Easiest Cookies Ever - You tube Recipe

Recipe
Ingredients:
2 packets of Cake mix (12oz - Home brand)
2/3 C of Vege Oil
4 Eggs - room temperature
2 Cups of Choc chips an - your choice

Method:
Sift the cake mix
Add all other ingredients
Add chocolate chips and/or nuts - your choice

Scoop into balls and flatten slightly on a baking tray
Bake for 8-10mins depending on your oven
* Very economical, can be doubled and great for school lunches

You can also check out youtube for the recipe based on an 18oz box of cake mix

Date Scones - Edmonds Cook Book

Pineapple Upside Down Cake

Ingredients:
3 TB firmly packe Brown Sugar
25g Butter Melted
Can of pineapple rings - reserve a 1/3C of the pineapple juice
100g Butter Softened
1/2 C Caster Sugar
2 Eggs
Finely grated zest of 1 Lemon
2 tsp Coconut Essence - not essential, I've made it without and it tastes fine
1C of Self Raising Flour - add a bit of baking powder if you don't have any self raising

Heat oven, grease/line cake tin. Sprinkle brown sugar and melted butter over base
Drain pineapples and reserve 1/3C of juice. Then arrange on the base over the brown sugar and melted butter.
Place the second measure of butter and caster sugar in a bowl and beat until pale and creamy.
Beat in Eggs, one at a time. Stir in Lemon Zest and Coconut Essence, then fold in sift flour alternately with the reserve pineapple juice.

Spoon mixture of pineapples, then smooth the surface.

Bake 35-40mins or a skewer comes out clean.

Note: Double the mixture so you have a thicker cake.

It's a new day

hi all,
sorry for my absence a lot has been going on since my last blog post. To cut a long story short, I had some health issues, financial issues, personal issues - you name it I've had it. I figure there is always someone worse off and after having some time out at Camp, talking and sharing with friends, it has no only lightened the load but helped me to refocus on what's important.

To that end this blog will now be about me and my family and all the stuff that comes along for the ride

February - Week 3

Here we go again... I must say one thing I have re-discovered is when you plan (somewhat - in my case), there is very little waste. You really want to use up what you have. We have started going back to the Fleamarket on a Sunday for our veges, as there are savings to be made eg...
Capsicums - $5.99 p/kg compared to $11.99 at the local green grocer. Gala apples $2.99 p/kg (good ones) doubled again at the local green grocer.

Baking: Coconut Bread and Walnut and Date loaf

We've have gotten off to a good start
Monday - capsium filled with cooked mince, veges, pasta sauce with a side order of potato Salad.
Tuesday - Chicken Fetticini with white sauce and mixed veges
Wednesday - Left overs
Thursday - Chicken Nibbles, salad and pasta
Friday - Fish and Chip pack from our local - late night after softball
Saturday - BBq at a friends
Sunday - Toasted Sandwiches

Review: Things got a bit hectic towards the end of the week. The more we cook at home the less we want to spend on takeaway. Seems a bit senseless to go and do a fortnight's worth of shopping and then go eat out 3-4 days a week, no wonder we never had any money...lol.

It's a good feeling to still have money in the bank to use on essentials. Oh and my $2.00 purchases have decreased by 80% - I'm sure my locals are gonna go out of business because of it...lol.

February - Week Two

Monday - leftovers. I had flan and coleslaw. Al had left over pasta, canned salmon and tomato, Oldest child he ate with my mum and the youngest child had noodles -punishement for being last to have dinner and the kitchen was closed.
Tuesday - Home made hamburgers
Wednesday - Savoury muffins
Thursday and Friday - both take out nights, i know, i know. Cannon starjam group was performing at the Halberg awards and then Friday I worked O/T and we got home very late from the game.
Saturday - Chicken nibbles and hot chips, it's so easy just to pop down to the local takeout and we jus surrounded by them. My will was weak and I couldn't resist...lol. Sad but true
Sunday - no take out, simple meal of eggs on toast...yummy

Review:
Yes we fell of the wagon...and it's so easy and so wasteful to be spending hard earned cash on takeouts. Next week we are back on the wagon, a few lapses doesn't mean we should give up completely.

Simple Savings - War on Debt: February

Simple Savings - War on Debt.
I've decided if I'm going to work towards financial independant I need to start NOW. The other week I printed off the War on Debt calender for 2011. Each month you are faced with a challenge and asked the same three questions but the answers are based on the challenge for that month.

February is: "NO SPEND CHALLENGE" - this will be a tough one for us so I decided to pick one thing that we waste money on and for us that's Takeaways. We are totally guilty of not prepping dinner before we go out.
What will we do? - No takeaways for dinner
How will it improve our lives? Reduce impulse spending and improve our overall health
How will we remember? Discuss what we are going to have the following night and prep what we can before hand.

The story so far.... Week One
Tuesday - Stuffed Peppers, I used the "food in a minute" recipe, very delicious but next time I'll use a meat based filling instead.
Wednesday - Lamb rissoles, coleslaw and potato salad
Thursday - Sliced paua, veges, pasta in white sauce
Friday - Fish and Chip pack (B) $5.50 to go with the left over salad
Saturday - Scrambled egg salad in a bread roll
Sunday - Tomato and Cheese Flan and coleslaw; I adapted a recipe from in the Recipe Mag
** We slipped on Friday but any other week we would have spent way more than $5.50.

REVIEW -
After only one week I feel more in control and it helps having the family on board with the idea. I said to a friend the other day - how can I expect my children to be financial independant if I can't do it myself. I definately not rushing things as it's going to take sometime to break the habits of a lifetime.