2024 From the Tightwad Gazette. : Number 2

 I learned a lot from the Tightwad Gazette that Still Works.  So I am sharing.

1.  Potatoes can be an inexpensive food.  But it depends on how you buy them.  I buy potatoes in a bag at the smallest price/ pound I can find.  A baked potato is one of the cheapest forms.  Mashed is also fairly cheap when you make them at home.  Fried, scalloped, augratin, and others made at home helps the budget.  Prepared mashed, scalloped augratin and such, not so much.  And the humble French frie, bought in the frozen food department, costs at least five times more than making them from scratch with a knife.

2.  When I peel potatoes, I make the peels a little thicker.  Then, for a different meal, I spray the peels with Pam and salt them.  Then I cook them in the oven until crispy.  A great side for sandwiches, pizza and more and made with something that you might throw out.

3.  I bake a lot.  To keep the cost down, I only buy flour at 99cents for a five  pound bag.  Sometimes I am lucky enough to find it at 50 cents a bag.  and I buy yeast by the pound for a very small fraction of the cost of the little packets.  Keep track of sales in the November/December time frame. Amish  Scratch and dent stores are also good sources.

4.  Coffee can be expensive.  And for me it’s a food group.   So we follow the system outlined in the Tightwad Gazette :  make your first pot as usual ; make the second by adding half the original amount on top of the first pot’s grounds.  The result is two pots of coffee  for 1 and 1/2 the grounds rather than 2.  If your coffee costs $5.12 per bag, by making it go further your cost ends up being $3.84.  Small savings add up.

5.  Keep your sugar and your baking soda near each other in the cupboard.  When you make pie filling, cobblers, fruit salads, and other items using fruit,  If you add 1/4 to 1/2 teaspoon of baking soda to the fruit, you can reduce the sugar by 1/2 and still get the desired sweetness.  The baking soda neutralizes the acid in the fruit.