Lunch
With no advance planning, we decided on our take on a quesadilla for lunch.
- 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
We decided on a meat free meal, and chose a Chowhound recipe for Grilled Halloumi and Vegetable Kebabs, except we dropped the tomato sauce in favor of one made of hummus and lemon juice.
While the flavors were there, this was pretty much a disaster of a cooking method. We felt that the recipe had been created without being tested, as the unevenness of cooking on the vegetables, combined with halloumi’s inability to stay skewered left us with fried halloumi separate from the grilled vegetables. This fried halloumi was better than the two pieces that remained in the kebab that were only cooked on the edge.
The hummus and lemon sauce worked really well with the vegetables. Next time we try this recipe, we won’t do the skewers: instead we’ll cook the vegetables and cheese directly on the grill plate.
A side rant: supermarket receipts from Smart and Final and Ralph’s are terrible. Smart and Final put the measure ahead of the item identification making it seem like the wrong item; Ralph’s (Kroger) abbreviate the item names so much it’s often impossible to identify what item is being referred to. Thankfully Trader Joe’s and Whole Foods have readable receipts.
- Two bell peppers were $2.63 but we used only one, or 66c per serve
- Baby bella mushrooms were $2.49 but we used only half or 63c per serve
- The eggplant was $3.06 but we used only about 1/4 or 38c per serve
- A lemon for the sauce was 79c or 40c per serve
- Hummus for the sauce was 33c per serve
- Halloumi $3.99 or $1 a serve
- And the rice: 33c a serve.
Dinner tonight tasted great despite the cooking challenges, and cost $3.73 per serve.