Penny Pinching Peach

For the semi crunchy, homeschool friendly and totally frugal!

Tag Archives: saving


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Keep Sliced Apples Fresh

How to keep apple slices fresh longer…

My kids love to snack on apple slices. The problem is, they frequently don’t finish all of the slices at one sitting. I got fed up with feeding the leftovers to the chickens, and remembered that I’d heard lemon juice would keep the slices fresh for longer. I didn’t have lemon juice, but I did have key lime, so I tried it. Here are the results, after 24 hours.

First, I put a slice aside as a control to see how well the key lime juice would actually work. Below is what it looked like after 24 hours, a sort of golden brown. It was also fairly squishy when I’d give it a squeeze between my fingers.

Apple slice without key lime juice

Apple slice without key lime juice

Next, I put a couple of slices of apple in a Ziploc baggie, sprinkled a few drops of key lime juice inside, swished it all around to make sure there was a light coating all over and squeezed the air out of the bag, leaving it on the kitchen counter with the other plain apple baggie. Below is what it looked like after 24 hours, almost as white as when I sliced it. The texture was also pretty much the same, and there was barely a hint of key lime flavor when eating it.

Apple slices with key lime juice

Apple slices with key lime juice

All in all, I’d say this experiment was a definite success. I’ve added a new weapon to my produce saving, grocery stretching repertoire! It’s also a great option for prepping healthy snacks the night before when you know you have a busy day coming up.

For more snack ideas, check out After School Snacks!


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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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CVS Super Savings

CVS Super Savings

CVS Super Savings

Yesterday’s trip to CVS was a booming success. If you need diapers, sodas and/or dish soap, this is a great deal!

I bought three packs of Huggies diapers, three 12 packs of soda, two Palmolive dish detergents, a small mouthwash and a body mist.

Huggies and Palmolive were part of a deal where you get $10 Extra Care Bucks if you spend $30. I bought three packs of Huggies diapers at  $9.49 each, used two coupons (if I had found the third that had fallen out in my purse, this deal would’ve been $2.00 better) and got two Palmolive dish soaps to complete the $30 minimum.

There is a coupon printing from the magic red machine for a travel size Colgate mouthwash, making it 50 cents.

I got a free body wash coupon for my birthday.

The 12 pack Coke products are three packs for $11, with $2 Extra Care Bucks for buying three packs.

I had $10 Extra Care Bucks left from a previous shopping trip a few weeks ago.

I also had a $5 off of $30 and $5 off of $15 coupons, one loaded on my card from an email and one a printed coupon, which both were able to ring on this transaction.

Total: $66.70

Cash Out of Pocket: $14.57

Extra Care Bucks for Later: $12.00

Savings Percentage: 78 (not counting the ECB to use later)

If I hadn’t had a 4 year old acting like a lunatic at the register, I’d planned to use the $10.00 Extra Care Bucks from the diapers and dish soap to pay for most of the drinks, which is what I’d suggest you do. In that case, you’d have only $14.47 out of pocket, or $12.47 if you can get the three Huggies coupons, unless you come in with the Extra Care Bucks like I did.

Want to take advantage of this deal? I’ll tell you where to get the Huggies coupons. Just make sure when you go in CVS to go to the red coupon printer for the in-store coupons. 🙂

If you want to earn points while printing these coupons, like I did, you can do so by joining Swagbucks and printing the coupons there.  You can do so by following the link here:

https://pennypinchingpeach.com/2013/10/04/swagbucks-savings/

If you don’t want to join the program and earn points toward gift cards or other great items just by printing coupons you are going to print either way, you can just follow the link below to simply print the Huggies coupons, although I am only seeing coupons for Slip-ons and Overnights, and I’d printed for regular ones on Swagbucks a few days ago:

http://www.coupons.com/coupons/Baby-%26-Toddler-Coupons-5491/

What has been your favorite deal you’ve scored lately?


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Happy Birthday Freebies!!

First Birthday

Three out of five members of our family have birthdays coming up in the next three weeks, and I’m already seeing some of the fun free stuff we are going to get in this year. There are alot of birthday freebies out there, and many of them have perks all year long. I’ve seen alot of them, but haven’t take advantage of them all. Some are not in my area, others I’m not interested in, some I just wouldn’t use. I’m only sharing a dozen of the birthday freebies I’ve actually signed up for, used myself and liked, so I can vouch for them. I’m aware of alot more, and plan to sign up for a few new ones I discovered while looking up these links to share with you, so I’ll probably update this list in the future to share some new favorites. I hope you enjoy these as much as I do.

Which birthday freebie are you most excited about getting for your birthday or someone in your family? For free clothes, check out  Schoola Discount Clothing

First Birthday

First Birthday


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Bic Bargain!!

Bic Bargain!

Bic Bargain!

Today I combined two $3 off Bic coupons from the Sunday paper with a Buy One, Get One 50% Off sale going on through Saturday at CVS. I paid 40 cents (just the sales tax) for two packs of Bic razors! That’s 2 cents per razor!! 🙂 These coupons will probably add up to very cheap deals on Bic at other stores, also, but that’s the one I had time to go to and it worked well.

Also, if you need anything that isn’t on sale this week, my Sunday paper had a circular with a 20% off coupon that is also good through Saturday. I’m not sure if that’s a local CVS circular or if it is nationwide. You can combine this with store coupons and manufacturer’s coupons, so that can add up to a good deal. I used it on nursing pads, wipes, diapers and Gillette products for my hubby. He will only use Gillette razors and shave gel. (Are all men stuck on certain brands???) They have a deal this week where you spend $30 and get $10 Extra Care Bucks back. I had several coupons to combine with it, including a BOGO, so it worked out to some super savings on expensive products. 🙂

What would you use the 20% off coupon for? 🙂 Are you or a family member stuck on one particular type or brand of a product, and won’t use anything else regardless of price?


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Pudding and Printable Coupons

Penny Pinching Peach

Penny Pinching Peach

This week I thought I’d go for a recipe that is both quick & simple, all while being light on the tummy and the pockets.

Refreshing Rice Pudding

1 cup cooked (Uncle Ben’s) white rice (approximately 1/3 cup uncooked)
1 1/2 cups heavy cream
1/3 cup (Dixie Crystals or Imperial Sugars) white sugar
1 cup (Dole) crushed pineapple, drained
1/4 cup shredded coconut

*Be sure to rinse, drain, and chill the cooked rice.
*In a small glass or metal mixing bowl, whip the cream, adding sugar gradually until cream becomes fluffy.
*Next, fold the whipped cream, drained pineapple and coconut into the chilled, cooked rice.
*Spoon the mixture into dessert dishes, serve and yum it up! 🙂

Coupons for: Uncle Ben’s Rice http://www.coupons.com/coupons/Food-Coupons-107/ and
Dole Canned Fruit and Dixie Crystals/Imperial Sugar http://www.smartsource.com/smartsource/index.jsp?Link=MKRU3JAAR6CCY
Total Value of Coupons: $3.50

Savor the savings! 🙂