DiGiorno pizza Review

(This post was originally posted on Chat with Sandy on 12/26/10)

Feeding Large Families Can Be Expensive

With both of my older boys home we have been having meals with all ten of us.  I have been lucky in the sense that we have 8 children, but 3 of them don’t live with us anymore.  Mix that in with the fact that my 4 step children are only with us 1/2 the time, we don’t have that many meals with everyone home.

But for 2 weeks with them home from boot camp we have had and will be having many meals with everyone.  Finding meals that will feed all of us for not a boat load of money (and that are easy too) are pretty important.

I didn’t have any problem at all with doing a shop for Collective Bias for DiGiorno Pizza.

Off to Walmart I went on December 23rd to do some shopping.
I checked Consumer Queen’s Data base to see if I could find a coupon. No luck on that one…poo.

A sign of the holidays… isn’t it?  The store was really crowded.  I didn’t have any problems finding the frozen pizzas.  I was a little bummed that they didn’t have a vegetable pizza – that is my favorite. But I ended up getting a meat pizza, cheese and also a mushroom garlic. They cost $4.98 each.  Pretty good for a nice thick pizza like that don’t you think?

Dave had purchased a Red Baron pizza at Kroger the week before. It didn’t have nearly so many pepperoni’s and was much thinner. It wasn’t so good.  He told me that he was trying to decide between the DiGiorno and the Red Baron. I had to laugh because he had no idea I was going to be doing this shop for the DiGiorno the next week.  He picked the Red Baron because it was less expensive. He told me later he was sorry he did.

The pizza went over well.  I had several thoughts from my family.   Here they are:
1) “It was Great!”
2) “It was too doughy”
3) “The mushroom garlic was too garlicy”
4) “Make sure you get this again”
5) “I wish they had veggie”

I started out with 2 pizzas and 6 people.  My boys and Dave. Then Dave’s 4 kids came over and we popped in a 3rd one to cover us all.

Three self rising DiGiono pizza’s, 2 liters of pop and a bag of chips later, we had a lunch meal that fed us all.  The pizza’s cost $4.98 each, the 2 liters of pop cost $1.76 and the chips were $2.88.  Total cost of the meal:  $19.58 to feed 10 of us… for a total of $1.96 per person.  Pretty good!

Here is the whole gang… being goofy!  Thanks DiGiorno for the pizza!  lol

Disclosure:  Collective Bias compensated me for the pizza and shop. The pictures and the opinions are those of mine and my families.

Organizing for Thanksgiving Dinner

Thanksgiving can be a time of stress but shouldn’t be. It should be a time of family fun and everyone coming together to eat a wonderful meal. Of course it is all to help us remember and realize how thankful we need to be for everything we have.

There are many this Thanksgiving who have lost their jobs, lost family members or are fighting life threatening illnesses. Along with our thanks we need to pray for them.

Enjoy your family, make amends if things are problematic and have a fun day together. To help make your day come off without a hitch planning ahead is essential.

Here is my list of To Do’s that may help you in keeping your cooking/planning stress down so that you can enjoy what is most important on Thanksgiving: Family and Friends
1) Make a list of who is coming to your meal.
2) Plan the menu. Make note of what days you are going to prepare each item.
3) Make a grocery list from the menu.
4) Check what you have to see what you need to buy.
5) Plan your grocery shopping day, making sure you have time for thawing of your turkey or premaking dishes. (Good  idea to make room in your refrigerator by cleaning out the old left overs, so you have room for all the food).
6) Do your shopping.
7) Try to clean your house in preparation the day before you have to do your cooking so you don’t over load yourself. Have your kids and husband help if possible.
8) Start your cooking, making sure you have storage space for the food. (Plastic bags can store many things including sauces. Just seal tight and lay flat..you can add many layers of food in a small space.)
9) Plan your Thanksgiving day cooking so that everything finishes about the same time.
10) Clean as you go and you won’t have as many dishes to wash after dinner.

Personally I am one that does the basic clean up to make room to get pies out and served, but I have no problem letting dishes set until after all my family/company has left. I would much rather spend time visiting with them while they are here than being up to my elbows in suds in the kitchen.

Eat lots of turkey, take that walk after the meal and enjoy family!

(this is a revised version of post from last year.)

Guest Post

Menu Planning

by Laura from I’m an Organizing Junkie

Laura from I’m An Organizing Junkie helped to inspire the feel of my blog. Once I discovered blogging I looked at many. I felt most comfortable with hers as I felt it was inviting and fun. I liked the colors, the feel of it and I decided that I also wanted to have a “comfortable” feel to my blog rather than “stiff or stuffy” feel.
She is by far the most recognized organizing blog and I am thrilled to have her being my guest blogger today.
I am so glad she is doing menu planning because it is something that I am not good at. I wish I was….I wish I liked to cook….I have attempted menu planning many times and never seem to stick with it. (See organizers aren’t always organized at every aspect of their lives – although I think we hate it when we aren’t!)
I am going to try her method and give it another shot. Just like I have started couponing..I am going to incorporate menu planning.

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Menu Planning Made Easy

I started menu planning three years ago when I became a stay at home mom. It literally changed my life and now I don’t know how I ever managed without it. I use to be under the impression that menu planning was too rigid and wouldn’t offer me any flexibility. Yet that couldn’t be farther from the truth. Menu planning allows me to prepare and shop for a whole week of dinner options at one time and even though I menu plan what I’m having on certain days I am by no means restricted to that. Having all the necessary ingredients on hand allows me the flexibility to switch days around if I need too without any problems. The menu planning itself takes me no time at all. Let me take you through the process of what works for me step by step:
If you can, choose a regular grocery day and stick to it. For instance I like to get groceries on Monday mornings at 8:30 am when the grocery store is less busy and I can get in and out in no time flat.
The night before grocery day sit down with a notepad and create sections for each day of the week.
Then looking through cookbooks or online start putting together a list of 5 or 6 different meals your family might enjoy that week. To make it a little easier for me when I do it, I start by figuring out which “meat” I’m going to have on which day. So on my notepad I might have chicken marked down for Monday and beef marked down for Tuesday. I also usually try to include at least one meatless dish. Once I know what meat I’m having I can do a quick search for say chicken recipes to find one that I want to use in my menu plan.
As you are doing your menu/recipe search you will certainly come across some more dishes that you’d like to try. I created a folder in my bookmarks called “recipes to try” with sub-folders listing the various food categories (ie: veggies, chicken, desserts, etc) and as I find recipes I’d like to try in the future I bookmark them for quick and easy access in subsequent weeks.
Don’t forget to create a night for leftovers. I purposely make extra on the other days so that I can afford myself a leftover day or two and that way nothing is wasted. This is especially helpful if scheduled for nights when you are busiest. I also do Simple Supper Sundays where anything goes.
Some other considerations to keep in mind when creating your weekly plan is what you might already have on hand in your freezer or pantry that might need to be used up. Select recipes around those ingredients and save money on your grocery bill that week.
Have a look at the grocery store sale flyers. If roast is on sale it is a good time to include roast in your menu plan. Also cross reference with any coupons you might have on hand.
Write a grocery list of the foods you need and post your menu where everyone can see it. No more having to answer the annoying “what’s for dinner?” question.
Join Menu Plan Monday to share and get menu plan ideas from other participants.
Smile and relax knowing that come 4 o’clock each evening you’ve got dinner covered. No panic necessary.