With everyone feeling the pinch at the grocery store and trying to make better food choices, how can you make your dollar stretch longer? Well I had been looking at the option of buying a FoodSaver to make my own stir fries and marinate/sanction out those big value packs of bonesless chicken breasts. I finally broke down and bought one along with a few rolls of the plastic bags.
A usual bag of pre-made stir fry veggies which gets me one use typically costs $3.50. I bought carrots, celery, zucchini, bamboo shoots, water chestnuts, broccoli and green onions. That stuff totaled $11.00 and I got 4 nights of stir fries out of them which averaged to $2.75. Now maybe saving $3.00 doesn’t sound like a big deal but it saves me from having to pick out the freezer burnt green beans and red peppers which I don’t care for which is money in the trash can. I know they’re fresh, the volume is more and no preservatives.
We also used to use 2 chicken breasts and cut them up but as I thin cut those frozen chicken breasts, I realized by thin cutting them we could use one and have it appear like just as much as two, thereby doubling the amount of dinners I can get out of them. I also pre cut each chicken breast and put in a marinade so I would just have to open and stir fry and save my time.
Yes, it took a long time to do (about 3 hours with cutting, peeling, etc) but I watched my soaps while I did it and now all of our dinners for next week are taken care of. Instead of buying those bagged salads we’re making our own and are going to get a canister for that so it keeps longer. Those bagged salads were only good for 2-3 days after we opened them.
So just in my one use of this machine, I can already see the money and time savings for the future. If you use one, feel free to share your experience!
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