $3. Let’s just say it is $3—doing the math, this means each bag costs $0.015. That’s nothing, really. And come on, I’m making good money; it’s not like I can’t afford to buy a pack of brown bags every 200 lunches. It’s hardly going to break me.

So why do I keep saving and reusing these bags?

To be honest, I’m not sure. Last Friday, for example, when I pulled three neatly folded, mint-condition brown bags out of my desk drawer, planning to take them home and store them in the cabinet for use the next week, I felt time pause. Purse slung on my arm, coat picked up, I had reached for my book and grabbed these bags. What in the world? I put them in my car and drove them home and thought: Have I gone a little overboard with this whole savings thing?

Earlier that week, I had seen that I was low on brown bags. There were two new, unused ones left. Yet somehow now, I’ve found a way to postpone purchasing a new, under-$3 package. Does this make me a frugal, thrifty individual? Or am I slowly nickel-and-dime-ing (or in this case, 1.5-pennying) my way to insanity?

Again, I don’t know. I am comforted, I suppose, by the utter freeness I feel to purchase things I really want, like the $80 boots of yesterday: brand-name and on sale, yes, but also unnecessary and probably a little extravagant.

The thing is, I’m finding, that I really hate wasting. The reason I’ll OK the $80 boots is because, well, I know I’ll use them. They’re replacing a $20 pair I got from Payless three years ago. That pair doesn’t fit as well and it has a hole in the right bottom heel that I repaired, but I’ve used them consistently for quite a while.

I don’t feel OK about tossing a $0.015 brown bag when it’s perfectly good. If I didn’t get anything on it, if there aren’t any holes or tears in it, why should I throw it away? That, to me, feels like wasting.

So here I am. I am slowly, timidly navigating the confusing world of wasting, not-wasting and frugality.

Right now, that means saving clean lunch bags.

So be it.

Spacca Napoli in Ravenswood

(This is weekly post #1 in the Frugal Foodie Thursday series.)

For months, Friday nights have been pizza nights. My brother and I started this tradition last winter in an effort to find the best pizza in Chicagoland. We’re big pizza fans—I, more than anyone. I could eat it every day: cold, hot, toppings, no toppings. And since I’m feeling especially daring, I might as well tell you my culinary exploits have involved my making every imaginable substance into its own kind of pizza. Crusts I’ve tried: store-bought dough, homemade dough, pita, Italian bread, crackers… I’ll spare you the details, but suffice it to say, each has its pluses and minuses. Each, that is, except the one I’m about to describe.

I should also tell you, in the interest of full disclosure, that, while I wouldn’t refuse it of course, I don’t especially prefer Chicago-style pizza. Call it sacrilege if you must, but this Chicago girl likes her pizza thin-crusted, Neapolitan-style. Blame it on world travel or perhaps my Italian grandmother. Either way, this is how it’s got to be.

A while back, Chicago Magazine did an issue that highlighted the best Neopolitan-style pizza places in Chicago. We’ve tried as many as we could. Some have been good, some great—but none could top Spacca Napoli, the first we visited and I daresay the best pizza in the city.

When you go, if at all possible, get the Pizze Margherita. It’s covered with just enough ripe tomatoes, Italian mozzarella, fresh basil and perfect olive oil. The crust is soft—not too soft, but easy to break off and chew, and crunchy—not cracker-crunchy but crisp. The flavor is sweet in a deliciously olive oil way, which, I’ll just say it, is the best kind of sweet in the world of pizza. It’s pizza perfection and, top this: it’s ready in minutes. Their ovens cook it up quickly and I mean quickly.

Other reasons to visit: a beautiful atmosphere, complete with al fresca dining, should you choose; great service—our waiter was completely charming; and easy parking just a block or so away.

Even more! Stop by their website, where a 25% OFF coupon will work for lunch Wednesdays or Thursdays through the end of the year. For dinner, I spent around $12, but I’ll admit I just drank tap water; I don’t know if the lunch menu’s even more affordable, but with the coupon, what could you lose?

Make plans to visit this incredible spot soon. I know you’ll love it.

↑ Grab this Headline Animator

frugal foodie thursdays

I should tell you a little something about me: in addition to being a frugal writer committed to Biblical finance who PF blogs and sometimes runs and also likes to travel, I am head over heels for one more thing: quality cuisine. I am a big-time, no-denying-it, long-time foodie.

Though I don’t get to spend as much time as I’d like with this passion, it still finds its way into my everyday life. I pack my lunches every day, I bake something every week or so, I go to the grocery store(s) on a regular basis. And cooking, for all its pleasures, is something I want to make more of.

So.

I hereby declare Thursdays to be frugal foodie Thursdays. Here at This Writer’s Wallet, I will be posting on frugal, food-related topics every week. Sometimes, I’ll review a local restaurant, sometimes I’ll share a recipe, sometimes I’ll link you to a bunch of others…you get the idea. It’ll be a regular, food-loving shmorgasboard of delicious info.
Why don’t you join me? You can participate once, every week, or whenever you’d like. If you post your own foodie Thursday entry, comment here with your link, and I’ll mention you in the post. It begins tomorrow, November 1. Happy eating!