Coffee, canned soup, blood sugar and budgets

I did buy a few odds and ends at Target last week so we could make it to pay day, and I didn't record it here because life got hectic. On Wednesday last week, I had a 'blood sugar episode' that ended in an indulgent dinner out. That was the day my daughter went to the ENT and received the news that she is getting tubes in her ears Nov. 2.

My husband made scrambled eggs that morning, while I packed my daughter lunch. When the adults sat down to lunch, we had pop tarts and coffee and my husband made himself peanut butter crackers. I promised to eat something later.

I forgot.

So my blood sugar dropped to 90 and with no appropriate fuel in my body I started to shake-- from my hands to my knees. And I ate a bowl of soup, but my daughter took half. (chunky chicken-broccoli soup transformed into a corn chowder with a can of creamed corn, soy milk and curry.)

My husband took me out to dinner. We went to Delahanty's where daughter ate half my jalapeño poppers... She had a jr burger with cheese, bacon and fries. Husband had fettucine Alfredo with bacon and peas. I had a beef and sour sandwich. We all had dessert, and I added a Weyerbacher imperial pumpkin ale for the season and we spent, with tip $62.

Moral of the story: Eating is necessary. And I still don't understand how people can send kids to school with a breakfast of cereal, pop tarts or, as I witnessed last week, Twinkies...

Good news is: Even with this dinner, and my scattered shopping trips, our budget remains in tact. Thus far in October, we have spent: almost 20% of our income thus far this month on food. Gulp. $125 on dining out and $115 on groceries. Hmmm... That leaves $10 for the next two weeks. I'll aim for $50, which will keep the total food expense for the month under $300.

One of the terms of our current budget is NO FANCY COFFEE. But I cashiered last night and discovered many varieties of Archer Farms coffee on sale for $3.50 for the 12 oz bag which is normally $6.99. My favorite tea (Tazo rest) was on sale for $2.79. (I have one 32-ounce mug most mornings and use one tea bag.) And I grabbed a cheap 28-ounce jar of peanut butter.

I bought in total:

- Market Pantry peanut butter, $3.49
- Archer Farms coffee, 4 bags at $3.50 each
- 3 boxes Tazo Rest tea, $2.79 each

Subtotal: $25.86
Team Member Discount: - $2.59
Red Card discount: -$1.16
No tax
Total: $22.11

Cinnamon Raisin Cream of Wheat and Nettle Tea

So, as I hoped, feared and expected, my doctor's appt yesterday revealed an iron deficiency. Luckily, not anemia, but a drop in stored iron from my winter high of 46 to a June 10 low of 13. This means I'm back on OTC iron tablets, vitamin C and a multivitamin.

So, I whipped up this iron-rich breakfast for our summer café: cinnamon raisin cream of wheat, lavender nettle tea and Bolthouse Farms mango-cherry Immunity-C Smoothie.

I had already told myself I would splurge on one of those smoothies when I saw Target had the smoothies on sale for $3.49!!! I dilute mine and use it to take my vitamins.

The nettle tea came loose from the local Nature's Way Market. I didn't know how strong it should be so I just dumped some in the bottom of my French press with some food grade lavender. The child likes it with honey. I prefer it straight.

CINNAMON-RAISIN CREAM OF WHEAT
Heat to almost boiling:
- 1 cup vanilla almond milk
- some sugar (less than 2 tablespoons)
- about one heaping tablespoon cinnamon
- one large handful raisins
Then when just starting to bubble add:
- 4 tablespoons farina

Stir until thickened

A favorite Mommy breakfast

This has become one of my favorite instant breakfasts: one morningstar breakfast patty on a slice of Archer Farm Apple Fritter bread with a BIG mug of Tazo herbal tea. My favorite tea is Tazo Rest, but I think it's been discontinued. On this particular day, I replaced it with Tazo Passion. Very fruity.

Rose tea

I love the Tazo Rest Tea. It's primarily rose, with lavender, lemon, and valerian. All sorts of restful herbs, but no chamomile which always overpowers everything.

I have been making iced tea with 50% green tea and 50% this rest tea, and it's good. Today I scaled back the amount of green tea.

The Tazo tea hot is yummy by itself so I don't know why I'm hesitant to make a full batch of Tazo rest iced tea.

Sunshine and iced tea!

I'm brewing some tea to ice to go with this lovely sunny day. First day of spring. Haven't been to the backyard yet for a post-winter assessment but I bet my chives are growing.

I have a big mug with four tea bags in it, ready to make 2-3 quarts of iced tea. The mix today is 2 teabags organic green tea (purchased a long time ago from the warehouse club in a big, big pack), 1 tea bag Celestial Seasoning Sugar Plum Spice, and one Celestial Seasonings Wild Berry Zinger.

Perfect Seasonal Breakfast

I served leftover pumpkin spice waffles from the other night, with my daughter's favorite almond sunset tea with (soy)milk and honey. And a clementine. Seems like a perfect seasonal breakfast. The tea seems to help my daughter's dry cough (even she remarks this is the case) and everything else just seems to hit the spot.

Almond Sunset 'Kid' tea

My daughter tends to get obsessive about drinks. Apple juice for weeks on end. Chocolate milk next. (Which is why I usually buy chocolate soy milk-- it doesn't have high fructose corn syrup.)

Last night my husband and I tried the new Le Creuset tea pot. It has the least obnoxious whistle of any tea pot I've ever heard. We had the organic black currant decaf tea that I survived on during my business trip to Pittsburgh.

Today apparently, my daughter could be bribed to eat her breakfast with a glass of 'dessert tea.' So, to the teapot I go. I believe I mentioned this tea once before, but it has become such a favorite (which I did not expect) that it should be mentioned again.

Mommy's special dessert tea is actually Celestial Seasonings Almond Sunset, a decaf herbal dessert tea of "roasted carob, roasted barley, roasted chicory, cinnamon, orange peel, natural almond flavor, blackberry leaves, and anise seed."

And this is how I make it:

Supplies

• one tea pot with water
• one expresso cup/ demi-tasse
• soymilk
• honey
• one teabag (Celestial Seasonings Almond Sunset)
  
• one baby or sugar spoon

and when pleasing children, scale and details are important.

As water heats, prep demi-tasse with about 1/2 teaspoon honey, either in the bottom or along the side. When the water boils, hold the teabag with one hand against the side of the cup and pour the water over the teabag into the cup. Fill the cup about 3/4 full, then dip the teabag several times into the water until it turns a rich orange-brown. Then remove the teabag. (This keeps the tea from getting too strong.) Stir with the tiny spoon to dissolve the honey. Add an ounce or two milk, in my case plain soy milk, and stir again. Serve with the spoon inside so little hands can stir and sip.

Peach and Almond Pasta

Leftovers are often the key to stretching the grocery budget. After Friday's dinner, we had eaten all the pork with apples but we hadn't finished all the gravy. In this particular case, pork with apples became pork with peaches and apples (not to be confused with pork with peaches and snow peas) because we ran out of apples.

I didn't want to waste that yummy gravy so we heated it up and added slivered almonds. We served as the sauce for multigrain pasta. It was fabulous. Though raisins would have made it better. We didn't have raisins,

Also, went bike riding five miles this afternoon. My water bottle is plastic and it always tastes plastic to me. I hate warm plastic-flavored water. And I knew by the time I needed the water it would be very warm. To combat this, I brewed a glass of Celestial Seasonings Wild Berry Zinger tea and threw it, bag and all, into my water bottle with all the ice I could stuff in there and some more water.