So here I am 30 weeks pregnant with baby #2: a baby boy! && we are so excited! But, we know that at the end of the day, we will be down one full income for upwards of 8 weeks. We are also aware that I work part-time; when I return from maternity leave we are expecting fewer hours. This means less pay. This means another visit to our monthly budget. So in comes planning mommy! A mommy who won’t have a brain to function, none the less sit for moments at a time planning breakfasts, lunches, and dinners around a 2 year old and a 2 day old!
I am also not a mommy that is very cook/recipe savvy. They say: if you can’t cook, follow the recipe. Baking isn’t like watercolors; you can’t just substitute. Well, here’s the mama who never follows recipes and is as picky as they come!
<<Insert rice.>> I love it! Recipe or no, you can eat it. I will use the term “rice” generally here, but just remember almost everything can be substituted for white rice, jasmine rice, wild rice, brown rice, yellow rice, whatever! And in almost all the recipes, you can suit your flavors and spices to taste.
In almost every recipe, you need rice, butter, salt. In many you can add in a variety of veggies and/or chicken/beef.
Fabulously Frugal has an amaaazing DIY Rice-A-Roni Recipe! In fact, we tried it out the other night. I need to sit down and figure out pricing exactly, but it is much cheaper than even the Aldi brand cheap Rice A Roni pre-made mixes for $0.89/pack… especially when I can get 15# of rice at SAM’s club for $8.00. Obviously that leaves me plenty of leftover rice for whatever else these recipes call for, even if I made a huge stock batch of this! It tastes delicious! I can’t wait to substitute in some wild rice and see how that tastes too!
Money Saving Moms has a declious recipe for another favorite I’ve tried from the $0.89 bags of Aldi brand Chicken, Rice, and Broccoli Casserole. I do not, repeat, do not like or enjoy broccoli. YUCK! So, I generally cut just the sprouts/leaves off the tops of the stalks and mix those in. The texture is absorbed in the rice texture, and the cheese covers the taste, but my body still gets to reap in the benefits! This one does use cream of chicken & mushroom soup and cheese. && freezes amazingly!
Pepper Steak from A Frugal Friend sounds delicious. I haven’t acccctually tried it yet. I don’t like peppers, though my husband adores them and we always offer them (and other things) to my child. So, I will probably sautee some carrot sticks along with the peppers, and eat those while giving my husband extra peppers! One pepper would be plenty! I can see this easily substituting with chicken as well.
While not on another blog, I also thoroughly enjoy baked brown rice. I can make a huge pan with one bag of rice, lentils (optional) and frozen veggies (optional) butter and salt that will last 2-3 days of time. Everyone in my family loves it.
I consider these to be what will become my three staple rice recipes. I have eaten them, or something similar, before and is much more exciting to me than boiled white rice or boiled white rice with teriyaki sauce poured over top (which is good too!). Here are two more links:
1. Beans & Rice Linky Party (with hundreds of recipes!)
2. How to Save Even More ($$) with Rice
So tell me!!! What are your FAVORITE rice recipes for the budget conscious mommy! Any that freeze well? Freezing rice can be tricky – what are your secrets and tips!?
Freshly Messy Life 