This past week

For this past week I have been a bit busy, and not really in a cooking mood. That's also not to mention that alot of the meat I have in my home right now was given to us. Some of these meats are from them having their animals butchered, and made up by those butchers.

Take last night for dinner, we had hot sausage with some curly fries for dinner. The sausage came wrapped in brown butcher's paper, and naray a price in sight, so I can not even begin to guess how much it might truely have cost.

The night before, we beens and weinies, which is super easy to calculate!

2 cans beans $1.00/can, makes them $2.00
1 can of pinapple, juice drained $1.29
6 wieners (we use chicken wieners, because they are cheaper) $1.98/package, so $0.99
Making the grand total of that meal $4.28

Another night this past week I made homemade pizza, with meat that I had seen reduced and placed promptly into my freezer for a night like this! Making your own crust only costs about a dollar to make, but for some, that's more than they can do. My solution is that a dollar store in town carries pizza crust and the pizza sauce for $2.00 each. I will include my pizza recipe after this...no worries!   ;)
Price breakdown:
1 Pizza crust, $1 for homemade (makes two), $2.00/each for prebought $4
1 can pizza sauce $0.99 (only if you made your own crust)
1 package of peperoni sausage $2.99
1/2 package of ham end pieces $3.24/package $1.62
500g cheese $4.99

Homemade Pizza Sauce
1 can tomaote paste $0.50
1tbsp oregano $0.09 (for
1 tsp garlic, basil $0.06, $0.07 respectivly
up to 3 tbsp water, depending on how thick you like your pizza sauce.  Free from the tap.

So here are the price totals:
With dollar store crust: $14.59
With homemade crust and boght sauce: $11.59
The pice completely homemade: $11.32

I know that the sauce doesn't make that much of a difference in this instance, but if I had waited to stock up on my tomatoe paste when it was on sale 3/$1...that could have meant a savings of $0.17 more cents. The biggest problem is the price of meat and cheese, getting these on sale is the best way to save more money. My family is big on cheese, so I am constantly buying cheese when it's onsale, and freezing it until we need it. If I can finde pregrated cheese on sale...I buy it HAPPILY, just because I usually hurt myself on the grater. Apparently people want you to work so hard that there is blood sweat and tears, but when it come to there food...not so much, go figure!  ;)

I will be posting the recipe for the homemade pizza dough later today, so have fun until then!  :)

You can use any bread dough recipie to make pizza dough, but alot of people prefer the recipes that are specifically for pizza, and I have to say that it does turn out tastier. The recipe that I am giving you is to make ALOT of pizza crusts. I know...who wants to make 20 pizza crusts at once? Well...I do...you can freeze it as soon as you have it rolled or "Toss" it to the pizza size (I am not that adventurous), or you can bake the crust for a few minutes and then freeze (this ensures that it won't do any rising after it thaws). I prefer to freeze after I get them in their shape, or else to freeze them after they are "dressed" with toppings. When I make this amount, however, I tend to go for just freezing the crust, because it makes it easier. I also have a bunch of aluminum round pie pans for just this purpose. You're asking yourself, why aluminum pie pans, I'll tell you why. My family like to have "create your own pizza night", which means individual sized pizzas. The pie pan bottoms are the right size, I can get them fairly cheeply, I can rewash them, and they take up less space than regular pie pans. I can also freeze them in stacks like that, and once frozen, I can remove them easily from the pans, and place them into freezer bags in stacks of four.

I usually go with the toppings that our family likes, and I only get enough for the one meal, but if you want to follow this recipe to a "T", you can always freeze them for later!  :)

Anyways...at long last...here is the recipe I use from "Growlie's For Groups Online Cook Book", who is a fellow British Columbian... http://lotsofinfo.tripod.com/index.html

Pizza Crust

100 servings

1/3 cup + 1 Tbsp Active dry yeast*
2 qt + 1/2 cup Water, warm ( 110 F)
6 1/4 qt All purpose or bread flour
2/3 cup Vegetable oil
2 1/2 tsp Salt
1/4 cup + 2 tsp Sugar
1 cup Cornmeal

Place flour in large mixer bowl. Make well in the center.
Pour in dissolved yeast, oil, salt and sugar. Gradually work into the
flour using dough hook on low speed. Knead for 15 minutes at medium speed.
Divide and shape dough into 5 balls, 2 lb 4 oz each. Let rest for 20 minutes.
Lightly oil 5 sheet pans ( 18 ''x 26''x1''). Sprinkle each pan with 1 oz ( 3 Tbsp) cornmeal.
Place 1 dough ball in center of each pan. Flatten dough by rolling or spreading
dough 1/8 '' thick to rim of pans. Keep edges thicker than center.
For topping, baking and portioning directions, see Pizza With Cheese Topping Recipe.
Dissolve dry yeast in warm water. Let stand for 4- 5 minutes.
For best results, have all ingredients and utensils at room temperature.

Plain Cheese Pizza

1/4 cup + 2 Tbsp Flaked basil
2 tsp Black pepper
1/2 No. 10 can Tomato paste
1/4 cup + 2 Tbsp Flaked oregano
5 sheet pans Pizza dough in pans
1qt + 1 1/4 cups Fresh onions, chopped
3 1/2 qt Water
1/4 cup + 1 Tbsp Flaked marjoram
1 Tbsp Flaked thyme
3 + 1/4 gal Mozzarella cheese, shredded
1 Tbsp + 1 1/2 tsp Garlic powder


Combine onions, garlic powder, pepper, tomato paste, water, and seasonings.
Simmer for 15 minutes.
Sprinkle 12 oz ( 3 cups) shredded cheese evenly over each pizza crust.
Spread 1 qt tomato mixture over cheese in each pan. Sprinkle 1 lb 12 oz ( 1 3/4 qt )
shredded cheese evenly over tomato mixture in each pan.
Bake until crust is lightly browned: Conventional oven: 475 F for 15 -18 minutes, Convection oven: 450 F for 15 minutes.
Cut each pan 4x5 ( 20 pieces per pan).
Add more toppings if desired
http://www.angelfire.com/bc/incredible/xH1pizzacrust.html