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Lunch

Another wholemeal wrap at 67c and half a chicken breast at 88c serve. To go with it we smeared the wrap with hummus and a Quinoa Edamame Salad we purchased. Two tablespoons of hummus is 1/5 of the $3.99 tub or 80c. Two ounces of the salad (twice what we’d normally put on, but it needed using) is $1.59 a serve.

Lunch cost $3.94 a serve.

Dinner

Dinner is a splurge: bacon wrapped filet mignon. A $16 Filet at just over 8 oz each is higher than normal supermarket because, again, it’s direct-from-farm in our monthly delivery and it is dry aged!

We’re celebrating our house closing so it’s time to let loose a bit. Besides, in a steakhouse, that’s a $40 steak. Without sides, which run $8-10 each or up!

Greg cooked crash hot potatoes and an arugula, beet and blue cheese salad to go with it. So our bill at the steakhouse would be close to $50 each without wine. Plus tip. We rarely have appetizers or deserts.

Potatoes are typically $1 lb this time of the year and that will serve us both, so 55c for the potato, because there are some salt and seasoning added. I’ve read that purple potatoes have more nutrition, but they don’t look great on a dark plate.

The pack of baby arugula cost $3 and we used less than 1/3 in total, or 50c each serve. The pack of beets cost $2.50 and was split between us for $1.25 per serve. The blue cheese was $7.50 or 5 oz – definitely not the cheapest on the market.

The salad is one Greg created: strew some arugula on the plate, add the warmed beets and sprinkle blue cheese (crumbles are easier) over.

So, our celebratory meal cost us $19.55 per serve, which seems pretty reasonable for a top class, dry aged steak, awesome potatoes and a great salad. It was beyond delicious. Unlike most filet, this had beef flavor so I’m glad we didn’t smother it in sauce, as is usually the case with filet. Typically filet has great texture but not much flavor. We’ve definitely noticed that grass fed beef has better flavor.

Lunch

For lunch on this cold, rainy day we decided to go for a warming soup: Pilgrim Joe’s Clam Chowder. At $1.49 a can it’s both delicious and cheap. You’ll need to add a can full of milk at $3.80 a gallon. 15 oz is about 1/8 gallon or 48c total. Each serve was almost exactly $1. The Wholemeal Lite English Muffin we served with each soup is also about $1 per serve. (Usually less for us because we buy on a 2-for-1 special and freeze them.)

Dinner

Tonight it’s time for Serious Eats’ Scotch broth. In what passes for the cold in LA, warming soups are definitely on the agenda. This recipe has four good serves, so prices are divided by 4 to get the per serve price.

Greg first pressure cooks the lamb shanks before adding them to the broth. His major variation from the written recipe is to use rutabaga (a.k.a. swede, turnip or keep) instead of the potato.

• Lamb shanks $8.87 or $2.22 a serve
• Parsnips  74c or 19c serve
• Carrots  38c or 10c serve
• Rutabaga (was rung up as turnip so might be off price) 81c or 20c serve
• Chicken Broth $2.29 or 57c serve
• Onion and other ingredients about 50c a serve (probably less)

Total cost about $3.75 a serve.

Lunch

One of the great things about cooking your own food is leftovers! There were two serves left of Friday’s Ham hock and lentil soup, and that’s what we had for lunch. $2.50 per serve.

We had an afternoon snack of half a meatloaf sandwich each. Only half a serve, split two ways, so $0.85 for the meatloaf, and two slices of multigrain bread, say 40c, split two ways so $1.05 for the half sandwich.

Dinner

We’re in what passes for Winter in California, so a pot roast is a wonderful dish for the season. The slow cook also fills the room with wonderful smells across a lazy Sunday afternoon. The recipe Greg chose is Pot Roast with Mushrooms from Serious Eats.

We went a little overboard on the beef. We’ve been getting a monthly delivery direct from farm, and haven’t been keeping up. The quality of the meat is very high – grass fed and organic – but so is the price. We used a 12 oz (350 g) chuck steak, which will give us a 6 oz serve each. Six ounces is the size of a typical protein serve in a restaurant.

Our steak cost us $7, but conventionally grown would run around $3.75-4.00 for 12 oz. Two 8 oz (250 g) boxes of mushroom were $6. The vegetable components ran to around $1.

A quart of beef stock is around $3 (depending on the quality) and half that was used in the recipe, so $1.50. I’ll allow 50c to cover the flour, salt and pepper.

Our organic meat extravaganza cost us  $16.00 or $4.00 per serve. With more conventionally grown beef, the meal would have cost $12, or $3 a serve.

We served with left over cauliflower mash and frozen peas. The mash was 40c serve, and the peas around 50c serve.

The pot roast was amazing for such simple ingredients.