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Your Cheapskates Club Newsletter 06:19

In This Newsletter

1. Cath's Corner
2. From the Tip Store - ​Caring for Guinea Pigs; Storing Sewing Patterns; Serviette Saver
3. This Week's Winning Tip - Changing One Little Habit Saves $200!
4. Share Your Tips
5. On the Menu - Roasted Chicken with Mustard Chive Sauce
6. The $300 a Month Food Challenge - Make a Packet Mix
7. Cheapskates Buzz - Cheapskaters are talking in the Forum and on Cath's blog
8. This Week's Question -
9. Ask A Question - Have a question? Ask it here
10. Join the Cheapskates Club
11. Frequently Asked Questions
12. Contact Details

1. Cath's Corner

Hello Cheapskaters

We're still enjoying our holiday. Tasmania is a beautiful state, we are in awe at the gorgeous countryside we've travelled through. The time is going to fast though, we leave soon, and I'll be back to work on Tuesday!

If you haven't already, tune in on Tuesday night at 7.30pm AEDST, for The Cheapskates Club Show. On Tuesday's show will be about The Bare Bones Grocery Challenge. You can find out more here.

And if you haven't already, please subscribe (so you'll never miss a live show), like (so we know you want more), and share (because we love to spread the message about living the Cheapskates way).

Lots of great tips in this newsletter, and I hope you enjoy the recipe in On the Menu - it's a camping favourite of ours. It cooks as well in a camp oven as it does a conventional oven, and the sauce is delicious.

Have a great week everyone. 

Happy Cheapskating,

Cath

2. From The Tip Store

Caring for Guinea
PigsWe recently welcomed  two male guinea pigs to our family, for free! Buying hay from the pet store can be expensive at $13-15 for a 2kg bag. Instead of buying small bags I bought a whole bale of lucerne at the fodder store for $15. So far this bale has lasted three months and we use it for their bedding and part of their feed. They also need one cup of fresh food a day so I see what is getting a bit wilted in the fridge.  The scrappy bits of green veg in the garden make for good feed; they even scraps like strawberry tops.
Contributed by Naomi McDougall

Storing Sewing Patterns
Are you a home sewer? Have you despaired at replacing pattern pieces into the paper envelope they came in? Well so did I and I often had mangled pattern pieces and/or torn envelopes until I decided to place each pattern into a large resealable plastic bag. Coles have boxes of 20 snap seal bags, 27x35cm, for less than $3 (15cents each). The pattern pieces have less folds so less wear and tear and the pattern envelope with the illustration goes in front so easily visible.
Contributed by Carol Woolcock

Serviette Saver
I use napkins at every meal, and discovered that we were going through a lot of packets. So I went to the Op shop, bought 1dozen material serviettes, use for 1 day, pop into the wash and reuse. Sometimes they get an iron. Cost us $5. After 12 months they are still as good as new.
Contributed by Glenda Hymers

Editor's note: If  you are a sewer, serviettes are easy to make. They can be made from just about any cotton or linen fabric. Old shirts make lovely serviettes, as do old doona covers and sheets or pillowcases. You get  6 - 8 serviettes from a shirt (depends how big you make them) and dozens from doona covers and sheets. A pillow case makes 8 matching serviettes.  Cath

Add a Tip

3. This Week's Winning Tip

This week's winning tip is from Amanda. Amanda has won a one year Platinum Cheapskates Club membership for submitting her winning tip. 

Changing One Little Habit Saves $200!
I have an Amazon kindle. I love to download books for my kindle from the Amazon site - many of them are free, or only a few dollars. At the moment I have about 60 books on the kindle, and have read about 20 of them. I have paid for about 40 of them, some a couple of dollars, some up to $10. Even figuring conservatively, I have probably spent at least $300 on kindle books. I also have recently spend quite a bit on eBay - not a lot in individual bids, just a little here and a little there. Recently I decided that it was crazy to have all these books on my kindle that I had not read yet, and I also started to wonder just how much my little habit was costing me. So I instituted a ban for a month. No Amazon, no eBay. Not even $1 for earrings from Korea, or a $2 kindle book. Zip, nada. Two weeks in and I have not spend a cent. So I decided to check my credit card balance - we have a Visa Debit as a part of my salary packaging for work, so the money that is on there is all mine. Imagine my surprise to find that I have saved over $200 in two weeks just by not spending on those two websites. *gasp* *cough* *choke* Just by changing a habit that I thought was 'little' I have saved $200 this fortnight. Note to self - think before I spend from now on. And continue my spending ban.

Congratulations Amanda,  I hope you enjoy your Cheapskates Club membership.

The Cheapskate's Club website is thousands of pages of money saving hints, tips and ideas. There are over 12,000 tips to save you money, time and energy; 1,600 budget and family friendly recipes, hundreds of printable tip sheets and ebooks.

Let's get together and make the Cheapskates Club Australia's largest online hint, tip and idea library. Share your favourite money saving, time saving or energy saving hint and be in the running to win a one-year membership to The Cheapskate Club.

4. Share Your Tips

Share your favourite hint or tip that saves money, time and energy and be in the running to win a one-year subscription to The Cheapskate Journal.

Remember, you have to be in it to win it!

Share Your Tip

5. On The Menu

Design best-practices suggest a large font size for easy readability both on desktop and mobile devices.

Roasted Chicken with Mustard Chive SauceI
ngredients:
1.5kg chicken pieces
1kg chats (baby potatoes), washed
1/4 cup olive oil
3 tbsp Dijon mustard
1 tsp vinegar
1 tsp garlic powder
3 tbsp chives
Salt and pepper to taste

Method:
Preheat oven to 200 degrees Celsius. Spray a large baking dish with non-stick cooking spray. Chop chives. Place the chicken pieces in the base of baking dish. Add potatoes around the chicken. In a small mixing bowl, whisk together the olive oil, Dijon mustard, vinegar, garlic powder, chopped chives. Pour over the chicken and potatoes. Season with salt and pepper. Roast in the preheated oven for 45-55 minutes, or until chicken is cooked through and potatoes are soft.

This recipe is from the Chicken Recipe File  https://www.cheapskatesclub.net/chicken.html

Next week we will be eating:
 
Sunday: Roast Beef

Monday: Chicken schnitzels, potato bake, peas

Tuesday: Veggie Pasta Bake, salad

Wednesday: Chicken pieces with mustard chive sauce* & baked potatoes

Thursday: MOO Pizza

Friday: Meatball subs

Saturday: Hot Dogs

In the fruit bowl: mandarins, bananas, strawberries

There are over 1,600 budget and family friendly recipes in the Cheapskates Club Recipe File, all contributed by your fellow Cheapskates, so you know they're good.

Add A Recipe

Recipe File Index

6. The $300 A Month Food Challenge

Make a Packet Mix
Commercial baking mixes are pretty mainstream these days. Cake mixes, muffin mixes, biscuit mixes, pastry mixes, pancake mixes, even cheesecake mixes are common and vary in price from the budget 75 cent generic cake mix to the very expensive gourmet mixes that cost up to $11 a box.  

I have no problem with using a mix if I'm in a hurry. And to be honest, sometimes they can be cheaper than making something from scratch. A packet muffin mix bought for $2 on sale, just needs 2/3 cup of milk added to it. So for $2.16 you can make 12 - 15 muffins, quickly and easily.

If you need to fill the cake tin in a hurry, it's an option.

While mixes are convenient, they do contain dubious ingredients (what is a caking agent and do you really want to be feeding it to your family?) and as is, they are often quite flavourless.

There is a better way, a much better way, to have the convenience of mixes without the expense or the health hazards.

You can have your cake and bake it yourself, too, by preparing your own baking mixes.

This is so simple, you’ll wonder why you weren’t doing it already.

To Create Your Own Mixes

1. Locate your favourite recipes for quick breads, coffee cakes, scones, cornbread, brownies, muffins, pancakes, and/or waffles. Just choose two or three to start. Pretty soon you’ll have an arsenal of baking goodness at your ready. (I even do this for instant oatmeal packets.) I've included my favourite chocolate cake recipe below, it makes great cakes and wonderful cake mixes.

2. Gather the ingredients for the recipes in question along with measuring cups and spoons and ziplock bags or air-tight containers and labels or a permanent marker. I find ziplock bags are the most convenient, cost effective and space saving. As a bonus they can be washed and re-used over and over and I use a permanent marker for labelling. I buy my ziplock bags from Aldi when they have their bulk sale once or twice a year.

3. Label your ziplock bags with the name of the recipe, the baking directions, and any wet ingredients that will need to be added later.

4. Create an assembly line to fill the bags with the ingredients needed for each recipe. I typically make six batches of each mix at a time. It doesn’t take much longer than doing one, and I have all the ingredients ready to go anyway.

5. Store these items in the freezer for longest storage. Even though all dry goods go into my freezer for at least a week, I always freeze mixes as soon as they are made too. Freezing not only kills any weevils that may be in the dry ingredients, but prolongs the shelf life of flours which can go rancid over time. If you're not going to use those mixes within six months or so, I suggest they stay in the freezer.

And there you have it - your very own method to make your own, unique baking mixes.

Here are some of the things I prepare as make-ahead mixes:

• Cakes (chocolate cake/coffee cake/gingerbread/orange cake/pound cake)
• Basic muffin mix
• Pancakes/pikelets/crepes
• Biscuits
• Bread (white/wholemeal/corn)
    
Quick Chocolate Cake
Dry Ingredients (add to the bag):
3 cups SR flour
2 cups sugar
1 cup milk powder
1/4 cup cocoa

Wet Ingredients (list on the front of the bag):
2 cups cold water
2 tsp vanilla extract
2 tbsp white vinegar
3/4 cup vegetable oil

You can double, triple, quadruple the quantities (I measure out seven lots at a time, make one up and package six). Put the dry ingredients into ziplock bags and seal. Label the bag and with a permanent marker, add a list of the wet ingredients and the instructions to the front of the bag.

To make a cake add the wet ingredients to the dry ingredients. Stir until just combined.

One quantity will make 2 dozen cupcakes or two 20cm square cakes. Bake at 180 degrees Celsius for 25 - 30 minutes for 20cm cake (or until a skewer inserted in the middle comes out clean). Bake for 12 - 15 minutes for cupcakes or until a skewer inserted in the middle comes out clean.

The $300 a Month Food Challenge Forum
 
The Post that Started it All


7. Cheapskates Buzz

From The Article Archive
The Minimum Wage Challenge 
How to Freeze Biscuit Dough 
Every Little Bit of Savings Adds Up

This Week's Hot Forum Topics
Freezers: Does the Cost of Running Them Outweigh the Savings?
Monthly Budget
Fake-Away Food Fix

Most Popular Blog Posts This Week
Examining Spending Habits Finds Savings
The Benefits of Being Financially Responsible
Stop Procrastinating and Just Do It

8. This Week's Question

A question from Maureen, via The Cheapskates Club Show
"How can I build a slush fund, when I don't have anything left from the grocery budget?"

Do you have the answer?

If you have a suggestion or idea for Maureen, let us know. We'll enter your answer into our Tip of the Week competition, with a one-year membership to the Cheapskates Club as the prize too.

Send Your Answer

9. Ask A Question

We have lots of resources to help you as you live the Cheapskates way but if you didn't find the answer to your question in our extensive archives please just drop me a note with your question.

I read and answer all questions, either in an email to you, in my weekly newsletter, the monthly Journal or by creating blog posts and other resources to help you (and other Cheapskaters).

Ask Your Question

10. Join The Cheapskates Club

For just $25 a year, you can join the Cheapskates Club and get exclusive access to the Cheapskate Journal, the monthly e-journal that shows you how to cut the costs of everyday living and still have fun.

Joining the Cheapskates Club gives you 24/7 access to the Members Centre with 1000's of money saving tips and articles.

Click here to join the Cheapskates Club today!

11. Frequently Asked Questions

How do I change my email address?
This one is easy.  When you login to the Member's Centre just click on your name at the top of the page to go straight to your profile page where you can update your details, change your password and find your subscription details.

Not a Cheapskates Club member? Then please use the Changing Details form found here to update your email address.

How do I know when my membership should be renewed?
Memberships are active for one year from the date of joining. You will be sent a renewal reminder before your subscription is due to renew.  You can also find your membership expiry date on your profile page.

When you login to the Member's Centre just click on your name to go straight to your profile page where you can will find your join date and your expiry date.

What will you do with my email address?
We never rent, trade or sell our email list to anyone for any reason whatsoever. You'll never get an unsolicited email from a stranger as a result of joining this list.

How did I get on this list?
The only way you can get onto our newsletter mailing list is to subscribe yourself. You signed up to receive our Free Newsletter at our Cheapskates Club Web site or are a Platinum Cheapskates Club member.

12. Contact Cheapskates

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  • Home
  • Join the Club!
    • Twenty Reasons to Join the Cheapskates Club
  • About Us
    • Cath's Story
    • Ask Cath
    • Glossary of Cheapskating Terms
  • Forum
    • Current Forum Discussions
    • How to Use the Member Forum
  • Inspiration
    • Getting Started
    • 31 Days of MOO Index
    • Articles
    • Housekeeping Routines
    • Budget Renovations
    • Saving Stories
    • Learning Centre
  • Recipes
    • Recipe File Index
    • Meal Plans
    • Add a Recipe
    • $300 a Month Food Challenge >
      • $300 a Month Food Challenge
      • The $300 a Month Food Challenge Forum
  • Newsletters
    • Newsletters 2023
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    • Newsletters 2021
    • Newsletters 2020
    • Newsletters 2019
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  • Saving Money
    • Latest Tips 2023
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    • Cheapskates Tip Store
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    • Top Tip Competition
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    • Changing Details
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