Issue 2: Penny for Our Thoughts
How to stretch your hard-earned dollars with our creative saving tips
Quick disclaimer: We are not sponsored or affiliated with the businesses mentioned in this issue. Our recommendations are based on what we believe will save you a bit of money this week (and many more weeks to come).
Hi there!
We hope you all are having a wonderful new year so far!
With January here, so many of us are resetting our minds, recharging our bodies, and even revisiting our finances. The latter might be the most challenging.
We get it. Setting up budgets and keeping tabs on your expenditures is not the most fun, but financial wellness is just as important.
While it might not be your typical fitness and health newsletter (don’t worry, it’s coming 😉), it’s never a bad idea to consider a financial diet.
With the rising costs of groceries, any bit helps maximize your already-bought products in your pantry. So, we went shopping to re-stock our fridge using Pay-Less’s Måolek Rewards and even utilized the new rewards catalog to help cut costs.
Ever wonder how far $40 can stretch? Our awesome contributor Roseann shares how she used her $40 budget for an entire day of eating, grocery shopping, and even fueling up! Read until the end to see how $9.37 can make three servings of pork bowls. 😋
Much love & moolah,
WW Team
Weekend Reads 📚
According to Science 🤔 How Can Financial Wellness Affect Your Health?
Local creative Marissa Muna’s piece on the 7 Toxic Habits That Got Me Into Debt – And How I Quit Them for the Financial Diet.
If you’re into making (financial) resolutions, here are 12 Expert-Backed Financial Resolutions To Make This Year—And How To Achieve Them
Bookmark this: Free budget spreadsheet and templates by Nerd Wallet
What’s in My Basket? 🛒
We now get into the “meat” of our financial topic.
Yikes, eating out and a grocery run can be pricey these days.
Thankfully, with rewards programs like Pay-Less Måolek Rewards, we can save some bucks with some points we’ve accumulated.
In this segment, we’ll walk you through our grocery list – what we bought, how much we spent, items we redeemed, and ideas for meal prep and pantry pairings.
Receipt 🧾
Our grocery list stuck to basic staples: milk, cheese, eggs, bread, and the works. These groceries should stretch most of the work week for two adults and one child (unless you’re an adult eating for two). Points were used for proteins (frozen mussels and frozen pre-cooked tempura shrimp) and veggies (spinach and mushrooms).
Total Spent: $69.92
Total Saved: $23.96
🤯
Mind-blowing isn’t it? We know. Check out our receipt below to see what we bought and how many points we needed to redeem our goodies.
Note serving sizes for the items purchased: Milk (1g), Cheddar Cheese (slices 8ct), Eggs (1doz), Butter (4 sticks), Deli Ham (9oz), Mussels (frozen 2lb), Tempura Shrimp (12 pcs), Brown Rice (15lb), Cereal (12oz), Bread (1 loaf), Fresh Spinach (10oz), White Button Mushrooms (1 carton).
Rewards Program
Pay-Less Supermarkets recently launched Måolek Rewards, a digital coupon and loyalty program for shoppers to accumulate points that can be redeemed for grocery items from their rewards catalog every month.
Did we mention that membership is free?
You can easily enroll online using your cell number and each time you check out, enter your number at the kiosk for your transaction to be logged and start accumulating points. Each dollar spent is a point earned. Maximize the program by downloading the AppCard where you can track accumulated points, view point expiration (they expire a year after they’re earned - use it or lose it!), digital receipts, clip coupons and view the entire rewards catalog. If you haven’t signed up yet, you’re leaving money on the table .
Meal Prep & Pantry Pairings
To stretch our dollars further, we thought of creative dishes to meal prep using ingredients that were already in our pantry.
Tip: Cook these dishes in large batches to pack for lunch or heat up for dinner! Any excess can be stored in the freezer.
Baked Mussels
A crowd favorite fiesta food that’s usually the first to be devoured from the table. It’s quick, easy, and delicious. Pantry items used for this dish were sriracha and mayo. For little effort resulting in a tasty reward, check out the recipe here. Note: we left out the masago (capelin roe) and the scallions and subbed them with a bit of onion and garlic powder for taste.
Spinach Side Dish
One of the best Korean side dishes EVER and one of the simplest to prepare. It also pairs well with the baked mussels 😉. We cooked a big batch of this with the large bag of fresh spinach we scored for free to last us a couple of days. We used Maangchi’s recipe using soy sauce, sesame oil, toasted sesame seeds, and garlic - all handy dandy things we keep readily in the pantry.
One-Pot Spaghetti with Mussels and Tomato
This one-pot wonder is convenient with ingredients that you should be able to find in your pantry besides anchovy filets because who in Guam would keep that in their pantry?! Maybe a TMNT lover but definitely not us, so we left that ingredient out.
Note: we subbed the canned cherry tomatoes for a large can of crushed tomatoes, and because we redeemed the mussels from this month’s rewards catalog, we used New Zealand mussels and not Australian as stated in the recipe. No offense, mate! Find the recipe here.
Tempura Ramen
Budget instant ramen gone boujee. Who doesn’t have instant ramen in their pantry for times when impulse buys get the best of you *ahem* (Attention Ross shoppers 😐). Cook the frozen pre-cooked tempura as directed.
While the shrimp is heating in the oven, cook the instant noodles as directed. Our fave is Neoguri Ramyun because the noodles are a cross of udon and ramen noodles. Add egg, chopped mushrooms (which we also got for free btw), and spinach… and BAM! You’ve got boujee Tempura Ramen.
We’d love to know what dishes you’d prepare using these goodies by responding to this email!
$40/Day – Challenge Accepted
Shout out to our contributor Roseann for documenting her day. Way to get creative with those points! 😉 If you would like to submit your $40/Day story, reply to this email.
Bonus Recipe: Japanese Butadon Pork Bowls
Recipe from A Day in the Kitchen. Some of the measurements were altered to match the meat-to-liquid ratio.
The recipe was enough to make two bowls and extra for lunch.
Purchased ingredients:
1 bunch green onions= $1.08 from Tokyo Mart
1 lb pork shioyaki = $4.80 from Tokyo Mart
Already at-home items:
Rice
Soy sauce
Mirin (sweet Japanese cooking wine)
Honey
Dashi (fish or meat stock – we used meat)
1 medium onions
Instructions:
Prep the meat by cutting them into 2-3 inches in length.
In medium pot, combine water, dashi, soy sauce, mirin, and honey and stir over medium heat.
Add pork to the pot and bring to a gentle boil. Cover with a pot and let it simmer for 45 minutes.
Add onions and let it simmer for another 15 minutes.
Serve over hot rice and garnish with green onions :)
Until the Next Issue!
We had loads of fun “spending” time with you on this issue 🤑
Be sure to subscribe below to catch next week’s issue where we focus on Fitness & Health 🏋🏽♀️.
We hope you all spend wisely, and save where you can to stretch those hard-earned dollars!