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Summer Lunch List of Ideas

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School is ending. This means that we need a Summer Lunch List. Why? Because children cannot live on sandwiches alone. We’re sure to lose our meal-planning brains by June. And we all just need a cheat sheet. Here it is!

Summer Lunch List of Ideas

  1. Bean and Cheese Burritos – Make a big batch and freeze them to rewarm quickly as needed.
  2. Meat and Cheese Burritos – Make a big batch and freeze them to rewarm quickly as needed.
  3. Black Bean Salsa – Take a few minutes to put this together, refrigerate, then pull it out and serve with chips.
  4. Cheesy Salsa Enchiladas – These only take about 15 minutes to put together from start to finish. Make them ahead and bake as needed.
  5. Chicken Salad – Serve on bread, crackers, or tortillas.
  6. Tuna Salad – Serve on bread, crackers, or tortillas.
  7. Sloppy Joes – Serve on buns or with tortilla chips.
  8. Taco Salad – Let everyone build their own as they like.
  9. Simple Chicken Cheeseballs with a Kick – Perfect with these smoothies.
  10. Black Bean Chicken Nachos – These come together surprisingly fast.
  11. Grilled Pizza Tortillas – Fast and easy!
  12. Quesadillas – Add torn spinach to these to “sneak in veggies.“
  13. Easy Cheesy Bean Dip – I love it when lunch includes a chip and a dip.
  14. Pizza Boats – You can grill these if you want to avoid the oven. :)
  15. Creamy Mac and Cheese – Have you tried making it this way? Amazing.
  16. Beanie Weanies – A kid favorite at our house.
  17. Guacamole – With chips. And smoothies. It’s lunch and I love it.
  18. Simple Last Minute Nacho Plate – Perfect when they’ve played outside all morning and come in starving.
  19. Sliced Ham – Tastes so good with potato salad.
  20. Simple Crock Pot Pizza Casserole  – Take 5 minutes to put this together in your crock pot during breakfast; then serve it at lunchtime!
  21. Turkey and Cheese Melts –  Use leftover bread or buns, top them with lunch meat and cheese, then melt them under a broiler for 2-3 minutes.

Convenience food back-up ideas:

At this point in my life, I try to keep some of these on hand for super quick meals:

  • Hotdogs
  • Frozen pizza
  • Chicken nuggets
  • Sandwich makings

Keep any or all of these on hand for easy lunch sides:

  • Baby carrots (I like the petite carrots – they are sweeter and easier to eat!)
  • Grape tomatoes
  • Mini sweet peppers
  • Sugar snap peas
  • Strawberries
  • Blueberries
  • Blackberries
  • Raspberries
  • Unsweetened Applesauce
  • Bananas
  • Grapes
  • Oranges
  • Clementines
  • Fresh Spinach or Mixed Greens
  • Sliced apples
  • Sliced peaches or nectarines
  • Steamed peas (frozen peas cook very quickly!)
  • Sliced cucumbers
  • Sliced sweet peppers
  • Raw broccoli “trees”
  • Cut cantaloupe
  • Watermelon wedges
  • Sliced pears
  • Pineapple chunks
  • Steamed green beans (frozen green beans take just a few minutes, but can cook themselves while you get the remainder of lunch ready)

Bonus Tips:

If you have Homemade Ranch Dip (storebought works too!) or Hummus on hand, these can be thrown onto the table quickly to help get the veggies down!

These smoothies go with just about any lunch and are super refreshing in the summer.

What are your favorite lunch ideas for summertime?

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Inexpensive Meals I Made From Costco

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This post may contain affiliate links which won’t change your price but will share some commission.

Grocery prices are on the rise. That’s why I am so encouraged to share these delicious, inexpensive meals I made from Costco groceries!

We really can be more cheerful about grocery spending, friends. Yes, some prices have gone up. But we can still make very reasonably priced meals for our families. And we can still even serve them WITH FRUITS AND VEGETABLES.

You know I had to say that, right? :)

Sometimes we think that we need to compromise on healthy foods in an effort to save money. Not so, not so. Let’s keep eating good food and know that we can focus on nourishment too!

I have become curious as of late, so I decided to spend some time breaking down the cost of some of the meals I made after a big Costco trip. I was so excited to see that every meal I made was still incredibly reasonable.

I typically feed a minimum of 10 people at each evening meal. Depending on our adult kids’ schedules and the friends they have with them, often we feed 15 or more at dinnertime. This makes my cost breakdown even more exciting. :)

If you’d like to take a look at the list of food I recently bought, you can check that out here.

Inexpensive Meals I Made From Costco

1. Chicken Salad on Croissants

I used canned chicken and croissants that I got at Costco to make a delicious meal of Chicken Salad on croissants with spinach. We had this with fresh strawberries, raspberries, and carrots. The cost for this meal was right around $18 for 10 of us to eat!

2. “Homemade” Pizza

We used the pizza-making-kit from Costco to have a pizza night. Everyone loved this! We made four pizzas and ate them with these nourishing smoothies. Total cost for this meal was only $17. Amazing, right? But wait, it gets better…

Only our six littles were home when we first had this meal, so we ended up having enough leftovers to stretch these pizzas into two meals. So my $6.97 pizza kit lasted us for two meals, which was awesome on the budget, and also because having pizza leftovers is soooo nice to pull out on a busy day!

($17 divided by 2 meals equals $8.50 per meal to fill my family with pizza and a nourishing side. SO AMAZING!)

3. Smoked Chicken

We marinated Costco boneless chicken thighs in barbecue sauce, then threw the chicken on the smoker. We ate this with steamed green beans, buttered corn, baked potatoes, and grapes. The total cost for this meal was $26.

Sound like an expensive meal? Maybe. But it was a full night with many of our bigs and their significant others being home. Plus some family friends and my niece joined us. So we actually fed 16 people that night – 10 adults and 6 kids. $26 for a meal like this!! It breaks down to just $1.62/plate.

4. French Toast

The cinnamon streusel bread from Costco makes the most wonderful French toast!! We use eggs from our neighbor and made this meal with sausage links and sliced pears (or another choice of fruit the kids grabbed). The total cost for this meal was $19 for 12 people, $1.58 each.

I hope this cost breakdown encourages you as it does me!

Want to make these meals cost even less?

All of these meals can cost even less if you make more of the foods from scratch. My current season in life gives way to me purchasing some convenience foods (like croissants and other breads, some boxed foods, and canned items). But to save more money:

1. Make Chicken Salad from a cooked whole chicken. Save the bones to make broth for another meal or two. Instead of buying croissants, make bread like this. Or homemade, easy Pita Bread. So much more money saved!

2. Make homemade pizza crust like this. You can make these ahead of time and freeze the extras for an easy meal later.

3. Watch for meat mark-downs! I recently found chicken thighs marked down for quick sale at Sam’s. I bought all I could!

4. Make homemade bread or simply skip the special cinnamon streusel bread to use a less expensive variety to make French toast. Skip the sausage in the meal and just enjoy eggs as protein. :)

What inexpensive meals have you made lately?

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Stay tuned for more Big Family Food posts, where I share all about how I make food for our big family! And read here to catch up on other posts in this series you may have missed. :)

Heavenly Homemaker's Club Members: Access your homepage and all your fantastic resources here! Not a member yet? Please join us!

$5 Family Supper Club – Join Us!

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Now introducing: our $5 Family Supper Club!

Grocery prices are on the rise. But we don’t have to despair!

We did some research, we did the math, and we came up with 10 entire tasty meals you can make for your family that will only cost $5 (or maybe even less)*.

*prices as of May 2022

Join our $5 Family Supper Club!

This is for real – we’re going to tell you how you can feed a family of four for just $5! These meals aren’t fancy, but they are delicious and easy. For one week only, we’re going to let you join our new club for FREE!!

Have more than 4 people in your family? Me too, times a lot! ;) No worries! The more you stretch these meals, the more you’ll save! Simply adapt these plans and recipes to suit your family’s needs.

What about allergies?

Most of these meal plans and recipes are naturally gluten-free and dairy-free or can easily be adapted without increasing much in cost. I LOVE THIS!!!

Are you ready to join the club?

If you join before May 18, 2022, you can enjoy all of this for FREE!!!!

We want to save you some grocery money, and we want to bless you with a little pile of resources to make it fun and easy to save. The only “payment” we ask for is that you please share this with all of your family and friends so that they can save too!

Here’s how it works:

  1. Sign up here to join our $5 Family Supper Club (free for one week only; $49 value!)
  2. Watch for an email to confirm that you want our meal plans and recipes (check that silly spam folder if you don’t see it right away)
  3. Once you confirm, you’ll receive an email filled with our Bonus Packet of money-saving goodies!
  4. Beginning May 19, watch for our $5 Family Meal Planning Cards and Recipe Cards to land in your inbox every Thursday for the next ten weeks!

EVERYONE is affected by the increase in grocery costs right now. Please help us spread the word about these awesome free grocery-saving resources!

Here’s the link to this post so you can easily share it on your favorite social media sites! http://heavenlyhomemakers.com/5-family-supper-club-join-us

Thank you so much for sharing this page with your family so that they can sign up to enjoy these free resources with us!

Watch for your free bonus materials to hit your inbox as soon as you sign up and confirm your subscription. Then the first of our series of 10 Menu Planning Cards and Recipe Cards will arrive on May 19, 2022!

Heavenly Homemaker's Club Members: Access your homepage and all your fantastic resources here! Not a member yet? Please join us!

Meals I’m Making with my Grocery Haul

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I recently shared details about all the groceries I bought in April. Some have asked, “What meals do you make with all of these groceries?” So I decided to give you a peek into what I’ve done with all this food!

If you’d like to see more specifics about what I bought and how much I spent (oy!), you can do that here.

 

First, did you see that I bought quite a few boxes of prepared snacks at Costco and Sam’s? Yep, it’s soccer season! I used all of the following groceries for snacks either to take to the ball field or on stroller walks for the littles:

  • Granola Bites
  • Yogurt Squeezies
  • Heavenly Hunk Snacks
  • Fruit Bars
  • Gogurt
  • Applesauce Squeezies

Next, it can be assumed that all of the fresh fruits and veggies I pick up throughout the month serve as snacks between meals or as side dishes for breakfast, lunch, and dinner. Along with frozen veggies, I typically keep these on hand as much as possible:

  • Mixed Greens
  • Spinach
  • Broccoli
  • Petite Carrots
  • Blueberries
  • Strawberries
  • Clementines
  • Pears
  • Apples
  • Grapes

Now, here’s an idea of some of the meals I put together with some of groceries I bought in April:

  1. I used the canned chicken and croissants that I got at Costco to make a meal of Chicken Salad on croissants with spinach.
  2. I used the Cinnamon Streusel Bread from Costco along with eggs from our neighbor to make french toast. SOOO good.
  3. We marinated the chicken thighs in barbecue sauce, then threw the chicken on the smoker. This is one of our favorite meals!
  4. Usually, on Fridays, we make a simple meal of chicken nuggets and fries in our Air Fryer. We call this “French Fry Friday.” But I also call it “Mom’s Night Off.”
  5. We used the pizza-making-kit to have a fun pizza night. Everyone loved this!
  6. The loaves of bread I bought were used to make quick sandwiches. All of the adults in our family often need to eat on the run, so it’s good that I keep bread and lunchmeat on hand for them. Also, about once each week we make peanut butter sandwiches for lunch for the little ones.
  7. I also used a loaf of bread along with the sliced cheese to make a meal of grilled cheese sandwiches. I served it with tomato soup, which I already had on hand, and fruits and veggies.
  8. I plan to use the Tilapia for fish tacos soon!
  9. I baked the package of hamburger patties and put together burgers for all of us to eat while watching Malachi play a soccer game one evening. We went through almost the entire package of 18 burgers that night because an outing like that calls for all hands on deck!

That’s some of us at a recent soccer game. :)

Snacks I made with these groceries

  1. I used the almond butter from Costco to make two big batches of Snickerdoodle Cookie Dough Bites. I love having these on hand for the kids to eat. (I already had honey and coconut flour to use in this recipe.)
  2. I used the baking ingredients to make muffins. We eat muffins like crazy at our house, working our way through these recipes.
  3. I use all of the mixed greens and frozen fruit to make our daily smoothies. (Like this for the grown-ups. Like this for the kids.)

Justus College Graduation Party

Our Justus graduated from college at the end of April. We had a “Fire Pit Party” so much of the food I’d picked up from Costco or Sam’s was set aside for this gathering. I filled in some gaps with a last-minute Walmart pickup order.

  • Hotdogs, Brats, and Buns
  • Boxes of Individual Chips
  • Potato Salad
  • Grapes
  • Strawberries with Cream Cheese Parfait
  • Small water bottles

Stay tuned for a post coming soon that shares the cost breakdown for some of these meals!

Heavenly Homemaker's Club Members: Access your homepage and all your fantastic resources here! Not a member yet? Please join us!

Big Family Food: Total Grocery Spending for April 2022

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This post may contain affiliate links which won’t change your price but will share some commission.

I decided to keep a running tab of all of our grocery spending for April. Ready for the great big break-down?

We are currently a household of 11. This includes 5 adults and six littles. Most days we feed extras like a fiance and a girlfriend of our boys #2 and #3. Plus any others we are blessed to enjoy at mealtime or after ball games!

Throughout the month, I typically:

  1. Head to Lincoln one time to stock up at Costco and Sam’s.
  2. Place several Walmart Pick-Up orders to supplement the fresh produce and other groceries we need.
  3. Get local milk at a farm once each week.
  4. Pick up WIC items and a few other groceries at a local grocery store close to our house.

Here are more specifics about what I bought and spent during the month of April 2022:

Walmart Pick-Up

In order to keep up with all of the fresh produce we eat at our house, I have been placing a Walmart Pick-Up order a few times each month. My friend Pam comes to help me with the kids each morning, and she is awesome enough to grab my pick-up orders when I schedule them right before her time to come over.

Walmart Pick-Up April 6: $112 

Walmart Pick-Up April 12: $167 – I was prepping for a huge Easter dinner, so this order included candy for our Easter egg hunt plus some treats to supplement our big meal.

Walmart Pick-Up April 29: $127 – Justus graduated from college on the 30th, so along with fresh produce, I ordered brats and other food we needed to feed people who came to his reception.

Local Grocery Store

We have a very nice store just a few blocks from our house. They are great, however, their prices are usually higher so it’s hard for me to justify doing much shopping there since we buy so many groceries.

I run there a couple of times each month, though, to grab a few needed items, to take advantage of sales, and to get WIC items. (Three of our foster daughters qualify for WIC, which provides them with free formula, milk, cheese, cereal, produce, and a few other items. This is a huge blessing!)

Since these trips are short and sweet, I try to take one or two littles with me so they can have a fun outing and learn a little bit about shopping and obeying at the store. Here’s a summary of our April Grand Central Trips:

Grand Central April 3: $15 – I ran in and grabbed milk because we were almost out!

Grand Central April 11: $42 – I picked up all of our WIC items for the month, plus filled in a few gaps by grabbing some buns and frozen items we needed. WIC covered most of our cart that day, praise God.

Local Farm Milk: $40 – We are in a group that takes turns picking up farm-fresh milk each Tuesday. We get 2-gallons each week, and it is incredible milk!

April Trip to Lincoln

Costco – $420

  • Bottled water
  • Olives
  • Granola Bites
  • Strawberries
  • Blueberries
  • Clementines
  • Apples
  • Pears
  • Canned chicken
  • Tortilla Chips
  • Gogurt
  • Heavenly Hunk snacks
  • Coffee
  • Olive Oil
  • Sugar
  • Brown sugar
  • Almond butter
  • Bread
  • Brat rolls
  • Croissants
  • Boxes of chips
  • Frozen pizza
  • Tilapia
  • Chicken thighs
  • Chicken nuggets
  • Mozzarella cheese
  • Cheddar jack cheese
  • Applesauce squeezies
  • Yogurt squeezies
  • Kombucha
  • Italian dressing
  • Mustard
  • Fruit bars
  • Cinnamon streusel bread
  • Pizza making kit (with four crusts and sauce)

Sam’s – $229

  • Boneless chicken thighs marked down!
  • Red grapes
  • Frozen cheese curds
  • Frozen orange chicken box
  • Case of canned baked beans
  • Case of canned corn
  • Spaghetti sauce
  • Sliced pepper jack cheese
  • Sliced colby jack cheese
  • 2-pack of whole wheat sandwich bread
  • Turkey lunch meat
  • Potato salad
  • Pepperoni
  • Mixed greens
  • Spinach x2
  • Bananas
  • Half and half
  • Sour cream
  • Hamburger patties
  • Hamburger buns
  • Applesauce
  • Spaghetti sauce
  • Fish sticks
  • Raspberries
  • Pears
  • Apples
  • Apple juice

Total Grocery Spending for April

$1,152 

I try to keep our spending under $1,200 each month, so mission accomplished. We fed guests, we ate well, and as far as I can remember, we didn’t eat out at all this month.

Wait. I was sick one day so Matt ordered pizza while caring for so many littles while Mommy was in bed. :)

Care to share what your grocery spending was for April?

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How to Say “Thank You” to a Teacher

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Need to say “thank you” to a teacher? Let’s talk about ways to do that…

Teachers work incredibly hard. As the school year winds to a close, let’s talk about ways to say thank you.

Note: Homeschoolers! Oh, moms and dads, you deserve so much thanks! You work so very hard and I will tell you from experience that your work pays off. Take care of you. Take time for you. Take time for rest. Nurture your relationship with God. Take some time this summer to reflect and refresh. It is needed and good. :)

Our littles go to public school right now.

Will they always? I have no idea. But God has made it very obvious that this is His plan for our 8 and 6-year-olds while I care for all of their little siblings all day. We’ve needed this and it is good. Brayden and Bonus Girl’s teachers have been fantastic and we want to thank them. Help us with ideas!

How to Say “Thank You” to a Teacher

I’d like to put several items into a gift bag for our kids’ teachers this year. Here are some ideas I have, and I’m hoping you’ll add your ideas in the comments. :)

  • Gift cards – for coffee shops, specialty shops, movies, and/or restaurants
  • Pamper Yourself items – like lotion, lip balm, and soap (these are our favorites!)
  • Handmade thank you notes from the kids
  • Summer Fun items – like sunscreen, a fun water bottle, and a new beach towel
  • Journal and pens – for the little bit of downtime teachers get; hopefully they can sit and journal in the sunshine!
  • Grilling supplies – like marinades and fun spices
  • A good book to read
  • A pretty indoor or outdoor plant
  • Homemade goodies that the kids help make*
  • Fun drink mixes
  • Homemade Vanilla – if you have some ready to share!
  • Variety of coffee and fun ice cube trays so they can make iced coffee

*Here’s a list of fun treats kids can help make to give to teachers:

What ideas do you have for teacher thank you gifts?

P.S. You might also want to gift coaches, piano teachers, special ed teachers, secretaries, custodians, and bus drivers. Who am I forgetting?

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Big Family Food: I Have Got to Organize My Kitchen!

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Got to organize, got to organize, I have got to organize my kitchen…

Ok. This is starting to get nuts. I’m nuts. My food situation is nuts. Oh my goodness, I just realized I am completely out of nuts. Or am I?

What’s wrong, Laura?

Nothing’s wrong actually. :) And really, I’m kind of having fun as I face this new “food challenge.” But I also feel like I’ve been a homemaker since 1994 and all of a sudden I no longer know what I’m doing.

When we started adding kids to our tribe in 1997, I learned slowly how to fulfill our family’s food needs. I learned how to save money while our family grew. I learned how to feed my family healthy foods. Then, I learned how to feed teenage boys. All the while, I learned how to feed guests.

I learned and I grew and I had a system. I HAD A SYSTEM.

And then everything changed.

My old system doesn’t work anymore. It hasn’t for quite some time and I’ve been adapting. My Great Big Costco Experiment proves that I am over here HOLDING ONTO MY HOTDOG while trying to figure out how to grocery shop for and feed such a large family now.

I actually love this. Not sure how to feed this tribe anymore? The old ways don’t work? Need to develop a new system to make this happen efficiently?

Bring it on.

But also, what happened to all that fruit I bought yesterday? I bought this and this at Costco one Thursday:

Then just a few days later I had to order this from Walmart:

Then a few days later I needed this:

I love that we have such a large family and that we eat so much good food. I just can’t figure out how to keep up.

Is there such a thing? Can I keep up?

Or is this my new norm?

Moms with lots of kids, tell me: Am I going to need to go to the store every few days from now on? After all, the little kids are just going to turn into big kids, and then I’ll look back on my groceries of 2022 and laugh at myself.

I Have Got to Organize THIS!!

I’m not sure I have any answers yet, but I am working now to figure out a new system that works. For grocery shopping, for keeping up with so many mouths and appetites, for dealing with pickiness, and for organizing it all in my house.

So that’s what I’ve been working on lately!

One of my biggest issues (besides keeping up with grocery purchases) is figuring out how to organize all of our food efficiently. Here’s what I’m working with:

  • We have a lovely closet-like pantry and a refrigerator/freezer in our kitchen.
  • Out in a storage room, we have additional shelves for non-perishables. We also have a second fridge/freezer out there plus two deep freezers.

It’s ugly out there, but it’s storage space so that’s what matters.

I’m very blessed to have so much outside room for storage. The problems have been that:

  • We have so many little ones (3, 2, 1, and 9months) that I have very little time to organize all of the food in storage. Whenever I get home from grocery shopping we all just stuff food into whatever freezers, fridges, and pantry spaces we can find room. There is no system and has not been organized.
  • Every time I need something from our storage room (at least a dozen times every day), I have to make my way from the kitchen, through the living room, through Justus’ room, and into the outside storage room. It’s not such a big deal, except that alllllll of the little ones want to follow me out there, then they get mad that they can’t play out there, then I have to grab up babies to get them back into the house…

IT IS A MESS.

As in, the system is a mess and the storage room has been a mess.

These “before pictures” don’t make it look like a total mess, but trust me, we couldn’t even walk in this room.

With all of the cases and boxes of food and paper goods, the storage room barely had a path to walk through to get to anything we needed.

I’ve been praying about how to make it work better, and dumb as it is, I’ve shed some tears over it. I’ve just been frustrated because I need to make it better and I haven’t been sure how.

Finally one day, I just started digging into my kitchen pantry. My goal was to get everything organized in a way that put everything in my kitchen pantry that I used the most. Everything else was going out to the storage room shelves.

Here is my kitchen the day I pulled everything out to regroup.

Meanwhile, I realized that I have an area in my kitchen, just behind my sink, that was basically wasted space. (I didn’t take a before picture, so sorry! I was too focused on figuring out a new system. Just know that it was messy and unusable.)

It occurred to me that with some work, we could turn that space into something useful and helpful for storage and efficiency. But what exactly should we do to make that area usable?

Have I ever told you about my dear friend Pam?

I’m not sure what I would do without her. She comes over for a couple of hours every weekday morning – to help with the kids, to help me with appointments, to help me with housework – whatever I need, she’s there.

Pam helped me brainstorm, then she worked with me to reorganize that unusable kitchen area. Sooooooo thankful!!! Keith “helped” her unscrew a little table that was attached to the wall taking up and wasting space. She yanked stuff off the wall. The baby girls and I scrubbed the walls and floor. Then Pam helped me move a shelf from the storage room into that area in the kitchen.

During nap time, I took trip after trip from storage room to kitchen, filling the shelves, then redoing the pantry.

Here’s the new shelf we moved into the kitchen:

And here’s the reorganized pantry:

Having the additional shelf in the kitchen changes everything! It looks so much nicer than the mess that was there before, plus now I have all of my non-perishables right in my kitchen. I still have to make the trek out to our storage room for food in our extra fridge and freezers, but having everything else right where I need it is SO HELPFUL!!

And speaking of the storage room:

We can walk through it and all that’s stored in there now is all of our paper goods, woot!

There is still more organizing that can be done in our house, but having our kitchen and food more organized sure is a huge blessing!

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Tips to Save Time in the Kitchen

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Since 2007 I’ve been sharing tips for how to save time in the kitchen. Here are some of my best!
Now that it’s 2022 and we’ve added more amazing kids to our family, I find that I continue to find more and more ways to use my time as wisely as possible.

My current favorite ways to save time in the kitchen:

Here are some additional time-saving ideas – in case you want to be awesome and make Cinnamon Rolls and Granola:

I’ve been buying granola as of late and the only cinnamon rolls we eat are ones I bought at Christmas-time from my nephew and nieces who were baking to raise money to buy more chickens for their family project. :)

So apparently that’s my newest time-saving tip: Buy it from someone else, ha. Goodness, how far I’ve come. I’m the one who used to make everything from scratch. I don’t even remember that old me anymore. :) I don’t have any guilt over this – the old me or the new me. That’s God at work, people. :)

Still, we are eating quite a lot of nourishing foods each day, even if we do compromise here and there.

What are some of your time-saving tricks?
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Chocolate Pumpkin SPINACH Cake? Yes.

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Yes, I made a new cake with spinach, a Chocolate Pumpkin Spinach Cake. It’s official. I’m ridiculous. But wait until you try this!

You can think I’m crazy if you want to. You’d be right. But adding spinach to cake? Well, it’s a hilarious way to eat vegetables. Your family will be none the wiser unless they watch you make the cake. Then you have some explaining to do.

Therin lies all the ingredients for a pumpkin chocolate cake, plus a generous amount of fresh spinach. All blended up, it turns into a cake. For Popeye. And everyone else.

Hey, this is a million times better than this fun – but full of sugar and white flour – add spinach to a cake mix idea. I still plan to make that from time to time because it’s fun and truly a good way to get my kids to eat greens.

But this Chocolate Pumpkin SPINACH Cake has both pumpkin and spinach, so it’s basically a health food. Covered in frosting. ;)

Chocolate Pumpkin Spinach CakeYum

Chocolate Pumpkin SPINACH Cake? Yes.
 
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Serves: 15
Ingredients
  • 1 cup melted coconut oil
  • 1 can pumpkin puree (15 ounces)
  • 2 eggs
  • ½ cup water
  • 2-3 cups fresh spinach leaves
  • 4 Tablespoons unsweetened cocoa powder
  • 2 cups whole wheat pastry flour
  • 1 cup sucanat or brown sugar
  • dash of sea salt
  • 1 teaspoon ground cinnamon
  • 1 teaspoon baking soda
Instructions
  1. Put all ingredients into a high power blender (like a Blendtec) starting with liquids first.
  2. Blend until well mixed and smooth.
  3. Pour ingredients into a 9x13 inch cake pan.
  4. Bake in a 350 degree oven for 30-40 minutes or until a toothpick inserted in the middle comes out clean.
  5. Allow cake to cool completely before frosting.

Want some low-sugar frosting options? Follow this search I did, and find all kinds of fun frosting ideas. Plus, you’ll see more cake recipes, and you know you want to add spinach to all of those!!

Have you tried this idea? Tell me how it went for you!

My family cannot tell there’s spinach in our cake. I love this!

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Big Family Food: Have Grocery Prices Gone Up at Sam’s?

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There’s so much talk about high grocery costs! So have grocery prices gone up at Sam’s also?

I had just made a run to our local grocery store – the one I try to support if at all possible. But they aren’t a chain so their prices are often higher than most other stores. Their sales are good though, and I like to support them since they are local, so I go there when I can. (Read here to get some great tips and recipes to help keep food costs down!)

One particular day recently though, I came home so discouraged. It seemed that everything everyone had been saying about grocery prices going up was very true. Everything I needed at the store that day seemed to have doubled in price. Ouch, that can really add up. And because we go through so much food at our house, I just couldn’t justify putting many “convenience foods” (Like bagels, hashbrowns, frozen fruit, yogurt…) into my cart.

I stuck to the very basics, came home with very few groceries, and tried to think creatively about how I could stay within our grocery budget while still recognizing that my cooking/baking time is very, very limited.

(Ha, “came home with very few groceries” was still a cart full. I had planned to get much more for our family that day, that’s all.) ;)

A few days later, I was able to head out of town to Sam’s to try to really stock up on items we needed. I took our 6-year-old with me for a much-needed one-on-one outing. She was BEAMING the entire time we were out! (And chatting. And chatting, and chatting. I’m learning that girls are different than boys, ha!)

Have Grocery Prices Gone Up at Sam’s?

My fear was that Sam’s grocery prices were going to be just as hiked up as they had been at our small grocery store.

I was getting low on just about all of our staples, plus I always need fresh produce. So I decided not to hold back while shopping that day. I was hoping to get enough food to last us at least two weeks. Maybe?? But I was also hoping to avoid going broke.

The only carts available that day were the flats, which I knew I would need. But I also don’t like how difficult it is to get everything onto a flat without stuff falling out. So I took the advice left by JJ on this post, and I grabbed boxes at the front of the store. Instead of just putting items onto the flat, I loaded them into the big boxes that sat on the flat. Worked like a charm!!!

After check out, the boxes filled the back of our Transit, but they sure did stack up nicely!

Then, of course, unloading it and putting it all away once we got home was the fun challenge.

What I got:

  • Big bag of apples
  • Big bag of pears
  • Big bag of nectarines
  • Bananas
  • 1 container of mixed greens
  • 2 containers of spinach
  • Container of blueberries
  • Container of strawberries
  • Container of kiwi
  • Asparagus
  • Big bag of petite baby carrots
  • 2 large bags of Fritos
  • 2 large bags of tortilla chips
  • Case of peaches
  • Case of mandarine oranges
  • Case of Rotel
  • Case of refried beans
  • Box of beef hotdogs
  • Box of orange chicken
  • Box of cheese curds
  • Bag of chicken nuggets
  • Pack of lime juice bottles
  • Coffee creamer
  • 1/2 & 1/2
  • Big bag of tator tots
  • Turkey lunch meat
  • Ham lunch meat
  • White queso
  • Sliced colby jack cheese
  • Shredded colby jack cheese
  • Box of avocado mash cups
  • Double bag of plain bagels
  • 2 large bags of frozen fruit
  • A few clothing items we needed

Total for food: $367

I was AMAZED and grateful that I got so much food for less than $400!

While grocery prices have gone up here and there, I didn’t find that the prices at Sam’s were shocking by any means.

Are Sam’s and Costco still going to save us money?

Absolutely.

Yes, prices have gone up somewhat because that’s what’s happening right now. But the savings I experienced at Sam’s that day was significant compared to what I’d found at a regular grocery store. Plus, overall prices were still extremely reasonable at Sam’s.

Next time I go to Costco I’ll do a similar comparison to see if the savings are still there. :)

What have you experienced with grocery prices where you shop? Are they going up?

P.S. Read this post to get great tips and recipes for help in keeping food costs down!

Heavenly Homemaker's Club Members: Access your homepage and all your fantastic resources here! Not a member yet? Please join us!