As I've referred to earlier than, one of the techniques Brian and I keep our grocery invoice down is that we do not eat a number of convenience ingredients. We nearly in no manner buy frozen food or aspects, apart from the occasional container of sale-priced pierogies (or pierogi, in case you need to apply the proper ethnic time period). We eschew maximum packaged snack food, who prefer to nosh on fruit or pop our personal popcorn. And of course, we do now not have youngsters, so we do now not have to buy specific ingredients that they're willing to consume.
The handiest consolation meals we have not sincerely decided a manner to do without is breakfast cereal, that's Brian's elegant weekday breakfast. We generally buy raisin bran from Aldi, that is the simplest cereal that falls internal our cutoff of 10 cents consistent with ounce. Occasionally we are able to get a rate this top or higher with the aid of stacking income and coupons, but most of the time, it is raisin bran Monday thru Friday, which receives a little stupid after a while. On top of that, Brian's a chunk annoyed about all of the packaging waste left in the lower back of from all the ones containers of cereal. Yes, the card bins can move in our paper recycling, and we've lately located a Terracycle bin at a neighborhood church for you to take the liners, however recycling stays simplest a far off third first-class to reducing and reusing.
The only homemade alternative we've found that's reasonably easy to make is granola. We used to use a recipe from the Tightwad Gazette, which I calculated to cost about $1.60 a pound (that's how we came up with our 10-cents-per-ounce benchmark for cereal costs). However, Brian doesn't really like it as well as the Aldi raisin bran, because it's too sweet for his taste even when cut with plain oats. It's also a bit of a hassle to make, because the mixture comes out really sticky. You have to keep stirring it as it cools to keep it from adhering to the pan, and even once it's completely cool, it has a tendency to form a single huge clump in the storage bin from which each day's serving has to be chipped off.
So earlier this week, Brian determined to try tinkering with the granola recipe to see if he may additionally need to provide you with some thing a chunk a great deal less candy and sticky. While he became at it, he lessen down on the amount of oil in the specific recipe and threw in some wheat bran to make it greater wholesome and filling. Here's what he did for his first small batch:
BRIAN'S LOW-SUGAR COCONUT GRANOLA, VERSION 1.Zero
1 cup + 2 Tbsp rolled oats
1/4 cup chopped walnuts
1/4 cup wheat bran
1/4 cup light corn syrup (Karo red)
1 Tbsp coconut oil
1/4 cup raisins
Combine first three ingredients in bowl. Heat syrup and oil over medium heat until they boil; pour over dry mixture and mix thoroughly with a fork. Spread in a pan and bake 20 minutes at 350 degrees F, stirring once at 10 minute mark.
Remove from oven, upload raisins, and allow to chill, stirring every now and then to prevent clumping or sticking.This came out a Lot less sticky than the original granola, and a Lot less sweet. To my taste, in fact, it wasn't really sweet enough. He was considering adding a bit of honey to the mix, and I suggested throwing in some sweetened coconut to give it a little sugar boost. However, when he tried his first bowlful this morning, he said that he actually finds it quite sweet enough for a breakfast cereal—a bit sweeter than the raisin bran, in fact. So he might just keep the basic proportions as is, and maybe add a bit of unsweetened coconut and/or some of his favorite flaxseeds for a little extra flavor interest.
From an ecofrugal attitude, despite the fact that, the real question is: how does this domestic made opportunity observe to the Aldi raisin bran in phrases of fee consistent with bowl? To parent this out, I checked the fee in keeping with pound we usually pay for some of these elements (guessing at those I didn't have any modern-day figures for) and calculated that this complete first batch of granola charge about $1.Seventy five to make. That's the first-rate news; the horrible news is that it made only about two bowls' in reality worth of breakfast. That works out to 88 cents a bowl, whilst Brian's regular breakfast of cereal plus upload-ins, primarily based on my calculations from final year's Reverse SNAP Challenge, is round sixty one cents a bowl. (In fact, it's definitely a bit bit a good deal less now, due to the truth the price of the Aldi raisin bran has dropped.) So on the equal time as Brian's new granola will reduce down on packaging waste, it may not surely keep us any cash.
We might also, of route, be capable of tweak the recipe to reduce its price a bit. Those walnuts are a luxurious aspect (I calculated their rate primarily based on what we generally pay according to pound on the Whole Earth Center, no longer on the brilliant good deal we have been given at remaining 12 months's backyard sale), so perhaps we ought to replacement some factor less steeply-priced, like some sunflower seeds or shredded coconut. And it would clearly workout better to use some different sweetener in region of that corn syrup. But for now, I'm willing to pay the better fee of the home made granola just for the sake of giving Brian a smash from the raisin bran recurring.
