Stretching the Food Budget -- 1 small loaf Ham = 5 Meals

I still had a small ham (loaf style from Walmart $6.99) that I needed to use up out of the freezer.

Meal #1

I sliced the ham, baked it with a tad bit of brown sugar sprinkled over and some water to help to keep it from drying out in the oven, then served it along side a Cauliflower, Broccoli, and Carrot Medley with scalloped potatoes in addition for our Sunday supper. We each had 1 slice of ham so we had leftovers.

Meal #2: 

I took a  few of the leftover slices, diced them up and made this Smoky Ham & Corn Salad for supper last night.  My entire family LOVED this salad... including all 6 of the children under age 10!   Definitely a keeper recipe!! The salad dressing is divine! 

Meal #3

Still a few slices leftover, so I made up more of the Smoky Ham & Corn Salad for us to have lunch with today and hubby took the bowl size portion that was leftover from last night’s salad with him today for his lunch.

Meal #4

That left 2 couple of ham slices leftover and the 2 ends.    So I ate the two slices for breakfast with a couple of slices of tomato on the side while the children happily munched down on a bowl of the Breakfast Cereal Mix I made up yesterday. (I’m not much of a cold cereal person.)

Meal #5

Those 2 end pieces I mentioned above will be diced up and put into the crockpot along with some pinto beans.  For now they are put away in a small container in the freezer.  I’ll probably make pinto beans next week for supper one night as this week’s menu is already planned out.

 

So as you can see… meals don’t have to have a lot of meat, nor do they have to be extravagant.  Simplicity is fulfilling and you can stretch your food budget a little more by using smaller portions of meat.

I had even considered making a little bit of ham salad (the recipe I normally use is from The Amish Cook cookbook and that one is similar) but decided to just make up more of the salad for us all and due to the fact I need to make some loaves of bread.