Carrs-Safeway Deals for the Week 5/6/15

 This wee we actually have an ad that let's me get back into the couponing saddle (as it were).

There's some good sales this week.  Check it out!


Carrs/Safeway Deals for the Week 5/6/15 (Prices Reflect Alaska Pricing)

Strawberries (2 lbs) on sale 4.99 (these have been REALLY good lately)

Cantaloupe (whole) on sale .99 lb

Coca Cola 12 packs on sale B2G2 (This works out to be about 4.00 per 12 pack when you buy 4)

Lays Potato Chips or Tostitos Cantina Tortilla chips 2.50 per bag

Simply Orange Juice and Variety Juices on sale 3.50

Next up is the buy 4 save 4.00 sale  First one is if you buy select General Mills Cereals or Kelloggs Cereals and buy 4, you save a dollar per box which comes out to 2.49 a piece.

Included in sale:  18.7-oz. Kellogg’s Raisin Bran, 10.5-oz. Frosted Flakes, 15 to 18-oz. Frosted Mini Wheat’s, 12-ct Pop-Tarts, 10.8 to 13.1-oz. Special K Cereal, 4.86 to 5.29-oz. Special K Bars or 6.7 to 7.44-oz. General Mills Nature Valley Chewy Granola Bars. Selected varieties Buy 4 Save $4 Mix & Match with Club Card 

 So, assuming you can find 4 boxes of cereal you want and your price goes down to 2.49 per box, now you can stack some coupons for an even BETTER deal!   You can also mix and match products to save money as well, so I'll include some coupon match ups for those.

Cookie Crisp Cereal, Cinnamon Toast Crunch Cereal, Honey Nut Cheerios, Peanut Butter Puffs Cereal  2.49 each when you buy 4
Use 1.00/2 – General Mills Cereal, any: Cheerios, Cinnamon Toast Crunch, Chex, Lucky Charms, Cocoa Puffs, Trix, Reese’s Puffs, Fiber One, Cookie Crisp, Golden Grahams, Kix, Total, Wheaties, etc.
Final Price:    1.99 per box when you buy 2 (and 4 total boxes of cereal overall)

Golden Grahams Cereal on sale 2.49 when you mix and match 4 boxes cereal
Use 1.00/1 Golden Grahams Cereal
Final Price:  1.49 per box 

12 ct. Pop Tarts on sale 2.49 each when you buy 4 products overall
Use 1.00/3 Kelloggs pop tarts toaster pastries
Final Price:  2.16 a piece when you buy 3 

Kelloggs Frosted Flakes on sale 2.49 per box when you buy 4 products overall
Use 1.00/2 coupon
Final Price:  1.99 each when you buy 2

Note:  I was in at Carrs today to get milk and the Kelloggs gluten free cereal is part of this sale.  Just an FYI to the gluten free folks out there.

Sunkist Tuna Pouches are on sale B1G1

Starkist Chunk Light Tuna (cans) on sale .89 each

Safeway brand Miracle Whip or Mayonnaise on sale 2.49 with in-ad coupon (limit 4)

2 Liter 7 Up on sale .99

Milton Gluten free Crackers on sale 3.49 (not sure if that's a good price, but was worth mentioning)

Safeway brand dish soap on sale 1.99 each

Stayfree and Carefree products on sale 3.49 each (this does not include the overnight pads)

Plum Organics Squeeze pouches on sale 1.25 a piece with in-ad coupon (limit 8)
Use 1.00/2 Coupon
Final Price:  .75 each when you buy 2

Purina Cat Chow, Friskies or Friskies Variety Pack (wet food) on sale 12.99
Use 1.05/1 Coupon
Final Price:  11.94

Campbells Tomato and Chicken Noodle Soup on sale .99
Use 1.00/5 (I know right) Coupon
Final Price:  .79 when you buy 5

 Mangoes on sale 1.66 a piece 

Yoplait Yogurt on sale .60 a piece

Safeway Kitchens Granulated Sugar 4 lb bag on sale 3.50

5.00 Friday Deals (deals are good for Friday ONLY)

Safeway Kitchen Breakfasts bread 2.50 a piece

Norther Chef Tilapia Fillets or Coconut Shrimp on sale 5.00 (10 oz. tilapia and 9 oz shrimp)

Lucerne Cheese on sale 2.50 a piece (6 to 8 oz chunk or shredded or 12 oz. American slices)

Safeway Kitchens Frozen Fruit (selected varieties) on sale 5.00 (2 lb bags)

Coca Cola 16.9 oz bottles (6 pack) on sale 2.50 a piece (these had a limit of 6 the last time I hit this sale)

Arm and Hammer Cat Litter (Clump and Seal included in sale) on sale 5.00 per box
Use 2.00/1 Clump and Seal Cat Litter
OR
Use 1.50/1 Arm and Hammer Cat Litter
Final Price:   As low as 3.00 after coupon

Viva Paper Towels 6 pack on sale 5.00
Use 1.00/1 Viva Towels
Final Price:  4.00

And there you are folks.  The best deals I could find at Carrs this week.  Good luck in your shopping!

Pantry Friendly Fig Sauce

Right, first a few notes on this recipe.  One, this is delicious and if you ordered something like this in a restaurant it would probably cost a small fortune.  Two:  This is deceptively delicious in that it is super easy to make.  Three (and this is important):  You are going to need fig jam to make this.

But, you can make fig jam super easy with dried figs!  I use the recipe for Heavenly Fig Jam by Ball without the liqueur.  Super yummy stuff.  I, unlike a lot of people, can the fig jam in 2 oz canning jars to keep the portions small and that's a perfect size for this sauce as you'll use the entire 2 oz jar.

I'd also like to send up some credit for inspiring this recipe.  I saw this recipe on the Prudent Homemaker and it looked awesome, but I've never even SEEN a fresh fig, so I had to improvise to make it pantry friendly and came up with this.  I changed the recipe to accommodate the fact that I was using fig jam instead of fresh figs and changed up the seasoning a bit, but that recipe definitely inspired everything about this sauce.

You can prepare your pork chops anyway you like for this recipe (if you want to recreate the dish in the photos), but I prepared mine with some salt and pepper and some olive oil drizzled over the top and then I baked them in the oven for about 40 minutes, until the juices ran clear and the pork chops were...well...done!

So, here you go.  You want a fancy looking (and tasting) recipe you can make out of your pantry and really wow people (and make them think you put a lot of effort into it) try this.  It is delicious!

Pantry Friendly Fig Sauce

Ingredients:

• 2 oz (1/4 cup) fig jam
• 2 oz (1/4 cup) apple juice
• 1/8 tsp. cinnamon
• 1/4 tsp. dried rosemary
• 1/8 tsp. dried thyme
• 3 tbs. butter
• 1/4 tsp. salt (or more to taste)
• pinch of pepper

Procedure:

Melt butter in a small saucepan over medium high heat.  When butter is melted add apple juice and fig jam and whisk until the jam is completely incorporated into the liquid.  Add seasonings.

Bring mixture to a boil and then reduce heat to medium.  Mixing constantly (I go for a wooden spoon to do this), cook until the mixture reduces by about 1/3 and is a sauce-like (but not too thick a sauce) consistency.  With the pectin in the mixture it will thicken as it sits.  Remove mixture from heat and let sit about 3 to 5 minutes to thicken.

Serve over pork chops or chicken breasts.

Suggested sides:  White rice and a nice salad with a french dressing.

Menu Plan Monday: Menu for Week of 5/4/15

Colds.  Who needs them?  We were able to fend of a really nasty cold that has been hitting the local area for months, but this week...with only two full weeks of school to go and now I and my son are definitely fighting it.  Blech!

When it comes to the menu plan, for the next couple of months, I'm going to be challenging myself to only buy the essentials (kid foods, milk, eggs, etc) and live as much as I can off of the pantry and the freezer to save money for one and for two...to save money *laugh*.

So, I sat down last night and came up with a tentative "schedule" to plan my meal plan around.  It goes something like this...

Sunday:  Leftovers Day
Monday:  Pasta Day
Tuesday:  Pork or fish/seafood
Wednesday:  Chicken or Beef Day
Thursday:  Breakfast Dinner Day
Friday:  Misc Night (good night for tacos, pizza, etc)
Saturday:  Whole Chicken/Chicken Day

Can't tell I have a lot of chicken in the freezer can you?  Anyway, that's the best thing I could come up with for a schedule of events, as it were, but I think this will help me to stay on track with main dishes for the next couple of months.

So, here's this week's menu!

Menu Plan for Week of 5/4/15

Monday:  Noodle Bowl Night
Tuesday:  Pork Chops with fig sauce (new recipe I'm messing with that will call for fig jam), rice, salad
Wednesday:  Crock Pot Chicken w/ Grill Seasoning, mashed potatoes, mixed veggies
Thursday:  French Toast, Bacon, fruit (from pantry)
Friday:  Fish, Rice, Cheesy veggies
Saturday:  Roast Chicken w/ Roasted root veggies
Sunday:  Leftovers

Breakfasts (outside of the norm):  Applesauce muffins, pudding parfaits

Desserts:  Yellow cake with chocolate frosting, jello with whipped topping, pantry custard ice cream (if I can find room in the freezer to try it out).

Kitchen Goals (despite being sick):  Make four loaves of bread to use 1 per week for the next four weeks.  Put three in freezer to use later.

Fred Meyer Deals for the Week 5/3/15

Wow, it's been a LOOONNNNGGG time since I wrote that subject line, with the exception of the date of course *laugh*.

One of the things I decided I really needed to do with the blog here is that I really needed to post up the weekly deals for Fred Meyer and Carrs/Safeway for Alaska seeing as how coupon blogs have kind of gone by the wayside since I stopped following or doing my own three or so years ago.

I've been doing the weekly match ups for my own personal use, but looking at my screen the other day I was like, "Wait.  Other people might be interested in these too."  If ever there was advice I could give on saving money it is this.  Be sure to check the weekly ads, weekly, comp shop and be sure to get the best bang for your buck with those in-ad coupons.

Carrs allows you to download weekly ad coupons onto your card now for convenience (course you can only use that once, but it still saves time), and Fred Meyer allows you to print the coupons from the weekly ads off online, so there's no worries about going to the store and not having the coupons you need from the ad anymore (which is lovely!).

So, here you go folks.  When I have TIME I'll be doing the weekly match ups and sale highlights for the two stores.  I won't be doing Target (don't shop there much) or Wal-Mart (because I don't shop at Wal-Mart), but I'll at least try to do these two stores for me and for you.

Some quick notes on coupon work ups.  If you see the following terms, they mean the following.

B1G1 = Buy 1 Get 1 Free
OYNO = On Your Next Order (having to do with Catalina coupons, speaking of which)
Catalina Coupons = Coupons that print at the register when you buy certain things.  Sometimes those deals work and sometimes they don't due to system errors or printer problems.
WYB = When You Buy
SS = Smart Source insert in the newspaper
Redplum = Another coupon insert that comes in the paper...you won't be seeing much of the SS and Redplum mentions as Alaska gets like no coupons.
P&G = Proctor and Gamble insert that comes in the newspaper on the first newspaper of the month.

And um, others I'm sure I'm forgetting.

So, here you go.  Weekly deals for Fred Meyer.

Fred Meyer Deals for the Week 5/4/15 (prices reflect Alaska pricing)

Private Selection Extra Lean Ground Beef 4.99 lb (for extra lean this is actually, sadly, a good price right now)

Large Hass Avocados or Mangoes 1.50 a piece

32 oz. International Delight Coffee Creamer 2.50 a piece with in-ad coupon (limit 4 per coupon)

Fred Meyer Canned Veggies, Beans or Tomatoes .59 per CAN with in-ad coupon (limit 6.  Limit one coupon per customer...so if you want to do this more than once in a week, only imput your Rewards Card number once to be safe)

Farmland Bacon 4.99 lb with in-ad coupon (limit 4)

Cheezit Crackers on sale 2.50 a piece with in-ad coupon (limit 4)

Pepsi and 7 Up, 2 liter bottle 1.50 a piece

Six pack Pepsi 16.9 oz bottles (so, just out of curiosity when did THAT shrink from 20 oz bottles???) on sale 3.33 a piece.

Colored Bell Peppers 1.25 a piece

Personal Watermelon or Pineapple 3.00 a piece (makes me wish I had extra pocket money...I'd get us a watermelon!)

Green Beans 1.99 lb

Zucchini or Yellow Squash 1.69 lb

Sweet Corn 3 for 2.00

Garnier Fructis shampoo and conditioner on sale 2.50 per bottle

Simple Truth Organic mini peeled carrots (16 oz) on sale 1.89

Langers juice on sale 2.00 a piece with in-ad coupon (limit 6):  Good price for juice!

Kroger brand Breakfast Sausage 2.99 with in-ad coupon (limit 4)

General Mills Family size cereals on sale 3.50 a piece 
 Use 1.00/2 General Mills Cereal (Cheerios, Cinnamon Toast Crunch, Chex, Lucky Charms, Cocoa Puffs, Trix, Reese’s Puffs, Fiber One, Cookie Crisp, Golden Grahams, Kix, Total, Wheaties, etc)
Final Price:  3.00 per box when you buy 2

Alba Shower Gel, or Bath Gel, Moisturizer or Cream, 2-32 fl oz; Select Varieties  on sale B1G1 (natural choices department)

Oroweat Bread on sale 3.49

Ragu Pasta Sauce on sale 1.99

And there you have it folks.  The best deals I could find at Fred Meyer this week.  Sadly, not a lot of coupon match ups in this week's ad, but still some decent produce sales and the Garnier shampoo and conditioner is a good price for middle line shampoo and conditioner.  And if I didn't have the canned veggies, tomato products and a bunch of dried beans in my pantry right now, you'd BET I'd be jumping on the canned veggie sale this week!

And remember too to download your double fuel rewards coupon onto your rewards card for Friday, Saturday and Sunday through August 2nd, so you can get the benefits of that when you go shopping on the weekend!

So, good luck in your shopping endeavors this week!

Monthly Shopping Goals for May and Garden Plans

Wow, this is a few days late, but it was a weekend where my poor husband has been just running into one problem after another.  Then, my children and I are all fighting colds, which is not good this close to the end of school (so don't want them to have to miss anything fun this time of year).

But, here we are in May and so I sat down and figured out my garden plans and monthly shopping goals.  So, here we go!

The Small and the Mighty

 In The Garden:

When we moved here three years ago, I was lucky enough to get some raised beds on the side of my house that the previous owners had put in.  The last couple of years I've put in loads of different things, but cabbage always seemed to take up a decent amount of room as I like to can sauerkraut in the fall.  But, last year we had a bumper crop when it came to the cabbages, so as a result I still have about 12 pints of sauerkraut left in the pantry.  So, I got to use that as an excuse to plant some different things ;).

So far in my beds I have planted some garlic bulbs, some sprouting potatoes (locally grown ones that just sprouted in my pantry, here's hoping that works well) and some onions that I took from an onion that was turning into a house plant in my pantry (seen up top is part of that bulb.  I was able to get four sprouts from the one onion).  I topped it off with a few herbs as well, such as parsley.  I've also planted herbs in my two wooden planters I have at the front of my house.

I have a raised bed in my front yard that is under a birch tree, so whatever I plant there has always had to compete with the tree roots for attention (previous owners put that in too).  Whatever I plant in my front yard also has to contend with spider mite infestation (it's been bad every year).  I somehow manage to keep it located in just the front yard, but any plants I plant in my front raised bed, I have to worry about.  So, I just said to heck with it and planted some chocolate mint direct in the ground, some spicy oregano (a clearance sale find at Lowes for 1.00) and a pineapple sage plant (an intriguing find at the nursery...unfortunately it's already not doing great, so we'll have to see if it survives or not).

I've got thyme, parsley, sage, oregano and basil in my planters and some in my garden on the edge.

Today I went and spent 20.00 at the nursery where I got two tomato plants (early producing varieties are the only ones I've had luck with in Alaska), some kale (I was hoping to find chard, but didn't see any), some lettuce and some marigolds (to beautify the yard a bit).  The tomatoes and lettuce I don't plan on planting for about another week, just to be on the safe side, but I'll be putting them outside during the day to help shore them up to the weather a bit.

Lettuce is a big deal for my garden every year.  I love being able to get lettuce throughout the summer and make fresh salads.  This year I got a variety of red lettuce.

I still hope to find someone who is willing to part with three rhubarb plants once they really start growing here (in the next month or so they'll start to take off).  I had two rhubarb plants on my property when we moved here.  One the previous owners put in a low part of the yard, so it doesn't get great drainage, which doesn't seem to make it happy and it has to fight the undergrowth for room to expand.  The other rhubarb plant I had was on the edge of our driveway and then my husband rearranged the driveway to work on our motor home last summer and well...alas my poor rhubarb plant I barely got a chance to know you.

Shopping Goals for May:

On the shopping goals front for last month, I was actually able to make my shopping goals plus added a few things on.  I was able to get 12 boxes of pasta added onto my Amazon.com order, was able to find clearance meat cheap this last week (which was, in a nutshell a Godsend as that will stop us from losing our minds eating chicken every day).  I was able to get the 25 lb bag of flour I needed, as well as a bunch of other groceries at Fred Meyer with my 7.00/35.00 store brand coupon that they had sent me.  I had no idea that Fred Meyer had some really cheap things in their generic line of products!  I was able to get the aforementioned flour, tea, tortillas, generic store Spam (Spam's not one of my favorites, but makes a passsable ham salad and can be used to make things like fritters), eggs, milk and other products and left spending 50.00 after coupon.  It was a good day that day.

I finally decided to pass on getting a flat of mandarin oranges as it would have cost me 10.00 plus to get there and that was a lot out of my weekly grocery shopping budget.  Instead, I stopped in a few weeks in a row and just bought three cans of mandarin oranges each time I was there.  I ended up with a total of six cans, which would be half of a flat, and that'll last us for a little bit, so I figure that will have to do for now.

I'm glad I was able to get so much added to my pantry last month as for the next couple of months, I'm going to end up having to live off the pantry a lot again to try and save money somehow.  It's been like the fates have been against me saving money (I'll get more into that on my Monthly financial workup post), but I'm determined to make this work.

So, be prepared for some pantry friendly recipes coming at you in your near future.

I DO, however, have a couple of shopping goals to accomplish this month.  Not many, but some.

Amazon.com:

I had plans on getting some pudding mix and stuff on Amazon this month, but when I realized how tight money was going to be, I cancelled those items.  Luckily, God provided for me by a sale for buy one get one free on pudding the store and I found ONE flavor of vanilla pudding that was .99.  I had a .50/1 E-Coupon loaded on my card and I had a couple of catalina coupons (one of the coupons that print at the register) for .50/1 as well.  So I was able to get six boxes of pudding far less than I would have gotten on Amazon by stacking the sale with the coupons.

So, my shopping goal on Amazon for this month is reduced to...

Crown Prince Fancy Pink Crab Meat, 6-Ounce Cans (Pack of 12)

I really want to make this goal work as I ran into the above canned crab even cheaper than it is now (which is still darned cheap when you consider how much a 6 oz can will cost you at least 3.69 on sale at the stores).  I'll be paying a total of 25.00 and some change for it, but it will be worth it as I am using canned crab more and more for crab cakes, soups and fondues.

Regular Stores:

Not much, honestly.  Other than I've decided to take advantage of the 5.00 Fridays at Carrs as much as I can to get strawberries while they are in season.  Normally I buy the big bag of frozen strawberries at the bulk stores when I am ready to can for the year, but if I can get one more thing of strawberries in season for 5.00 at Carrs I'll be getting off about 5.00 cheaper than getting them at the bulk store and on top of that they'll taste better as the frozen strawberries tend to be pretty tart.

Other than that I'll be keeping my eyes out for fresh produce sales to help with canning later or to just have to supplement the pantry shopping I'll be doing.  I might also try to get a few more cans of generic canned Spam to use in dishes.

And that's it for shopping goals for the month. 

Hope you got your goals worked out for the month as well!

Frugal Friday: Money Saving Weekly Recap

Well, another week has come and gone and here we are at Friday again, which means another weekly recap of money saving things I did this week!

1. I decided to start out with this one because I find it humorous.  Why?  Because my brain is shot and I have a warped sense of humor *laugh*.

Williams Sonoma has had me on their e-mail list for, geez, years now?  I ordered some sandwich cutters from them about four years ago when they were on clearance with free shipping with the intent of making some nerdy sugar cookies for my husband.  And yeah, I've never ordered anything from them since.

So, suddenly I get an e-mail from them saying, "We miss you!"  Which totally cracked me up and I actually laughed at the screen and said, "Really?  How can you miss me.  You never had me."

But, anyway, back to the point.  The e-mail went on to tell me that they were giving me free shipping and 20% off my order, no minimum amount to buy with a personalized coupon code they gave me.

I figured, "Well, maybe I can find something cheap that I need" and went to the site with all expectations to be disappointed.  But, hey I actually found something I've needed for a while!

A lot of my kitchen implements are starting to show years of hard use (can't tell by the Thrifty Thursday posts can you?) and one of the things that are really showing wear are my spatulas/turners.  My one silicone spatula that I really liked is finally getting so weak that it bends at the drop of a hat instead of really turning much of anything, my plastic spatula loses a bit more off of it every time I make hamburgers and I have one Oxo turner that is so huge that I barely use it as it doesn't like to turn things so much as rip them apart.  So, when I found the above Easter themed spatula, my first thought was, "Wow, that's kind of ugly", but my second thought when I saw the price was, "and beautiful!"  The spatula, after coupon code, cost me a total of 2.49 (yay for clearance!) down from 22.00.

It actually does turn things too, which was my biggest worry getting a spatula shaped like a chicken.  So, woohoo for a cheap spatula :).

2.  I darned a couple more of my husband's socks.  This is like a new chore for me, it seems, that resembles the never ending chores like laundry and dishes.  Every time I think I'm close to done, I find about fifteen more socks with holes in them.  At least I'm fixing them.  Slooooowwwwllly but surely, but they are getting fixed.

3.  I fixed a hole in the quilt I made my daughter for Christmas.  She found the hole and was all upset when she pointed it out to me.  We then had a long talk about taking care of our things and the reason that the hole got ripped in the quilt, odds are nine times out of ten, was that she constantly throws the quilt on the floor and it got caught on something.  I patched it with a small piece of material that I cut away from the material I had left from making the quilt, so at least it blends in well with the quilt.

4.  I shopped sales and used coupons to get the most of my money. I managed to get some vanilla pudding mix for .49.   I felt good when I went into the store yesterday to deposit money to make sure our mortgage payment would go through okay (our bank has a storefront at our local shopping center) and I ran into a bunch of meat on clearance CHEAP!  I was able to get steaks for 2.00 and some change per package (thin cut steaks, but like I cared), lamb chops for 2.00 as well.  I walked off with a ton of meat for 30.00.  I hated to spend the money, but at the same time I knew it was a deal I was NOT going to walk away from.

5.  I started taking pantry and freezer inventory post meat buying trip as I'm hoping to do a month of pretty much living off of my pantry here as much as I don't really WANT to do that, but I kind of need to do it just to keep on top of money a bit better.

6.  I planted an onion today that was sprouting like mad.  I took what little onion was left carefully away and was able to split the onion into four separate sprouts and I planted them.  I figure even if two of the four survive, even if they don't produce an actual onion I might at least get green onions out of the deal for the summer, so it was worth it for me.

7.  I was able to score clothes today at my favorite used store for .25 a piece.  I've been working, slowly, on putting together my own ten item wardrobe (for further details on that, google it :).  I read about the ten item wardrobe and I loved the idea as it is really versatile and minimalistic, so I've been trying to collect clothes slowly to make my own.  I'm up to about four core items now with some additional shirts and stuff to interchange for summer, so when I ran into the sheer blouse that could go over my various tank tops, I was thrilled as it was a great way to lighten up my pretty neutral themed wardrobe at this point.

I was also able to score a swimsuit for myself (I might need to take it in in a few places, but for .25...yeah totally worth it), some long John's in the next size up for my daughter for next winter, a shirt for my son, a skirt and top combo for my daughter and a couple of other items (not shown) that I'm putting aside for Christmas gifts (the long johns and the shirt and skirt were sets...yes sets...for .25 a piece.  It was awesome).  I spent a total of 1.75 and feel really good about what I got.

I also shopped yard sales to get things I needed as well.

8.  I made all of our meals at home and got more creative with the menu, which made my husband happy and saved us money.

And there you are folks.  Some of the ways I saved money this week.  How did you do?

What I'm Reading in 2015, April: Victory Cookbook

I forgot to do this yesterday as I've been kind of busy lately, so, without further ado, here's the book I read in April!

Victory Cookbook:  Nostalgic Food and Facts From 1940 - 1954 by Marguerite Patten, OBE

This is a book I bought last year sometime and had skimmed it a lot, but had never read it cover to cover.  I figured April was a great opportunity to do this.

This, by far, is one of my favorite books period at the moment.  Victory Cookbook is actually a collection of three of Ms. Patten's books, "We'll Eat Again", "The Victory Cookbook" and "The Post-War Kitchen" The books follow Britain through the Second World War with rationing, after the war when women were starting to work more outside the home and rationing was still in effect and the post war kitchen which goes year by year from the end of the war until rationing ends.  Be sure, if you buy this book to get the British version of the book as the American version only includes two of the books (I linked to the British version).

This book is at once fascinating and inspiring.  You think you are hard up for money?  You should get these books.  When you read this book the first thing that really starts to hit home is how bad rationing in Britain really was.  Ever wanted to know about 100 different ways to mix mashed potatoes to make different dishes, including how to make a mock cream with them?  This book is for you.

I really find the books inspiring reading about the social history behind the recipes, what rationing involved and, with all of that, there are still TONS of recipes in this book, which is even better to me.

I've made some of the recipes from this book and I have to say that everything I've made has been really good.  Some of it surprises you when you look down at a basic pastry recipe made with no fat or mashed potatoes as a base and go, "Um, am I nuts for doing this?" only to find that the pastry actually does turn out in the end.  The ingenuity of the Ministry of Food to feed a population when there wasn't a lot of food to be had, as well as the ingenuity of the women in that period who had to cook with next to nothing available, is just utterly fascinating to me and a constant source of inspiration in my day to day domestic life.  And those women were dealing with no food being available and no soap or other things while their communities were being bombed and they were working long hours in factories and such to take over when the men were overseas at war.  I'm always amazed how much they did and how they managed to do it.

I would recommend this book to anyone who needs some inspiration in their day to day cooking as well as to anyone who wants to read more about the social history of Britain during WWII.  I majorly enjoyed this book and will continue to enjoy it for years to come.