The fact that it’s more frugal than dinner out is just a bonus at this point, but cooking from home is always a great way to save money on date night. However, there’s something to be said for getting away and enjoying an evening out.

Here are 3 great ways to go out for dinner for less:

Begin at the Beginning

You don’t have to order a whole meal, to enjoy a dining experience. The hubby and I actually go out often, just for an appetizer or two. We can share an appetizer spread for far less than the cost of two dinner entrees.

Daywalker

Who says you can’t celebrate Valentine’s Day during, you know, the daytime? A lunch date can make for significant savings, especially if your children are in school. It eliminates the need for a babysitter. Plus, many restaurants offer lunch menus at a discount.

Just Desserts

I don’t think there’s anything more sexy than sharing a dessert with the hubby. Enjoy a meal at home, then linger over a special dessert or after dinner drinks. It’s an inexpensive way to snag a small part of the dining experience.

Related, on Babble.com: 14 Ways to Celebrate Valentine’s Day Without Spending a Dime

Photo Credit: Flickr

1. Budget Date Nights
2. 30 Ways to an Inexpensive But Romantic Date
3. Fine Dining on a Fast Food Budget

If you want to add a splash of flavor to your stir-fry, check out NAKANO’s Seasoned Rice Vinegars—a little goes a long way! NAKANO is currently collecting your favorite ways to use their vinegars through their Splash Madness Sweepstakes. Plus, you can check out some of their splash tips for more quick, easy dinner flavors.

To enter, simply “like” the NAKANO Facebook page, fill out the sweepstakes form and share your favorite “splash tip” for using NAKANO’s Seasoned Rice Vinegars. You’ll be entered for a chance to win one of several prizes—including a brand new, top of the line refrigerator, a fancy juicer or blender or one of several prizes featuring Nakano Vinegars and cooking accessories.

The sweepstakes ends 5/17/11 and is limited to one entry per person per day. Check out the official sweepstakes rules for more details, and be sure to share your splash tips with me too—I’m always looking for new meal ideas!

This is a sponsored post written by me on behalf of NAKANO’s Splash Madness sweepstakes, but all opinions are 100% mine.

1. Frugal Gift Idea: Baby Shower Essentials Kit
2. Planning Ahead for Easter Dinner Savings
3. What’s for Dinner?

But, I did feast on so much amazing food throughout the weekend. Then, my mom sent most of the leftovers back home with us! We have ham, Easter eggs and mashed potatoes. Some of it has already been packed into school lunches. I also have a variety of ways to use up the rest for breakfast, lunch and dinner this week. We can make ham & chicken salad, soup, sandwiches and casseroles.

Here a few recipes & ideas:

5 Ways to Use Leftover Easter Eggs
Leftover Ham for Breakfast, Lunch and Dinner
Ham & Potatoes, Take 2: The Soup & Sandwich Sequel
What to Do With Leftover Ham

How are you cooking your leftovers this week?

1. Planning Ahead for Easter Dinner Savings
2. 5 Ways to Use Leftover Easter Eggs
3. Leftover Ham for Breakfast, Lunch And Dinner

We’ll either have green beans or creamed peas. Corn or mac & cheese. The veggie tray will be filled based on what fresh foods I find in the days leading up to Easter. And, dessert? Well, I’ll have a hard time sticking to just one. Carrot cake or strawberry pie are the current front runners.

This year, it looks like we’re heading to my parents for Easter, since we’ll be celebrating my nephew’s birthday the same weekend. That makes my job a lot easier, because the extended family always has a pitch-in. I’ll be helping Mom with the ham, eggs & potatoes. Then, I’m just responsible for my own contribution so I can definitely go with the sales, or things I’ve already stockpiled, on a quick dish or two.

What’s on your plate for Easter this year?

Included recipes & searches are linked via Foodily. I was selected to be a Foodily Brand Ambassador by Clever Girls Collective, which endorses Blog With Integrity. This is a compensated program, but all of the opinions I share are my own.

1. How To Use Easter Leftovers
2. Leftover Ham for Breakfast, Lunch And Dinner
3. 5 Ways to Use Leftover Easter Eggs

We don’t usually do much around here, short of wearing green to avoid leprechaun pinches, but the girls get a kick out of that. I’m not much for corned beef & cabbage, so that St. Patrick’s Day tradition is lost on us. The truth is, I’m not much for any green foods. And, I’m trying to change that.

I have applied to be the next Mamavation Mom and am making real changes in our family’s lifestyle. That means more vegetables & more exercise (okay, any exercise!) and less junk food. Which means the Shamrock cookies I might otherwise turn to for a St. Paddy’s Day treat are out of the running this year.

I’m challenging myself to add more green foods this week instead! Ordinarily, when I hear green food, I think green beans—it’s pretty much the only green veggie I actually like. Well, and fresh green peppers—but don’t even think about cooking them if you want me to eat them! Last week, I made peas for dinner, announced that everyone was eating them (yes, including Mommy!) and they did!

My super picky teen didn’t complain once—which is the point of the whole thing. Our girls need to see us living healthy, if we’re going to expect them to do so. The hubby & I are working out regularly, eliminating soda and making efforts to improve our diet. I’m eating breakfast daily, making healthier choices for lunch and working extra veggies into our dinners.

This year, instead of green milkshakes & cute cookies, our St. Patrick’s Day green will come from salads & veggies—but not broccoli. Nothing you can say will ever convince me to eat broccoli.

What’s on your menu for St. Patrick’s Day?

Included recipes & searches are linked via Foodily. I was selected to be a Foodily Brand Ambassador by Clever Girls Collective, which endorses Blog With Integrity. This is a compensated program, but all of the opinions I share are my own.

1. Planning Ahead for Easter Dinner Savings
2. Saving Green by Living Green
3. 1 Chicken = 3 Meals (Introducing Foodily Menus)

It’s a family affair at around here. We’ve never had much luck with sitters (although the hubby’s parents offered babysit tonight—hooray for date night!) and rather than be disappointed year after year, we just make the day about the girls. No gift expectations, no stress over fitting a date night in on a certain date.

We just make it a fun, silly day for the girls. We’ve enjoyed candlelight dinner for five, heart-shaped pizza and red soda floats. I’ve made them heart-shaped pancakes, baked cookies and served cereal in heart-shaped bowls. This year, I have a few new tricks up my sleeve.

Strawberries are on sale this week, so I’m thinking parfaits! Of course, it’s easy to get carried away with Valentine’s Day desserts. The real trick is coming up with a family dinner everyone can enjoy—without going overboard on the grocery budget. It is No Spend Month, after all.

Sticking with the red theme, I can go with tomato or pepper based items. Maybe tomato-basil soup or chili—both are inexpensive, and I already have most of the ingredients on hand. I was also considering lasagna—I can use my mini-heart cookie cutters to carve designs into the noodles. The girls would get a huge kick out of that one.

While I’m cutting heart shapes, I think I’ll have a little fun with the girls’ lunches. Heart designs in their tortilla wraps, heart-shaped sandwiches. Oh, I love the cheesy! And, I think I’ve just decided to go with crusty grilled sandwiches, cut into heart shapes, for Valentine’s Day. I can pair it with tomato-basil soup for a light, festive meal. It should be fun.

What’s on your Valentine’s Day menu this year? Tell Foodily for the chance to have your selections featured on their site.

How to Share Your Foodily Menu:

1. Go to Foodily.com and login with Facebook Connect (or create a login).
2. Play around with recipes and find your favorites to create a perfectly delish Valentine’s Day meal!
3. Once you’ve selected a recipe save it to a menu:
   • From the recipe, select the “save” button, save it as an appetizer, main, etc., and then it’ll ask you to name your menu. Create your special Valentine’s menu title.
   • Continue adding recipes and saving to that menu
4. View your menu (either from tab at top or from your profile) and grab the URL (you can also share your menu on Facebook and grab the URL there). Note: the URL will look similar to this: http://foodily.com/m/1234
5. Tweet the following and be sure to include the #foodilyvdaymenu hashtag at the end:

   Check out my @foodily Valentine’s Day menu! Create one of your own! http://foodily.com/m/2791 #foodilyvdaymenu

   (Note: You can also enter by sharing your menu on Foodily’s Facebook wall.)

6. Foodily will be watching and selecting menu winners daily to be featured on the Foodily site!

I was selected to be a Foodily Brand Ambassador by Clever Girls Collective, which endorses Blog With Integrity. This is a compensated program, but all of the opinions I share are my own.

1. Planning Ahead for Easter Dinner Savings
2. 1 Chicken = 3 Meals (Introducing Foodily Menus)
3. There’s More Than One Way to Go Green For St. Patrick’s Day

When I’ve got all 3 girls, I need something simple that even my youngest can handle. Homemade pizzas always fit the bill and are a way of life around here. This Mexican pizza twist makes it a healthy, frugal option. It’s one of their favorite weekend lunches. After last week’s Icepocalypse, it was a warm, welcome treat.

Mexican Pizzas

soft tortilla
olive oil or spray
refried beans
tomatoes or salsa
cheddar cheese

Spread olive oil onto each tortilla.

Bake at 350° for 5-10 minutes. Tortillas should get a little crispy. You may need to turn them once in the middle to prevent curling.

Remove from oven and spread warm refried beans on each tortilla.

Add a layer of tomatoes or salsa.

Top with cheese and return to oven for 5-10 minutes, until cheese is melted & bubbly.lunchkid-friendly

Our meal broke down to about $.78 per serving, since Kroger has several ConAgra deals right now. Plus you can use the coupons from last week for even greater savings. The Ro-Tel was FREE after coupon, Rosarita beans were on sale and we used Pam olive oil spray, to make it easier for the girls. Besides, I’m always up for modifying a recipe to make it even more frugal!

This shopping mission was sponsored by Collective Bias, but all opinions are 100% mine.

1. How To Grill a Pizza
2. California Ham Sandwiches
3. Summer Salsa

Cooking at home is a great way to save money. Not only can you steer clear of restaurants & drive-thrus, but you can plan meals around the sale items for even greater savings.

One of my favorite ways to really stretch the grocery budget is investment cooking—one main meal with leftovers to use in additional menu planning all week. Thanksgiving turkey, leftover Easter ham, pork loin and a whole chicken can be stretched through several meals.

I will frequently prepare a whole, roasted chicken for dinner, then follow it up by using the broth in a favorite soup and the leftovers for chicken salad later in the week. Soups, stews, casseroles & salads are all great ways to use what’s left of the chicken after your first dinner. The cool thing with Foodily is that I can create a menu to save all my favorite leftover chicken recipes.

Use Foodily menus to piece together appetizers, entrees & desserts, plan a weekly menu or create a menu for entertaining. I used it to maintain a list of recipes that use the same basic ingredient. Cook once—make several meals throughout the week. Build & save your own menus, then share them with friends on Facebook.

And, don’t forget to share them with me! I’m always looking for new recipes—which is why I <3 Foodily. With recipes culled from some of my favorite sites & blogs, I can find all the foods I love in one place. Speaking of recipes, here are the instructions for the basic roasted chicken we started the week with—enjoy!

Simple, Bundt Pan Chicken

whole chicken
salt & pepper
potatoes
carrots

Position chicken over the center of the bundt pan. Salt & pepper all sides, to taste. (A pretty liberal sprinkling would be great!

Cut potatoes, lengthwise, into quarters. Arrange around the pan. Salt, if desired.

Arrange baby carrots or carrot sticks between chicken & potatoes.

Bake at 375° for 1 hour per pound, until chicken is golden & cooked to an internal temperature of 180°.

gluten free

I was selected to be a Foodily Brand Ambassador by Clever Girls Collective, which endorses Blog With Integrity. This is a compensated program, but all of the opinions I share are my own.

1. Planning Ahead for Easter Dinner Savings
2. Beat the Heat: Chicken Salad Wraps
3. How To Use Easter Leftovers

So, uh, pick me! I’m fairly new to the Superbowl party gig. After all, my team went 3-13 twice in a year just a decade a go. I pretty much rock kids’ birthday parties, though, so I’m taking my skills to a more grownup level. The key to creating a unique party experience is the theme—which is a done deal for a Superbowl party.

When I plan a party, I really like the food to fit the theme. We had heart & flower shaped sandwiches at a Care Bear tea party, pink milk at a Charlie & Lola party, spooky foods at a Halloween party and an entire marshmallow buffet at, well, a marshmallow party. The football cake is the crowning glory of our Superbowl party food.

For the rest of the day, we just snack on finger foods—inexpensive snacks like jerky (even more frugal if you know how to make beef jerky), flavored popcorn, fruit & nuts and dip. Oh, the dip. We have dip for chips, dip for nachos, dip for veggies and dip for fruit. I don’t know that it’s a theme thing, really. I just really like dip. It’s frugal, fun and super fast to make. Here is a family favorite for game day:

Touchdown Tortilla Dip

8-oz cream cheese
1/2 c salsa
1 can chili (with or without beans)
cheddar cheese
Tortilla Chips (These actually come in blue, red & green, so you can include team colors!)

Spread cream cheese into the bottom of a small baking pan. Layer salsa, chili and top with cheese. Bake at 350 for 10-15 minutes, until cheese bubbles. Serve warm with tortilla chips for dipping. It is the perfect party appetizer as it serves a huge crowd for around $5—enjoy!

I was compensated through Collective Bias for my time & effort promoting Snack Bowl 2011, but all opinions are 100% mine.

1. Money Saving Monday: Superbowl Party
2. California Ham Sandwiches
3. Summer Salsa