After making some Red Curry Paste, I wanted to try it out. I didn't feel like making my favorite panaeng-style curry, so I tried this recipe from a recent issue of Food Network Magazine. I really like this one - it's easy and delicious. Plus, as an added bonus, the leftover sauce goes great with naan or pita chips!

Now, the original asks that the dish be served cold - good for these hot summer months - but I found it works great either hot or cold. I like mine with rice stick noodles, though you can substitute whole wheat spaghetti, fettuccine or similar without any problems. Just cook it according to the package directions like any pasta.

I also found this was best if the sauce was allowed to rest in the fridge for a few hours. Even a half-hour rest is beneficial.

I like to serve this alongside a bit of cabbage slaw tossed with a vinaigrette.

In the last post, I alluded to some good news we were celebrating. Here's the scoop: During the last month, I've been working on my senior project for my bachelor's degree. Last week, I turned it in and on Saturday, I received my evaluation notice. I passed with flying colors! As of now, I have my Bachelor's of Science in Accounting!

It's really good to be able to get back to writing about food and recipes now that the project is done. I have a bunch of recipes set by to share with you!

The little jars of red curry paste are by now ubiquitous and, unsurprisingly, one lived in my spice cupboard for quite some time (naturally being periodically replaced as I emptied it). I'd never really thought much about making it myself - it seemed impossible to get that dark, earthy aroma.

Then, of course, we ran out and immediately thereafter, had Thai cravings. Yes, we could have (and did) go to the local Thai restaurant (very good, would recommend), but I wanted my curry, not theirs.

Now, the thing about my small town is that there's not a lot of choice. There are two grocery stores and Walmart. Prices for "exotic" ingredients, like curry paste, are exorbitant, despite thriving communities of expats from various Southeast Asian countries only a half-hour's (or so) drive away. I usually go to one called "Southeast Asian Market" on 4th East and 9th South that carries all sorts of fun ingredients - I once found a packet of 5 snake heads in the freezer, for example. They have good prices on a lot of items, one of which is curry paste, which comes in little cans for about a quarter of the price my local stores ask.

Still, going downtown is a pain, particularly in the summer when daily temps are around (or over) 100F and the truck's a/c isn't working. We didn't need anything else since most of the items we use, we bought in bulk last time. I still didn't want to pay Macey's price, so I started looking around for a recipe.

I found one in my Quick & Easy Thai book. (I love this book - everything I've ever tried has come out wonderfully.) I even had all the ingredients on hand, thanks to my husband's affection for fresh enchilada sauce.

All I can say is: why on earth did I not do this before? It's far, far better than the stuff I had been buying.

Look for dried chiles in the Hispanic section of your supermarket, if you're in the US. Or, better yet, go to a Hispanic market - they will have the best selection at the best prices.

We stopped by Macey's Thursday night to buy some little things - some apples, because no one had good fruit on Monday, a handful of shallots to make veggie bouillon and chicken stock, plus a quart of plain yogurt because it was on sale and it just sounded good. Plus, I was having cookie cravings and I remembered this recipe I wanted to try that needed yogurt.

We spent: $6.42 Remaining budget: $9.73

We didn't really intend to come in so far under budget. It just worked out that way. Unless something comes up tomorrow, it looks like we'll be finishing up well under budget.

Today, since we had some money left over and I received some very good news this morning, we went out to eat lunch at Del Taco.

We spent: $4.25 Remaining budget: $5.48

The week is officially over, and with it, the challenge. We finished up well under budget! We succeeded!

Let's hope that we did well enough to gain the attention of the judges at All*You - I'd love to be a finalist! (I'd also love to win, but that goes without saying. ;-))

Menu for the final part of Week 4

Tuesday Breakfast: Bacon popovers (my favorite), cantaloupe Lunch: Random Thai-style stirfry whipped up by my husband so I could write Dinner: Tacos (with homemade taco shells) plus salsa cruda/mango-pineapple salsa, black beans with onions and peppers

Wednesday Breakfast: Mushroom omelet, cantaloupe, sausage patty Lunch: Braised leeks with walnuts and sun-dried tomatoes over pasta Dinner: Garlic burgers, homestyle fries, fry sauce (this is Utah) made with homemade bbq sauce and sour cream, braised radishes and zucchini Dessert Air-popped popcorn and fruit smoothies

Thursday Breakfast: Dutch baby, turkey bacon, fruit smoothies Lunch: Sausage and egg sandwiches on homemade onion buns Dinner: Chef salad with Lavash (from Beard on Bread) Dessert: Eggless Yogurt Chocolate Chip Cookies and milk

Friday Breakfast: 10-grain pancakes, apple and turkey bacon Lunch: Fried rice Dinner: Skillet pasta Dessert: Milk and cookies

Saturday Breakfast: Scottish oatmeal, hardboiled eggs, sausage patty Lunch: Del Taco Dinner: Dad took us to Applebees and Coldstone for a celebratory dinner

Finally, it's the last week of the Grocery Challenge. We went shopping yesterday, mainly because I needed to go renew some library books before they were overdue today. It means we missed the sales, but it's a small price to pay.

Surprisingly, we didn't buy all that much. We weren't able to get much in the way of fruit for breakfasts, save for one cantaloupe, so I think there'll be another shopping trip later this week. Onions are finally coming down in price, so I have hopes for repeats of last fall's 25c/lb onion crops. I hate paying $1.50+ a pound for onions (and we go through a LOT of onions, about 3 - 5 lbs per week).

Anyway, we picked up a few bunches of radishes at Rancho to make a braised radish dish I saw on Ruhlman's blog, a beautifully ripe mango for mango salsa (more on that soon, it was wonderful), and lots of nice big jalapenos.

We spent: $8.22 Budget remaining: $41.78

We went to Jason's Deli for lunch because it just sounded good. (And boy, was it ever.) No charge for this one, it was on the house thanks to my winning a Twitter trivia contest a couple of weeks ago!

Finally, Winco. We mainly needed produce and dairy today, but we also found boneless pork loin on sale, so we picked up a few pounds. It pushed our trip total up, but we're low on sausage patties.

We spent: $25.63 Budget remaining: $16.15

And that's that! I know I've been posting all about this all the time, but my senior capstone is almost done and soon I'll have the energy to cook and write about food again. I'm so excited!

Sunday Breakfast: Fried egg, turkey bacon, hash browns, cantaloupe Lunch: Ramen salad with TVP Dinner: Florentine lasagna with Mom

Monday Breakfast: Dutch baby, cantaloupe, sausage patty Lunch: Jason's Deli! Dinner: Citrusy black beans, mango-pineapple salsa, baked tortilla chips, avocado -- I will be posting about these soon! Really really good.

We're almost through this challenge and this is the final week. I hope you're enjoying this series! Next week, I'll return to my normal recipe posts but it's been nice to talk a little about shopping frugally and menus.

However, I won't be able to write very much this week because my senior project is so very close to being done that I'm devoting almost all of my writing energies towards it. Let's put it this way, I hope to hand it in for review by Tuesday! It won't be done on Tuesday, of course, as I'll probably have revisions to make before it's finally complete, but I'm hoping to have my project fully completed and graded by one week from tomorrow.

So, I'll post a little bit when we go shopping and when the challenge ends. Otherwise, I'll be taking the week off to focus on my project. I can't believe I'm one week away from finishing my bachelor's!!

I've got some great recipes to share when this is all over though! I'm looking forward to it and I hope you will too.

...

We need to make more Veggie Bouillon this week and we kept completely spacing the celery we needed for it until last night when I walked into the produce section at Walmart while grocery shopping with my dad and suddenly remembered. Luckily, we had just enough for $1 bag of celery (it being on sale helped).

We Spent: $1.03 Remaining Budget: $0.85

Yay! We managed to come in just under the wire again. Just one more week to go, but we've already decided to switch our food budget to something similar more permanently because it's really helped us curb our impulse buys. (But I think $50 is a little too low - maybe $60 per week instead.)

Menus for the past several days:

Wednesday Breakfast: Buckwheat Rauga Pankūkas (yeast pancakes from Beard on Bread), pear Lunch: Tortellini with peanut-curry sauce, salad Dinner: Kāpostu tīteņi (cabbage meatballs), baked potatoes and spinach salad

Thursday Breakfast: Dutch baby, turkey bacon and a pear Lunch: Leftover kāpostu tīteņi over leftover rice Dinner: Chicken-Bacon-Mushroom pizza (made with whole wheat bread dough, based on an idea in Beard on Bread) and spinach salad

Friday Breakfast: Fried egg, turkey bacon, biezputra (hot cereal made from oats and wheat flakes), cantaloupe Lunch: Peanut butter and jelly sandwiches on homemade wheat bread Dinner: Verdolaga Sauce over Achiote Frijoles Recado with Flour-Corn Tortillas (from Chickens in the Road)

Saturday Breakfast: Homemade wheat bread, sausage patty, fried egg, cantaloupe Lunch: Ramen Salad with TVP Dinner: Jim's Family Restaurant with Dad - California burger for me, fish & chips for Artis, water

I really wasn't sure if we would be able to make this far. We spent almost our entire budget in one day last week and this week. I was positive we'd forgotten something.

Something I'm learning with this challenge - I do not need to worry so much when I'm going to be doing the grocery shopping again in about three or four days. I would feel differently if we didn't have so much food in the pantry and freezer that we can make all sorts of meals -- being out of one or two ingredients, while inconvenient, is not the end of the world.

Now, while my husband and I are living the life of unemployed college students, we don't have much. But we do have enough to eat well and eat healthy; we actually spend more than $50 per week on groceries usually. And yes, we do spend more time in the kitchen because we enjoy cooking and baking -- but that's not true every day. Some days, we don't want to do anything in the kitchen, not even the dishes!

I hear of a lot of people saying they can't eat well with less than $x per week, that they have to buy processed food, that fresh produce is too expensive. It doesn't have to be that way, but you have to be willing to try.

Here's my advice:

• Watch where you shop. If you don't you WILL pay too much.
• Be willing to experiment and cook from scratch. If you aren't, processed, unhealthy foods often seem cheaper and/or easier.
• Rome wasn't built in a day: It takes time to build up a thorough pantry. It also takes time to figure out what you really want to have on-hand all the time. If I had to make a list, it'd probably wind up being equally divided between spices, flours and baking ingredients, protein, dairy and veggies. When you don't have much in the way of ingredients in the pantry, getting started is a monumental challenge -- and very expensive -- so take it slow.
• Be willing to buy frozen or canned at some points during the year. Sometimes, especially in the winter, fresh produce IS too expensive or too expensive for the quality available.
• Always remember to keep frozen and canned veggies in mind. They're picked when ripe and in season then preserved for later. In areas with bad tomatoes, canned is much better - there's a reason many recipes call for canned tomatoes because you can get reliably ripe and good ones canned.
• And the corollary: Watch for what's in season and try to buy that instead. In the winter, enjoy root vegetables and winter squash along with pomegranates and citrus, for example. What is in season will taste the best.
• Learn to cook, at least the basics, because knowing is half the battle. If you know how to cook, you can take basic ingredients and transform them into a good meal easily and quickly.
• Learn to make a few dishes really well. These will save your ass when you're too tired and too lazy to do anything. Always have those ingredients on hand. It could be as simple as roasted chicken with potatoes and carrots - 5 minutes of prep, 1 hr of cooking, 2 (or more) meals if you're single or married w/o kids.

We're starting to use up some stuff in the pantry now but by choice, not by force. Last night, we went to Walmart to buy some household products, like paper towels and scrubbie sponges, neither of which are counted towards our grocery challenge budget (thankfully). We picked up some sour cream though, since they have the best price.

We spent: $1.90 Remaining Budget: $48.10

Today is Shopping Day, so we headed out fairly late to Winco and Rancho. Unfortunately, today was not the day Rancho got all its good produce in -- some of the sales advertised in this week's circular weren't out on the shelves, like cherries and spinach. But we did manage to get three wonderfully ripe cantaloupes for $2 and a big watermelon for less than $2. I also got some plantains, so I'm going to make that roasted plantain dessert again once they ripen to mostly black. (There will be a blog post, I just need to double-check my measurements before I finish writing it.)

We spent: $8.66 Remaining Budget: $39.44

We also stopped at the little taco truck on 35th South and (roughly) 72nd West for lunch. My husband was hoping for some chicharrón tacos (fried pork rinds) but we were too late, so we got some spicy shredded beef (birria), chicken (pollo), head (cabeza) and pork (carnitas) tacos. Damn but they're good. They beat the stuffing out of Del Taco or any other Mexican fast food chain.

We spent: $4.00 Remaining Budget: $35.44

Finally, Winco. We weren't able to get a lot of produce at Rancho today so we had to get it at Winco. Plus, we needed some extra bulk goods - more unbleached flour, gluten flour (for Gluten Bread from the Beard on Bread book later this week) and small items like dried parsley and dried tomatoes. We did, however, opt to spend 45c on a small handful of Crown dark chocolate truffles as a treat. Really rather good, I'm definitely buying them again for my chocolate cravings.

We spent: $33.56 Remaining Budget: $1.88

Yikes! Almost all the way gone again and I'd hoped to buy a box of tea for my husband's newfound iced tea habit. We still have a ton in the cupboard though, so I'll plan on that purchase next week.

Monday Breakfast: Manna (Eng. farina or cream of wheat) with preserves, breakfast sausage patty, homemade applesauce Lunch: Fried rice Dinner: Pollack pancakes¹ with Tartar Sauce, Curried Bulgur, cabbage-carrot-cucumber salad Dessert: Pear and peach tart² (based on the Free-Form Peach Galette) with milk

Tuesday Breakfast:turkey bacon, hot cereal with strawberries, fried egg³ and coffee Lunch: Tacos at the taco truck! 4 tacos, $4. Delish. Dinner: Chef salad with garlic-rosemary bread (again, from Beard on Bread)

Notes: 1. We had this horrible frozen pollack in the freezer. It's so wet, you can't easily fry it. Just awful. But I didn't want to waste it by throwing it away so instead I combined it with everything from the Easy Salmon Cakes in the food processor and whizzed it until it was a thick batter. I had to add more flour and cornstarch just to get it to thicken up a bit more, then fried it up. Tasted pretty good! 2. Another thing I needed to use up -- leftover frozen pears from last year and two peaches from last week. 3. The last of the eggs! We skipped eggs at breakfast on Monday so we'd have the last two today. I'm so glad we went shopping today!

The absolute worst part of this challenge to date: Running low on eggs.

On Sunday, we learned that we go through more than 18 eggs a week. We usually have two cartons of 18 eggs on hand, but I didn't realize just how many we ate each week until we cut back to picking up one carton each week for the challenge. Apparently, we go through about twenty to two dozen eggs each week. Wow.

Of course, it doesn't help that we've used/will use a bit more than half a dozen eggs just today making crepes and omelets and fresh pasta. That's not really a normal day but it sure contributes to our not having enough eggs until shopping day.

I'm hoping to keep chickens once we become homeowners, I wonder if we can get away with just a half dozen chickens? I would really hate buying eggs if we have laying hens.

Sunday, Independence Day Breakfast: 10-grain pancakes, pear and pea-sausage omelet Lunch: Savory crepes stuffed with refried beans, fried onions, cheese, chiles and enchilada sauce Dinner: Fresh pasta with leeks, walnuts, sun-dried tomatoes

Halfway through already!

We were once again under budget by $3.03, having spent $46.97 all in one day, so we decided to pick up some leeks at Walmart to make some more veggie bouillon this week.

We Spent: $2.31 Remaining Budget: $0.72

Not as good as last week, but pretty damn good considering we went through Winco without our calculator and hoped that what we were picking up (a lot of coupon-deals that we normally don't buy) was going to fit into what we had left after Rancho. So I'm pretty happy with our progress.

We, for some reason, didn't write much of a menu for the week. It was the hardest week to get dinner on the table. I really need a menu to structure and plan around, while we were able to use up most of the produce we bought relatively easily, dinner was way too stressful and usually quite late.

All the same, I can't deal with menus that plot out a particular meal to happen on a particular day. I tried, I failed. Invariably, I never want what's supposed to be made that day, I'd rather have something else, or I don't feel up to cooking it. My menus are just lists of mains, sides and things to use up; we pick out dinner from them each afternoon.

Here's what we wound up having for the past few days. Lunches remain very difficult to figure out, I'd have to say that's our most challenging meal of the day.

Wednesday Breakfast: Orange crepes using Ruhlman's Ratio (damn things stick like crazy if you sub juice for water, do not recommend), turkey bacon, a pear, coffee Lunch: Ramen chicken soup (Husband was sick, wanted soup, so I made some) Dinner: Mujadarrah

Thursday Breakfast: Crepes with fresh peach preserves, turkey bacon, a pear, orange juice Lunch: Sardicado (otherwise known as Sprats/Sardines and Avocado) sandwich for Artis, peanut butter and fresh raspberry preserves for me, (homemade) kefir and iced tea Dinner: Sausage, bacon and leek pizza (with new and improved crust technology!) plus a spinach salad

Friday Breakfast: Basic White Bread from Beard on Bread, fried egg, Breakfast Sausage Patty, pear, coffee Lunch: Vegetarian tacos Dinner: Stirfry of random fridge contents over rice with teriyaki

Saturday Breakfast: Hot fruited oatmeal with blueberries, hard-boiled egg, three little smokies, coffee Lunch: Ramen salad with TVP Dinner: Coconut shrimp, curry-peanut noodles (recipe to come), chilled tomatillo-cucumber soup, brownie bites (cake balls but with brownies and no frosting)

Avocados have been regularly going on sale for 4/$1 and we've been taking advantage of it. It's possible to freeze avocado if you mash it and add a bit of lemon juice against browning, though at the moment I'm not very sure what I'll turn it into except guacamole.

Of course, random guacamole ingredients on hand isn't a bad thing either. But as it turns out, there is something you can do with it in a savory dish.

You see, I felt like pasta the other night but nothing quite sounded good. I didn't want dried, I guess is what it boils down to, and we didn't have any frozen. We had avocados quickly approaching over-ripeness, an old leek on its last legs and an assortment of other potential meal components. So, I started flipping through the Beard on Pasta book I picked up on a whim a few years ago.

A page caught my eye: Avocado pasta. Huh. I didn't know you could use avocados that way. Hell, I never would have thought about putting avocado chunks into a hot sauce either.

My husband thought it sounded intriguing too, so we gave it a whirl.

You know what? It turned out pretty damn good. It's rich. It's subtle. It's a lot of fun.

It was also surprisingly fast. It only took about 20 - 30 minutes for my husband to put together the pasta from scratch and only 3 minutes for it to cook. The sauce was easy, about 10 minutes, plus 5 or so to prep - the whole meal? Less than an hour!

But I have to apologize to my mom. She suggested we freeze larger portions of the beans we cook every few days. We thought it was way too much trouble to go to - but then we realized what we actually had a problem with was mashing them into little tupperwares. If you flat-freeze the cooked beans by spreading them out in a single layer on a baking sheet, they don't stick together and can be easily stored in a big gallon freezer bag, ready to provide a helping handful for any occasion. So, now we do that a lot. Thanks, Mom.