Author: Philip

Lunch

Another chilly (for LA) day so a warming lunch was in the oven when Philip arrived back from a short Burbank Monday.

• Two eggs per person or $1.00 per serve
• The asparagus was on special for $3.49 and we steamed half of it before adding the eggs, or 88c per serve
• Some grated cheddar rounded out the meal, at 50c per serve.

Lunch today was warming, delicious and cost $2.38 per serve. Today’s image is of lunch.

Dinner

Two more serves of Bruce Aidells’ Pot-Roasted Grass-Fed Beef Chuck with Winter Root Vegetables with cross rib roast was an easy choice for tonight. Served in a bowl to get the maximum amount of the luscious liquid, and a bread roll to soak it up made a delicious meal.

The pot roast was $6.44 per serve and the par baked rustic bread roll was 63c or $7.07 per serve.

Lunch

With Winter’s “biggest storm” underway and a generally miserable day, a warming meat pie seemed to fit the bill well.

Trader Joe’s Steak and Stout pies are $6.49 for two or $3.25 per serve.

Dinner

Greg has been wanting to try this Shrimp and Corn Chowder for some time and tonight was the night. Hunkered in under the storm, driveway sandbagged and effectively closed, it was a night for something warm and soothing.

As it turns out this recipe makes at least 10 very generous serves, although we built the basic soup and only cooked one night’s shrimp at a time, to keep the shrimp from over-cooking. As an alternative to milk we opted for coconut milk (to avoid a probable dairy intolerance).

We served with a par baked sourdough roll.

We felt that overall, the dish was a little too corn heavy – half the recipe would be fine – and a little too sweet. We plan on experimenting before using the rest of the chowder.

• Frozen corn cost $4.98 for two 16oz packs or 49c per serve
• Russet potatoes cost $1.43 or 14c per serve
• Carrots cost 24c or 3c per serve
• Six onions cost $2.49, we used two or 9c per serve
• Coconut milk cost $1.69 for a can, or 17c per serve
• Chicken broth cost $1.99 for a quart, or 20c per serve
• Thick cut bacon is $7.99 for 12 strips, or 26c per serve
• 16oz of shrimp cost $6.99 but we used half for this meal or $1.75 per serve
• Par-baked roll is 63c.

Dinner tonight cost $3.76 per serve and, other than a little sweet, was pretty tasty.

 

Lunch

Because we could, we had the bacon and tomato from a BLT on a very nice sprouted multigrain bread from Trader Joe’s with some supermarket tabouli.

• The sprouted wholemeal is $3.49 a loaf with 18 slices, or 39c per two slice sandwich
• The bacon was $6.99 for 12 slices, and we used 1.5 per serve, or 88c
• We used one kumato per serve or 58c
• We served 1/4 of the tabouli salad or 67c per serve
• Eggless mayo add another 15c per serve.

Lunch today cost $2.67 and was pretty good.

Dinner

A nice warming beef  beef massaman curry seemed appropriate with Winter’s worst storm pending. We had some Beef Sirloin Tip Steaks from our Prather Ranch meat delivery, which is not a cut we’re familiar with. We opted to leave them whole and cook in the Massaman Curry sauce.

Beef massaman is warming without being too spicy. We use a curry base we buy from Amazon for this simple, quick meal.

• We had two steaks of around 10oz each or $5.86 per serve
• The curry is $3.38 per can or $1.69 per serve
• Coconut milk is $1.69 per can or 85c per serve
• Peanuts were $2.99 but we only used half, or 75c per serve
• Potato adds 25c per serve
• The bunch of carrots was 89c but we used half in this dish, or 23c per serve
• Organic brown basmati rice is $4.49 for the pack, but we used only about 20% or 45c per serve.

Dinner tonight was perfect for the weather: delicious and warming but a little expensive at $10.75 per serve. The brown basmati rice (pressure cooked) was light, fluffy and tasty. It’s likely to become our go to rice.

Lunch

For a lunch variation we went back to our gyro/yeros meat.

• The fully cooked sliced gyro/yeros meat is $3.99 per 10oz pack. There are really four serves, so each serve is very slightly cheaper than the chicken, at $1.00 per serve.
• The flatbread is 50c per serve
• Hummus is $3.99 per container and we used about 1/6 or 33c per serve
• We served 1/4 of the tabouli salad or 67c per serve.

Lunch today cost $2.50.

Dinner

With ground pork in the freeze, it was time to revisit the Stir Fried Shanghai Noodles with Ground Pork and Napa Cabbage with some modifications. Bok Choy substituted for the napa cabbage and we used rice noodles.

The recipe makes four very generous serves.

• The pork came from our Prather Ranch meat delivery – 1 lb of ground pork cost $8.31 or $2.78 per serve
• The brown rice vermicelli retails for $2.49 or 63c per serve
• The various seasonings add around 30c per serve
• We used about half of the $1.49 mung bean sprouts or 75c per serve
• The bock choy is $1.79 for the pack, or 45c per serve.

Dinner tonight cost $4.91 per serve for a filling and very tasty dish.

Lunch

We both felt like something ‘eggy’ so we decided on fried eggs on the sprouted multigrain toast with a smear of vegemite, which brings a little umami and salt to the dish.

• The toast is 39c per two slice serve
• Pastured eggs are 50c each, or $1.00 per serve
• Add 5c for vegemite.

Lunch today cost $1.44 per serve.

Dinner

For dinner we used a cross rib steak for Pioneer Woman’s Pot Roast which we’ve enjoyed in the past. This is not a great cut of meat so marinating or slow braising in a pot roast is a great way to get the best from the protein. We had a roast of just over two pounds, which we duly consumed among the three of us, although Philip had a double serve.

We served with cauliflower mash.

• The roast was $21.37 or $5.34 per serve
• Onions are 20c per serve
• The carrots were 69c or 35c per serve
• One cup of red wine is around $1.33 or 67c a serve
• Two cups of broth is half a $1.99 carton or 50c per serve
• The mushrooms were $1.99 or $1 a serve
• The Rosemary came from our own plant
• Add another 15c for oil, seasoning and Thyme
• The organic cauliflower cost $4.20 but we got six serves, so 70c per serve.

Tonight’s dinner cost $8.91 for the pot roast meal.