Sausage Skillet Recipe (made with $2.99/lb fresh sale sausage at Whole Foods)

DISCLAIMER: This is a 20 Minute Meal (17, actually!).

As promised, I've written a recipe using the amazing sausage that's on sale at Whole Foods this week (until Tuesday). This can obviously be made with any sausage, but Whole Foods makes their's fresh, and it's just about the most beautiful sausage I've ever seen. I don't even really eat meat, but this stuff is top of the line. I always take sausage out of the casing before cooking with it, and this sausage just has huge chunks of fresh pork in it. It's actually really impressive, and I never even knew that this is what sausage is supposed to look like. Plus, they're huge. They're 6 oz. each, which is the equivalent of two normal sausages.

awesome price

awesome sausage

So, since these are such a steal, I decided to use them in 2 recipes. If you're a sausage person, I would buy a few pounds of these and freeze them. They'd be great on the grill. We chose hot, but they have sweet and herb, as well. These are originally $4.99/lb and are on sale $2.99.

The recipes I've written are Hot and Spicy Sausage Skillet and Sausage, Mushroom, and Bean Meatloaf. I will share the first recipe, but not the second one (meatloaf). The meatloaf was good, but I haven't perfected the recipe yet. The point is, you can buy a pound of these sausages, a pound of mushrooms, and a can (or 1/3 bag dried) of beans and make 2 dinners that serve a bunch of people.

Hot and Spicy Sausage Skillet
serves 5-6 hungry adults

12 oz. spicy sausage (about 2 1/2 c. for those without a scale - 2 links from WFs - $2.24)

1 c. organic red beans ($.55 - TJs)

3 1/2 c. quartered white button mushrooms ($1.50 - Haymarket)

2 T. olive oil ($.24)

2 cloves sliced garlic ($.04)

1 t. salt (<$.01)

1 t. dried parsley ($.06)

1 t. dried basil ($.06)

1 dash black pepper (<$.01)

4 c. organic whole wheat penne ($.85)

Total is $5.50 for a meal that serves at least 5. That's $1.10/person. Not bad.

1. Bring large pot of water to a boil, with 2 T. salt.
2. While that heats up, quarter a 10 oz. package of mushrooms, which will yield about 3 1/2 c. mushrooms. Quartering means cutting into 4 chunks. Not 4 slices. I should've taken a picture of that, sorry. It's like cutting a cross in the top of the mushroom. OK. It's not that difficult. Also, while the water is heating:
   Squeeze the sausage out of the casing into bite sized chunks. Also:
3. Slice 2 cloves of garlic.
4. Add 4 c. penne to boiling water and stir.
5. In a LARGE skillet, over medium high heat, add 2 T. olive oil and let it get hot for a second. Then add in the sausage chunks, salt, parsley, and basil, and brown over medium-high heat until cooked (6 minutes or so).
6. Once cooked, add mushrooms, garlic slices, and beans, along with 2 ladlefulls of pasta water. Let it simmer over medium-high heat while the penne finishes cooking.
7. Once the penne is done, add that to the skillet (about half of the pasta water should've evaporated and cooked the mushrooms) and toss (still over medium-high heat). This helps the pasta absorb the sauce.
8. Serve and enjoy.

scrimpyTips for this recipe:

- You can use chicken or turkey sausage also.

- This would be delicious with some fresh grated cheese on top.

- You can make the sausage topping ahead of time, and then just reheat it with some pasta water. Toss with fresh pasta and you're good to go.

CVS Sale Item of the Week Award (plus some info on filtering your water)

The CVS Sale Item of the Week Award goes to Pur water filtration items which are 20% off.

Getting a water filtration system can be pricey to start, and the refills are often expensive. I try to buy my refills at a wholesale club like BJs when I go home to NY. But if you don't have wholesale as an option, your best bet is to try to catch them on sale at CVS. We use Brita, but Pur goes on sale at CVS and Brita rarely does. So, i'd go with Pur.

Pur items deserve the award because it's important to filter your water. Check out these articles about what can be found in tap water. I mean, obviously Pur wants to scare you into buying their product, but what they're reporting is true. There's bad stuff in tap water and it's probably better (especially for children) to avoid drinking it all the time. It's not too hard, or really too expensive, to get a filter.

If you are worried about the cost of a filter system and refills, think about how much you spend on bottled water. Now, pay $20 for stainless steel water bottle, and pay about $30 for your filtration system. That's $50. If you buy a bottle of water a day this will pay for itself in a month. And you save bottles from landfills. And you don't drink plastic chemicals. And you don't drink other crap from your tap.

So, that's all! I hope I motivated you to start toting your own bottle filled with fresh, filtered water from home. It's good for you, and good for the earth.

CVS Sale Sunday

Well, there's nothing too great on sale at CVS this week. I'm not lying, see for yourself. Here are the highlights, though:

• There's a bunch of junk food-ish type things on sale if you're into that. I mean, everyone is ocassionally, right? Doritos are 2/$5, CVS brand cookies are on sale 2/$5, and CVS crakers are on sale 2/$3. These crackers are good, trust me. And if you pack your lunch and you like junk food, these are good sales because you can individually package this stuff and really save.
• Drumstick ice cream, Dibs, Fruit Bars, and Skinny Cow 6 pk. are on sale 2/$6 or $3 each. Dibs are addictive. Be really careful.
• CVS Brand vitamins are buy one get one free. If you're like me, and procrastinate taking your vitamins, this is a good sale. Just go buy them and be done with it.
• Dawn dish soap is $.97. I used to buy this before I switched to earth and people friendly Method soap.
• Clorox GreenWorks is on sale 2/$6. If you don't want to make your own cleaners, then you can buy this and be greener.
• Pur water filtration products are 20% off. This is a good time to buy a system and start bottling your own water into a stainless steel water bottle. You could also stock up on refills. Once you buy one, you can always join club Pur (sounds cool...NOT) and get coupons. Then you could use the coupons when Pur goes on sale at CVS and really save.
• Cascade dishwasher liquid is $2.99. I used to stock up on this when it went on sale this cheap. I am going to explore greener options once mine runs out, though. But if you use a dishwasher and this kind of soap, it's a great sale.
• Crest is 2/$5...be sure not to get tricked into buying the small tube of Pro-Health...get one of the big tubes.

CVS NOT sale item of the week award goes to Bounty basic. These paper towels SUCK and smell weird, too. Wait until Bounty normal 12 pks. go on sale $6.99. You couldn't pay me $5.88 to buy the Bounty basic again.

So there you have it. Nothing too great, but I figure I'd let you know!

scrimpySnack of the Week!

UPDATE: I was kind of tripping out. I wrote this recipe excluding the crumb topping, but I just ate another one, and they're pretty damn good with the topping. I'm updating the recipe and the prices to include the crumb topping - but I reduced the butter because there was too much.

Good Sunday Morning, everyone! I'm here to share the scrimpySnack of the Week. I like to write these recipes on Sundays, because that's the day when I bake Mike's lunch snacks for the entire week. If I make a dozen, I'll usually freeze half, and have the second half ready for me when I don't have a chance to bake something, or we're starving and have no other decent snacks in the house.

This week's snack is Whole Wheat-ish Organic Blueberry Muffins. The recipe makes 8 muffins, and I don't see why you couldn't double it. This recipe is a compliment to Thursday's post about using frozen fruit and vegetables.

Whole Wheat-ish Organic Blueberry Muffins

makes 8

3/4 c. whole wheat flour ($.08 - stop and shop!)
3/4 c. white all purpose flour ($.11 - WF...a bit more expensive)
2/3 c. sugar ($.20)
2 t. baking powder ($.08 - please triple check this and don't use baking soda on accident!)
1/2 t. salt (<$.01) (excuse the formatting from here...I'm stuck with a messed up keyboard - trust me it's worse for me than it is for you)

1/3 c. canola oil or other vegetable oil ($.26)

1/2 c. milk or yogurt (organic - $.19)

1 egg (organic - $.29)

1 cup frozen blueberries (organic - TJs - $1.08)

1 T. flour ($.01, to toss blueberries in so that they don't sink in the batter)

2 T. sugar + 1 t. cinnamon + 1 T finely diced butter + 1 T. flour = crumb topping ($.20)

Total is $2.51/8 crumb topped muffins...$.31 each

1. Preheat oven to 400 and prepare muffin tins by greasing them or putting in muffin cups.


2. Combine flour, sugar, baking powder, and salt.


3. In a measuring cup, measure oil and add the egg. Then fill with yogurt or milk to make 1 cup. You should need about 1/2 c. That's how much I needed.


4. Add the oil mixture to the dry ingredients and stir slowly until JUST combined. If you over stir muffin batter, you will make your muffins tough. So, stir them as few times as absolutely necessary.


5. Toss the blueberries with the flour. This is done so that they don't sink. This batter is so thick that they won't sink, anyways...but I also do it to keep the blue color from bleeding too much (even though it still will a bit). Toss anything that you plan to put in a muffin in flour first so they don't sink.


6. Fold in the blueberries carefully and spoon the batter into cups.


7. Sprinkle with crumb topping, or just plain sanding sugar, or nothing, if you'd prefer.
   
8. Bake for 20-25 minutes. Mine took 25. The picture is of my muffins, with the too buttery topping. They are a little dull looking because of my camera and the wheat flour which makes them a bit brownish.

Anyways, these are awesome and delicious. Like, SO delicious.

scrimpyTips:

- You can use all white flour, I just used half and half to up the healthy quotient. You could also add 1/4 c. of ground flax.

- You could use a mixture of brown and white sugars.

- These can be frozen.

- You can use milk, soy milk, buttermilk, or yogurt. I used yogurt and they're really moist!

- These would obviously be even better with fresh blueberries. Those would be a hell of a lot more expensive though! Props to Trader Joe's for coming through with the 12 oz. bag of frozen organic blueberries for $2.69.