I always thought that the fact that Hubby takes his lunch to work every day was not only highly commendable, but also very thrifty. I mean, buying lunch every day is expensive right? Well apparently, when a third of your grocery bill goes on snack foods, taking your lunch isn’t exactly cheap either!
I was shocked when I actually started taking note of how much money I was spending every week, trying to fill Hubby’s lunchbox. Every Monday I go to the supermarket and fill up my trolley with boxes of muesli bars, individual tubs of yogurt and fruit, Up n Gos, packets of biscuits, crackers etc. All individually packaged for his convenience, so when he packs his lunch of an evening, all he has to do is stick his hand into a box, or break off a tub, pop it all into his little esky and he’s done. The price that I’m paying every week for convenience sake is horrifying enough (and I don’t buy the expensive stuff!), but then there’s the issue of how much nutritional value he’s actually getting from all that food. All of it is packed full of preservatives, sugar and those nasty little numbered chemicals that Sixty Minutes is always telling us are poison.The thing is, since Little Lady turned one, I have been doing the same for her. Until recently, every week I would buy the boxes of muesli and fruit bars, little flavoured rice bikkies and cheese sticks so that she had something to snack on during the day. I hadn’t even thought about the fact that, as each of those little boxes only contains 6 fruit bars, if she had one every day, it wasn’t even enough to get her through the week. Again, the wasted money is bad enough, but also, what kind of rubbish am I feeding my child?!
Now there are the obvious ways to save money here; stock up on large cans of fruit and separate it into small containers, rather than buying little snack tubs; buy LL a block of cheese and take the extra 5 seconds to cut her some slices, instead of buying a pack of cheese sticks; bake my own biscuits and cakes etc. But, Hubby and LL both really love their muesli bars, chocolate chip cookies and sponge cake are expensive to bake and not very filling, and neither has a very long shelf life. So, what would my newest inspiration, the goddess of frugal living and author of down---to---earth.blogspot.com, Rhonda Hetzel do? She would start looking at ways of making healthy, filling snacks that can be frozen or kept in an air tight container for weeks on end while still remaining edible, and she would doing this with ingredients that are relatively inexpensive and purchasable in bulk.
And this is how I found myself in my kitchen yesterday, baking sultana scones and making home made muesli bars.Sultana scones are cheap to make, absolutely delicious, filling, healthy and they can be frozen. One batch makes about 18, so if Hubby takes 2 to work every day that’s 9 days worth of lunchbox fillers! Unlike the packet of biscuits that barely lasts 3 days. Most of you wouldn’t even need to make a special trip to the supermarket to make these. All of the ingredients are staples that can be found in any pantry.
The muesli bars are a little more fiddly. They will require a trip down the health food aisle of your local supermarket. To buy all the ingredients will cost you about or just under $25. But, I estimate that you will get at least 4 batches of muesli bars out of it. And when each batch produces about 18 bars, that’s a fairly substantial saving! Buy those ingredients in bulk and you’ll save even more! Plus, there are no colours, no preservatives and no chemicals. Just wholegrains, seeds and dried fruit guaranteed to fill you up!
I have to admit, my first batch was not overly successful. For some reason my mixture ended up very dry and fell apart when I tried to cut it. But, I have discovered that by adding another ¼ - ½ cup of honey, they were perfect! As for the first batch, I added some dried apricots, sealed it all up in little bags and Hubby has been taking delicious trail mix to snack on at work.
The best part, is that LL lady is loving both the scones and the muesli bars, so I will no longer be buying her the little convenient snacks either. Frugal snacking, the nutritious way!
The first, unsuccessful, batch of muesli bars
SULTANA SCONES
Ingredients:
3 cups SR flour
2tsp Baking Powder
80g butter (room temperature)
¾ cup sultanas
1 ¼ cups of milk
Method:
Sift flour and baking powder together into a bowl.
Rub in butter with fingertips until mixture looks like bread crumbs.
Add sultanas and mix through with a fork.
Add in milk, I put the whole cup, mix with a fork or bladed knife, and add in the extra ¼ cup in small amounts depending on the dryness of the mixture.
Gather dough into a ball and tip onto a floured surface.
Knead a few times, but remember, scones are better with less handling.
Use a floured rolling pin to roll out to about 3 cm thickness.
Use a 5-7cm cutter or a good sized drinking glass to cut out as many scones as you can.
Put on a lined tray, touching.
Bake in 210 degrees Celsius for 15-20 mins.
Note, this recipe has already been adjusted as per my second batch.
Ingredients:
1 cup rolled oats
1 cup dessicated coconut
1/2 cup wheatgerm
1/2 cup sesame seeds
1/2 cup pumpkin seeds (pepitas)
1/2 cup sunflower kernels
1 cup sultanas
125g butter
1/2 - 3/4 cup honey
1/3 cup brown sugar
Method:
Grease and line a 3cm deep, 16cm x 28cm baking pan with baking paper. Cook oats, coconut, wheatgerm, sesame seeds, sunflower kernels and pumpkin seeds in a frying pan over a medium heat, stirring for 8-10 minutes or until golden.
Transfer to a bowl and set aside to cool.
Stir in sultanas.
Cook butter, honey and sugar in a small saucepan over medium heat, stirring, for 3 to 4 minutes or until sugar dissolves.
Bring to the boil, reduce heat to low.
Simmer, without stirring, for 7 minutes or until mixture forms a soft ball when a little is dropped into ice cold water.
Add to dry ingredients, stir until combined.
Spoon mixture into plan. Use a large, metal spoon to press down firmly.
Allow to cool and slice into bars.
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