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Re-Planting Your Kitchen Scraps: How to Re-Grow Romaine Lettuce

March 7, 2013

If you have been keeping up with our Re-Planting Your Kitchen Scrap series here is a new one to add to your list! Romaine lettuce.

It’s very simple to do. Just cut about 3 inches from the base. Stick them in a cup of water and place on a counter or in a window.

These photos were taken 4 days after they were ‘planted’ in the water.

I will transplant these in a container probably in another 4-5 days when there is a little more growth. I’ll be sure to update you with photos!

You can check out how to re-plant green onions here.

You can also check out how to re-plant celery here.

Re-Grow your veggies – How to replant your kitchen scraps: Re-Growing Celery

February 24, 2013

Celery is one of those veggies that I love because I can throw it in all kinds of stuff and no one even knows it’s there. I especially love to put it in spaghetti and pizza sauces! Did you know that you can replant your celery? It’s not quite the instant gratification like the green onions but it still grows fairly quickly.

Cut the celery stalks leaving the base. Then put the base of the celery in a dish filled with water. The celery drinks a lot of water so you will have to keep adding water fairly frequently. Your celery will start to grow from the center. Keep the celery base in the water until you start to get stalks forming and leaves. The photo above was taken about a week and a half after it was put in the water.

Once your celery has started to grow you will be ready to plant.

So here is our celery plant about 2 weeks old. You will want to keep it well watered! Soon our little plant will be shooting up! Celery plants are neat looking plants as they grow. This makes a really great project to do with the kids! I will make sure to keep you updated as our celery plant grows!

Check out how to re-grow your own green onions here.

Check out how to re-grow romaine lettuce.

Regrow your veggies: How to Replant your Kitchen Scraps

February 22, 2013

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Spring is almost here which means I’m planning on what we are going to grow outside. I love having fresh veggies and herbs and growing them ourselves we not only have control over keeping them pesticide free but also we can save a bundle!

But I love to grow things inside all year. Did you know that some vegetables (and fruit) you can re-grow? It’s pretty cool and really easy!

Let’s start with the easiest to re-grow. I promise, even if you claim to not have a green thumb you can re-grow green onions! Green onions grow quickly (I’ll be sure to take photos this week just to show you how quickly!)

Here’s how you can grow green onions at home. Buy your green onions at the grocery store like you normally do. Bring them home and use them in your favorite recipe, cutting them to about 2 inches above the white parts. Then put them in a dish full of water, with the roots in the water. Let them soak up the water for a few days.

Then simply transfer to a pot. Your green onions will grow quickly (in the photo above you can see on the tops the new growth). This photo was taken only 2 days after I originally cut them!

I always have green onions growing in our kitchen! It’s nice to be able to walk over and cut what I need. I use them for a lot of recipes!

While green onions aren’t very expensive, the pennies eventually add up right? I was buying two bunches of green onions a week. Now that I regrow our green onions, I buy about 1 bunch a month. (I replace my pot of green onions about once a month)

Buying 2 bunches of green onions per week for a year: $70.72 ($70 a year on onions! CRAZY!)

After regrowing – buying 1 bunch per month: $8.18

Total savings by regrowing: $62.56!!

Tomorrow I will show you another vegetable that we regrow!

UPDATE: Here are our green onions a week later:

Check out how to re-grow your celery here.

Check out how to re-grow your Romaine Lettuce here.

Simple Vinegar Cleaner (All Purpose)

July 16, 2012

I knew this day would come.

The day I finally went through my stock pile of all purpose cleaner. I really wanted to try making my own cleaners for a while now. I’ll admit, I was nervous. I wasn’t about to sacrifice sparkling counters for, well, much of anything. So I stopped buying cleaner. Even on sale. And even when I had coupons for it.

It was rough.

I do things to be frugal. I knew that making your own cleaner was cheap, but I was able to get such good deals with stacking coupons and sales was it worth it? I mean, from a financial stand point you don’t get much cheaper than free.

The verdict: Uh yeah it’s worth it.

If you have been even thinking about it a little bit here is why I’m now converted to homemade all purpose cleaner.

1. It works. Really well. Like super well.

2. No chemicals.

3. Cheap.

4. And if you stockpile and get all of your cleaner for free think about this: There is no need for a stockpile. Which means you have extra space!

Here you go:

Simple Vinegar Cleaner

2 cups vinegar

4 cups HOT water

1/4 cup lemon juice

Put into spray container. Shake well. Label if you feel so inclined.

Easy as pie.

Have you ever made your own cleaner?

Save the Produce: Part 1

January 31, 2012

Did you know that American’s throw out, on average, 25% of all their food. It comes out to an average of $2,200/family wasted! Shocking huh? Shocking that we are wasting $2,200 each year? Yes. Shocking that while in other countries people are literally dying for food and we are simply tossing it in the trash because we didn’t have a chance to get around to muching on it.

We all know I’m a self proclaimed coupon queen. However, there usually aren’t coupons for produce. BUMMER! It used to be every week I’d buy carrots, onions, celery, chives, corn, whatever. A bag of potatoes every couple weeks. Berries. Oh, and don’t forget containers of fresh thyme, basil and whatever seasoning I needed. And I’ll admit. I wasted at least 75% of it. At least. I’d need 1/2 of something for a recipe. Or worse. 2 tablespoons of fresh herbs. And the rest of that $3 seasoning – thrown in the trash.

Anyone else suffer from produce-wasting-itis? Have no fear, the money saving doctor is here! This is part 1 of my mini series Save The Produce.

Ready?

Fact #1 – My family now eats double the vegetables it used to.

Fact #2 – I spend 50% less than I used to on produce. Yup 50% less for us to eat 50% more.

First thing I do when I get home from the store. Cut the veggies.

Have them all sliced? Perfect.

Next, bag em up. I bag quite a few bags of mirepoix. (What’s mirepoix? It’s a French cooking term for mix of carrots, celery, and onion. It’s the beginning of most stocks, soups, sauces, stews, etc.) I add in 1/2 cup of each to a baggie. Pre-measured and ready to go. Even when I don’t make something homemade, it’s so easy to grab a bag and add it to store bought sauce (I have to put ours through the food processor otherwise my picky little guy won’t eat it due to seeing the veggies). Such an easy way to add some veggies to spaghetti sauce or pizza sauce!

I toss all of the single serve mirepoix mixes into one big gallon bag. Makes organizing the freezer easier! (One day I’ll have a food saver!)

I also do the same thing for potatoes. I slice some, dice some others. Just dump into boiling water for mashed. Add a bag into a stew. It may not seem like much, but for some reason I’m so much more apt to use them when they are pre-cut. Not even like it saves THAT much time! 🙂

My favorite way to save the produce is every time we have leftover veggies – corn from dinner, I sliced too many potatoes, carrots that didn’t get eaten, whatever – they get dumped into the leftover bag. You can’t see in the picture above but this bag has corn, carrots, potatoes, onion, celery, and a little red pepper. When the bag gets full – add some stock and a few other simple stockpile ingredients and you have a fabulous veggie soup. All from food that would have otherwise been thrown away. OR use the bag in a fresh pot pie. Either way. Delicious.

Such an easy and simple idea. Chop it. But I can’t even explain how much this has saved our family in produce! I no longer have to buy a package of celery each week (I wish we actually ate a thing of celery each week!) but the 1 package lasts 2 weeks. That bunch of carrots doesn’t go to waste. And we eat each and every bite of those onions. Plus, I get an extra meal out of something I would have otherwise thrown away! Perfect!

Stay tuned for more of the Save the Produce mini series!

Still to come: Herbs, Saving fruit and Don’t throw that part away – plant it!

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