Hello Lovely Savers! As promised, here is the first featured recipe on Sugar and Savings!

I love cooking and baking, I am the co-owner of MinneCakes Bakery, but when I was in college I found it hard to cook for just myself. I loved the idea of grocery shopping and getting healthy ingredients, but often they would go bad before I could even use them.
I had to get creative unless I wanted to eat take-out all the time. Don’t get me wrong, I love Chinese food, but did you know that eating out for two or more meals a day equates to around a minimum of $480 a month?!?! I may be a bit of a cheap finance nerd, but that’s ridiculous even to those not obsessed with balancing their checkbook.

This is what my beloved roommate did all the time, and she was just shocked when at the end of the month she couldn’t find where her money had all gone. $8 here and there for a meal doesn’t seem so bad… until you add it up. You can read my post on saving money at the grocery store here.

I came up with tons of cheap, delicious, (mostly) healthy, meals that I could make in my tiny apartment kitchen. I call this, The Loneliest Cookbook.

My first recipe I am going to share is actually one I find myself craving even today. Like I said, I love Chinese food, and while it’s usually a pretty cheap take-out option it does still have a price tag. This recipe was inspired by my family’s favorite restaurant, Great Mandarin, this is where all of my birthday dinners have been held for at least the last 10 years. This dish is served there as a side dish, but I think it is so good I eat it for my whole meal… or several.

Beans and Rice:

Hold on- what? Beans? Beans and rice? What kind of fancy meal-for-one is that? Just you wait, this baby is delicious.

Beans and Rice:

Prep time: 30 min.

Total Cost:$4.00 or less

Number of Meals: 2+

Ingredients

1 pound of green beans (buy fresh, no cans, no frozen, yuck. Also, a pound of green beans is usually under a dollar.)

Your choice of rice (I used minute rice in college- cheap and quick. You can also buy bags of frozen rice that take two minutes in the microwave, also cheap and quick but taste a little plasticky to me.)

Soy sauce

Vegetable Oil

Garlic salt and pepper to taste

Directions:

1. Prepare the rice as indicated on the bag or box, make as much as you’d like. (I happen to love rice so I always make a ton)
2. While the rice is on the stove, wash your beans and cut off the gross little nubbly parts.
3. In a pan, place the cut beans and some vegetable oil.
4. Heat the pan on medium or low, add soy sauce to taste.
5. Sprinkle the beans with garlic salt and pepper.
6. Fry in the pan until the beans start to darken.
7. After the rice is done, fluff with a fork and serve up in bowls or on plates.
8. Put the beans on top of the rice.
9. Mix up the remaining oil and soy sauce in the pan and pour over the dish if you’d like more flavor.

Enjoy!

If you don’t have to share, this can last you up to three or four meals. Yay leftovers! Thank you so much for joining The Loneliest Cookbook’s first blog post! Next Monday I will be back with my review of the “30 Days to $1,000 Challenge”.

Sugar and Savings,

Taylor

XOXO