Kale: The Queen of Greens

We have a Taco Bell right next to the grocery store.  Every time I buy groceries I can hear it taunting me, "You could just have a burrito for $1.29!  And you don't even have to make it!"  On one hand, it's awesome that I can buy a burrito for less than it would cost me to make it at home.  And on the other hand, it's terrifying that I can buy a burrito for less than it would cost me to make it at home.  What do they put in that stuff, anyway?

With that said, it's hard to be healthy on a budget, especially when fast food is readily available and cheaper than the grocery store.  And yet, I can't help but think that what's helping my pocket book short term could be hurting my body in the long run.  When you look at it that way, a bundle of kale and a bag of nuts is a lot cheaper and a lot more fun than a triple bypass.

Kale, also known as The Queen of Greens, is a powerhouse of nutrition.  Kale ranges anywhere from $0.75-$2.50 per bunch, is plentiful, and easy to find year round.  Kale is rich in vitamins A, C, and K, thus boosting immune function, firming your skin, fighting free radicals,  enhancing reproductive and heart health, and maintaining strong bones, among other glorious benefits.  Now, I'd call that a pretty sexy veggie.

my kale salad

Kale Salad
6 cups raw kale--un-chopped
1/4 cup grated parmesan or romano cheese
1/4 cup olive oil
1/2 cup blanched almonds or walnuts
1/4 cup raisins or cranberries
1/2 cup raw basil, un-chopped
dash of salt.
1. In a food processor, chop kale and basil
2. Place kale and basil in a bowl and add parmesan, olive oil, salt, nuts, and raisins/cranberries





Kale Pesto
1 cup kale
1 cup basil
1/2 cup parmesan cheese
1/2 cup nuts
1/2 cup olive oil
2 or 3 garlic cloves

Blend all ingredients in the food processor and put on pasta, bread, or veggies.

Carla's Spicy Kale
6 cups of kale
1/2 cup chopped red onions
Butter or Oil
2 garlic cloves
2 T balsamic vinegar
1/4 cup beer
1/4 cup hot sauce
1/2 cup water

1. Satee butter, onions, and garlic
2. After the onions begin to brown, add kale
3. pour in liquid.
4. Stir over heat until kale is barely wilted (it will continue to cook after you take it off the heat)
5. Serve over beans, rice, or just eat it by itself.

Garlic Kale
Place your fat of choice and 3 garlic cloves in the skillet.  Add a dash of salt.  Cook until the garlic begins to turn brown.  Add kale and cook until kale leaves barely begin to darken.

If you have any good kale recipes please share!

The $20 makeover

Haircut: $11 Eyebrow wax: $7.  a cup of coffee: $2. A day at the beauty school? Priceless.

I can't afford $70 to get my hair done.  As a consequence, I've cut my own hair for years.  Sometimes it's cute, sometimes it's awful.  You never know what you're going to get when you're cutting the back of your hair with a straight razor and have no idea what it looks like.  Then my life changed.  My friend, Amanda, started beauty school.  At first I went to be supportive.  Then I found out that she's good!!

I know.  You think that sounds scary.  But look at it this way: everyone's got to start somewhere.  And either you have it or you don't.  So, the key is to have your hair cut by someone who has it, who is just starting out.

Amanda Rogers, getting ready to chop off my mullet at The Salon Professional Academy.

If you don't know anyone personally at the beauty school, make an appointment for a pedicure.  Think of this as your undercover trip, an investment in the future of you hair.  Let's be honest, you can live with a bad pedicure, but the mop that frames your face had better be lovely.  While you're getting your pedicure, ask your nail girl who gives the cutest cuts and look at the students' hair.  When you find the student with cute hair ask him/her who cut it--chances are it was another student.  When they tell you, make an appointment.  Done.  You have your stylist.

Next stop: massage school.

Below is the menu for The Salon Professional Academy (www.nashvillebeautyschool.com).

• Haircut                               $9
• Child’s Cut (12 and under)$5
• Bang or Beard Trim       $7
• Shampoo & Style              $6
• Special Occasion Updo$19
• Conditioning Service   $6
• Color & Style                   $19
• Highlights                        $29
• Perm                                $39
• Relaxer                           $39

SKIN   STARTING AT:

• Facial                              $19
• Facial with Makeup     $19
• Makeup Application      $9
• Facial Wax                       $9

NAILS   STARTING AT:

• Manicure                         $9
• French Manicure         $14
• Pedicure                        $19
• Polish Change              $5
• Paraffin Dip                     $7
• Nail Art                            $4

The 90's are Over; Let's Eat Sweet Potatoes.

and if you're really enthusiastic about your sweet
potatoes you can buy this print here

First of all, I would like to give a giant thank you Colleen Wandel, owner of Say Ooh, for giving this fancy girl's blog a make-over. In addition to giving this blog a new face, this lovely lady also makes beautiful "pretty-enhancers" made from vintage lace, nightgowns, buttons, and feathers.  Be sure to stop by her shop and delight your fancy.

So, now that we've gone to Colleen's shop and browsed her pretty-enhancers, I am going to talk about a pretty-enhancer that you can eat.  Sweet potatoes.  When the 90's told us to stop eating potatoes, many of us lumped sweet potatoes into the same category and cut them out of our diets, only bringing them to the table on Thanksgiving.  Well, I'm here to tell you that we needn't pay heed to the 90's any longer.  Keep Weezer in your hearts and discard the rest--no more peace signs, no more giant cell phones, and no more strange diet fads that tell you not to eat sweet potatoes.  Not only are sweet potatoes good for you, make you look good, and taste so yummy, but they're only $0.69 per pound, which means we can afford them.

According to Alexander Page at Stuff You Should Know, one sweet potato can give you 40% of your daily intake of vitamin E.  Vitamin E both repairs and protects your skin.  Alexander Page says it so nicely that I'm just going to give you his explanation:

"Antioxidants are agents that neutralize the oxidant effect of free radicals, which are molecules that damage collagen and cause skin dryness, fine lines and wrinkles [source: Bouchez]. A simple chemistry lesson can explain how vitamin E does this. The atoms that comprise your body try to maintain an even number of electrons -- that's what makes them stable. If an atom has an uneven number of electrons, it will steal an electron from another atom to become stable. When your skin takes a beating from outside factors, such as the sun's ultraviolet rays, your body can produce free radicals. Free radicals are atoms with an uneven number of electrons, and when they form inside your body, they steal electrons from healthy cells like the ones that make up your skin. This can cause a damaging chain reaction, and that's where antioxidants like vitamin E come in [source: Rice]." [Alexander Page, Stuff You Should Know].


So, what I'm saying is that those of us who can't afford La Prairie's $1500 skin care line just need to go ahead and fork out 69 cents on a pound of sweet potatoes.

In addition to repairing your skin, sweet potatoes are rich in beta-carotine and vitamin A, vitamin C, potassium, and fiber.

I usually just bake my sweet potatoes, then dress them with some butter and cinnamon (preheat oven to 400 F, wrap your potatoes in foil, poke a few holes in them with a fork, and bake for about 40 min).  However, if we're feeling fancy, there are a few ways we can dress our potatoes for a meal worth talking about.

Following are 10 fancy and tasty sweet potato recipes:

1. Roasted Sweet Potatoes with Black Beans and Chili Dressing
2. Curried Sweet Potatoes
3. Sweet Potato Casserole
4. Scalloped Sweet Potato Stacks
5. Sweet Potato Mash
6. Sweet Potato Dauphinoise
7. Jamaican Sweet Potato Pone
8. Cuban Sweet Potato Salad
9. Spicy Sweet Potato and Coconut Soup
10. Baked Sweet Potato Falafel 

Monday giveaway: a SCOBY of your very own

Kombucha: the fancy way to stay healthy.  Ok, so I realize this is the newest health fad.  However, I've been drinking this stuff for a month and my energy levels have nearly doubled.  Unfortunately, at 5 bucks a pop, I can't afford it.  This is why I make my own.

Buying Kombucha vs. Making It: being fancy and poor isn't all glamour.

You'll need the following:
filtered water (don't use distilled), 4 tea bags (either black or green tea.  No herbal teas, ladies), a giant pickle jar (if you don't want to spend the $5 on a jar, go down to your local deli and ask them for one of their left over jars), cheese cloth, 1 cup of sugar, 1 c. kombucha, and a SCOBY (symbiotic colony of bacteria and yeast).

1. Place tea and sugar into a separate bowl. Pour 1 quart of boiling water over tea bags and sugar and let sit until room temp.

2. Pour tea/sugar/water into your giant pickle jar

3. Pour 2-3 more quarts of water into the mixture

4. Pour in 1 c. of kombucha and place your SCOBY on the top with the dark side facing down.

5. Cover with cheese cloth and allow to sit, untampered.

6. Your kombucha will be finished when it is fizzy (5- 10 days).

7. Bottle and refrigerate.

8. Drink 1 cup every day.  You can also mix kombucha with your favorite fruit juice (I mix mine with lemon juice)

Ok, now for the fun part.  I have in my possession an extra SCOBY, which I will give to one lucky lady.  I want to hear about a fancy poor moment you had this week.  I'll draw a name at random from the comments below.

Pretty Skin!!!

I want to dance with vanity and still have the gumption to stand when it's over.  And I want to have good skin doing it.  Unfortunately, my favorite products (i.e. the orange sugar exfoliant by Fresh) cost upward of $50.  I thank my mother, my grandmother, and my Aunt Patti for my expensive taste.  However, it can't be helped. My taste may be expensive, but who says you have to spend a fortune on goodness?

this is a portrait of Erzsebet Bathory, the Countess

    who bathed in the blood of young maidens to retain her youth. 

Little did she know she could have used a sugar scrub.

I love the Fresh products because they are comprised, primarily, of things I can buy at my neighborhood grocery.  But since I can buy the ingredients at my grocery then I should just make it myself, right?  And the answer is yes.  After a short trip to the grocery, all you'll need is a bowl, a spoon, and a pretty little air tight container that you love to open and close (I'll admit, I do love the sound the Fresh container makes when you close it--the glass is so thick that the sound it makes is most substantial and satisfying.  Do you know what I mean?)

Granted, my Fresh exfoliant that I love so has many more ingredients, so know we're not making the exact scrub.  But this exfoliant works like a charm.   Use it one to 2 times per week.




1 tablespoon cane sugar
2 teaspoons of oil (try olive, avocado, macadamia, sesame, jojoba, or coconut oil. you may have to try a couple before you find the right oil for your skin)
1 teaspoon of orange juice
Citrus zest
(the citrus is optional for those of us with dry skin.  If you do leave the citrus out, add another t of oil.  However, if your skin is extra dry, throw some oats and honey into the mix.  Wear it for 10 minutes--eat it if you'd like).


Wet your face with a warm cloth.  Gently message the face with your sugar scrub.  Let it sit for 4-5 minutes.  Then rinse and moisturize (I moisturize with olive oil).  Pretty skin!!!!  

you can't take the fancy out.

The roof leaked. The window sill was rotting. The floor creaked and caved around the 60 year old heater in the floor. The grass had grown 2 feet tall because I couldn’t afford to put gas into the mower. I sat on my couch, eating my meal du jour, a hot dog and mayonnaise, while I sipped hot water from a Hutschenreuther teacup (Richelieu), signed and numbered “33.” 

Hutschenreuther Richelieu 

Hot dog and Mayonnaise

do these really go together?




















Yes, yes, it is true. Fancy moved out of her parents’ house and into a place of her own, carting only her Hutschenreuther and an old silver spoon she got from her mother. It’s a well known fact that the women in my family can pick out the most expensive thing in the room because it’s the first thing to which we’re drawn. We’re fancy girls. We want it all. And really, let’s be reasonable, what’s the point in having cake if you can’t eat it too? 

And yet, amid all of the frill, there’s the survivor, the warrior, the girl who will stop at nothing for freedom and a love to call her own. Though she may have to trudge through the rain, sell her dresses to buy groceries, hold the soles [souls] of her shoes together with duct tape, and wear mud on her shirts because she can’t afford detergent, she will survive. She will make due. She will rise above and conquer. And she’ll look good doing it. 

This, my friends, is why I present you with the fancy girl’s guide to being poor. Because you can take the girl out of the fancy, but you can’t take the fancy out of the girl.