Penny Pinching Peach

For the semi crunchy, homeschool friendly and totally frugal!

Category Archives: Cooking With Coupons

This section is where you’ll find tasty recipes using each week’s best coupons & sales.


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Chocolate Banana Peanut Butter Glaze Cake

Chocolate Banana Cake With Peanut Butter Glaze

Chocolate Banana Cake With Peanut Butter Glaze

I have been trying to cook from ingredients I already have in my cabinets as much as possible. I had a couple of bananas that were overripe, and was out of chocolate chips and raisins for the cookies I’d normally make with them. I also had a cake mix that needed used, and a craving for chocolate and peanut butter. From that jumping point, I brainstormed and cooked up the Chocolate Banana Cake with Peanut Butter Glaze. Wanna try it? Here is what I did…

Chocolate Banana Cake

1 Duncan Hines chocolate cake mix
1 cup water
1/2 cup oil
2 eggs
2 mashed overripe bananas
Grease a 13×9 pan. Bake at 350 for 32-34 minutes, or until toothpick stuck in the middle comes out clean.
Frost it with peanut butter glaze.

Peanut Butter Honey Glaze

1/2 cup peanut butter
1/4 cup honey
1/4 cup water
Mix well.
This would work great as a simple topping for cake,  muffins,  or brownies. It would also make a healthy sweet fruit dip.
Pretty simple, huh? My family loves this easy peasy cake! It’s moist and sweet without being sickeningly sweet. It’s also very inexpensive, especially if you’re like me and only buy cake mixes with awesome sales and coupons.
If you want another way to use up overripe bananas (or peanut butter, my couponing comrades!), try these recipes below…
Peanut butter chocolate chip close-up

Peanut butter chocolate chip close-up

Peanut Butter Chocolate Banana Oatmeal

Peanut Butter Chocolate Banana Oatmeal


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After School Snacks

With school just starting, I thought I’d share a few suggestions for a variety of after school snacks. There should be something to make any kiddo happy in this list, from homemade junk food to truly delicious healthy options!

Easy Cake Mix Cookies

This is a super simple and versatile cookie recipe you can whip up in a snap with whatever mix you have on hand. Try it!

Easy Cake Mix Cookies

Easy Cake Mix Cookies

Crafty Snacking

This post has a few creative, cute and quick snack ideas, including the friendly spider below. Anyone can do these, even kids!

Happy Spider

Happy Spider

Penny Pinching Popsicles

Try these refreshing and inexpensive homemade popsicles! You won’t regret it!

Penny Pinching Popsicles

Penny Pinching Popsicles

Super Yummy Don-t-Tell-Them-They’re-Healthy Snacks

Here’s a list of fun, easy and very healthy kid approved snacks! Many of these can also be made by the kiddos themselves.

Veggie Snack

Veggie Snack

Completely Healthy Cookies? Yes, Please!

This recipe for multiple versions of oatmeal cookies are made with only wholesome ingredients- no sugar or flour- and pass the taste test of my children and hubby who all have a sweet tooth. They are quite filling, and healthy enough that you could be the cool mom giving them cookies for breakfast! 😉

Peanut butter chocolate chip close-up

Peanut butter chocolate chip close-up

Home Flavored Yogurt

Do you love yogurt, but not all the sugary content or the high price tag on individual servings? This is the perfect idea for you!

Home Flavored Yogurt

Home Flavored Yogurt

Some More S’mores

Love s’mores, but no time for campfires for awhile? Here’s your solution!

S'mores Cupcakes

S’mores Cupcakes

Which of these do you want to try first? These are all tried and approved by my own munchkins. They don’t pretend to like anything just to spare Mommy’s feelings, so you know they’ve passed at least a couple of kid tests. 😉


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Warm Salad

Warm salad

Warm salad

My kiddos and I love our veggies.

Sometimes you don’t really need a recipe to have a quick and healthy meal, and this is one of those times. When I was a little one, I loved veggies, but absolutely hated salads. I think it may’ve been because they were just so much lettuce and so little flavor, so it kinda felt like I was literally eating rabbit food.

My munchkins love Mommy style salads, because there are lots of veggies, but lettuce is never the only star of the show. I have mixed greens growing in my little backyard garden, and prefer spinach or green leaf lettuce to iceberg, for both taste and nutrition. I make sure to use a variety of ingredients like a variety of veggies, shredded or cubed cheese, crushed pecans or croutons, fruit, and at times even proteins like chicken or egg.

Sometimes I even make a warm salad, which is what I want to share with y’all now. For supper the other night I threw together a warm broccoli, carrot and egg salad, which the kiddos and I gobbled right up. Wanna try it?

You’ll need to steamed or boiled  broccoli florets and julienned or thinly sliced carrots. (If you’re in a huge hurry, you can microwave them on high for 4 minutes in a microwave safe container with a moist paper towel over them.) Add chopped boiled eggs, shredded cheese and a small amount of salad dressing. You want enough dressing to lightly coat your veggies, but not enough for them to swim in. 🙂 We used caesar salad dressing this time, because that’s what was in the fridge at the time. Ranch or Italian both work well, also. Stir until everything is well coated, and serve warm.

It’s as simple as that! I had my little ones digging into their vittles less than 10 minutes after I opened the fridge to gather my ingredients together. They thought it was yummy, and I knew it was healthy. That is what I call a win-win! 🙂

Good stuff!

Good stuff!

What is your favorite kind of salad?

We eat lots of different types of salads during the spring and summer. There are just too many delicious fresh fruits and veggies available this time of year for us not to take advantage of them! They make for many healthy, delectable meals, desserts and snacks for this penny pinching peach’s family. 🙂

For another great vegetarian dish, try my Easy Mexican Bean Salad!


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Some More S’mores

S'mores Cupcakes

S’mores Cupcakes

Princess Peach and I love our s’mores, but there isn’t always a bonfire and roasting stick available, so I’ve come up with some creative ways to get that ooey-gooey yummy fix. One of my s’more inspired concoctions is S’more Cupcakes. Lemme tell ya, we gobbled these right up! Not to brag, but they were so moist, just gooey enough and the flavors were the bomb diggety. They were also alot of fun for Princess and I to make together, which helped make this a recipe to keep in the “make again” file. Want to make these yourself? You know that you do! Who doesn’t love s’mores?? They’re basically a symbol of summer, and they include chocolate! Oh, and don’t get me started on cupcakes! They just make me happy! They’re a pre-portioned piece of cake and they bring back fond memories of childhood with every bite. Put those together, and you’ve got Heaven in your mouth! 🙂 On to the directions…

S’more Cupcakes

1 Devil’s Food Cake mix, following directions on box for mixing

12 large marshmallows (we used the ones made for s’mores, since they were flat)

1 cup mini marshmallows

1/2 cup of chocolate chips

Dropping in Marshmallows

Dropping in Marshmallows

Mix the cake batter according to directions, adding the chocolate chips. Fill each cup about 1/3 of the way with the cake batter. Drop three mini marshmallows in each cup. Finish filling the cups with the remaining batter to about 2/3 full. Bake in the oven according to the directions for cupcakes on your Devil’s Food Cake mix.

Before the marshmallow topping

Before the marshmallow topping

When you remove them from the oven, flip the oven to broil. Place your large marshmallows on top of each cupcake, then pop them back into the oven. Broil until they puff up and are very lightly browned, watching closely, since they will burn very quickly. Remove, cool, and enjoy!

My kiddos absolutely drooled over these, gobbling them right up. They had a blast with the process of making them together, as well. My daughter loved adding the chocolate chips to the batter and dropping in the marshmallows. Both of my munchkins were mesmerized by watching the marshmallows puff up in the oven. They were so excited to finally get to chomp into these scrumptious bites of gooey goodness! You’ve got to try them, too! There are even coupons available to go with this yummy recipe! See below…

Sharing their cupcakes

Sharing their cupcakes

What is your favorite kind of cupcake? Do you enjoy s’mores, or are you allergic to melty chocolate gooey scrumpdeliciousness? 😉 For more recipes, please click the Chef’s hat!


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Tomato Cucumber Macaroni Salad

Tomato Cucumber Macaroni Salad

Tomato Cucumber Macaroni Salad

Want a quick & healthy dish for a summer lunch? Try my Tomato Cucumber Macaroni Salad!

It’s super simple, and a hit any time I make it. I made it the night before while I was making baked mac and cheese for supper, and let it chill overnight to marry the flavors better. It really did blend the tastes together even more strongly by morning.

Here’s how you make this easy pleasure macaroni salad:

Boil two cups of macaroni noodles to al dente.

While the noodles are boiling, chop up two medium cucumbers and two medium tomatoes. Toss in a medium sized bowl with a bit of salt and pepper.

When ready, drain the noodles and rinse with cold water until they are cooled off. Dump in the bowl with the chopped veggies.

Pour in ranch dressing to taste and stir well. You can eat it then or chill overnight.

This would be good with sweet onions, shredded carrots, broccoli, chopped olives, tuna or shredded chicken stirred in, as well. It’s a versatile sort of “dump salad”, and oodles of fun for the palate to play with a variety of ingredients. I love to use fresh veggies from my garden for light and refreshing lunches in the summer time, so it varies what I make according to what produce is on hand.

This is great for packing in something like these World Kitchen Pyrex 6-Piece Food Plus Storage Set for lunches, if you have a cooler to carry or refrigeration available wherever you’re headed for work, school or play. Just pop one open on your lunch break and dig in! 🙂

What are some of your favorite lunches? What splendid summer veggies do you have an abundance of to gobble up? Also try my Weeknight Dinners!

Peace, smiles, and good vittles for all! 😉

“Penny Pinching Peach is a participant in the Amazon Services LLC Associates Program, an affiliate advertising program designed to provide a means for sites to earn advertising fees by advertising and linking to Amazon.com”


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My Kids’ Favorite Oatmeal

Peanut Butter Chocolate Banana Oatmeal

Peanut Butter Chocolate Banana Oatmeal

If you are one of those moms who just wants to quickly throw something together to feed the ravenous hordes in your house, but would prefer that something be healthy as well as faster as a wink and kid approved….this is the post for you!

My five year old long ago declared that she hated oatmeal, it was disgusting and slimy, and she would never, ever like it, no matter what. Challenge me, do ya, kiddo? Alrighty then! Challenge accepted! 😉 Guess what? She likes oatmeal. “But only the good kind you make, Mommy, not that other stuff, so I still hate that!” The following concoctions are the few approved by my resident oatmeal snob and the rest of the family.

This is my kids’ favorite oatmeal- and one of their most requested breakfasts. It’s Mommy and Daddy approved, too! My husband has me pack the ingredients for him at the fire station sometimes, because it sticks with him pretty well.

Take 1-2 packs of plain instant oatmeal and prepare according to package. Chop

Strawberries and Cream

Strawberries and Cream

up 1-2 bananas, according to taste and the number of people eating (2 packs and 1 banana is okay for just me and my two small children). Mash it into the oatmeal, along with a generous dollop of peanut butter and a sprinkling of chocolate chips. Stir and serve. Delicious!! The bowl in the

photo was immediately prepared and dished out for my munchkins and I, who were quite annoyed when I paused to take a photo of their breakfast while I was making it. 🙂

Another winner is one I call strawberries and cream. You can use chopped strawberries with milk and strawberry jam or chopped strawberries with cream and honey or chopped strawberries and strawberry yogurt. All of them give a yummy effect, so use whatever works in that category. Just strawberries and milk wasn’t nearly sweet enough, and the same with the cream, so the jam and honey helped with that. If you can’t tell, I’m the queen of kitchen improvisation.

Lastly, we have another super simple selection that is kiddo approved. Simply mix in a scoop of peanut butter and a dash of cinnamon, with or without honey or a smattering of chocolate chips. Similar, but mentionably different, from the first flavor.

Simply Sweet

Simply Sweet

I love meals that can be made quickly, cheaply and healthily from ingredients I normally have hanging around the house, anyway. These definitely fit that description, so I hope y’all enjoy them, too.

Does your family like oatmeal? What are their favorite flavors? If not, do you think any of these could possibly convert your own personal oatmeal snobs? It’s worth a try! it worked on my little princess picky pants, so it might work on yours, too. 🙂

Want another great recipe using oatmeal? Try my family approved Completely Healthy Cookies for an easy peasy snack that is both healthy and delicious.


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Easy Cake Mix Cookies

Easy Cake Mix Cookies

Easy Cake Mix Cookies

My family loves super soft cookies, and I love simple and inexpensive treats. While I don’t always keep cookies around, sometimes nothing else will do. I usually have some cake mixes stashed in ym cabinets, so I decided to try out this easy cake mix cookies recipe, shared at the bottom of this post.

The beauty of this recipe is it’s versatility. You can literally do pretty much any flavors you can get in a cake mix and throw in whatever mix-in tickles your fancy. My husband is a fiend for chocolate and peanut butter together, so this time I went with devil’s food cake and peanut butter chips. It was the bomb diggety!

This recipe is a terrific choice for cooking with kids, because it’s pure simplicity and no fuss to make, and what kid doesn’t like cookies? 😉 My five and two year olds had a good ol’ time dumping in the ingredients, doing quality control taste tests on the peanut butter chips, dumping spoonfuls of batter on the cookie sheet, and eating the results of their labor.

Some other flavor combinations I think would be yummy? Lemon cake with vanilla chips, almonds or coconut. Chocolate cake with white chocolate, coconut, raisins or nuts. Vanilla cake with chocolate chips, dried cranberries or nuts. Peanut butter cake with chocolate chips, Reese’s cups diced up or nuts. Orange cake with dark chocolate chips or dried cranberries. Strawberry cake with dark or white chocolate chips. I’ll stop now, but you get the picture. There are TONS of possibilities!

What flavor combinations can you come up with?

Here is the link to the simply sweet recipe I used as my base.

http://www.food.com/recipe/easy-cake-mix-cookies-5287


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Dinner For a Dollar

Dinner For a Dollar

Dinner For a Dollar

“Dinner for a dollar?!?”  they exclaim, “It can’t be done!!”.

Let me tell ya, honey, it most certainly can! Tonight I made this delicious pasta dish for less than a dollar. It fed my five year old, two year old and me with leftovers…and we all ate seconds!

I am challenging myself to stretch our grocery money as far as possible, and cook from the pantry as much as I can to help with a money crunch while my husband is taking a career furthering class for several weeks and missing a lot of work to do so. I haven’t been shopping in about a week and a half, so I am doing pretty well with it thus far.

I found some pasta with no crazy ingredients, just semolina and durum flour, marked down for 25 cents each when I was shopping a couple of weeks ago, so I grabbed several packages. I used half a pack of those noodles for this dish, plus a can of Italian diced tomatoes (66 cents), a sprinkling of parmesan, a handful of mozzarella cheese and the last few slices of ham lunchmeat we had in the pack before we go grocery shopping tomorrow.

Dinner For a Dollar? It's Doable!!

Dinner For a Dollar? It’s Doable!!

I mixed the cooked pasta with the tomatoes, let my oldest sprinkle on the cheese and the shredded lunchmeat and warmed it in the oven for about five minutes. TADA!!!! A super cheap and yummy supper created in less than 10 minutes! 🙂

While this cost me less than a dollar, with more average prices it might cost closer to two dollars. Even still, it’s a budget friendly and speedily prepared meal for the penny pinching parent who is crunched for time.

“Penny Pinching Peach is a participant in the Amazon Services LLC Associates Program, an affiliate advertising program designed to provide a means for sites to earn advertising fees by advertising and linking to Amazon.com”

Need more recipes on a dollar budget? Check out this ebook on Amazon, Easy Recipes: Budget Dinners: Eat Well for A Single Dollar, as low as free!

What is the cheapest home cooked meal (that your family actually enjoyed ) you’ve made recently? Want another delicious pasta recipe? Try my You Can Have Your Cheese and Tomato Sauce, Too, Pasta Casserole!

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This and That Infused Water

5

Have you tried making your own infused waters?

I’ve seen all sorts of blurbs online about this wonderful fad of making infused waters at home. Now, generally I’m not one to jump on the myriad bandwagons of fads, but in this case it seemed harmless. Since I need to drink a lot of water, love fruit, and always have mason jars floating around the house, I decided to give this particular trend a try. I have sampled a variety of different flavors, so I’ll tell y’all about it. Prepare yourself! 😉

Blueberry Lemon Infused Water

Blueberry Lemon Infused Water

*Penny Pinching Peach is a participant in the Amazon Services LLC Associates Program, an affiliate advertising program designed to provide a means for sites to earn advertising fees by advertising and linking to amazon.com.

My first taste test was blueberry lemon infused water.

It was quite pretty, and made a truly refreshing beverage. I just sliced up a lemon, threw in a heaping handful of blueberries, filled my quart jar (better yet, try a Aladdin Original Insulated Mason Tumbler 20oz, Aqua ) with water, shook it up and stuck the whole concoction into the fridge overnight. When I tried it in the morning, it was a big thumbs up. I was able to refill using the same fruit four times over the course of two days. The fourth time the flavor was starting to fade, so I just ate the blueberries and called it good. 🙂

Key Lime Infused Water

Key Lime Infused Water

My next flavor fling was key lime infused water.

I quartered two key limes, squeezed them into the jar, and filled it up with water. I also added two tablespoons of sugar melted into some hot water, because I figured it would be way too tart and kinda icky on it’s own. I think I was right, but it would’ve been smarter healthwise if I had just used a tablespoon of honey or something. 🙂 It didn’t make it sweet at all, just cut the sour a bit. This one only worked for two refills, but may’ve worked for more and a stronger flavor with a large lime or more key limes. I liked the blueberry lemon better, but this still had a nice little zest.

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Mango Infused Water
Mango Infused Water

My third fruity concoction to check out was mango infused water.

I sliced up half of a mango into my jar, filled it with water and shook it, letting is sit overnight. It had a pleasant mellow mango flavor to it that lasted through a couple of refills. Try it!

Blackberry Infused Water

Blackberry Infused Water

My fourth taste test to share was blackberry infused water!

I’d just picked a big jug full of blackberries and wanted to see how it was. It came in a close second to the blueberry lemon on the taste test and the water color was a beautiful purple.

By this point, my sweet husband had taken note of my new fun water trick and bought me a really pretty fruit infusing water bottle!

He got mine off the clearance rack at Walmart, as seen in the photo. I love it! It made it so simple, and I could take it anywhere and keep adding water as it got about half empty throughout the day for continuous lightly fruity refreshment. Infusing water with the mason jars was great, but using the nifty little Cool Gear Flavor Infuser 28oz BPA Free-red* with the insert and the top that snaps shut so my kids can’t dump it all over me took it to the next level, honey! 🙂 (The fact it was on clearance added to his thoughtful hubby points. LOL)

Cucumber Key Lime Infused Water

Cucumber Key Lime Infused Water

My final creative flavor combination to share is cucumber and key lime infused together!

I took a few thin slices of cucumbers and put them in the bottom half of my infuser insert in my Cool Gear Flavor Infuser 28oz BPA Free-red*, then quartered two key limes, squeezed them into the cup and threw the quarters into the infusion insert. Next morning, I had a drink best described as “fresh”. The flavor was surprisingly strong in a pleasant way. I’d thought of cucumber because I’d seen a few places that cucumber water could boost metabolism and aid in weight loss. Can’t hurt, huh? 😉

To sum it up, I’d definitely recommend doing your own infused waters if you like a little flavor in your beverages and are trying to drink more water!

Don’t expect it to be as strong of a fruity taste as juice, but it is very pleasant and certainly makes me reach for my water a little more frequently than always drinking it plain. Adding a bit of citrus like lemon or lime to whatever fruit definitely seemed to amp up the flavor of the “host fruit”, from my little experiments. Play with the flavors. It’s fun! I’m thinking of trying pineapple or peaches next.

What fruit would you try to infuse first? Need some healthy snack ideas to go with that refreshing water you’re going to be sipping? Head over to Super Yummy Don’t-Tell-Them-They’re-Healthy Snacks!


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Ramen Noodle Meals

Ingredients

Ingredients

If you are like me, you make an honest attempt at feeding your family healthy meals, but sometimes…you settle for kinda sorta healthy. One of my “I’m too busy to be truly healthy” meals is to make souped up Ramen noodles.

One beyond easy option? Merely fix a box of the teriyaki flavored noodles in the microwave while sauteeing some fresh spinach and mushrooms in a pan with a bit of butter. When the noodles are finished, just stir it all together and eat. I only use half of the seasoning, because the sodium content is through the roof and it tastes fine without it all.

Fancy Pants Ramen Noodles

Fancy Pants Ramen Noodles

Another way? Get the regular type of ramen you have to boil. The flavor doesn’t matter because you aren’t going to eat it. While the noodles are boiling, shred a carrot, slice a few mushrooms and toss some mushrooms into a pan with a little butter or olive oil. Saute until just tender, then push to the edges of the pan and scramble an egg or two in the middle. Add the noodles. For seasoning, I either saute some minced garlic with the veggies, sprinkle a generous ammount of parmesan with the finished product or spritz it with some soy sauce. Whichever way you choose, it’s yummy and even moderately healthy. 🙂

Yet another yummy Ramen twist? Make it into tuna casserole. Cook the noodles while you mix a dollop of mayo, dollop of sour cream, handful of cheddar cheese, diced celery, and sliced mushrooms (canned or fresh). Stir it all together in a small baking dish and top with either crushed Ritz crackers or cheese. Bake at 400 degrees F until warm through, usually about 20 minutes.

One last version for the day? Boil two packs of the noodles at the same time as microwaving a steam bag of broccoli florets. When they are both ready, throw together in a large pot with a can of cream of chicken soup, half a cup of sour cream, and about a cup of cheddar cheese until warmed through. Supper is served!

What are some of your favorite twists on Ramen noodles?

For some great recipes, please click the Chef’s hat!

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