Comparing Prices in Grocery Ads

Yesterday and the day before, I learned about comparing prices in grocery ads.  I compared three advertisements—Fred Meyer, QFC, and Safeway.  The things that I chose to compare were as follows: milk, eggs, cheese, ground beef, chicken breast, strawberries, yogurt, chips, cereal, bread, lunch meat, ice cream, Oreo cookies, potatoes, apples, lettuce, and tomatoes.  It was interesting for me to look at the ads and have my mom tell me approximate regular prices for items, because there were some items that were priced differently than I expected.  In the end, I converted each section to the same measurement and took averages from the other stores for any unknown item and added them together, getting a total amount for the goods for each store.  The total for approximate regular price was $55.22, for Fred Meyer it was $34.33, for QFC it was $48, and for Safeway it was $40.67.  As you can see, the best place to shop for these items I learned would be Fred Meyer, being almost $15 less expensive than the most expensive place, QFC.  I spent close to 2 hours making this comparison. 

Here is a copy of the chart I made.  The lowest priced items in each section are circled in red.

Amazing Mint Chocolate Brownies

A few days ago I made my favorite brownies, which are probably one of my favorite desserts.  I believe that my sister found the recipe in a library book—they are always a treat when she makes them, so I decided to make them.  The brownie itself is from a package mix, but with a few extras added in.  That was simple for me to make.  The frosting proved to be a little more problematic though.  It started out with powdered sugar that was partially rock-hard and a sifter that didn’t work most of the time.  Thankfully we had more powdered sugar in a package, and then I just tapped it through the sifter, because by that point I had given up on it (it kept getting stuck, and no, it wasn’t because of the hard powdered sugar, although that really didn’t help).  After 20 minutes I finally had sifted my three cups of sugar.  Then I mixed in the other ingredients for the frosting and managed to get more frosting stuck to the electric beater than the bowl, meaning it took multiple times of cleaning the beater to get the frosting mixed.  Finally I was ready to frost the brownies and learned that when I spread it, it pulled up the top layer of brownie, making the lovely mint-green frosting covered in brown dots of chocolate.  I managed to cover up the largest chunks, but I think next time I will remove the crumbly top layer of brownie before I frost it.  The chocolate glaze worked out smoothly, my only problem being that I didn’t read the directions to see to refrigerate it an hour before cutting it.  In total, it took me about an hour and forty minutes to make the brownies (including powdered sugar sifting time!).  Despite my frustrations, they still tasted the same in the end.  But maybe next time I might just let my sister make them for me though!

Chocolate-Glazed Mint-Frosted Brownies

1 hour 15 minutes + baking + cooling + refrigerating

Ingredients: Brownies: 19.5-19.8 brownie mix, ½ cup vegetable oil, ¼ cup water, 2 large eggs, ½ tsp. peppermint extract, 1 cup semisweet chocolate chips. 

Mint frosting: 3 cups powdered sugar—sifted, 1/3 cup butter—softened, ¾ tsp. peppermint extract, 2 tbsp. milk, 2 drops green food coloring (optional). 

Chocolate glaze: 1 cup semisweet chocolate chips, 2 tbsp. unsalted butter, 2 tbsp. corn syrup, 1-3 tbsp. hot water.

Directions:  Pre-heat oven to 350°F and spray 13” x 9” pan.  Mix brownie mix, oil, water, eggs, and peppermint extract.  Stir in chocolate chips.  Pour and spread evenly in pan.  Bake 28-30 minutes and then cool completely on wire rack.

Frosting: Beat powered sugar, butter, and peppermint extract with an electric mixer on low until blended and smooth.  Beat in milk, one tablespoon at a time, until smooth and spreadable.  Beat in food coloring, if desired.  Spread over cooled brownies.

Chocolate glaze: In a small saucepan set over low heat melt the chocolate chips, butter, and corn syrup, stirring occasionally, until melted and smooth.  Stir in hot water, a few drops at a time, until the mixture is thin enough to drizzle.  Drizzle over top of the frosting.  Refrigerate one hour to set the glaze.  Cut into squares and keep stored in the refrigerator.

Spaghetti--the quick way

I guess that I made the cheater’s version of spaghetti a couple nights ago because I used sauce out of the can instead of making it from scratch.  I was voted to make dinner by my dad, who helped pull out ingredients, so I didn’t even think of the possibility of making it from scratch until now.  Anyway, I made the quick version of spaghetti, it taking only about half an hour to make.  At my house, we break the spaghetti noodles in half before we boil them so they aren’t so long—that way they also fit in the pot all at once.  I learned that if I hadn’t broken them in half though, the bottom would soften so the rest of the noodle would sink into the water, thus boiling all the noodle (I had been wondering how it would work with the noodles sticking out part-way—I thought the first part of the noodle would be overcooked, but apparently not).  As far as the spaghetti sauce, I also learned of the two options to warm it—either stovetop or microwave.  I chose the microwave since the spaghetti noodles were done cooking, so we could serve dinner sooner.  Ideally I would have learned to make the sauce from scratch, but at least it’s better than buying frozen spaghetti dinners (at least I assume so, I don’t know that I’ve had one before!).

Although you likely don’t need the directions and ingredients for partly cheater’s spaghetti, here they are:

Spaghetti

Time: 30 minutes

Ingredients: salt, spaghetti noodles, spaghetti sauce, parmesan cheese

Directions: Bring water to a boil and add a dash of salt.   Cook spaghetti noodles for seven minutes, until soft.  Drain water.  Warm spaghetti sauce, and serve over noodles with parmesan cheese.

Spaghetti served with green beans.