Your Cheapskates Club Newsletter 24:18
In this Newsletter
1. Cath's Corner
2. In the Tip Store - An Alternative to Shredding Paper; A Tasty Gift; Freeing Up Cash
3. Share Your Tips - Have a great money, time or energy saving idea? Share it here
4. On the Menu - A Use It Up Challenge
5. The $300 a Month Food Challenge - Soup Making 101
6. Cheapskates Buzz - Cheapskaters are talking in the Forum and on Cath's blog
7. This Week's Question - How do I stick to a meal plan?
8. Ask Cath - Do have a question for Cath? Ask it here!
9. Join the Cheapskates Club
10. Frequently Asked Questions
11. Contact Details
1. Cath's Corner
Hello Cheapskaters,
I hope you are all having a wonderful week and welcome to all our new members. I'm not going to rabbit on this week, there are so many great ideas in this newsletter that you don't need my waffle. Just enjoy the hints and tips, and perhaps enjoy a pot of Stock Soup to keep warm.
We're on the homeward bound leg of our trip, although we'll be taking a few weeks to get there, and our budget is looking good, even with all the fun things we've been doing.
Have a great week everyone.
Happy Cheapskating,
Cath
PS: Love our site? We love referrals! Send a note to your favourite newspapers, magazines, radio stations, TV stations, friends and relatives, and tell them about us!
2. From The Tip Store
An Alternative to Shredding Paper
You don't need to buy a paper shredder for home use. Just use kitchen sink with warm water and a dash of detergent then add the papers to be destroyed. In minutes the paper dissolves to paper mâché consistency and can be squished into balls for the bin or garden.
Contributed by Lindy Stuetz
A Tasty Gift
Approximate $ Savings: $50-100
My best friend's birthday came up at a very financially strapped moment. After much brain wracking I came up with a gift that she's still talking about months later - a personalised cake. With basic cake making materials I had in the house and a bag of two of lollies I made a cake in the shape of her final year honours project (a weird prehistoric worm). The beauty of this gift is that even if it's not quite a success, odds are the recipient will know what design you were going for (lopsided melty Dalek anyone?) and it will taste good. The internet has many images and examples to help you along. Just use a favourite, faithful cake recipe and have a go and save at least $30, or more.
Contributed by Laura Birch
Freeing Up Cash
When I started out seriously budgeting, we had two school aged children, credit card bills, mortgage, car payments as well as everyday living. We both work full time and weren't getting anywhere fast or had any spare cash, so I set up an envelope system for my bills. I split it all up into fortnightly amount (that's when we get paid) and started putting the money away. For the first twelve months it was hard but if you persevere it will get easier. I can now make double payments on the house, have cleared the car payment, credit card bills, have just sent my husband to Germany for a holiday with his family and have spare money in the bank. I have never felt more in control of our money than I do now. Our children don't miss out on anything and now our son works he realises the value of money and saves his up. He has already purchased a car for when he gets his license.
Contributed by PD
There are currently more than 12,000 great tips in the Tip Store
3. Submit Your Tip
The Cheapskate's Club website is over 3,000 pages of money saving hints, tips and ideas. 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. We publish a Winning Tip each Thursday, so enter your great money, time or energy saving idea now.
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!
Submit your tip
4. On the Menu
This week I'm going to challenge you to use the food you have on hand in your pantry, fridge and freezer to create delicious meals and snacks for your family. The benefits are many: you'll clean out the pantry, stop wasting food and spend less at the supermarket, greengrocer and butcher to name a few.
Here's a recipe that you can vary with whatever extra ingredients you have at the time. Be creative and adjust them to suit your tastes.
Cheesy Risotto
Ingredients:
1 tbsp butter
1 tbsp vegetable oil
2 spring onions finely sliced
300g arborio rice
1/2 cup water
1/2 tsp Dijon mustard
4 cups hot chicken or vegetable stock
1 cup grated cheddar cheese
2 tbsp chopped chives
Method:
Melt the butter and oil in a pan over medium heat and cook the sliced spring onions until softened. Add the Arborio rice and keep stirring for a minute or so, then turn up the heat and add the water and mustard, stirring until the water is absorbed. Start ladling in the hot stock, letting each ladleful become absorbed as you stir before adding the next one. Stir and ladle until the rice is al dente, about 18 minutes, then add the cheese, stirring it into the rice until it melts. Take the pan straight off the heat, still stirring as you do, and serve immediately, garnished with the chopped chives.
This week we will be eating:
Sunday: Roast Chicken
Monday: Apricot chicken
Tuesday: Crockpot Lasagne
Wednesday: Grilled fish, wedges, tossed salad
Thursday: MOO Pizza
Friday: Salmon fritters, potato wedges, salad
Saturday: Tacos
There are over 1,600 other great money saving meal ideas in the Recipe File.
5. The $300 a Month Food Challenge
Soup Making 101
Winter demands hearty, warming soups and you may think making soup is easy, and it is, for the most part. But it's also easy to end up with a pot of flavourless, grey water if you aren't careful, and no one wants that.
Good soup depends on good stock: beef, chicken or fish stock provides the base for flavourful and economical soups guaranteed to warm you up and keep your grocery bill low. Make your own for the best results, but if you don't have any on hand, a carton of stock will do. Try to avoid using stock cubes if you possibly can, they really don't make good stock and are super-salty. Keep the water from boiling or steaming vegetables and add this to your soup stock, it adds extra flavour and nutrients and you won't waste it by pouring it down the drain.
Stock soups are made from the stock with the addition of meat and fresh vegetables and a grain, cereal or bean i.e. dried lentils, kidney beans, rice or macaroni.
To make a basic thick soup you will need:
4 - 6 litres stock, including the meat from the bones
1 large onion finely diced
1 large carrot finely diced
2 celery ribs sliced
1 small turnip peeled and diced
1 parsnip peeled and diced
2 cups soup mix - a mixture of lentils and beans
Bring the stock to a rolling boil in a large stockpot. Add the vegetables and the soup mix and stir. Turn the heat down until the liquid is at a rolling simmer. This is important because unless you want to stand and stir constantly for hours, you need the vegetables and soup mix to keep rolling around in the pot. If they settle they will stick to the bottom of the pot and burn, ruining the soup.
You can add any other vegetables you like to your soup pot. Potato makes a good addition, bulking out the meal and acting as a thickener when soup mix is scarce. You can also add tomatoes, mushrooms, zucchini, cauliflower, broccoli, cabbage - you are limited only by your imagination and the contents of your fridge.
To make your own soup recipe follow this outline:
1.Start with a stock (choose one)- chicken, beef or lamb.
2.Add a protein (choose one) - meat, chicken, lamb, ham or bacon bones
3.Choose a thickener (choose one, measure 2 cups) - soup mix, beans, lentils, macaroni, pasta twirls, broken spaghetti, rice or barley
4.Throw in the vegetables (as many as you like, about 4 cups) - onion, carrot, celery, zucchini, cabbage, capsicums, tomatoes, mushrooms, broccoli, cauliflower, parsnip, turnip, swede, squash, pumpkin, green beans, peas
5.Season to taste* - salt, pepper, bouquet garni, thyme, parsley, chives, coriander
Bring the stock to the boil in a large stockpot. Add the other ingredients of your choice and simmer for at least 1 hour.
*It is better to under season and add more at the table than it is to over-season and have a soup that is too salty or too spicy. If you do over-salt the soup, add two potatoes, peeled and halved, about 20 minutes before the end of cooking time. The potato will absorb some of the salt.
If you like meat in your soup, save one or two slices of roast beef, lamb or chicken, dice them and add them to the soup pot. But meat isn't essential, we often just have vegetables and beans, or vegetables and pasta in our soup.
An 8-litre stock pot of soup feeds us for the weekend, and costs as little as $3, a very frugal meal.
The $300 a Month Food Challenge
The Post that Started it All
6. Cheapskates Buzz
Most popular forum posts this week
Reduce Reuse Recycle
http://www.cheapskatesclub.com.au/memberforum/showthread.php?2314-Reduce-Reuse-Recycle
Cleaning the Inside of the Car
http://www.cheapskatesclub.com.au/memberforum/showthread.php?2209-Cleaning-the-inside-of-the-Car
Down to One Wage for Time Being
http://www.cheapskatesclub.com.au/memberforum/showthread.php?2181-Down-to-one-wage-for-time-being
Most popular blog posts this week
What are Your Top Financial Goals?
http://www.debtfreecashedupandlaughing.com.au/2018/01/what-are-your-top-financial-goals.html
Delicious Ways to Use Almond Meal
http://www.debtfreecashedupandlaughing.com.au/2015/10/delicious-ways-to-use-almond-meal.html
Chocolate Cake
http://www.debtfreecashedupandlaughing.com.au/2018/01/chocolate-cake.html
7. This Week's Question
Q. Hi Cath, I’ve always been a wee bit canny when it comes to savings across my life. When I started reading your newsletter, tips online and a couple of your available books, I realised I still had a long way to go. I am wondering if anybody can help me with regards to keeping to a menu. I write down the meals for dinner. I have tried 1 month, 1 week and 3-day menus but I always find that I can't stick to them for whatever reason. Is there any trick to keeping to them - especially when the family are big meat eaters and I'm not? I get fed up of trying to cook for two different lots of tastes in the family. SC
A. Oh, the only trick to sticking to a meal plan is to do just that - stick to it! Whatever is written down for dinner that night is what you prepare and eat.
So, ask yourself why you can't stick to the meal plan? What is causing you to ignore it? If it is just complaints from the family get tough - you're the cook, you choose what's for dinner. If your children are old enough let them plan, shop, prepare, serve, listen to the whining and clean up. I found that worked well, stopped complaints and made getting dinner on the table easy.
When you meal plan do you check the calendar, so you know who will be home for dinner, what time everyone will be home, who is working late, who has sport etc.? You can still plan meals for those nights, and in fact it is important that you do, or you'll end up with takeaway or buying ingredients to make something else.
You don't need to cook for two lots of tastes - just prepare one serving less of meat and add extra vegetables. Make the vegetables you prepare and serve tasty, you'll enjoy them more but so will your family.
Plan ahead - every night check the meal plan, take out any meat that needs to thaw and place it in the fridge, get any veggies etc. and put them in a bowl on the bench or sink or in the fridge, any other ingredients and put them together. If you need a recipe get the book, find the recipe and mark the page and leave it with the other ingredients.
Choose easy meals - spag bol and salad, rissoles and veggies, casserole and rice, meatloaf and salad, fish, wedges and coleslaw, roast and baked veggies etc. Don't plan meals that take a lot of preparation or a long cooking time unless you have all day to devote to cooking dinner.
8. Ask Cath
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
9. Join the Cheapskates Club
For just 10 cents a day 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!
10. Frequently Asked Questions
How do I change my email address?
This one is easy. Members can update their email address or any other details by clicking on "Edit Profile" directly under their membership number after they have logged in to the Member's Centre. Subscribers to our free newsletter can use the Change Your Address form (under Customer Service in the menu) and fill it out. Once you've filled it in click the send button and we'll do the rest. Please remember to include your old email address so we can find it in the list as well as the new one.
How do I know when my membership should be renewed?
When you login to the Member's Centre you will be told how many days of membership you have left once you have 30 days left. Just click on the link to renew and your membership will just continue on, uninterrupted.
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 You Get on Our List?
You signed up to receive our Free Newsletter at our Cheapskates Club Web site or are a Platinum Cheapskates Club member
11. Contact Details
The Cheapskates Club -
Showing you how to live life
debt free, cashed up and laughing!
Contact Cheapskates
1. Cath's Corner
2. In the Tip Store - An Alternative to Shredding Paper; A Tasty Gift; Freeing Up Cash
3. Share Your Tips - Have a great money, time or energy saving idea? Share it here
4. On the Menu - A Use It Up Challenge
5. The $300 a Month Food Challenge - Soup Making 101
6. Cheapskates Buzz - Cheapskaters are talking in the Forum and on Cath's blog
7. This Week's Question - How do I stick to a meal plan?
8. Ask Cath - Do have a question for Cath? Ask it here!
9. Join the Cheapskates Club
10. Frequently Asked Questions
11. Contact Details
1. Cath's Corner
Hello Cheapskaters,
I hope you are all having a wonderful week and welcome to all our new members. I'm not going to rabbit on this week, there are so many great ideas in this newsletter that you don't need my waffle. Just enjoy the hints and tips, and perhaps enjoy a pot of Stock Soup to keep warm.
We're on the homeward bound leg of our trip, although we'll be taking a few weeks to get there, and our budget is looking good, even with all the fun things we've been doing.
Have a great week everyone.
Happy Cheapskating,
Cath
PS: Love our site? We love referrals! Send a note to your favourite newspapers, magazines, radio stations, TV stations, friends and relatives, and tell them about us!
2. From The Tip Store
An Alternative to Shredding Paper
You don't need to buy a paper shredder for home use. Just use kitchen sink with warm water and a dash of detergent then add the papers to be destroyed. In minutes the paper dissolves to paper mâché consistency and can be squished into balls for the bin or garden.
Contributed by Lindy Stuetz
A Tasty Gift
Approximate $ Savings: $50-100
My best friend's birthday came up at a very financially strapped moment. After much brain wracking I came up with a gift that she's still talking about months later - a personalised cake. With basic cake making materials I had in the house and a bag of two of lollies I made a cake in the shape of her final year honours project (a weird prehistoric worm). The beauty of this gift is that even if it's not quite a success, odds are the recipient will know what design you were going for (lopsided melty Dalek anyone?) and it will taste good. The internet has many images and examples to help you along. Just use a favourite, faithful cake recipe and have a go and save at least $30, or more.
Contributed by Laura Birch
Freeing Up Cash
When I started out seriously budgeting, we had two school aged children, credit card bills, mortgage, car payments as well as everyday living. We both work full time and weren't getting anywhere fast or had any spare cash, so I set up an envelope system for my bills. I split it all up into fortnightly amount (that's when we get paid) and started putting the money away. For the first twelve months it was hard but if you persevere it will get easier. I can now make double payments on the house, have cleared the car payment, credit card bills, have just sent my husband to Germany for a holiday with his family and have spare money in the bank. I have never felt more in control of our money than I do now. Our children don't miss out on anything and now our son works he realises the value of money and saves his up. He has already purchased a car for when he gets his license.
Contributed by PD
There are currently more than 12,000 great tips in the Tip Store
3. Submit Your Tip
The Cheapskate's Club website is over 3,000 pages of money saving hints, tips and ideas. 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. We publish a Winning Tip each Thursday, so enter your great money, time or energy saving idea now.
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!
Submit your tip
4. On the Menu
This week I'm going to challenge you to use the food you have on hand in your pantry, fridge and freezer to create delicious meals and snacks for your family. The benefits are many: you'll clean out the pantry, stop wasting food and spend less at the supermarket, greengrocer and butcher to name a few.
Here's a recipe that you can vary with whatever extra ingredients you have at the time. Be creative and adjust them to suit your tastes.
Cheesy Risotto
Ingredients:
1 tbsp butter
1 tbsp vegetable oil
2 spring onions finely sliced
300g arborio rice
1/2 cup water
1/2 tsp Dijon mustard
4 cups hot chicken or vegetable stock
1 cup grated cheddar cheese
2 tbsp chopped chives
Method:
Melt the butter and oil in a pan over medium heat and cook the sliced spring onions until softened. Add the Arborio rice and keep stirring for a minute or so, then turn up the heat and add the water and mustard, stirring until the water is absorbed. Start ladling in the hot stock, letting each ladleful become absorbed as you stir before adding the next one. Stir and ladle until the rice is al dente, about 18 minutes, then add the cheese, stirring it into the rice until it melts. Take the pan straight off the heat, still stirring as you do, and serve immediately, garnished with the chopped chives.
This week we will be eating:
Sunday: Roast Chicken
Monday: Apricot chicken
Tuesday: Crockpot Lasagne
Wednesday: Grilled fish, wedges, tossed salad
Thursday: MOO Pizza
Friday: Salmon fritters, potato wedges, salad
Saturday: Tacos
There are over 1,600 other great money saving meal ideas in the Recipe File.
5. The $300 a Month Food Challenge
Soup Making 101
Winter demands hearty, warming soups and you may think making soup is easy, and it is, for the most part. But it's also easy to end up with a pot of flavourless, grey water if you aren't careful, and no one wants that.
Good soup depends on good stock: beef, chicken or fish stock provides the base for flavourful and economical soups guaranteed to warm you up and keep your grocery bill low. Make your own for the best results, but if you don't have any on hand, a carton of stock will do. Try to avoid using stock cubes if you possibly can, they really don't make good stock and are super-salty. Keep the water from boiling or steaming vegetables and add this to your soup stock, it adds extra flavour and nutrients and you won't waste it by pouring it down the drain.
Stock soups are made from the stock with the addition of meat and fresh vegetables and a grain, cereal or bean i.e. dried lentils, kidney beans, rice or macaroni.
To make a basic thick soup you will need:
4 - 6 litres stock, including the meat from the bones
1 large onion finely diced
1 large carrot finely diced
2 celery ribs sliced
1 small turnip peeled and diced
1 parsnip peeled and diced
2 cups soup mix - a mixture of lentils and beans
Bring the stock to a rolling boil in a large stockpot. Add the vegetables and the soup mix and stir. Turn the heat down until the liquid is at a rolling simmer. This is important because unless you want to stand and stir constantly for hours, you need the vegetables and soup mix to keep rolling around in the pot. If they settle they will stick to the bottom of the pot and burn, ruining the soup.
You can add any other vegetables you like to your soup pot. Potato makes a good addition, bulking out the meal and acting as a thickener when soup mix is scarce. You can also add tomatoes, mushrooms, zucchini, cauliflower, broccoli, cabbage - you are limited only by your imagination and the contents of your fridge.
To make your own soup recipe follow this outline:
1.Start with a stock (choose one)- chicken, beef or lamb.
2.Add a protein (choose one) - meat, chicken, lamb, ham or bacon bones
3.Choose a thickener (choose one, measure 2 cups) - soup mix, beans, lentils, macaroni, pasta twirls, broken spaghetti, rice or barley
4.Throw in the vegetables (as many as you like, about 4 cups) - onion, carrot, celery, zucchini, cabbage, capsicums, tomatoes, mushrooms, broccoli, cauliflower, parsnip, turnip, swede, squash, pumpkin, green beans, peas
5.Season to taste* - salt, pepper, bouquet garni, thyme, parsley, chives, coriander
Bring the stock to the boil in a large stockpot. Add the other ingredients of your choice and simmer for at least 1 hour.
*It is better to under season and add more at the table than it is to over-season and have a soup that is too salty or too spicy. If you do over-salt the soup, add two potatoes, peeled and halved, about 20 minutes before the end of cooking time. The potato will absorb some of the salt.
If you like meat in your soup, save one or two slices of roast beef, lamb or chicken, dice them and add them to the soup pot. But meat isn't essential, we often just have vegetables and beans, or vegetables and pasta in our soup.
An 8-litre stock pot of soup feeds us for the weekend, and costs as little as $3, a very frugal meal.
The $300 a Month Food Challenge
The Post that Started it All
6. Cheapskates Buzz
Most popular forum posts this week
Reduce Reuse Recycle
http://www.cheapskatesclub.com.au/memberforum/showthread.php?2314-Reduce-Reuse-Recycle
Cleaning the Inside of the Car
http://www.cheapskatesclub.com.au/memberforum/showthread.php?2209-Cleaning-the-inside-of-the-Car
Down to One Wage for Time Being
http://www.cheapskatesclub.com.au/memberforum/showthread.php?2181-Down-to-one-wage-for-time-being
Most popular blog posts this week
What are Your Top Financial Goals?
http://www.debtfreecashedupandlaughing.com.au/2018/01/what-are-your-top-financial-goals.html
Delicious Ways to Use Almond Meal
http://www.debtfreecashedupandlaughing.com.au/2015/10/delicious-ways-to-use-almond-meal.html
Chocolate Cake
http://www.debtfreecashedupandlaughing.com.au/2018/01/chocolate-cake.html
7. This Week's Question
Q. Hi Cath, I’ve always been a wee bit canny when it comes to savings across my life. When I started reading your newsletter, tips online and a couple of your available books, I realised I still had a long way to go. I am wondering if anybody can help me with regards to keeping to a menu. I write down the meals for dinner. I have tried 1 month, 1 week and 3-day menus but I always find that I can't stick to them for whatever reason. Is there any trick to keeping to them - especially when the family are big meat eaters and I'm not? I get fed up of trying to cook for two different lots of tastes in the family. SC
A. Oh, the only trick to sticking to a meal plan is to do just that - stick to it! Whatever is written down for dinner that night is what you prepare and eat.
So, ask yourself why you can't stick to the meal plan? What is causing you to ignore it? If it is just complaints from the family get tough - you're the cook, you choose what's for dinner. If your children are old enough let them plan, shop, prepare, serve, listen to the whining and clean up. I found that worked well, stopped complaints and made getting dinner on the table easy.
When you meal plan do you check the calendar, so you know who will be home for dinner, what time everyone will be home, who is working late, who has sport etc.? You can still plan meals for those nights, and in fact it is important that you do, or you'll end up with takeaway or buying ingredients to make something else.
You don't need to cook for two lots of tastes - just prepare one serving less of meat and add extra vegetables. Make the vegetables you prepare and serve tasty, you'll enjoy them more but so will your family.
Plan ahead - every night check the meal plan, take out any meat that needs to thaw and place it in the fridge, get any veggies etc. and put them in a bowl on the bench or sink or in the fridge, any other ingredients and put them together. If you need a recipe get the book, find the recipe and mark the page and leave it with the other ingredients.
Choose easy meals - spag bol and salad, rissoles and veggies, casserole and rice, meatloaf and salad, fish, wedges and coleslaw, roast and baked veggies etc. Don't plan meals that take a lot of preparation or a long cooking time unless you have all day to devote to cooking dinner.
8. Ask Cath
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
9. Join the Cheapskates Club
For just 10 cents a day 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!
10. Frequently Asked Questions
How do I change my email address?
This one is easy. Members can update their email address or any other details by clicking on "Edit Profile" directly under their membership number after they have logged in to the Member's Centre. Subscribers to our free newsletter can use the Change Your Address form (under Customer Service in the menu) and fill it out. Once you've filled it in click the send button and we'll do the rest. Please remember to include your old email address so we can find it in the list as well as the new one.
How do I know when my membership should be renewed?
When you login to the Member's Centre you will be told how many days of membership you have left once you have 30 days left. Just click on the link to renew and your membership will just continue on, uninterrupted.
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 You Get on Our List?
You signed up to receive our Free Newsletter at our Cheapskates Club Web site or are a Platinum Cheapskates Club member
11. Contact Details
The Cheapskates Club -
Showing you how to live life
debt free, cashed up and laughing!
Contact Cheapskates