I (Barb) am doing a “low spend” challenge for the month of January. In order to do a productive low spend month you have to look at your fixed expenses and your modifiable expenses and see where you can cut costs. I outlined all my expenses at the end of last month and decided the easiest place to cut costs was food, entertainment and clothing (as well as other accessories). Besides fixed costs, money would be spent only on necessary food items (those needed to help use up other food items we already had) and household items (but only to replace items that are used up like laundry soap or bath soap etc.) Let’s talk food for a minute. I bet if you look around in your fridge, freezer and pantry you’d find a pile of food you could use to cook all kinds of meals. Same for me. I think what happens is that I tend to stick to the same few favorite meals and so instead of using everything I have I just buy new stuff to make the same meals and continually push other items to the back of the shelf until they are expired or no longer usable and they get thrown away. One of my goals for the low spend month is to use up those items and prevent the undue cost of food waste to my pocket book and the environment. It’s crazy the amount of food I have in the house && I’m embarrassed to say I’ve looked at all of that before and said, “we have nothing to eat.” No more!! So far this month I’ve spent only $6.90 on groceries && I’ve used up two lonely (and slightly squishy) eggplants to make my husband’s favorite Romanian sandwich spread, a butternut squash (that I brought back from Virginia in October - thank God they keep so long!) to make a really delicious soup, and a whole bag of fruit I froze in December (that was going to go bad before we could eat it all) to make these jam bars!! We are a week in and I’m feeling GREAT! This challenge has caused me to be more creative in the kitchen than I’ve been in a long time && I love the renewed creativity I have for cooking on a budget. What’s one way you could cut costs this month? What would you do with the money you saved?
JAM BARS Recipe
Crust and topping:
1 1/2 C whole wheat flour
1 1/2 C old fashioned oats
1 C coconut (or brown) sugar
14 Tbs grass fed salted butter
1 tsp baking powder
Jam:
6-8 cups (depending on fruit size) assorted fruit from your fruit bowl or freezer that needs to be used up! (I used 2 cups pears, 1 1/2 cups raspberries, 1 1/2 cups blackberries, 2 cups strawberries)
1 tsp cinnamon
1/2 coconut (or brown) sugar
1/4 cup chia seeds
Directions:
Combine all of the crust/topping ingredients in a bowl. Mix with hands until coarse crumbles form. Use half as crust and half as topping
Let the fruit become warm and let it release juices heated on medium on the stove. Add cinnamon and brown sugar - stir to dissolve. Add chia seeds. Turn off heat and let stand 10 minutes. Use hand blender to purée. Pour over crust layer.
Bake at 350 for 40 minutes (turn in oven halfway through). Store in airtight container for up to 5 days.
If you want a simple way to save this recipe for later, download this PDF!
Enjoy!
Barb
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