Cheap Recipes to Make at Home

There are many tips to making cheap recipes when trying to save on your food budget. Fist every family likes to have some form of bread in the kitchen. Have you noticed the price of bread lately?

Learn to make it at home; it is much cheaper. There are other breads like biscuits, pancakes and muffins which are very easy and quick to make. By combining your own biscuit mix, a quick biscuit recipe is a lot cheaper. (Recipes below) Homemade mix is even cheaper than buying the packaged mix at the grocery.

The best way to make cheap recipes is to create them from simple basic ingredients which most of us already have in our kitchens. Not only are these simple recipes the cheapest but most often they are the best flavored ones also. One of the most popular cheap recipes around my house was fried potatoes and onions. Saved bacon fat was melted in the big old iron skillet. Add a little at a time as needed during the cooking to keep from sticking; it gives great flavor to the potatoes and onions. The skillet was filled with peeled and sliced potatoes and peeled and sliced onions. Use about one third as many onions as potatoes; slice all about the same size and sprinkle with salt and black pepper. Cover with a lid and cook on medium low until very tender stirring frequently.

Everyone gets hungry for a good dessert from time to time and everyone seems to love chocolate. One of the best cheap recipes for a dessert I can remember when growing up was chocolate mayonaise cake recipe. We never had chocolate (it was too expensive) but we always had a can of Hersheys cocoa powder; it was cheaper and lasted forever. We always seemed to have a jar of mayonnaise; back then it was about fifteen cents a quart jar. This recipe requires no eggs or shortening but only basic ingredients. This cake is very moist; it good dusted with powdered sugar or your favorite frosting.

CHOCOLATE MAYONAISE CAKE RECIPE

• 1 ½ Cups mayonnaise
• 1 ½ Cups water
• 6 Tablespoons dark cocoa powder
• 1 ½ Teaspoons vanilla
• 3 Cups flour
• 1 ½ Cups sugar
• ½ Teaspoon salt
• 3 Teaspoon baking soda

Preheat oven to 350F degrees.

Combine and blend mayonnaise, water, cocoa and vanilla.

Combine dry ingredients; add to mayonnaise mixture and blend well.

Pour into a greased and floured 9 X 13 inch baking pan.

Bake 35 to 40 minutes or until tester comes out clean.

BISCUIT MIX RECIPE (adding baking powder)

• 7 Cups flour
• 1 ½ Cups nonfat dry milk
• ¼ Cup baking powder
• 1 Tablespoon salt
• 1 Cup solid shortening

BISCUIT MIX RECIPE (using self rising flour)

• 7 Cups self-rising flour
• 1 ½ Cups nonfat dry milk
• 1 Cup solid shortening

For either recipe that you choose, mix all ingredients together well. Put mix into clean dry jars. Puts lids on tightly and store on shelf until ready to use. Use the mix in the following recipes.

TO MAKE BISCUITS

• 2 Cups mix
• 1 Cup water

Preheat oven to 400 F degrees.

Put mix and water in a bowl. Stir until blended. Dough should be soft. If needed add a little more water. Turn dough out on a floured surface and knead until smooth. Roll dough out to ½ inch thick. Cut biscuits into circles and lay on a greased sheet pan. Bake for 10 to 12 minutes or until golden brown

TO MAKE SWEET MUFFINS

Cheap recipes can be made with biscuit mix recipes; experiment by adding different fruits in the muffins.

• 2 Cups mix
• 3 Tablespoons sugar
• 2 Eggs
• 2/3 Cup water

Preheat oven to 375F degrees.

Line muffin tin with paper liners.

Combine mix and sugar in a bowl. Add the eggs and water. Stir until the mix is wet and blended but batter still has some lumps. Spoon batter into muffin tin ½ full. Bake for 20 minutes or until pick inserted comes out clean.

HOW TO MAKE FRUIT COBBLER

• ¼ Cup melted butter
• 1 Cup mix
• 1 Cup sugar
• 1 Cup water
• 2 Cups canned fruit with juice

Preheat oven to 350F degrees.

Melt butter in the bottom of a square baking pan. Add the fruit and juice into the pan. Blend the mix, sugar and water until smooth and pour the batter over the fruit. Bake for 1 hour.

HOW TO MAKE PANCAKES

• 3 Cups mix
• 2 Eggs
• 1 ½ Cups water
• 1 Tablespoon oil

Blend together the mix, eggs and water until smooth. Drop by ¼ Cup into hot grease on a hot griddle. Brown on both sides.

BIG MAC SAUCE RECIPE (Imitation but good)

Do you ever have a Mac attack? Mix up this sauce and try it on your home cooked hamburgers; easy and cheap.

• 1 Cup Miracle Whip salad dressing
• 1/3 Cup creamy French dressing
• ¼ Cup sweet pickle relish
  
• 1 Tablespoon sugar
• ¼ Teaspoon pepper
• 1 Teaspoon dry minced onion

Combine and mix all ingredients; cover and refrigerate.

More Great Recipes and Tips for Cheap Living

Go to Painless Cooking Home Page from Cheap Recipes