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Thursday, March 12, 2009

Frugal Asparagus Bruschetta and a Frugal Few Minutes

Today is Thursday and that means I should link to the nice blogger who invited me to her Thrifty Thursday gathering. Last week I wrote a post and left a message on her site, but forgot to put a link to her site here. Bad etiquette. A definite technoklutz moment.


Frugal Asparagus

My readers know that I was planning on eating leftover pinto bean soup yesterday. When we got home--later than usual due to required meeting for Mr. DFS--I remembered that I had two bunches of asparagus that I had bought before the trip to Arkansas. It was $0.99 a pound, a great price, but needless to say it's not frugal if you don't use it.

My readers also know that I detest cooking when we get home from work. Still, it's easy to cook asparagus. Break off the ends and cook in water in a big pan. You just lay the asparagus flat.

It's also easy to toast a piece of homemade French country bread (courtesy of my in-house baker, Mr. DFS, who has been providing this service for over 30 years). It's also easy to rub with a clove of garlic, sprinkle with olive oil, salt and pepper.

It is a moment's work to lay some asparagus across this (aka bruschetta) and eat it. If you have the strength after a long day at work, you could, just maybe, grate a bit of cheese over all.

Reader, we ate it all up. Sorry, no pictures.


A Frugal Few Minutes


You may wonder, what do frugal people do for fun. Here is a glimpse into the fun moments of two frugal friends and colleagues. I am so lucky that one of my dearest and most frugal colleagues has an office across the hall from me. I am also lucky that his office is quite overcrowded with books, so he set up a small desk in the hall by the window. From inside my office, I can hear him in conference with students. He is always patient and kind, never sarcastic. I am guilty of occasional (okay, frequent) sarcasm. So hearing him with his students makes me a better teacher, nay, a better person.

Yesterday my colleague had the Wednesday paper, so we spent a few happy moments looking at the grocery ads for the week. We discovered that there was nothing good at Winn-Dixie. Albertsons has fabulous sales on orange juice, grapes, brown sugar, sour cream, and oatmeal, to name a few. We noted that the only well-priced sale item at Piggly-Wiggly is the cabbage ($0.25/lb for St. Patrick's Day). We sadly decided that it's not worth it to stop at the Pig just to buy a cabbage or two.

We had 100% agreement on what the good deals are this week and we were equally fast at spotting them. It was a tie!


Lagniappe

If you want FREE cabbage, potatoes, and carrots, head down to New Orleans for the St. Patrick's Day parade. Instead of throwing Mardi Gras beads, riders throw your dinner. Be careful! And sometimes you have to kiss people (Kiss me, I'm Irish) before you get your cabbage.

4 comments:

Duchesse said...

I like roasted asparagus so much better than boiled, and suggest it would be great on bruschetta. So many vegetables are good roasted: carrots, cauliflower, broccoli are a few we roast all the time.

Frugal Scholar said...

Duchesse--I am roasting asparagus as I type and will report back. thanks for the suggestion.

Midlife, menopause, mistakes and random stuff... said...

Oh dear Frugal Scholar.....every time I read your post I find myself hungry. I grow asparagus and I also spent all day yesterday planting my Romaine and Red Lettuce, my Early dividend broccoli and my flat red onions. I also put my Sweet Baby Girl Cherry tomato's into bigger buckets until I can safely put them into the gourn. And....they already have a few sweet little yellow blooms on them!!! I'm so excited that I can barely wait.
You really brought back a few memories for me today.
I used to visit a friend of mine in Metarie and she lived over close to Veteran's Blvd.
We'd walk over to the Irish Parade and try not to get hit in the head with a head (of cabbage).
Do you still have any of those Loo-siana sweet clementines?? How about Satsuma's?
I'll pay the postage if you send me a few???????

Frugal Scholar said...

@Midlife--OOH! Wish we could grow those things. We have a lemon tree. We just bought a few more citrus trees, so if you'll wait around 5 years we should have some satsumas for you.