This is a quick and easy healthy meal, so I used to make this salad regularly when I was working outside the home. Because that was also before I put my efforts into frugality, I shudder to think what this meal must have cost us back then. The good news is that we can still work it in to our budget!
I went to yoga last night when my husband came home from work, so he gave our daughter dinner and put her to bed, leaving us with the opportunity to have a quiet meal of something she might not be terribly excited to eat. The stars aligned, as I had stopped at Jewel earlier and noticed that they had not-frozen tuna steaks (wild and not imported) for $13.99/lb. This doesn’t sound very frugal, but I also knew that I had all of the spices, oil, vinegar, and wasabi and that the produce happened to be on sale at Meijer, where I was planning to stop anyway.
So let’s break down the cost of the recipe (which I doubled since it is a “Cooking for One” recipe):
Seared Ahi Tuna and Salad of Mixed Greens with Wasabi Vinaigrette (Rachael Ray)
1 ahi tuna steak, 6 ounces
I got two tuna steaks weighing .76 lb at Jewel for $10.63.
2 teaspoons five-spice powder, available on spice aisle
I had this already (sunk cost), but in attempt to be as accurate as possible, I used about 50 cents worth for this.
1 teaspoon grill seasoning, such as Montreal Steak Seasoning, or salt and coarse pepper
I also had this already and the cost would be too negligible to be worth calculating.
Cooking spray or vegetable oil, for brushing the grill pan
I used a quick spray of Spectrum canola oil that I think I got for a dollar after stacking coupons at Whole Foods, another negligible one.
5 ounces, half a sack, mixed prewashed baby salad greens
We didn’t double the greens because this amount was plenty for both of us. I picked up a container of Earthbound Farm organic spring mix for $.17 at Meijer after stacking a $1.00/2 mperks store coupon and two of the $1.00/1 manufacturer coupons in the Jewel coupon book. That particular sale ended yesterday, but the manufacturer coupon is good until 9/30 so I am sure something similar will come up again. If this were earlier or later in the summer, we could have just relied upon the garden for the greens.
2 radishes, sliced
A bunch of radishes cost me $.69 at Meijer. I used about a third of them, so that is $.23. Radishes are always relatively cheap.
1/4 European cucumber, thinly sliced
I used half of a regular cucumber because they were 3/$1.00 at Meijer, so another 17 cents here.
1/2 teaspoon wasabi paste
I used Penzey’s wasabi powder, which I already had. Even to make a teaspoon, it was only a quarter worth!
1 tablespoon rice vinegar or rice vinegar
I had this and the cost is negligible.
1 tablespoon soy sauce
Again, this is a pantry staple with a negligible cost.
3 tablespoons -virgin olive oil
I didn’t double this either, as it seemed like it would be too much. I used four tablespoons, which would I’ll estimate cost me 30 cents at my threshold price of 15 cents per ounce.
Salt and freshly ground black pepper
Another negligible cost.
It adds up to $12.45. That is just over $6 per serving, which is not really much of a splurge!
Obviously, a big part of this was that I had all of the pantry ingredients on-hand because we use them regularly, which allowed me to just calculate the cost of the amount I was using. It wouldn’t be terribly frugal if I had to go out and buy wasabi and five spice just for this if I didn’t think I would make this very often or use those ingredients for anything else. But, for the flavors you know your family likes, don’t be afraid to spend a few dollars on more exotic spices, because having them on hand will pay off in the future when you find a new recipe to try and save yourself a trip to the store. As I have mentioned before, it costs me a few dollars every month or two to keep my spice cabinet full of all sorts of great stuff.
