HAWAIAN BANANA NUT BREAD

This blog is about being frugal and being wise and using the things God provides for us in a wise way. Being good stewards. One of the many ways to do that is being alert and taking advantage of what God opens up to us. Hence, this recipe, but it's so much more than about the recipe!!!

Last week, when I was preparing the Pimento Cheese spread I had to run to the store and buy a jar of pimento and a loaf of bread. As Mickey & I went rushing into the store, (seems we are always rushing these days!!!!) we passed the produces area and I noticed they had riper banana's by the sack full. As we sped by I told Mickey, "remind me to stop and look at these before we check out.

(click to enlarge)

Upon inspection here was a 3.76 lb. bag of ripe bananas for $1.39, or $.37 per pound.

Very interesting!!!

Looking closer...yes they were ripe but not over ripe and not particularly bruised. Gotta buy these and make some Banana Nut Bread!!! I love to keep baked sweet breads in the freezer so that when ever someone comes I have something sweet, yet 1/2 way good for us, to serve them with coffee. I try not to keep too much sweet stuff sitting around the house because we eat it!!! and we surely don't need to be doing too much of that. I have found that I can take a Banana Nut bread right out of the freezer, slice it and serve it on the spot. Sometimes I'll warm the slice for a minute in the microwave.

SO......as a consequence of being alert and being aware of good buys I was able to prepare all these loaves of one of our favorite sweet breads. I baked 3 batches and baked one each morning before the house got too warm.

The above two views are the first days loaves. In the second picture you can see I've cut off the ends.......we had to sample and see that they were good!!! Right???? One large loaf and 3 small loaves. Notice the odd shapes of the 3 small loaves. Here's why.....I have the small aluminum disposable plans......BUT I do not dispose of them......I use them over, and over, and OVER again. Just wash them out, kind of "reshape" them and store until next time. When I say I am frugal......I am frugal.

Well, I have probably used these pans for a couple of years, and after the shape of these loaves I decided it was time to go get 3 more disposable aluminum baking pans!!!

Here are day 2's 3 medium size loaves still in the pans to show you the pans. I got these three pans for $1.28.

Day 3's 3 medium size loaves from the new pans.

Now, for the recipe. I call it Pineapple Banana Nut Bread but the official title is Hawaiian Banana Nut Bread. I got this recipe in the 1980's from a girl I worked with. It had come from her mother. I have many Banana Nut Bread recipes but this is by far my favorite because it is so moist.

HAWAIIAN BANANA NUT BREAD

3 c flour

2 c sugar

1 t salt

1 t soda

1 t cinnamon

Combine and mix the above 5 ingredients.

Then combine together:

3 eggs

1 1/2 C oil

2 C mashed banana

8 oz crushed pineapple

Combine dry and wet ingredients until moist.

Add 1 c pecans or walnuts and stir.

Spoon into 2 or 3 greased bread pans

Bake @ 350 degrees 60 to 70 minutes.

Back to my bag of banana's!!! There were 15 banana's in my $1.39 bag. I used 4 bananas in each recipe or 12 bananas. I had 3 left - used 1 in a fruit salad I made out of an apple, orange, 2 slices of cantaloupe, coconut and the banana. By the way, it was yummy!!! Then we each had a banana to eat for breakfast with milk and sugar one day.

Be alert to the bounty the Lord offers us ... be frugal ... and ENJOY!!!

Two Recipes Using My Food Grinder

As promised yesterday on Show & Tell I am sharing 2 recipes that I made using my food chopper/grinder.

Roast Beef Sandwich Spread

I do not have actual quantity sizes to give you. since the object of this spread is to use up whatever size piece of left-over roast beef you have.

The small piece I had left over from our Sunday dinner was about 4" x 2 1/2". I simply ground up the roast beef and added; chopped green onions, pickle relish and mayonnaise thinned with 2% milk. It looks rather plain and bland but let me tell you, it was delicious. I stored this in a plastic container and we had several days of wonderful Ground Roast Beef sandwiches for lunch.

This is a very frugal, tasty and nutritious sandwich spread.

Pimento Cheese Spread

Recipe:

8 oz cream cheese - $.99 (bought on sale)

8 oz cheddar cheese - 3 for $5 = $1.66 (bought on sale)

32 oz velvetta cheese - $4.49 (bought on sale)

6 oz jar pimento - $1.34

mayonnaise

1. Let cream cheese come to room temperature. Place in large mixing bowl and stir with large spoon until smooth and creamy.

2. Cut cheddar & velvetta cheeses into small pieces for grinding.

3. Alternate grinding cheddar & velvetta into the bowl with cream cheese.

4. Add some of the pimento as you go along.

5. Mix mayonnaise thinned with 2% milk as needed. I mixed a small amount about 1/2 way through. I mixed another small amount and added at the end to make it creamier.

Using my purchase prices and adding an additional $.50 estimate for the mayonnaise & dab of milk the total cost for 10 cups of spread is $8.98 or $.90 per cup or $.11 an ounce

The cost of prepared store pimento cheese (with all the ??? things listed on the ingredients) was 14 oz for $2.79 . That would make it $.20 an ounce.

SO.... my home made comes to $1.54 for 14 oz. versus the store bought for $2.79 for 14 oz. A savings of $1.25 or a 44 1/2%. Plus mine is so much healthier without the added ???? ingredients. Since we have to pay sales tax on grocery purchases I also saved an additional $1.06 taxes I would have paid on my 10 cups.

Now I call that frugal!!!

I took 1/2, or 5 cups, to the church this week for the 50 people who gave of their time and love for Vacation Bible School and I took a plate of it, surrounded with various crackers to Bible study Tuesday night.

SHOW & TELL - Food Grinder/Chopper

WOW!! The last Friday of June. Where have the first 6 months of 2009 gone?!!! Going to fast for me. Well, it's time to participate in Kelli's Show & Tell again. Go here, learn all about it, sign up on Mr. Linky to participate, and then read all the interesting posts of things that others "Show" and "Tell" about.

Oh....I almost forgot....this is my first time to participate in Show & Tell from my Frugal Blog instead of Penless Writer!!


I want to show you my handy, dandy food chopper/grinder. This food chopper belonged to my mother and I truly do not know how old it is. I do know she used it a lot to prepare different things. She gave it to me in the early 70's, and I've used it a lot in the 30 some years since then. The wonderful thing about this food chopper is it works as good today as I'm sure it did when my mother first acquired it.

You can see from the extra blade on the counter that it has 2 size grinding blades. The smaller one, which is in the machine, is the one I use the most.

This is the side view and you can see it is electric. This is easy to use: you simply place the food to be ground in the upright stainless steel funnel. The wooden pedastal is used to press the food down. The ground food comes out the sideway piece into the bowl which you have placed under it.

It is easy to take dismantle to wash when you are done. It stores easily in it's own plastic cover and sits on the shelf in the cupboard about my kitchen vent light & fan.

The quality of the items that were made & purchased 50-60 years ago is so far superior to what can be purchased today. How many items you are currently using in your kitchen will be around, and operating just as well, in 30-40-50 years from now?

Tomorrow I am going to be sharing 2 recipes that I just this week made using this wonderful, handy-dandy food grinder. Please come back and visit then.

Manicure/pedicure advice

Several of the blogs I read has talked about getting manicures & pedicures recently. That reminded me of a "trick" I've learned to do so wanted to pass it on here.

I always treat myself to a manicure & pedicure at the beginning of summer....in time for sandles!!! It is not something I can afford to do on a regular basis but I do allow myself at least this yearly luxury.

Instead of picking out a color at the salon I always take my own bottle of nail color with me for them to use. This little trick enables me to get several more weeks out of my manicure/pedicure by being able to "touch-up" the polish myself because it is my own polish.

You all may already be doing this.....but I thought it was worth posting here just in case anyone hadn't thought about doing this little.....ssttreacccccccchhh it trick.

Lunchmeat savings

I came across this great way to save on lunch meat and just had to share. While watching Good Morning America one morning, they had a segment on saving money at the grocery store.
Those segments always intrigue me so I made sure I paid attention. They had this family on...you know the family of six who only spends $300 per month on groceries blah blah blah....
One of the suggestions is that you purchase a cooked ham and have them slice it at the deli counter. If you shop at the deli counter you know ham or turkey can run up $8.00 a pound.

Sooo, I decided to try this. Back in the meat section like where the bacon and pre-packaged lunch meats are I found a fully cooked package of Jennie*-O Turkey Ham. It weighed two whole pounds. It was $4.99. I thought that was really good $2.50 a pound. I went back to the deli with my 2 pound turkey-ham and asked the nice young man behind the counter to slice it thin for me and he kindly obliged. So if you and yours like ham sandwiches for lunch...try this for some $$$$ savings.

Remember go to the deli to get it sliced not the meat counter.

WASHING DISHES THE OLD FASHION FRUGAL WAY

Since it is just the 2 of us in our house hold I do not use my dishwasher except when we entertain or have large family dinners.

I have always just washed the dishes in the left hand sink and run the water constantly as I rinsed and placed them in the right side sink. A lot of times Mickey dries them as I wash or I dry them when I have finished washing all of them.

Recently my blog friend, Soholiah, was in Africa, working at a Children's Home, and did a post about doing dishes the Old Fashion Way with dish pans. It brought back memories of my mother using a dish pan. I realized that I would not be using nearly as much water if I used a dish pan to rinse the dishes in, rather than wasting water as it constantly ran during the process.

Hence my new pink plastic dish pan that fits perfectly in the side sink.

As I rinse the dish I then just place it on the towel to the side of the sink on the counter. You can see from the small amount of dishes we have per meal that this is my preferred frugal way of doing them.

Just another small way I have found to economize on the water and electric bill. Not wasting as much water, and drying them by hand towel.

Addemdum: Be sure and read Tammy's comment which covers another "frugal" point about using the dish pan that I failed to cover. Thanks Tammy!!!