GRAINS AND BEANS- tips

Frugal tips!:::: Grains and beans are a great, healthy, and inexpensive food source to work into your menu. You can buy bulk beans(20lbs or so) for about as much as you can buy a sack of burgers, if you check around for a good source. You folks back home can probably order things like this from one of the markets down in Collegedale. That town is a 7th Day Adventists community and their grocery store is really a health food store. A wonderful place to go!..... Many grains can be bought for pennies even at your local grocery store. (Sometimes you can make requests!-Look at the store's web site. Kroger has a place on their site where you can request certain items.) The trick to buying at a good price at a local store is to be careful which department you buy it from. For example, in the health food section of the store, you can buy a one pound bag of organic, name brand barley for about $5 or $6, HOWEVER, if you look where the rice and beans are sold and/or oriental items -you can find it for .59 cents for a one pound bag! YEAH! .... Millet is sold at a high price in the local store too. ($5-$6 a pound) BUT- I found it at Muddy Pond (Mennonite Community) for about a dollar a pound. Millet is a wonderful grain! Many health food experts recommend it because of the high nutritional value. It is also a mild grain for kids too-- by that I mean that it doesn't have a real high fiber content so it's easy on the tummy for even babies. ....Brown rice is another inexpensive grain that can be easily worked into your menu. It's great to add to casseroles and soups as a 'filler'. (Fills you up, stretches the dish even further, etc.)Beans are also a great addition to your soups and main dishes. Examples: add leftover pinto beans (or chili beans)to your Mexican dishes or your taco meat. Add your leftover beans to hamburger soup or vegetable soups. Several times I have snuck leftover refried beans into meatloaf! (shhh!!!) Gather recipes to incorporate more beans and make big batches and use them in dishes for days. Example: white beans and cornbread and potatoes etc. one night, make baked beans the next night, and white chicken chili the next. Freeze any leftovers for a quick side dish for lunch. ...There are many websites with frugal recipes and recipes with simple ingredients. Be creative- and healthy!