Jul 1: Trader Joe’s Tarte D’alsace; Grilled Chicken, Jaipur Vegetables and Rice

Lunch

For today’s lunch we had Trader Joe’s Tarte D’alsace – half each. We seemed to have nailed the reheating by ignoring instructions and allowing the oven to come to temperature first, then continuing with the convection heating.

Trader Joe’s Tarte D’Alsace is $4.49 or $2.25 per serve.

Dinner

The thigh and leg from this week’s supermarket rotisserie chicken were the protein, accompanied by Trader Joe’s Jaipur Vegetables and short grain brown rice.

The rice was prepared in the pressure cooker (otherwise it would have taken too long being brown rice), while the Jaipur Vegetables were boiled, while above the boiling water the chicken was reheating in the steam.

A little sriracha sauce added extra spice.

  • The $10.99 chicken is broken into quarters or $2.75 a serve
  • The Jaipur Vegetables are $1.99 a pack, or $1.00 a serve
  • Rice adds another 50c per serve.

Dinner tonight was mostly pre-prepared and cost $4.25 per serve.

Jun 30: Quesadilla; NY Strip Steak with Caesar Salad

Lunch

We were planning on having the gyro meat in a wrap again, but it’s disappeared from the shelves at Trader Joe’s. This is not unusual!

  • One flatbread (half of two) costs 50c a serve
  • Half a can of refried beans, shared across two halves: 26c
  • A very generous serve of salsa is 20c per serve
  • 2 oz of cheddar split between two is 50c per serve

Lunch today cost $1.46 per serve.

Dinner

NY Strip Steak with ‘new’ Caesar Salad for our Thursday night steak night tradition. Tonight it was an aged NY Strip Steak from the Prather Ranch delivery.

We grilled it very rare on the flat side of the griddle on the induction heater and kept it blue – exterior seared while the interior is only warm. Because this is dry aged it can take it.

  • We buy Prather Ranch meat because of the quality, not price so 12.8oz for $20.47 is definitely not the cheapest NY Strip you can buy, but I doubt you’d find better meat for $10.24 per serve
  • A pastured egg is 50c or 25c per serve.
  • Seasonings ran about 45c per serve
  • An organic lettuce cost $1.99 or $1 a serve
  • Instead of croutons, we used Mesquite smoked almonds which are $7.49 for the pack, but we used only about 1/8th of the pack, or 47c per serve
  • Instead of parmesan, we sprinkled some blue cheese crumbles on the steak. $3.49 for the container but again we used only a small portion, or 22c per serve.

Tonight’s steakhouse quality meal was $12.63 per serve. The steak was exceptionally tender with a great beef flavor.