Speaker 1: Episode one, Frugal Meal Planning with Ashton Cope. Welcome to
Speaker 1: the Frugal Friends podcast, where you'll learn to save money,
Speaker 1: embrace simplicity, rights, and liver with your life. Here your
Speaker 1: host Jen and Jill Oh. Welcome to the Frugal Friends podcast.
Speaker 1: My name is Jen, my name is Jill, and we
Speaker 1: are talking all things around meal planning today. Yes, we
Speaker 1: need this, we all need this. We know that you
Speaker 1: are here for it and it'll be everything you expected more. Yeah,
Speaker 1: because we've already done the interview so we know what
Speaker 1: it entails, and it is chocked full of stuff you're
Speaker 1: gonna want to take, like audio notes on your phone,
Speaker 1: so just don't be scared to pause, take a note.
Speaker 1: And then Ashton has a really great resource on her
Speaker 1: Instagram bio that you're all going to want to download,
Speaker 1: so because I'm going to go there after this and
Speaker 1: download it. Very excited. It's been a long time since
Speaker 1: we've done a like actual meal planning episode, so we've done.
Speaker 1: Episode sixteen was like our first foundational meal planning in
Speaker 1: prep episode. And then we have one of my personal favorites,
Speaker 1: episode seventy nine. Do you remember this one? I forgot
Speaker 1: We did that the Frugal Friends Food Blog Awards. It
Speaker 1: was a very unique episode where we didn't go through articles,
Speaker 1: but we just went We gave awards to several different
Speaker 1: food blogs different unbeknownst to them. Never done war since then.
Speaker 1: Just I feel like we should do that again for
Speaker 1: some other category. So if you have a category that
Speaker 1: you want us to make up awards first brother, let
Speaker 1: us know in the Frugal Friends community on Facebook and maybe,
Speaker 1: just maybe you will get that episode because that was
Speaker 1: really fun. One. Yeah, I'm seventy. Yeah, So I'm excited
Speaker 1: to hear from Ashton. She's got a great blog where
Speaker 1: she talks about meal planning, she does meal planning services,
Speaker 1: she's got all kinds of resources, and she's sharing some
Speaker 1: very tangible top tips with us today. So let's get
Speaker 1: into it. Hey, Ashton, welcome to the Frugal Friends podcast.
Speaker 1: How are you. I'm good? Thank you so much for
Speaker 1: having me. I'm excited. We are so thrilled to have
Speaker 1: you on this show, and we imagine we're going to
Speaker 1: get a ton of listeners because this is a huge
Speaker 1: pain point for so many people. Part of that is
Speaker 1: because we have to eat every day, which is a
Speaker 1: whole other issue and of itself. Right, I won't elaborate
Speaker 1: on that one, but about how to eat every day,
Speaker 1: let's not reveal that it just is. It's a never
Speaker 1: ending thing that we get constant listeners curious about, even
Speaker 1: in my social circles. Not that they're that large hashtag covid,
Speaker 1: but this is a thing. What do I do? How
Speaker 1: do I meal a plan? Because because it's not just
Speaker 1: eating every day, it's it is the meal planning, the shopping,
Speaker 1: the cooking, the what do I do with leftovers? Anyhow,
Speaker 1: thanks for coming on and solving all of our problems
Speaker 1: for us. So, Ashton, can you kick us off? Just
Speaker 1: tell us about yourself? What got you into meal planning?
Speaker 1: What's the overarching Ashton story? Yeah? So I am from
Speaker 1: Grand Rapids, Michigan, and I was born and raised here,
Speaker 1: kind of moved around a lot. But the one theme
Speaker 1: that I have always maintained, regardless of what I'm doing
Speaker 1: and where I'm living, is that I just literally love
Speaker 1: budget lifestyle. Whether I'm in a season of not really
Speaker 1: needing it but just prioritizing it, or I'm in a
Speaker 1: season of like, okay, it's you know, survival of the
Speaker 1: fittest at this point, I have to live on a budget.
Speaker 1: I just love it when and so when I got started,
Speaker 1: my oldest daughter was like two months old. I thought
Speaker 1: I'd be super busy with like the whole mom life thing.
Speaker 1: And then I realized that newborn's literally sleep all day,
Speaker 1: and so I was super bored and just watching something exists. Yeah,
Speaker 1: and so that's only fun for like the first few hours.
Speaker 1: And then you're like, okay, I really have and you
Speaker 1: feel like I need to do something. My creative juice
Speaker 1: is needed to be exercised. So I decided to start
Speaker 1: a blog. And originally my blog was budget Um Fashion
Speaker 1: for Moms and Babies, and then I got like a
Speaker 1: month into it and realized how much I hate fashion.
Speaker 1: I love the budget and like it's kind of that
Speaker 1: whole like your passion isn't always your mission and so
Speaker 1: while I love dressing up my baby, that's not what
Speaker 1: I'm about. So it was great. I still dressed my
Speaker 1: baby every day. It was just like, I gotta pivot,
Speaker 1: and I ended up moving into budget home renovation. A
Speaker 1: couple of years later, I was actually about seven months
Speaker 1: pregnant with my second daughter, and renovated our whole house
Speaker 1: by myself while my husband worked, and that kind of
Speaker 1: started picking up momentum until our house was finished and
Speaker 1: I had no more projects to do. So one night,
Speaker 1: I was sitting at the table on a Sunday evening
Speaker 1: like I always did, to plan our meals, and I
Speaker 1: decided to like do hashtag you know, real life on
Speaker 1: Instagram stories and I just was like, hey, guys, I'm
Speaker 1: post you know, I'm planning out my meals for the week.
Speaker 1: I wonder if you guys would be interested in like
Speaker 1: seeing what I have planned. And the risk aunt was astounding.
Speaker 1: I had never seen a response the way, like with
Speaker 1: any of the other things I tried my hand, I
Speaker 1: never saw like that, yes, please tell us what you're eating,
Speaker 1: tell us, why tell us what you're planning? To tell
Speaker 1: us how? And so I'm like, oh, dang, Like I
Speaker 1: didn't realize this was a thing, but this is actually
Speaker 1: a thing. So I kind of, I don't want to
Speaker 1: say I fell into it, but it was something I
Speaker 1: was always doing that I never realized. You know, it's
Speaker 1: not something that you walk into a party and you're like, hey, guys,
Speaker 1: want to know what I planned for me my meals
Speaker 1: this week? You know, It's like something that until people
Speaker 1: see you and and it randomly comes up maybe in
Speaker 1: like a circle of like friends, close friends. It's not
Speaker 1: something I realized people needed until they did, so I
Speaker 1: just kind of started sharing it. My passion really lies
Speaker 1: with low income eating, so that's kind of where I started,
Speaker 1: is like, here's how to eat on a budget, which
Speaker 1: you know, I'm on the perfect podcast to talk about
Speaker 1: this today. I'm so excited, And here's how to stick
Speaker 1: to your plan. Because we have now finished January, we
Speaker 1: are heading into the rest of our year, and most
Speaker 1: of the time all of those resolutions end up falling off,
Speaker 1: and so this is a great way to kind of
Speaker 1: like get back on track and keep it moving for
Speaker 1: the rest of the year. I love I love this story.
Speaker 1: Who knew we can have you back on the podcast
Speaker 1: to talk about home renovations and budget fashion. But you're right,
Speaker 1: it's not I mean, food prep isn't glamorous. It's not
Speaker 1: something that is immediately going to draw people in, but
Speaker 1: it does solve a pain point. This is a massive
Speaker 1: pain point for most people. So yeah, it's not what
Speaker 1: we want, but it's what we need. Yeah, and I
Speaker 1: love that you shared a bit of your business journey,
Speaker 1: because I've always said, like, just having the knowledge of
Speaker 1: how to do certain online business things is enough. A
Speaker 1: lot of people get into it and they fail in
Speaker 1: I think, oh, I'm just not cut out for this.
Speaker 1: But it could be that you're learning the skills so
Speaker 1: that you are aware when a good opportunity falls into
Speaker 1: your lap. If you don't know what to do and
Speaker 1: how to capitalize on unique opportunities that come your way,
Speaker 1: you will totally miss gold mines. And so I don't
Speaker 1: think that any like business endeavor side hustle endeavor is fruitless.
Speaker 1: I always think it helps us to be more aware
Speaker 1: when successful opportunities are presented to us, because that's so
Speaker 1: many stories are like it kind of just fell into
Speaker 1: my lap, like I can name. I for so long
Speaker 1: have attributed my success to getting lucky, and I've had
Speaker 1: to kind of start to reframe that and be like, no,
Speaker 1: you put in the work, so when the luck was, like,
Speaker 1: when a lucky opportunity presented your itself, you could capitalize
Speaker 1: on it. Yeah. Yeah, And so I hope people take
Speaker 1: away that from your story as well, because I know
Speaker 1: we have a lot of people trying to start online
Speaker 1: businesses or side hustles and stuff. So that is really encouraging,
Speaker 1: just on a side tangent. Yeah, So now you do
Speaker 1: custom meal planning, what are some of the tips you
Speaker 1: give a client whose main goal is to reduce their
Speaker 1: spending on food? Well, obviously, as a meal planner, my
Speaker 1: first piece of advice is to have a plan. Don't
Speaker 1: walk into a grocery store thinking, you know, oh this
Speaker 1: sounds good or oh I think I saw like a
Speaker 1: Facebook recipe that had this in it. You know, that's
Speaker 1: where a lot of the overspending and the impulse buying
Speaker 1: because we do that with food. We do it with
Speaker 1: food more than we do it with anything else, and
Speaker 1: we don't realize we're doing it. We impulse spend on
Speaker 1: food constantly just because it sounds good, or it looks good,
Speaker 1: or we heard about it, you know, in a podcast
Speaker 1: or whatever. So that would be my first tip. My
Speaker 1: second tip is do all the prep work way before
Speaker 1: you actually step foot in the store. So besides having
Speaker 1: a plan, that also means using keyword rich search terms,
Speaker 1: whether through Google or Pinterest, use search terms. Two of
Speaker 1: my favorites are They're gonna sound really self explanatory, but
Speaker 1: I'm gonna say them anyways, budget meal ideas and affordable
Speaker 1: weeknight meals and the plethora of ideas that come up.
Speaker 1: You can get super hyper specific and say budget chicken
Speaker 1: dinner ideas or you know whatever. You can get even
Speaker 1: more specific with multiple ingredients recipes with chicken and broccoli.
Speaker 1: And so that takes me into my third tip, which
Speaker 1: is narrowed down the ingredients that you plan to use
Speaker 1: for the week and then plan accordingly. So choose like
Speaker 1: two proteins I'm gonna eat this week chicken and fish
Speaker 1: or so whatever you want um, and then you know
Speaker 1: a few protein and produce carrots, spinach, broccoli, whatever you want.
Speaker 1: The point of this is to make sure you're cooking
Speaker 1: up what you purchase before you purchase more. Because when
Speaker 1: we purchase on top of things we haven't used, they
Speaker 1: get buried, they get forgotten, and then they get spoiled
Speaker 1: and wasted, and wasted food equals wasted money. So this
Speaker 1: way you know we're buying less, which means we are
Speaker 1: spending less and we're using less, which creates a better
Speaker 1: impact on the environment as well, because the greenhouse gases
Speaker 1: produced from wasted food and landfills is much worse than
Speaker 1: that of anything else that gets thrown away. Yes. Absolutely.
Speaker 1: I've did a nutrition challenge once and they said for
Speaker 1: meal planning, to use like three plus three was three
Speaker 1: proteins and three carps, and then just plan like all
Speaker 1: your meals around those, so you make sure you use
Speaker 1: all of them up. And it's just like really simple,
Speaker 1: Like I can get behind like math stuff. If you
Speaker 1: give me an equation, I can get behind that numbers
Speaker 1: the numbers three plus three. Okay, that's perfect. Two For
Speaker 1: those people who are like I hate meal planning, because
Speaker 1: there are people who hate it, I know that I
Speaker 1: am kind of alone in my love of picking out
Speaker 1: meals and searching recipes on Pinterest, and so that is
Speaker 1: so much easier for someone who doesn't love that part
Speaker 1: of dinner time. They have just like you said, three
Speaker 1: and three. So it's like all you have to do
Speaker 1: is mix and match and come up with a few
Speaker 1: different ways to cook just the one thing, so that
Speaker 1: you're not swimming in this huge sea of ideas. You've
Speaker 1: narrowed it down so that it's much easier to choose
Speaker 1: from the few things that are listed. These are such
Speaker 1: good tangible tips, and you're right, none of it is
Speaker 1: mind blowing, but we need these reminders. As you're talking,
Speaker 1: I'm remembering the times when I did these things, and
Speaker 1: I remember being shocked at how low my grocery spending
Speaker 1: was for that week, and then something happens. I don't know,
Speaker 1: I just get off track and I don't keep doing
Speaker 1: these things. But this is a tried and true method
Speaker 1: of prepping and planning beforehand, staying simple. And I even
Speaker 1: love your simple suggestion of using s e O like
Speaker 1: search engine optimization ways of getting the meals that we
Speaker 1: want with the food that we have on hand. I
Speaker 1: will often do that, and I'm sure this is what
Speaker 1: you're speaking to as well. But if I have just
Speaker 1: a couple of things in my pantry or in my
Speaker 1: fridge just to look up, can these things be used together? Yeah?
Speaker 1: I do have a little bit of chicken and some beans.
Speaker 1: What do I do? Chicken and beans? What do I know? Beans?
Speaker 1: And then sometimes I get to try new things as
Speaker 1: a result of that. It doesn't necessarily mean that just
Speaker 1: because we're getting a few things that we can't have
Speaker 1: variety in our meals exactly. You mentioned to Ashton just
Speaker 1: about the food waste and being cognizant of that, because
Speaker 1: not only is food waste not great for our environment,
Speaker 1: it's also not great for our budgets. What are some
Speaker 1: of your go to ways to reduce that food waste? Yeah,
Speaker 1: so again this isn't like this profound thing I'm about
Speaker 1: to drop, But the best way is to just know
Speaker 1: what your most time sensitive ingredients are and then use
Speaker 1: them first. So pay attention, be really mindful that you
Speaker 1: know these few items need to be kept in plain
Speaker 1: view in my fridge, in my pantry because I know
Speaker 1: that those are going to go bad first. So you're
Speaker 1: going to plan those meals for the beginning of the
Speaker 1: week obviously, because they're not going to keep quite as
Speaker 1: long as the other items. And that kind of means
Speaker 1: being a little more organized in your pantry and in
Speaker 1: your fridge, and at the end of each week, kind
Speaker 1: of taking inventory of everything that's in there, making sure
Speaker 1: that those condiments that you know you knew were on
Speaker 1: their last leg kind of need to be shifted forward
Speaker 1: so that you can use them first. Like I said,
Speaker 1: the produce that needs to be used first, and then honestly,
Speaker 1: when in doubt, just freeze it if it's especially proteins
Speaker 1: if you forgot to make that meal, that's a okay,
Speaker 1: don't beat yourself up about it. We all do that.
Speaker 1: We all decide that cereals easier than you know, that
Speaker 1: full meal you were going to cook. But just do
Speaker 1: yourself the favor of freezing it, because not only is
Speaker 1: that helping your budget because now you have something to
Speaker 1: pull out of the freezer later in the week or
Speaker 1: next week, it's also saving your mental health and your
Speaker 1: self confidence because we all feel that, like ding it,
Speaker 1: I had to throw that away and that makes me
Speaker 1: feel really bad. So it really just helps in so
Speaker 1: many different aspects. If you just toss it in the freezer,
Speaker 1: then you feel like at least you've accomplished something. You know. Yeah,
Speaker 1: I stopped trusting myself to use my produce in a
Speaker 1: timely manner and just started buying frozen vegetables, Like I
Speaker 1: no longer buy fresh cauliflower or broccoli or corn, or
Speaker 1: rarely anything unless it's like on super sale fruit. I'll
Speaker 1: buy fresh fruit, but I just buy it frozen already
Speaker 1: because I can't be trusted. I feel you, I know myself,
Speaker 1: and that's a tip to that I often forget about.
Speaker 1: I just this week frugal fail. I had bought a
Speaker 1: jar of pesto a while ago, used half of it,
Speaker 1: loved it amazing, and then just looked back at it
Speaker 1: and the jar did say use within two weeks of opening,
Speaker 1: and it's been over two months. So I don't Speaking
Speaker 1: of not trusting yourself, I don't trust myself to know
Speaker 1: whether or not something's good or bad. And I don't
Speaker 1: need that stomach ache in my life. But I thought
Speaker 1: if I would have just frozen it, opened it, use
Speaker 1: what I wanted, freeze the rest of the pesto, like
Speaker 1: it works on most things. Yeah, it does, And I
Speaker 1: will tell you frozen broccoli thrown into the oven and
Speaker 1: roasted taste the same as fresh broccoli roasted preach. Don't
Speaker 1: get it twisted. Oh thank you for saying that too,
Speaker 1: because I tell so many of my clients. I'm like, hey,
Speaker 1: I put like four bags of steamable veggies on your
Speaker 1: grocery list. I hope that's okay, justin you know, I've
Speaker 1: done a lot of research and there's really no nutritional difference,
Speaker 1: So don't feel bad for tossing it in the microwave.
Speaker 1: It saves dishes, it saves time, and it saves you
Speaker 1: from from wasting it. So plus they're for a bag.
Speaker 1: I know, they're so cheap and you don't have to
Speaker 1: chop them. They're already there, already flourishes. I don't want
Speaker 1: to eat. Oh yes, I just want to eat the
Speaker 1: tree parts, leave the stocks out. I actually just bought broccoli.
Speaker 1: I think they call it bits or something, which it
Speaker 1: has the stocks in it. It was even cheaper. I
Speaker 1: won't do it again, but I did get a big
Speaker 1: bag because I just wanted to see what it was
Speaker 1: like because I don't mind the stocks, and it was
Speaker 1: like too many stocks with all stocks, so trying to
Speaker 1: pull one over. Yeah, so just have that tip if
Speaker 1: you're a broccoli lover, don't be fooled by the bits.
Speaker 1: Real talky. Okay, So for those of us who don't
Speaker 1: like cooking, like I have revealed so many times of myself,
Speaker 1: what are some tips that we can use to actually
Speaker 1: follow through with the meal plan we've created. Yeah. So
Speaker 1: I have a lot of clients who either don't love
Speaker 1: cooking or they are busy career women and their husbands
Speaker 1: do a lot of the cooking, and so it needs
Speaker 1: to be life and so these these recipes need to
Speaker 1: be like as no effort as possible, and so use
Speaker 1: that actually to your advantage when you're searching search it's
Speaker 1: okay to have like three crock pot meals in one week.
Speaker 1: They make something called a crock pot saver. It's a
Speaker 1: bag that goes in your crock pot so that you're
Speaker 1: not having to scrub out your crock pot every day,
Speaker 1: and it's a life saver. It's so helpful. So plan
Speaker 1: crock pot meals, sheet pan meals, you can even there
Speaker 1: is a search term that is no effort dinner ideas,
Speaker 1: and they are like literally dump and go move on
Speaker 1: with your day. Let's make this as painless as possible.
Speaker 1: Also ten minute meals, one pot dinners. I mean, honestly,
Speaker 1: I feel like there's almost a better selection for people
Speaker 1: who hate cooking than there is for people who love cooking,
Speaker 1: because these are so simple and so few ingredients, so
Speaker 1: little time that it's like, it's honestly sometimes quicker to
Speaker 1: make these than to order take out and have it delivered,
Speaker 1: so and it's way cheaper. Yeah, that's been an unfortunate
Speaker 1: reality for me. Sometimes I'm just like I don't feel
Speaker 1: like cooking, let's just order in and then I'm like,
Speaker 1: that's gonna be at least forty five minutes away, versus
Speaker 1: I could cook this and we'd be eating in twenty minutes. Darn,
Speaker 1: but my money is happy, is certainly happy? Oh yeah,
Speaker 1: these are I think you're just even providing such great
Speaker 1: search terms. It's almost like the from the influencers perspective,
Speaker 1: what are the hashtags you typically put on things? There
Speaker 1: you go, that's what you search, and that's how you
Speaker 1: find it. And I would encourage people don't just look
Speaker 1: at the first page of Google. There are hundreds of
Speaker 1: pages of Google for each search term. So maybe one
Speaker 1: week you're looking on page one, and next week you
Speaker 1: look on page two, and then three. There's an endless
Speaker 1: like Google is endless, Google is. I love that, Ashton,
Speaker 1: And I'm curious. This isn't a question that we previously
Speaker 1: talked about, but how much time does it take you
Speaker 1: two meal plan? Because that is a whole other thing
Speaker 1: we talk about how long it takes to cook food.
Speaker 1: What I mean, now that you're a pro, what are
Speaker 1: you finding? So I love this question because it's something
Speaker 1: that I pride myself in very much. I've actually gotten
Speaker 1: it down to like thirty minute a week to plan
Speaker 1: the meals. And then the way that I organized my
Speaker 1: grocery list, I can be in and out of a
Speaker 1: huge chain grocery store in like thirty minutes check out time. Wow, jealous, right,
Speaker 1: I'm jealous, So I am beautiful. Yeah, that is amazing.
Speaker 1: It takes I have been doing this for a while
Speaker 1: and I love meal planning, but it always takes me
Speaker 1: about an hour and I feel pretty proficient at it.
Speaker 1: But man, that sounds lovely, Like what do you do
Speaker 1: to get it that quick? So the first thing I do,
Speaker 1: I have an actual monthly calendar template and I go
Speaker 1: through an empty calendar for the month before I plan anything,
Speaker 1: and I'll put a protein in every single day, so
Speaker 1: and I enge them up. And then typically I like consistency,
Speaker 1: so we typically do something around tacos or something on
Speaker 1: Tuesday because hashtag taco Tuesday is my favorite day of
Speaker 1: the week. Mondays, I usually do like a meatless Monday.
Speaker 1: So that's already solution right there. I already know I'm
Speaker 1: going to cook something with no meat that day, and
Speaker 1: then Friday's it's going to be something kind of like celebratory,
Speaker 1: whether that is like homemade pizza, or like loaded fries
Speaker 1: or something super easy that you can throw together. That's
Speaker 1: like I want to call it like bar food, since
Speaker 1: there's no you know, happy hours anymore. So something really
Speaker 1: tasty that like everybody can be really excited about that
Speaker 1: doesn't take a whole lot of effort. So really, the
Speaker 1: two days that I'm trying to get a little more
Speaker 1: creative are Wednesday Thursday. Thursday is our busy day, so
Speaker 1: that's gonna be a crop pop meal or a sheep
Speaker 1: pan recipe something like that, because I know I need
Speaker 1: as little time invested into it as possible. And then Wednesday,
Speaker 1: I get a little creative, and I usually will go
Speaker 1: off of something that I use called family favorites, and
Speaker 1: I keep a notes list in my phone in the
Speaker 1: notes section of every time someone in my family or
Speaker 1: just me has liked a meal that I've made, and
Speaker 1: I'll write it down, and then I usually will pull
Speaker 1: from that because it's hump day and if people have,
Speaker 1: you know, something to look forward to, they're more likely
Speaker 1: to eat those other two meals before they get to
Speaker 1: that favorite. And then you're getting people to like complain
Speaker 1: less and be a little more adventurous. And so it's
Speaker 1: kind of just like a little algorithm I've created for
Speaker 1: my own meals. But it's so easy to follow that
Speaker 1: it's like I'm not spending all this time searching and searching.
Speaker 1: It's a little bit easier because I've narrowed it way down.
Speaker 1: Oh I'm so glad we dug into this question because
Speaker 1: I think having a framework like that, I mean, just
Speaker 1: as humans, we do well with structure and routine. Some
Speaker 1: of us like to be more rigid than others, and
Speaker 1: so for those who want more variety, you're still giving
Speaker 1: a structure to implement variety, but at least it takes
Speaker 1: a lot of the decision making out of it just
Speaker 1: to have, Like you're saying, a meatless Monday, that's not
Speaker 1: saying what exactly you're going to eat. It's just gonna
Speaker 1: be based around vegetables, creative Wednesday, easy Thursday. Who I
Speaker 1: can get on board with that one, right, Yeah, I
Speaker 1: love that phrase, a structure to implement variety, because yeah,
Speaker 1: we do all love consistency, just some people love variety
Speaker 1: more than others, and some people are a little more rigid,
Speaker 1: and that when you give a structure to for either
Speaker 1: or that's really great. Speaking of structure and something that's
Speaker 1: really great and easy and quick. Yes, the that's right.
Speaker 1: It's time for the best minute of your entire week.
Speaker 1: Maybe a baby was born and his name is William.
Speaker 1: Maybe you've paid off your mortgage, maybe your car died
Speaker 1: and you're happy to not have to pay that bill anymore.
Speaker 1: That build buffalo bills, Bill Clinton, this is the bill
Speaker 1: of the week, all right, Ashton, how that we've yelled
Speaker 1: at you. We love to invite you to share your
Speaker 1: favorite bill of the current week, and I know you
Speaker 1: have one for us. I do so I mentioned earlier.
Speaker 1: I am from Grand Rapids, Michigan. So it is frigid
Speaker 1: where I am at right now, and the apartment that
Speaker 1: I am in is electric heat, an electric everything. So
Speaker 1: that is like number one selling point on most Midwesterners
Speaker 1: is natural gas heat when you're trying to look for
Speaker 1: a home. I did not have that luxury, but I
Speaker 1: have the luxury of lowering my bill of the week,
Speaker 1: and that is my electric bill. I had. My landlord
Speaker 1: kindly stopped over and gave me the fancy tape that
Speaker 1: goes around all the windows to help insulate, and my
Speaker 1: lovely mom helped me so some blackout curtains for all
Speaker 1: of my windows, and already I have been able to
Speaker 1: turn the heat down in my house because it's finally
Speaker 1: staying and it's not leaving. So I'm pretty excited about it.
Speaker 1: Hashtag adult ing. I'm very proud of my curtains and
Speaker 1: my windows. Amazing bout current Basically hibernation mode is in
Speaker 1: full swing. I can't see the sun, but exactly do
Speaker 1: you know how much you've saved or is that yet
Speaker 1: to be determined? I will have to see, but the
Speaker 1: energy company does tell me, so I will see hear
Speaker 1: tod on you guys, and share when I find out.
Speaker 1: That's amazing. It does help that stuff you put on
Speaker 1: the windows. It minimizes drafts insanely. Well. If you want
Speaker 1: to submit your bill of the week, if it has
Speaker 1: to do with making a cave out of your apartment
Speaker 1: or anything else related to you are Batman, visit Frugal
Speaker 1: Friends podcast dot com slash bill. Leave us your bill.
Speaker 1: We're excited to hear it. What you got for us?
Speaker 1: And now it's time for the lightning all right, So
Speaker 1: for today's lightning round, we are going to share our
Speaker 1: current favorite freezer meals. Because I've already given myself away.
Speaker 1: I love the freezer and it is my go too.
Speaker 1: But I love making freezer meals because they are like
Speaker 1: truly dump and go, and I prepare some of them
Speaker 1: in advance, and like on a day where I'm just
Speaker 1: like I can't, I can pull one out defrosted all day,
Speaker 1: or just defrosted in the microwave for a few minutes,
Speaker 1: and then it's ready for my pressure cooker. So, Ashton,
Speaker 1: I would love for you to go first. What is
Speaker 1: your favor right now? So my fav falls somewhere between
Speaker 1: meatless Monday and taco Tuesday. It is a sweet potato
Speaker 1: black bean soup that is so good. It's so easy
Speaker 1: to And one thing that a lot of experts will
Speaker 1: say is regular white potatoes do not freeze well. They
Speaker 1: absorb moisture. It's not pretty, it's not tasty. But sweet
Speaker 1: potatoes are a lot creamier. And so if you you
Speaker 1: make a soup base out of a sweet potato, then
Speaker 1: you don't have like the dairy issue, and it's already
Speaker 1: creamy and it freezes beautifully. And I will heat that
Speaker 1: up in my crockpot all day and then serve it
Speaker 1: with cheese. Casita is on the side. It's amazing. Black
Speaker 1: bean soup is on my meal plan this week. Oh good,
Speaker 1: good choice. Yes, I love you. Got me at cheesecase Cdia. Yeah,
Speaker 1: I do love a good Cadia. Also, thanks for the
Speaker 1: tip about white potatoes. Also, freezer meals don't always work
Speaker 1: for me because a lot or at least these like
Speaker 1: one pot meals. Because my husband doesn't like soup. Love
Speaker 1: him to death, He's got a lot of great qualities,
Speaker 1: he just really doesn't like soup, so that takes away
Speaker 1: a lot of the really easy meals. However, if I
Speaker 1: can serve a soup with bread or any other type
Speaker 1: of accompaniment, it does, you know, make it more palatable.
Speaker 1: So for the soup idea with a cheesecase City, Yah, yeah,
Speaker 1: I'm on board. Good. Hopefully Eric's on board. Travis doesn't
Speaker 1: really like soup either. He'll eat it, but he doesn't
Speaker 1: get Yeah. Maybe it's just like I want to choose
Speaker 1: something that my husband walks and he says, Okay, this
Speaker 1: is the soup course, and I'm like, this is not
Speaker 1: a soup course, this is your meal. This is this
Speaker 1: is a super meal. There's meat in here. You can
Speaker 1: choose meat. I don't want it to be wet. He
Speaker 1: doesn't really talk that way, but for these purposes, he
Speaker 1: can't control what's said on the podcast. Yeah he can.
Speaker 1: That's just that's why. Yeah. So for me, if you've
Speaker 1: been listening to this podcast for a while, this is
Speaker 1: going to be the same go to I typically talk
Speaker 1: about as it relates to my freezer. Got this one
Speaker 1: from my mama. Shout out to Brenda. I really enjoy
Speaker 1: finding well, I don't enjoy this, but it helps me
Speaker 1: finding an afternoon where I can cook up a bunch
Speaker 1: of breaded chicken cutlets and I'll just make a whole
Speaker 1: ton of them and freeze them and then I can
Speaker 1: pull them out and use them in a variety of ways.
Speaker 1: That's usually what takes me the most time is cooking
Speaker 1: my protein, so being able to pull it out and
Speaker 1: use it in chicken parmesan, or throw it on a
Speaker 1: salad or you dame it however you want to use
Speaker 1: breaded cooked chicken cutlets, that's my go to. I usually
Speaker 1: have a handful of them in the freezer. And also
Speaker 1: I recently got a really nice blender, like pretty obsessed
Speaker 1: with my blender, So having frozen fruit in the fridge
Speaker 1: has been awesome because I know the Typically when we
Speaker 1: talk about meal planning, we're talking about dinners, but I
Speaker 1: also have to eat breakfast and lunch. I don't know
Speaker 1: about the rest of you, but I usually have more
Speaker 1: than one meal a day, and so having frozen fruit
Speaker 1: that I can throw into a smoothie for a quick
Speaker 1: breakfast in the morning is my go to non dinner idea. Yes,
Speaker 1: I love it. And Eric doesn't eat leftover, so you
Speaker 1: kind of have to plan for breakfast and lunch. And
Speaker 1: the blender has helped incredibly with due using food waste.
Speaker 1: For me, if I've got a bunch of lettuce or
Speaker 1: really any other vegetable that's about to go bad, I'm
Speaker 1: just like, well, here you go and fruit. Oh yeah,
Speaker 1: it's fun over here at the Syrian. Think twice before
Speaker 1: I accept your next smoothie. It's vegetables, trust me. Okay, okay,
Speaker 1: So mine I have to first is this jumbalaya that
Speaker 1: I love. I had it at some kind of New
Speaker 1: Orleans restaurant at Universal Studios and I loved it, And
Speaker 1: so it was a vegetarian jumbalaya and I added some
Speaker 1: chicken to it. So I just used frozen chicken like
Speaker 1: chicken breast, and so freeze that all up together and
Speaker 1: then throw it in the pressure cooker with some stock
Speaker 1: and rice, and then it cooks all together, and the
Speaker 1: rice is perfect at the end. It does do better
Speaker 1: when it's like too frosted for twenty four hours versus
Speaker 1: going and like totally frozen, just because the rice doesn't
Speaker 1: take that long to cook. But if you're using brown rice,
Speaker 1: like go to town. My other one that I've been
Speaker 1: super into is Indian food right now. I'm loving Indian food,
Speaker 1: So chicken teak and the sala that's a big one,
Speaker 1: or any curry. So doing that with the frozen chicken,
Speaker 1: and I buy if I'm doing a freezer meal, I
Speaker 1: don't buy fresh meat. I buy frozen meat because why
Speaker 1: why would I spend the extra money to get fresh meat.
Speaker 1: But I did just switch up. I have been buying
Speaker 1: chicken breasts, but I just bought a five pound bag
Speaker 1: of chicken tender loins because they're smaller, so they will
Speaker 1: cook faster in the instant pot and they'll be easier
Speaker 1: to like up when eating them. So I just switched
Speaker 1: from breast to tenderloins and put those in my freezer
Speaker 1: meals and then just throw them in and for the
Speaker 1: Indian food, I make the rice separately. But yeah, those
Speaker 1: are kind of a favorite chen. Check you out with
Speaker 1: some tips. I'm making notes from my own self. I
Speaker 1: see those cooked chicken breast and I'm always like, I
Speaker 1: don't know what am I going to do with it?
Speaker 1: It's just chicken. It's just frozen. Yeah, and it's why
Speaker 1: not if you're just going to be putting it in
Speaker 1: like a casserole type dish. Yeah, it's great. I do.
Speaker 1: Sometimes I'll buy like a big ten pound bag of
Speaker 1: frozen chicken and just make like five freezer meals with it,
Speaker 1: like it's great, so good. Yeah. Well, thank you so
Speaker 1: much Ashton for coming and sharing your great wisdom with us.
Speaker 1: It's been a while since we've done a meal planning episode,
Speaker 1: so I hope that everyone got a refresh memory or
Speaker 1: if you weren't with us when we did our last
Speaker 1: episodes on meal planning, welcome to the meal plan Army.
Speaker 1: Where can we and our listeners find more about you
Speaker 1: and what you do? Yeah? So, my website is Ashton
Speaker 1: Cope dot com. That's a s H T I N
Speaker 1: C O P dot com. I am at Ashton Cope
Speaker 1: on Instagram. If you find me on Instagram and head
Speaker 1: to the link in my bio, I actually have an
Speaker 1: ultimate guide to meal search terms free. That is what
Speaker 1: everyone needs. Everyone needs that. It's clickable so you don't
Speaker 1: even have to copy and paste. It will literally take
Speaker 1: you straight into your Pinterest app and search it for
Speaker 1: you when you click each one. It's awesome. I technically
Speaker 1: made it for myself and thought I would share the wealth.
Speaker 1: So here it is. Thank you. Yeah, so that's where
Speaker 1: you can find me, sweet Ashton, thanks so much. Yeah,
Speaker 1: thank you for having me. I love talking with you girls.
Speaker 1: Thank you. It makes me excited to cook. That'll last
Speaker 1: for a day. But I appreciate the motivation. That's all right,
Speaker 1: that's all right. Oh how fun and amazing and helpful
Speaker 1: and motivating that yeah of you was. I feel as though, yes,
Speaker 1: it's providing benefit to our listeners, but I also just
Speaker 1: feel like I did that for myself. I needed that
Speaker 1: interviewing and conversation with Ashton. I was hoping she would
Speaker 1: tell me some of her like a list of her
Speaker 1: search terms for Google, and when she's like, I have
Speaker 1: a whole list. You can go to my Instagram and
Speaker 1: get it, and I was like, yes, thank you, that's
Speaker 1: what I wanted. I'm about to go do that right now. Yeah,
Speaker 1: and super fun. So my goodness enjoyed that. I hope
Speaker 1: you all enjoyed that. Thank you for listening. We also
Speaker 1: want to thank you for your kind reviews on iTunes
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Speaker 1: Friends is produced by Eric Cirianni. So Jen, what are
Speaker 1: you cooking tonight? Um? I don't remember. It's on my fridge.
Speaker 1: What are you cooking tonight? It's still up in the air.
Speaker 1: As soon as I get off this, I think I'm
Speaker 1: gonna pull chicken out of the freezer. And then I
Speaker 1: have some leftovers from a restaurant the other day that
Speaker 1: had like some extra sauce. It's like noki and sauce,
Speaker 1: and I think I'm just gonna throw in some chicken
Speaker 1: into that sauce from my leftovers. You are great at
Speaker 1: repurposing leftover. It has been a fun challenge, and I've
Speaker 1: found that I enjoy that you are really good at
Speaker 1: as long as I have something to work with, I'm
Speaker 1: getting better at figuring out what I can do with it.
Speaker 1: I know that I have tomorrow is black bean soup,
Speaker 1: but I can't, for the life of me, remember what
Speaker 1: tonight is. Last night was cheeseburger, like a cheeseburger mac
Speaker 1: and cheese. Yeah, it was so comforting, like it was
Speaker 1: just very much comfort food and definitely not healthy at all.
Speaker 1: We're trying to eat healthier without like cutting out all
Speaker 1: sugar because the doctor actually told Travis not to do
Speaker 1: any more sugar detoxes because he works nights. I don't know,
Speaker 1: I don't know what that means, but he said his
Speaker 1: body needs the sugar. So now traffic is like, got
Speaker 1: eat sugar. Wow. Sure, we're going to get lots of
Speaker 1: responses from people saying that's not true. Right, Yeah, I'm
Speaker 1: sure she did not mean adage sugar. She just meant
Speaker 1: don't do any crazy deat doxes. So yeah, that's about it.
Speaker 1: And after he said that, I brought home a connoli.
Speaker 1: I feel like I got you boom, I got you boo.
Speaker 1: I got him one and me one because you know
Speaker 1: they're nice together. You need to be on the same
Speaker 1: journey as him ultimately, yeah, yeah, ultimately, and we'll get
Speaker 1: there together. So yeah, well done,