Your Cheapskates Club Newsletter 33:22

In This Newsletter
1. Cath's Corner
2. From the Tip Store -  Mum's Speedy Noodle Casserole; Become Part of a Clothing Chain; Recycling a Household Appliance Creates a Planter Box
3. Share Your Tips  
4. On the Menu - Meal Stretcher: Sweet Lamb Curry
5. The $300 a Month Food Challenge - Tips for Stretching Cheese
6. The Weekly MOO Challenge - MOO Gravy Mixes
7. Cheapskates Buzz
8. The Cheapskates Club Show
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,
Do you ever have one of those days, when it starts out as if it's going to be a wonderful day, and then in the space of a few minutes, just falls apart?

Yesterday was that day for me. It started off as normal, and then a phone call, an email and another phone call just turned it upside down, inside out and twisted into a knot.

The to do list grew by almost double; I was dealing with some sad news; juggling a change of plans for the weekend and trying to get this newsletter ready to go out to you, my Cheapskating friends, on time. And the internet went down!

I was tested, or rather my patience was tested. For every job crossed off the list, two more were added. By the time Wayne came home I was exhausted, teary, cranky, cold, wet (don't ask), trying to get the kitchen cleaned up so that it could just be messed up again to make something, anything, for dinner. I'd had enough.

Then the boys finished work, and came out and one unpacked the dishwasher while the other one cleaned the benches. Wayne made me a cup of tea and took the rubbish out. And the Internet came back. Phew!

AJ took over getting dinner, Tom took over getting the beds made for our visitors that arrive tomorrow, Wayne put washing away and made sure Lacey's bowl had water and her bed was ready for her. And I sat and drank my cup of tea, took a few deep breaths and remembered that no matter how horrible I thought yesterday had been, today was a new day, with new possibilities for living the Cheapskates way.

Have a great week everyone, and remember, if today isn't what you had hoped or planned, tomorrow is a new day with brand new possibilities! 

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

Mum's Speedy Noodle Casserole
This is a great way to use up left over noodles whether they are lasagne, macaroni or any other kind. We love having a variety of noodles, spirals, spaghetti, shells, macaroni combined adds fun and interest to this meal.

Fry a chopped onion in a pan with a small amount of butter. Add all the leftover noodles and fry lightly. If they are lasagne noodles slice them into smaller pieces. Add a can of champignons with its water, a can of mushroom soup, and about half a cup of water. Simmer together until smooth and mixed. Leftover vegetables and meat can also be added. Top with grated parmesan and cheddar cheese and bake or grill until golden. This is a deliciously creamy dish, great with crusty bread.

Become Part of a Clothing Chain!
I had a girl and then a boy. My friend had a boy and then a girl. So now, at the end of each season we go through our cupboards and sort out the clothes that don't fit anymore. Then we get together for coffee and swap clothes. This gives me almost an entire wardrobe of clothes for my son. Then I write a list of what he didn't get in the swap and wait until those items come on sale. It spreads out the purchases and saves me lots of money.   
Contributed by Sarah

Recycling a Household Appliance Creates a Planter Box
Use your old upright fridge or freezer for a garden box. Have it degassed, put some holes in the underside and take the door off. Then lift it up off the ground and fill with soil. Add your plants and you have done something wonderful for the environment and saved a bit of money, as the planter boxes cost anywhere upward of $150. Not only that, you are being kind to your knees.
Contributed by Cara

Editors Note: With a little creative thinking you can use all manner of old whitegoods for planters. We pulled the drum out of an old, useless washing machine to use as a strawberry planter. We painted the outside green and lined it with mesh to hold the soil. It works beautifully and is the perfect size for strawberries. Cath

There are more than 12,000 great tips in the Tip Store 

3. Share Your Tips

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.

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

4. On The Menu

Sweet Lamb Curry
This is a meal stretcher recipe, a way to get the cost of a lamb roast down so it's a little more affordable.

Ingredients:
2 tablespoons vegetable oil
1 brown onion, finely chopped
2 to 3 tablespoons mild curry powder
500g cooked lamb, diced*
1/2 cup fruit chutney
1 Granny Smith apple, peeled, cored, finely chopped**
1/2 cup sultanas
1/2 cup chicken stock or water
Plain yoghurt, to serve***

Method:
Heat oil in a large heavy-based saucepan over medium heat. Add onion. Cook for 2 to 3 minutes or until tender. Increase heat to high. Add curry powder and lamb. Cook, stirring with a wooden spoon, for 5 to 6 minutes or until browned. Stir in chutney, apple, sultanas and stock or water. Bring to the boil. Reduce heat to medium-low. Cook for 15 to 20 minutes or until mixture thickens. Serve over steamed rice with a dollop of yoghurt on top.

*I eyeball the lamb, and use the bits cut off the bone, and some of the smaller slices diced up. Remember, smaller dice give the appearance of more, so keep the chunks smaller and you won't need to use as much!

**I use any apple from the fruit bowl, I don't buy a Granny Smith just for this recipe.

***MOO yoghurt works really well in this recipe and will cut the cost.

Next week we will be eating:
 
Sunday: Roast Lamb  

Monday: Sweet Lamb Curry & rice

​Tuesday: Spaghetti Alfredo

Wednesday: Baked Chicken Wings & Veg

Thursday: MOO Pizza

Friday: Fish, Wedges, Coleslaw

Saturday: Soup & Crumpets.

There are over 1,800 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

5. The $300 a Month Food Challenge

Tips for Stretching Cheese
We are cheese lovers in our home. Hard or soft, as long as it is cheese, we'll devour it. And that can play havoc with my grocery budget, especially now when the cheese we like, which isn't even a "brand" is $9 a kilo! Ouch! And that's when we can get it; it has been out of stock for weeks and weeks and we have finally eaten down the fridge stocks.

I keep the cost of the cheese component of my grocery budget down a number of ways:

1. I buy blocks of tasty cheese and grate them to use on pizzas, pasta bakes, potato casserole etc. Grated cheese freezes beautifully and can be used straight from the freezer for casserole toppings. To stop the cheese shards sticking together when they are frozen add a teaspoon of corn flour per cup of cheese when you pack it into containers or bags. Shake it up to coat the cheese and you won't have a problem with clumped, hard lumps of cheese again.

2. I make mozzarella, ricotta and feta. Fresh mozzarella grated in slivers over hot pasta is divine. These are three of the easiest cheeses to make and they are so versatile. Ricotta can be used in dips and cheesecakes or as a spread on bread instead of butter. Feta is delicious on its own and in salads.

3. I buy blocks of the more expensive aged hard cheeses when they are on sale and use my trusty cheese slicer to slice them. This is the biggest cheese cost saver for my family. I never buy sliced cheese. The slices are always much thicker than what I slice myself and at twice the price of a block of the same weight I feel it's money I could use for something else. Slicing the cheese myself and storing it in a Tupperware container.

4. I portion the cheese out. That means when I do my monthly grocery shopping and buy cheese for the month, it is packed into weekly portions and frozen. I take one portion a week out of the freezer and put it in the fridge to use for cooking, sandwiches, salads, snacks and so on. When it's gone, it's gone. I don't get any more out until the next week. We've learnt over the years to make our cheese last or go without.

We get to enjoy the cheeses we like without blowing my grocery budget.

Is cheese a big expense for your family? How do you make it last? Or do you just absorb the cost and buy more when it's all gone?

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

6. The Weekly MOO Challenge

MOO Gravy Mixes
Last week we made gravy from scratch, using the pan drippings. It's delicious, isn't it? This week I'm sharing my two MOO gravy mixes because sometimes we don't have pan drippings and we want good gravy.

As with all things MOO the advantage is you control what goes into it. When you are looking for a stock powder, read the ingredients and buy one without MSG. I use Massel stock powders, they cost a little more but are 99% fat free without MSG and are suitable for vegetarians and vegans.  They are truly concentrated which means you use less to get the same flavour.

Beef Gravy Mix
Ingredients:
1/2 cup plain flour
3 tbsp beef stock
1 tbsp garlic powder
2 tbsp onion powder
1/2 tsp salt
1/2 tsp celery seed
1/2 tsp black pepper
1 tsp ground thyme

Method:
Combine all ingredients and store in an airtight container.

To make gravy, whisk 1/4 cup of gravy mix with 1 cup of boiling water (or vegetable stock or pan juices or milk) in a large heat-proof jug until there are no lumps and the gravy has thickened.  If the gravy is too thick add a little more boiling water, whisking well.  

Chicken Gravy Mix
Ingredients:
1-1/3 cups skim milk powder
3/4 cup plain flour
3 tbsp chicken stock powder
1/2 tsp ground sage
1/4 tsp salt
1/2 tsp black pepper
1/2 tsp ground thyme

Method:
Combine all ingredients and store an airtight container.

To make chicken gravy melt 2 tablespoons of butter in a small sauce pan. Whisk 1/2 cup gravy mix into 1 cup of water (or milk if you want a rich gravy) until there are no lumps.  Add to the saucepan and whisk the butter into the gravy mixture. Bring to a boil, turn heat down and simmer 1 minute until the gravy thickens, stirring constantly.  Add more liquid for a thinner gravy.

These recipes make the equivalent of four packets of flavoured gravy mix.
Get in on the fun and discussions here.

7. Cheapskates Buzz

From The Article Archive
Beat the Morning Rush
Handling Hand-Me-Downs
How to Beat Rising Power Bills

This Week's Hot Forum Topics
Seniors $200 a month Food Challenge
Homegrown Produce with the Biggest Bang for Your Buck
Stuffed Chicken Drumsticks

Latest Tips
Stretch Your Milk
Take Out the Batteries
​
8. The Cheapskates Club Show

Join us on YouTube each week and see how we are  living debt free, cashed up and laughing - and find out how you can too!

Latest Shows 

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 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 for a full year.  

That's unlimited 24/7 access to EVERYTHING in the Member's Centre!

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 either signed up to receive our Free Newsletter at our Cheapskates Club Web site or are a Platinum Cheapskates Club member.

​12. Contact Cheapskates

The Cheapskates Club -
Showing you how to live life
debt free, cashed up and laughing!

PO Box 5077 Studfield Vic 3152
Contact Cheapskates