Eat better. Save money.

On my path to better nutritional health I am slowly moving away from prepackaged foods. By doing this I have started saving money and I believe that the food I cook is more nutritious than much of the food I could buy in the box.

I cook whole turkey and chicken in the crock pot with a bit of salt and garlic. When finished I de-skin and de-bone the bird. I then partially shred the meat into smaller chunks. I personally mix the white and dark meat together for a bit of variety in my meals to come. I then package loosely in cottage cheese containers. This amount is perfect for the size of meals that I cook for my family. I can usually get about 2 containers of meat from a chicken and about 3 out of a young turkey. (my husband always steals at least 1 leg when I am not looking) Any juices I leave in the crock with any left over meat and make a chicken and dumplings or I freeze it in ice tray for later use.

Speaking of dumplings, I make those from scratch as well. I use a basic egg noodle recipe and make many batches in one day the lazy way. I use a bread machine. 2 actually. I put the ingredients in the pan, set it to the dough cycle, and start her up. It takes about 2 hours to finish, but at least I am not stuck in the kitchen all day making noodles. I freeze the dough that I am not going to use immediately and can usually sick it in the refrigerator the day before and have it thawed before dinner. I still keep a bag or box of dried pasta around for any "oops i forgot" moments. One alteration I do make to the noodle recipe is that I use V8 juice, left over spaghetti sauce or even veggie soups that I get on sale in place of the milk in this recipe. You can not taste it, it makes the pasta pretty colors for the kids, and I like to believe that it adds a little healthy to meal that the kids dont eww about.

I love my bread machine. I have successfully made noodle dough, bread, and even used it to make the dough for my breads that I bake in the oven. I tend to like the oven bread the best because it does not stale as easy and it is also a more convenient size for sandwiches. My family will go through a loaf of store bread in 2 days, OR I can make loafs of bread at dinner time. 1 for dinner and 1 for lunch the next day. I usually have enough left over to cook only 1 loaf on the third day.

This may seem like a lot of work for not so much money spent. But so far I have been choosing things that do not take that much time and effort. Plus it TASTES better and I feel better knowing what goes into my food.