Not thinking about money

I haven’t been thinking that much about my money lately.  I have my budget and I’m working towards meeting it, and recording each purchase I make.  The markets are up and down (mostly down) the economy makes me worry, gas prices are high, and I worry about my job.  But for the most part, I just live my life, and the money mostly takes care of itself.  This must be a benefit of having a plan.

My weakness this month has been groceries (already, again) but I’m making an effort to eat what I have.  Despite my ban on groceries, I stopped by a new store the other night, but only because I was in the neighborhood (which is at least $5 from my neighborhood) and I wanted to see what it had to offer.  It is a health food store of sorts, with a lot of organic products.  I was mostly interested in their bulk food selection.  I didn’t get much (less than $5) because I didn’t really need much, but I was impressed with the bulk bins and will be back someday, with a better plan.

I did purchase $1 worth of pastry flour, thinking it was something like bread flour and wanting to give homemade bread another go.  It isn’t the same thing, not at all.  However, I found a recipe to use it in since I had the other ingredients on hand.  I don’t really recommend this quick bread, but if you happened to buy pastry flour and don’t know what to do with it, it is not bad.  I also bought wheat bran (another $1) because I’ve been itching for some bran muffins.   I’ve made these before and they were good.  I did some Googling and found you could substitute a concoction of regular milk and vinegar for buttermilk, so I have all the ingredients I need for these too!  (Except raisins, which I dislike.)

I’m still not entirely convinced that all this home baking/cooking really saves me money.  Every bread I’ve tried has failed so far, so I am going to try actual bread flour.  Yeast isn’t exactly cheap either.  I need to find some yeast in bulk, those packets aren’t cheap.  I should make sure they aren’t expired–maybe I have an excuse for my failures!  At least I know exactly what went into my food, even if my pizza crust failed to rise.

Next week when I’m craving something sweet, I’m gong to attempt some Chinese steamed buns (Mantou) to eat with sweetened condensed milk (not the fried ones).  I had them at Dim Sum once, and I looked up a recipe–there is almost nothing to them.  They certainly aren’t a healthy dish (though here is a version that claims to be), but I can have them as a desert.  I am making them partially out of nostalgia–I ate them on study abroad in Hong Kong. The cost of some condensed milk is small price to pay for a happy memory.

In other food related news, someone on my blogroll (forgive me, I can’t recall who) linked to Lynnae’s list of recipe’s for a month.  She has selected quite a few recipes that are frugal and uses beans heavily.  There may be a few new meals there to try out.

By the way, my dad gave my car a listen, and said I should take it to a muffler shop first, because he thinks it is in the exhaust.  If it is the muffler, it will be much cheaper at a muffler shop.  If not, I will take it elsewhere.  He said I may simply need a new muffler (~$100) or it could be the catalytic converter (~$1000) or anything in between.  I’m hoping for a muffler.