The 19 Cent Cupcake - No Box Mix or Canned Frosting Required

This cupcake recipe is the first recipe that I have ever created solely based on price.  As part of the Hunger Challenge, I had $87 to spend on food for the week for my family of three - and as a cupcake blogger, I wanted to include cupcakes.  For this recipe (and everything else we ate during the Challenge), I assumed that I had nothing in my pantry except salt and pepper.  If I wanted to use vanilla extract, the cost of buying that vanilla extract would count against the total.

I ended up baking eight banana cupcakes with dulce de leche frosting.  Each cupcake cost nineteen cents (thirty-three cents if you serve it with a scoop of homemade banana ice cream).  The cupcakes themselves are simple and not overly sweet, but when you top them with the dulce de leche and eat them with the ice cream, they rival any of my pricier creations. 

I Don't Have a Clue

Last night, I received the following comment on my Facebook page (it's no longer up, so don't look for it) and I wanted to publicly respond:

If a family receives food stamps then I doubt that they have the means to access a Whole Foods store. Buying organic is usually not at the top of the priority list. I work with this population daily. You don't have a clue, despite your good intentions. No need for comment, I am opting out of your FB page.

She's right.  I don't have a clue - which is exactly why I am participating in the Hunger Challenge (read my intro post on the Hunger Challenge for all of the details).

Everyone who is participating in the challenge is free to interpret the rules how they'd like.  Several people have asked me whether I'll be using items already in my pantry during the week.  The answer is no.  The only items in my pantry that I am using this week are salt and pepper.  Yes, I could have taken the challenge one step further and relied on public transit or only visited grocery stores within a certain radius of my home.  Admittedly, that would have been more of a challenge.  But, I wanted to use the week to explore - to really think about what food costs and how those costs differ from place to place.

What would it be like to eat on food stamp dollars at Whole Foods, the normal store where I shop?  What if I shopped at a less expensive grocery store like Shop 'n Save?  How much cheaper would it be?  What would the experience be like shopping in a bargain basement store like Aldi?  Would I save money by shopping at bread outlets?  How much would I rely on coupons?  If I just went to one store, I feel like I would have missed out on an education.

That being said, let's talk about my first few shopping trips.  And yes, the first one was at Whole Foods.  You'll see that I was able to get some good values, but it wasn't easy.

Food Outreach Hunger Challenge

I'm spoiled when it comes to food and I know it.  Here's a breakdown of my typical week's eating:

• Breakfast for me consists of cold cereal and soy milk.  I have a pantry stocked with five different kinds of cereal that I mix and match.  I'll typically have some raisins for my breakfast dessert (every meal needs to end with something sweet!).
• I eat lunch out with my husband and toddler every single day.  We don't go to chains and rarely go to places that would be considered "family" restaurants.  Since he's been going out to eat his whole life, my son is fairly well-behaved.  If he starts to get too loud, my husband or I will take him for a walk (but, that doesn't happen too often).  One of my son's favorite foods is sushi.
• In the afternoon, I'll have a snack, some fresh fruit, a piece of a $7 bar of chocolate, or whatever the cupcake of the week happens to be (remember, too, that the cupcakes often contain free ingredients provided by companies so that I'll share their products with my readers).  
• Because my husband takes food photos for several local magazines, a few nights each week our dinner is the food that he has photographed (the chefs typically give it to him because after he's taken the photo, they can't serve it to a customer).  Other nights, my husband might cook.  He does all of the cooking and he is incredibly talented.  When we cook at home, it often costs almost as much as when we go out to eat since we shop at Whole Foods and buy expensive fish and meat and impulse buy any new and exotic ingredients we see.  But in reality, Jonathan almost never cooks because he doesn't have to.  If we don't have any free food or leftovers to eat for dinner, I may just have cereal because I'm so full from my giant lunch.

I am lucky.

This week, our family is taking the Hunger Challenge on behalf of a unique non-profit organization called Food Outreach. Located in St. Louis, Food Outreach provides nutritional meals to individuals facing HIV/AIDS or cancer who also struggle financially. It is very strenuous for these individuals to eat nutritiously because they often rely on Food Stamps, which provide just $29 a week for groceries. Today through Saturday, our family is eating on $29/person ($87 total) to spread awareness of the necessity for Food Outreach’s services (and services provided by other similar organizations throughout the country).

I know that for some of you, this may not seem like challenge - this is your life.  I'm someone who can't think of the last time I went three days without eating in a restaurant and I have gone a lifetime not paying attention to what goes in my grocery cart as long as I am happy with the ingredients.  This is going to be a major challenge for me and my family.

Because this is a cupcake blog, I have given myself one additional challenge.  If I can do so without sacrificing the nutrition of my family, I am going to try to make a small batch of simple cheap cupcakes at the end of the week. 

I will share Hunger Challenge updates throughout the week both here and on Facebook and let you know what we're eating and what I've learned. 

Join me in this challenge by visiting hungerchallengestl.org to pledge $29 or to find out how you can help.