Sweet Love and Ginger

Jessica

Artichoke & Sun Dried Tomato Pesto

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Artichoke & Sun Dried Tomato Pesto

It should be that time of year when our thoughts are swarming with spring gardens and summer pools, but unfortunately for us in the northeast the weather (namely the polar vortex) has had other plans.

Now I’m usually a lover of the snow, I mean any excuse to curl up with a book and a cup of tea is a good thing in my view, but snow and freezing temps this time of year mean that my garlic, and early spring flowers are taking a beating. I’m not pleased about it. Not to mention the hiking plans that ended when it started to hail.

Moving on from disappointing weather I decided to spend most of the weekend crafting and baking all sorts of treats (many of which you will see coming up on Plum Deluxe soon enough). I was craving something that reminded me of spring or summer so I dug through my canned goods and came up with this pesto/dip recipe. It’s a little thicker that a typical pesto but that’s one of the things I like about it. It’s a perfect spread for toast or sandwiches, but also a great dip on crackers, chips or veggies. Versatile recipes man they are the thing.

valentine breakfast sandwich recipe

I actually made this for the first time back near new years, where served as a dip it was a hit. It was also a pretty big winner on this sandwich (pictured below). This time around it went on toast with some melted Swiss cheese because that’s what was in the house. I’m thinking an experiment with puff pastry is in order next.

Artichoke & Sun Dried Tomato Pesto

Artichoke & Sun Dried Tomato Pesto
Ingredients
  • 1 (14 ounce) can artichoke hearts, drained
  • ½ cup sundried tomatoes, packed in oil
  • ¾ cup parmesan cheese
  • 3 cloves garlic
  • ¼ cup pine nuts
  • Pinch of salt
  • 1/3 cup extra virgin olive oil
Instructions
  1. Add all the ingredients to a food processor and blend until smooth. You may need to stop and scrape the sides of the bowl to ensure complete blending. Serve immediately.

 

How I Built a $2000 Savings Out of Thin Air

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spilled-moneyfinal

Yep that title reads correctly. With a little work I was able to come up with over $2000 out of basically thin air. Finances and future planning have been a big topic in our household since Chuck and I have gotten married and combined everything. We have a lot of dreams and being financially stable is the only way to successfully achieve them. In all of these conversations I could not help but think that there had to be more optimization possible. Meaning that I knew there were more ways for us to save/make money than we currently were. I gave myself a challenge to come up with as much money as possible by the end of March (this started in the new year), and was pleasantly surprised at how much I was able to come up with on my own. While the tips and tricks below worked for me they may not work for everyone so keep that in mind as you read through.

  1. The most obvious thing that I did was sell a bunch of stuff on Craigs List. We had a bunch of appliances and items that we simply weren’t using so I sold them, getting nearly $1000 in just a few weeks.
  2. Called my car insurance company and was able to get $35 immediate return plus $10 a month going forward for discounts that I had not previously been signed up for. One of them was simply by being married! Once I finish the defensive driving course I will receive another discount going forward.
  3. In January I participated in a no shopping month – usually we budget $50 a week each for random spending (include lunches out) so this month when I got the cash out each week I put it in my piggy bank instead of my pocket. Also this month I did the slow carb diet, which ended up saving us a bunch of money on groceries.
  4. I looked into my current health insurance and and found out that I can get up to $300 back from participating in certain events, like annual physical, health assessments, and more I was able to make $100 in a few hours of filling out forms. I’m hoping to cash in the other $200 soon.
  5. Checked with my energy company and signed up to receive rebates for things we were already doing. I’ll post a more in depth explanation of this after we finish a few projects but many energy suppliers will give you significant rebates for switching to more energy efficient equipment. Some of the changes we had already made upon moving into the house, it was a nice surprise to find out I could get paid for them.
  6. A surprisingly rewarding effort was collecting and rolling a bunch of spare change I found around the house. I made nearly $100 from this, and rolling it myself saved me the fees from using coin star. It took less than an hour while I was watching TV one evening. #worthit
  7. I cancelled an old credit card that I never used anymore (we switched to a cash back rewards card instead). When I canceled I also cashed in all the points that had added up over the years and it ended up being worth over $300. Again it was a nice surprise. If you use a credit card I strongly suggest getting one that you get cash or another reward from, otherwise you are missing out!
  8. At the beginning of the year I got a small raise. I did the math and took all the extra money I was earning this year out of our savings. I know that this might be frowned upon, since the money isn’t physically in our account yet but I’m not worried about it. I would rather have that extra money working for me now than waiting.
  9. I did a few odd jobs. Running errands for work, babysitting, dog watching, etc. are all little jobs that can really add up. Other things you could try would be mystery shopping, filling out online surveys, etc. There are a million ways to make a little extra money.

So now the question is what do I plan to do with this money? Some people would argue that I should treat myself for all the hard work, but I don’t think this is really the best idea. If we were in debt or didn’t already have a cushy emergency fun I would dump it on those. Since we are set in that department I plan to invest it all. Hopefully in 10 years that money will more than double it will help us come one step closer to early retirement, because that’s the dream around here.

Do you have any ideas that I didn’t cover here? I’m definitely interested in making and saving more!

Recently

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March seemed agonizingly slow to me this year. I think it’s because the weather was so back and forth and all I could think about was getting my hands dirty in the garden. Starting a few seeds indoors just was not enough for me. I have plans for our little home, big ones and I want to get to work on them.

IMAG0473

Both Chuck and I (me with a little prodding from Alicia) seemed to get into the spring cleaning mind set. I can never fathom where all the “stuff” in our house comes from. Why do we have so much that we simply don’t need? Where does it come from? My main goal is to get the office under control, while Chuck is anxious to get the room over the garage in order. It will all get done someday (I hope).

It’s also the home stretch of cold weather so while I haven’t spent much time developing new recipes I have been cooking our cool weather favorites in preparation for the warmer months of grilling time.

Spring here we come!

 

 

Spent on Groceries in March: $171.65 – woot woot! and I wasn’t even trying!

Total for the year: $592.62

Cost of Garden Supplies 2016: $23.28 (Seeds, pots, garden gloves, etc)

Filed Under: Recently

Crock Pot Pea Soup from Leftover Ham Bones

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So this isn’t your typical chop everything up and dump it in the crock pot recipe for pea soup that everyone is used to,  let’s just get that out in the open right now.

Don’t get me wrong that modern American classic is one of my favorites, but sometimes you just have ham bones lying around needing to be used. Easter definitely just happened over here so you can imagine the oversized hams that have been prepared as of late.

Pea Soup from Leftover Ham Bones

It starts out easy enough; toss the bones with whatever meat they have left right into the crock pot along with some split peas, broth, and spices. Let that go until the peas are soft and the meat is falling off the bone. Then you add in all the other good stuff (the veggies) and clean the bones, dumping the meat back into the crock.

See that’s not so hard and you can now reap the benefits of the “bone broth” that was created while they simmered in the crock. Not to mention the flavor that using bones adds.  You’ll never want the easy-chop version again.

In this particular recipe I do not use potatoes because we are still on the “slow carb diet” (notice the use of kidney beans) for the most part, but you can add them in with the rest of the vegetables if you prefer.

Pea Soup from Leftover Ham Bones

Crock Pot Pea Soup from Leftover Ham Bones
Ingredients
  • 1 ham bone with meat (about 2 lbs) or 2 cups diced ham
  • 1 lb dried green split peas, rinsed
  • 1 bay leaf
  • ½ a small yellow onion, chopped
  • 2 stalks celery, minced
  • 1 clove garlic, minced
  • 4 cups chicken broth
  • 2 cups water
  • 2 carrots, chopped (about 1 cup)
  • 1 (15.5 oz) can kidney beans
Instructions
  1. Place ham, peas, bay leaf, onion, celery, garlic, broth and water into a large Crockpot. Cover and cook on low for 8 to 10 hours or high for 5 to 6 hours. The peas should be soft, and ham falling off the bone.
  2. Remove the ham and bones from crock pot and transfer to a rimmed baking sheet, set aside to cool for 5 to 10 minutes.
  3. Add the carrot, and beans to crock pot and turn onto high for 2 hours.
  4. Meanwhile remove the ham from the bone and shred into bite size pieces. Return to the Crockpot and stir to combine. Allow the Crockpot to complete cooking.
  5. Once the carrots and beans are soft turn of the Crockpot and serve.

To speed up the final steps you can also cook the carrot and beans on the stove top first. If you prefer you can also add them with the rest of the ingredients in the beginning, however i find that these ingredients become too mushy for my taste.

The Best of SL&G 2015 is Here (Finally)

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I realize at this point we are a nearly a quarter of the way through the year and that means I am quite behind at getting the Best of Cookbook out to you guys, but that’s life folks. Like it or not we are busy bees over here, but you’ll hear all about that later.

This year’s book is leaps and bounds beyond last years, in this author’s humble opinion. I really love having these books as catalogs of how far I’ve come as both a recipe writer and a photographer. I’d like to say I love photography, but really I hate it. To me it’s a necessary evil in the blogging world, but it’s nice to see that I can improve so much as something I don’t really love.

Best of SL&G 2015

In addition to amazing pictures this year’s book also has some amazing recipes all selected based on their popularity. I’d like to take a moment to thank every single person for visiting, commenting, and sharing SL&G over the last nearly 4 years. Without you guys I surely would not still be here today. It means so much to me that you all like what I do and keep encouraging me to post day after day.

If you are interested in getting a copy of the Best of SL&G 2015 just sign up to be a part of the newsletter over there on the right hand side of the page. The new book goes out tonight! As an added bonus you will also receive the 2014 ebook upon initial sign up.

Thanks!