Small Thing I Did to Save Money Today!

diapasoun · July 9, 2019, 5:24pm

Did not buy shit because I wanted to do better at Plastic Free July (and so I did not buy expensive berries + chocolate)!

brute · July 9, 2019, 6:21pm

Decided against buying a garden hose reel. I’ll make something serviceable out of the scrap lumber in the garage instead.

Kitti · July 9, 2019, 8:24pm

Mushroom packs were going bad at the grocery store,so they were on sale. We bought all of them. Diced them up and they are in the freezer saving us $40 in mushrooms in the future.

LadyDuck · July 10, 2019, 1:36am

Yoghurt and muffin brought from home, so I didn’t go out for a coffee and cake.

HaH · August 18, 2019, 7:41am

Cut my husband’s hair! $$$

Elle · August 19, 2019, 3:37am

Meal planned and preppurchased

Smacky · August 19, 2019, 4:59am

Stayed home.

MonkeyJenga · August 20, 2019, 1:11am

My post hike snack was mostly free samples at the grocery store.
I picked up blankets from buy nothing for my park cuddle dates.
Got a ton of free produce from food not bombs.

HaH · August 20, 2019, 9:21am

Recommended that the library acquires the books I’m hoping to read that it doesn’t already own. Every book it buys is money saved for me and many, many other readers

MonkeyJenga · October 21, 2019, 9:11pm

I got an email that a refund for a double-charged item at FM went through. It didn’t show up on my account when I went to checkout, so I wrote an angry email. Three hours later, that $6 credit showed up. I only had to pay 13 cents for a box of tampons and a chocolate bar. (THESE ITEMS ARE RELATED YES.)

HaH · October 25, 2019, 3:10am

Trimmed Ewok’s fringe and mullety bits of hair myself.

HaH · October 25, 2019, 7:25am

Drove myself to and from an appointment instead of taking uber.

brute · October 25, 2019, 4:44pm

Made another round of coffee rather than drinking a canned energy drink.

Dehydrated and powdered 8 pounds of mushrooms that were a bit past prime (though I’m at about capacity for mushroom powder)

Dehydrating 16 pounds of reishi for tinctures.

Wearing a robe rather than turning on the heat for the house.

Smacky · October 25, 2019, 4:45pm

Tell me about this please.

brute · October 25, 2019, 5:03pm

So, in this case it was Maitake/Hen of the woods, but it works for any mushroom that is older/a little ratty looking but not slimy/decomposing. I slice them into strips about 1 cm thick and lay them out on the dehydrator pretty close together and run it at 135°F for 10 hours or until the mushrooms feel completely dry. Then I throw them in the blender and blend on high for ~1 minute, so that they are pretty well powdered (Easier with normal edible mushrooms. Reishi are super woody and need a high powered machine)

That powder I store for up to a year in an airtight container and sprinkle over stirfry, add a couple tablespoons to soups, or anything else that I want to have a meatier/earthier taste that isn’t from actual meat or things like soy/fish sauce.

diapasoun · October 25, 2019, 6:22pm

Oh man. My mushrooms usually get slimy when they go bad, but I really want to do this the next time I get shriveled shrooms.

katscratch · October 25, 2019, 7:50pm

@brute I used to do that with shiitakes but now they’re cheaper to buy dried! Yum. I do just mushrooms and also mushrooms with a bit of red pepper flakes and garlic salt which I call “egg powder” because that’s what I use it on.

brute · October 25, 2019, 8:43pm

Ooh awesome idea! I’m going to rest this tomorrow. I think I’ve got some goat cheese in the fridge, this could be a very happy breakfast

Bracken_Joy · October 25, 2019, 10:09pm

Nom nom paleo also has a recipe for “magic mushroom powder” which is a total umami bomb. I recommend!

MonkeyJenga · October 25, 2019, 10:46pm

This was yesterday, but I dragged my tired butt to free food and put a good chunk in the freezer already so it wouldn’t go bad.