Originally posted on Facebook - The Power of 5's 2018-05-016-001

Recently I was going through a sweet tooth phase and I discovered that Tru Valu Long Circular sells Biscuit cakes, (a past love from my childhood) at $2.00 for one.

The first set of three biscuit cakes which I bought were :

Thicker than the expected "height";

The taste was one part essence which pervaded each mouthful,

There was just enough sugar in it;

The texture was soft and a small piece warranted a second taste and so forth.

Since then I have been trying to capture that taste and texture almost every week.

So to get back to the Power of 5's. After consuming those Biscuit cakes, I tend to get creative as to what I can do with a little bit. So here are some of the Power of 5's suggestions:

In some earlier posts, I have explored the 1/2 lbs and 1 lbs which can allow you to create a soup with $10 of ingredients.

If one were really stretched, then an omission of an item can take the cost of the soup down to $5.00 or

Change the type of soup from a split pea, potato, pumpkin soup, to a potato soup to a pumpkin soup or

A fried pumpkin side or a fried potato side all under $5,00 or within $5.00.

Some of the other alternatives are: a bunch of pakchoy with 5 pieces for $10.00 or 4 pieces for $10.00 which works out to about $2.00 or $2.50 per side or thereabouts if one were to consider the other ingredients.

Recently I was able to purchase a bunch of callaloo bush for $8.50 which was outside of my range of prices for items for that day.

However the bag of callaloo bush included a pack of coconut milk which normally costs about $4.50.

When the two items were put together, the callaloo bush came out at about $4.50.

I was also able to get 3 small sweet potatoes for about $5.00, some pieces of ginger for about $5.00.

So with that in mind, let me leave you with a math puzzle and a test of your optimism:

There is a game which is offered by NLCB where you can wager $1.00 and win $30.00. So if you were willing to wager 4, $1.00's, twenty times you may achieve a gross receipt of $2,400. Now this return does not compare to that of Cash Pot and you may be seriously tired after trying, but if you are willing to work your brain, then the grocery shopping may be a thrill as you can look at all of the $5's with glee.

So look at the forms, read the front and the back and enjoy...