Red Hot Jello

I had to figure SOMEONE was wondering why it was necessary to fit cinnamon imperials in to our tiny grocery budget! Here is the reason!

This is yet another one of our family holiday favorites. My mom ALWAYS made it for Christmas when I was a little girl. However, I don't remember actually eating it because, as I recall, one of my cousins always ate the ENTIRE pan -- perhaps even before everyone sat down to dinner. I'm pretty sure it's his favorite thing ever. In fact, when he got married, my mom gave his wife-to-be the recipe, ingredients and a Jello mold. It was so cute!

Red Hot Jello -

1/4 cup of red hots
1 cup of boiling water
1 small box of cherry Jello
1 can of applesauce*

Melt red hots in water. Pour over jello and dissolve. Add applesauce. Pour in to bowl or Jello mold.

*I couldn't find a CAN of applesauce, for whatever reason. Instead, I used about 3/4 of a small jar of UNSWEETENED applesauce. I really, really enjoyed it with the unsweetened variety. I thought it really let the cinnamon shine through. Without the super-sweetness I was like, "This REALLY tastes like a candied apple. YUM!

Don't forget to share in the recipe sharing fun at Vintage Recipe Thursday, LifeAsMom, Balancing Beauty and Bedlam, Tempt My Tummy Tuesdays, Tuesdays at the Table.

Not-So-Super Target

We did make it to Target to finish up our grocery shopping for the week. I spent $33.28 pre-tax and saved $18.22. I was once again kind of underwhelmed. I guess my complaints are sort of the same as when we went to Wal-Mart -- fewer sales, no circular, not able to pre-plan coupons. Lesson learned - better to shop the sales at higher priced grocery store than a national chain "super store."

Our menu plan for this week won't be very elaborate. For some reason I've been feeling overwhelmingly busy. The nature of being a working mom, I suppose, is that I just don't have the time for food preparation or even "real meals" like I would like to. Believe me, I have some serious guilt over it. Anyway, we'll be eating brown bag lunches all week, except for when the girls are home with my husband on Mon and Tues. They'll eat the meatloaf and sweet potatoes on Mon. and probably fish sticks and fries on Tuesday. They usually will eat some fresh fruit while daddy prepares lunch. He actually does a great job of not just throwing them in front of a plate of junk. It takes some guidance, but he can totally manage. For dinner, aside from Monday night at Alpha, we'll probably eat frozen enchiladas, shells and cheese with added frozen broccoli and a side of apple sauce and cheese quesadillas with black beans. Friday nights always end up having to be something really fast on the way to dance -- bagels and cream cheese or PB&J. It sure isn't fancy, but my family doesn't mind!

I'm also working on altering my mom's pumpkin muffin recipe. I made them on Halloween for a Halloween open house we had at my house. I substituted 1 cup of whole wheat pastry flour for the all purpose, and you could not tell AT ALL. I also used 1/2 cup of Canola oil with DHA for half a cup of the regular canola. Next order of business is to try a higher percentage of whole wheat flour and switch the other half of a cup of regular Canola oil for unsweetened applesauce. I figure if I can pass off those switches, we'll have a much healthier snack. I'll make sure to post a final recipe once I think it's in tip-top shape.

See this week's other grocery trip here.

See also Life as Mom and Menu Planning Monday.

Not a lot of food around here! For some reason we've really been plowing through the food we have. I have a bunch of staples, but just not a whole lot of meal type stuff. Unfortunately, the grocery store sales seemed really weak this week. I decided we would try the Wal-Mart market by us again. I hadn't been in probably 18 months or so, so I figured it was worth a shot. However, since they don't publish a circular, I couldn't prepare a list or coupons. A total shot in the dark...

Here is what we came home with --


Total cost was $10.99 before tax. The crackers also had a free after mail in rebate tag on them. I was happy with the price of what I DID get, but I was really unimpressed with the general cost of things and the lack of sale items! We won't be going back any time soon!

I was pretty disappointed on our way home because I was HOPING to pick something up for dinner. We ended up having cheese quesadillas and bananas with vanilla yogurt. Not an ideal combination, but it wasn't so bad!

I'm not quite sure what I'll do to get us through the rest of the week! I'm thinking maybe we'll try Target tomorrow night. Hopefully I can match some sales with some good coupons!

See this week's trip to Super Target here.

See last week's $50/grocery project here and here.

See also, beingfrugal.net.

Hanging out with Mom is SOOOOOOO fun...

(Wordless Wednesday)

Wordless Halloween

Icebox Boston Cream

I got tired of calling it "You know, that Boston Cream thing...the one with the graham crackers," so I started calling it what it is...Boston Cream Casserole. Now, this is a recipe you can get excited about. It is yummy in the tummy. Of all of the recipes I have poured blood, sweat and tears in to, it is the ONE thing my in-laws go crazy for. And, yes, it's the easiest thing ever.

Ingredients -

1 box of graham crackers
3 small boxes of vanilla Jello pudding
3 cups of milk
1 tub of Cool Whip
1 tub of chocolate frosting (I liked the whipped varieties.)

To start mix together the three packages of pudding and 3 cups of milk. Once it is stirred together, fold in the Cool Whip. Next, make a single layer of graham crackers on the bottom of the 9 x 13 pan. Spread half of the pudding mixture over the graham crackers. Top cream mixture with another layer of graham crackers. Top that layer of graham crackers with the second half of the pudding mixture. Top the last half of the pudding with a third layer of graham crackers. On the third layer of graham crackers, you will top it with the entire can of chocolate frosting. Done!

This does need to chill for at least 6 hours or so the graham crackers can soften. Honestly, try this one out! Come back and tell me how much your family and friends loved it! It's perfect for anyone with a hopeless sweet tooth!

If you love this, you'll also love my No Bake Lemon Cake.

See other recipes at Balancing Beauty and Bedlam.

You know it's a good trip when you have trouble making sure everything is visible for a picture.

Honestly though, I can barely believe this trip. I didn't want to go. I still don't feel good. It's a beautiful day outside, and I wanted to be having fun. But...we went. We had to, or we wouldn't have eaten this week. Here is what we got...

1 bag of cinnamon imperials
1 bag of frozen corn
1 bag of frozen peas
2 boxes of Cheez-Its
6 boxes of General Mills Cereal
1 jar of unsweetened generic applesauce
1 box of Jello
2 jars of Simply Fruit jam (I love these!)
1 32 oz bottle of Wesson canola oil
2 pints of Blue Bunny ice cream
1 Hormel turkey and gravy dinner
2 boxes of Hormel Little Sizzlers
3 1 lb bags of Reeser's hashbrowns
10 cups of Dannon yogurt
2 tubs of Philadelphia cream cheese
1 5 lb bag of Russet potatoes
1 small tub of cottage cheese

Get this -- pre-tax total was $25.72. I feel like we did SOOO good. All 6 boxes of cereal, all of the hash browns and nearly all of the yogurts were entirely free. I got a $6 bounce back coupon for milk on the cereal too. All in all, I think I came out actually $7 in the positive on the cereal deal. I'm thinking about swinging by the store for the cereal deal again! While that's normally more sugar than I want my family to eat, I will let them eat it in moderation while General Mills pays me out in organic milk.

As I already mentioned, we'll be eating things like fish sticks and fries, grilled cheese with tomato soup, sausage, eggs and hashbrowns and cavatini. I'm also going to whip up a family favorite -- Red Hot Jello, so stay tuned for that recipe! We'll be snacking on bagels and cream cheese, cereal, baby's favorite, pumpkin muffins, fresh apples and pears, biscuits and jelly and banana peanut butter smoothies.

See this week's other trip here.

See also Menu Planning Monday.