07 December 2007

When being frugal bites you in the backside

Yesterday I spent half the day making a triple batch of egg rolls and then I also made beef and broccoli stir fry. I deep fry the egg rolls and make sweet and sour sauce and they are SO good! And I put 3 meals worth in the freezer. Plus the stir-fry is also to die for. The downside is it makes a lot of dirty dishes. And it makes a mess of the stove.

Last night as I was cleaning the stove and the drip pans and washing all the dishes, I realized that being frugal once bit me in the backside.

My long time fans will remember that this house came up for sale the same day that we got an offer on our old house. When we bought this house, we closed on it 3 weeks before we closed the sale of our old house to give us time to move stuff over gradually. Once I came here to do some deep cleaning and I took the drip pans of the stove home with me to the old house to clean there. I have this great trick to clean them; I put them in a pot with some dishwasher detergent and boil them on the stove for a while. When you take them out, the grime just wipes right off. As I walked into the house from the garage, I dropped all the drip pans and three of them got dents on the edges and the paint chipped off. I priced replacements at the home center and they were 5 or 6 dollars a piece. I didn't buy them, and figured I could find them cheaper elsewhere.

Well, I was wrong. I never found them cheaper elsewhere, and now, four years later, I can't even find the same color drip pans. So every time I clean my stove and see those chipped edges, I am reminded that I should have just forked over the $20 to get new ones.

Has something like that ever happened to you?

2 comments:

christineka said...

Do you know, I've never washed my drip pans? I can't get the burners hooked up if I unhook them, so my stove is dirty. Thanks for the tip on how to do it though. I used to try washing them like dishes and it didn't work. Maybe some night after I've made dinner I'll try boiling the drip pans.

I make the mistake of thinking I'm getting a great deal buying something or other of the store brand. Then I go to another store and find them selling a name brand cheaper. It annoys the heck out of me.

Jennifer @ Fruit of My Hands said...

Gah! Yes I've done very similar things.

Most recently my frugal faux pas has been rewashing clean laundry because I'm not being mindful of which basket is which. Done that twice in the last week. D'oh!