A Week Of Thrifty Meals #2

 

From the freezer I chose a package of bacon, one good sized boneless skinless chicken breast, an eight ounce package of grated cheese and four English muffins.  Each week I like to make a selection like this and challenge myself to work out a week of meals.  In addition to these items I had two servings of Korean beef and a serving of homemade tomato soup along with a little over a cup of cooked rice leftover in the refrigerator that would need to be eaten so they did not go to waste.  Lots of really good options to start off my week.

 

Leftovers from the week before

I have been wanting chicken curry for quite some time so I decided to begin with that by making up a half recipe using only half of the chicken breast I had thawed.  I diced it up along with some leftover canned pineapple chunks, celery and a bit of onion I had in the fridge.  I used a chicken bouillon cube to make the one cup of broth I needed.  I served this over the leftover rice from my refrigerator.  It made three servings of curry and was absolutely delicious.

 

Delicious chicken curry

I diced up the remaining chicken breast half and cooked it with garlic powder and a little soy sauce before adding it to some Asian coleslaw I made using cabbage and a carrot I had in the fridge, radishes and green onion from our garden and sliced almonds along with a handful of chow mein noodles from the pantry.  I made the dressing for the coleslaw with ingredients from my pantry.  This salad was a nice refreshing option to have as our days were quite warm.  We ended up with four hefty servings of this delicious salad.

 

Asian inspired coleslaw topped with diced chicken

The homemade tomato soup was reheated in the microwave and served with a grilled pepper jack cheese sandwich for supper one evening.  Grilled cheese and tomato soup is one of my all time favorite meals since childhood.  A delicious BLT sandwich was also one of our quick summer suppers one night.  Another favorite to be sure.

My personal favorite - grilled cheese with tomato soup

 

And of course!  The BLT

During the week I made bacon and egg sandwiches for a quick brunch.  I cut the bacon strips in half and fried them crisp.  Then I lined up three halves in the pan and cracked an egg over the top with some salt and pepper.  On a toasted English muffin this was a great way to start the day.  Six strips of bacon plus four eggs was the perfect amount to go with the four muffins which easily made me four scrumptious breakfast sandwiches.  I said "four" a lot in that last sentence, LOL.  Sourdough waffles also made the cut.

 

I crack an egg on top of my cooked bacon strips, let it cook a bit,then flip it over
Place this on a toasted english muffin - delish!

 

I made green salads several times as our side dish using romaine hearts and other items I already had on hand.  Leftover black olives went into our salads along with sliced banana peppers from a jar in the fridge and some grated carrot.  We made a point to use up the last bits of salad dressing we had open before we opened up another bottle as we had three of them upside down in the refrigerator at the time.

 

Sourdough waffles using friendship bread starter

This was a good challenge for me because this week fell before my monthly shopping trip so we were a little bit thin on produce, especially for fresh salad, but I made it work.  By keeping our meals super simple and eating up our leftovers I didn't have to cook or prepare much during this week either.  At the end of the week I still had the unopened package of cheese and one strip of bacon left.  Everything was tasty, nutritious, and very satisfying.  We enjoyed our meals and because we efficiently utilized what we already had on hand we didn't break the bank in the process.  Thrifty and delicious!