You Cooked it How Long?!?

My whole chicken turned out pretty good and I survived touching the raw chicken as well. Luckily, my husband stepped up to the plate and was willing to stick his hand into the chicken to get the bag of stuff out of it! I wanted to touch the chicken as little as possible and so the packaging went out with the other parts ASAP.

I was not sure how long to cook it or when it would be done, so I called the Perdue hot-line. The woman asked me how I had cooked the chicken and when I started by saying, I put it in at 400 degrees....she replied "Oh, no! Let me send you a $5.00 coupon." So I am not one to turn down a free coupon, even if I had no plans of buying chicken ever again, but I am sure I can find some way to use it!

I almost called the Mrs. Smith's hot-line as my pumpkin pie remained watery in the middle even on the following day. I put it back in the oven and after about 20 minutes it was done correctly. I guess I should not try to cook something I have not cooked for the first time on Thanksgiving! Thankfully, they have the hot-lines available for people to call, even if you are a somewhat experienced cook!!

Know Me, Know Thy Coupons

Yesterday I went to the grocery store for my weekly shopping trip. I had spent the evening before planning my trip and pulling coupons. The store was having a buy 10 -- save $5 promotion. I had used information from other blogs as to which items were included in this sale. Some of the information was not the same, but I managed to find other items to save money on.

One of the items that was on sale, that I did not know about was Fruity Cherios. Both of my kids (that's the toddler and the hubby) love these and they NEVER go on sale. The fact that there was not a single box left is evidence that they never go on sale!

I went to customer service to get a rain check for the cereal. I had written down all of the information for the rain check and delivered it to the employee. In order to get the special price, you have to buy 10, so I told the employee that I would buy 10 and that she could write that on the rain check. She told me there was no need to do that because she trusted me and knew that I would buy all 10 and "have coupons for every box I bought."

So I guess the people who work at the store where I shop regularly know me and know my coupons.

Failed Contest

Well, I only made it one week in the contest. It would have been a lot easier to do if it was not in the middle of summer and vacations. Not only did we take a trip to DC for a baseball game and eat 2 meals out- we went to NYC for a few days. This made it impossible to stay on budget.

I am still trying to save money in other ways and use my coupons and sale match-ups each week in planning. This past week, chicken breasts were on sale so I stocked up. I bought 10 packages of chicken ranging from 1 1/2 to 1 3/4 lbs. I then spent the next few days cooking all of the chicken except two packages. I froze the breasts in baggies. The cooked chicken is in the process of being diced and frozen for future meals. It is time consuming and I really don't love chopping chicken, but it does save me a lot of time when cooking during the week. I should have enough chicken to last me through the end of the year or close. So the fact that I have bought almost all of my chicken for the year, means I will be saving a lot on money in groceries each week, since I will not be buying any meat.

I may pick up a few packages of Quorn veggie crumbles for beef recipes. Which, by the way they have been running coupons for $1.25 off- so I will be stocking up and searching for those coupons since it is a product I know I will use. I may even consider purchasing them, because a)my family loves this products and b)this product almost never goes on sale and c)it's a great coupon.

I used 1/2 bag of the Quorn veggie crumbles for dinner tonight. We had Chilli Mac skillet. This is a very easy meal and all of the ingredients are all things I have stockpiled: can of pinto beans, can of tomatos, a can of tomato sauce, 1/2 bag of Quorn veggie crumbles, and of course cheese!