Holidays on the Cheap

Wow. It's December. I pretty much missed Halloween, which totally threw off my holiday barometer. Then Thanksgiving came late, and here I am still with pumpkins strung about my apartment, no tree, and no shopping done. Oh, and like EVERYONE ELSE in the country except for the tools that wrote that article in the Times about throwing a "budget" party (to the tune of $30 a head), I am freaking worried about my finances. With academia, I get what I like to call mandatory unpaid vacation for almost a month, and employment is shaky for summer. While I could toss some cash around this holiday, I need to sit on it for hard(er) times and keep paying down the unholy amount of debt I've amassed over the five years. Hey, I'm working on it quite well. Just sayin'.

So how to handle this situation? Well, most of my nearest and dearest are getting various combinations of delicious Cinnamon Bread (I can make two loaves for about a dollar -- recipe to follow), other assorted baked goods, and bargain-basement knickknacks I've picked up over the last few months at ridiculous discounts. The parents and Mr. B. get a little more.

So how do I make bread for a dollar? Easily. Granted, I'm blessed with two things many people are not -- a Costco membership and a Kitchenaid stand mixer. (Both results of Mr. B.) 25 pounds of flour at costco is about seven dollars. Two pounds of yeast is between three and four dollars. A giant container of Saigon cinnamon? Three dollars. I don't even know what I paid for the ten pound bag of sugar. I do know that I fell over laughing when I saw it contained over 1500 servings. Anyway, the bread recipe I use, which I will post soon, calls for about five cups of flour, a little butter, 2 packs of yeast (I need to refresh myself on the conversion -- five spoonfuls or something), a little water, and a little sugar. The dough hook does the work, I let it rise, divide it, roll it, melt more butter, brush it, and sprinkle cinnamon sugar over it. Then, roll, rise, and bake, and you have two loaves of ridiculously delicious bread at less than a dollar. One of the bakeries in town sells it for $6 a pop. I really need to open a shop.

Anyway, more on holiday frugality to come.