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There was a cheapskate special on Oprah years ago where a man reused paper towels. He would actually hang them up to dry in his kitchen, which begs the question: Why didn’t he just use cloth towels? On another show I saw eons ago, I think it was on Donahue, a woman with a large family gave advice on how to use up the dregs of the jam jar by putting some milk in the near-empty jar, swirling it around, and then pouring the mixture into an ice cube tray to make freezie pops. The audience actually groaned at that one.
I wash and reuse plastic bags sometimes, but usually when I’m in Germany and they’re harder to find. It’s more of a recycling issue for me. (I also bring my own bags to the store.) To save I’ll clip coupons to shop and I use coupons when I go out to eat, but I don’t go crazy with it. (If you ever go to Ruby Tuesday’s in the US you should sign up for their e-mail newsletter as you can save nearly half on your meals there.)
All of that is preface for this story about a dude with a 70s pr0n stache on the new TLC special “Extreme Cheapskates.” In a preview clip, the guy cooks up two goat heads that he bargained with the butcher to buy for around $7. It looks really disgusting, but the environmentalist in me tries to reason that it’s good that he’s using the entire animal. Here’s more:
When times get tough, it’s not unusual for people to start cutting back a bit.
But for one penny-pinching man featured on TLC’s upcoming special “Extreme Cheapskates,” reducing his spending a bit isn’t good enough. No, Jeff Yeager does much more than that. He goes on an all-out weekly fiscal fast several times a year and doesn’t spend a cent of his own hard-earned money.
Instead, during his fasts, Jeff spends only the loose change that he finds around town. And when he does use that money, it’s to buy the cheapest things he needs — including food. This leads to some … umm … uncommon dishes at the dinner table.
“I create my menus around what is least expensive,” Jeff explained in an exclusive clip TLC shared with us. “Not only does that save you a lot of money, but you tend to eat healthier. Like organ meats!”
Mmmm! OK, maybe not. Even Jeff’s wife, Denise, admits that she’s not always a fan of his meals. “Some of the food he eats, I just can’t get myself to … to fathom eating,” she said in the clip.
Like the goat heads Jeff bargained with his local butcher for.
[From Today Show’s The Clicker]
If this dude wants to save money he should eat vegetarian. In college we used to eat ramen or pasta for just about every meal. A nice batch of potatoes or some rice and beans (add salsa for taste) are both cheaper and much more palatable than trying to scoop meat out of a head that’s staring at you. Then again, if this guy was just cooking up some farfalle it wouldn’t be newsworthy. This is a stunt for a reality show, and it worked. Also, it seems callous to showcase people who are just cheap when so many people are truly struggling, but that’s TLC for you. Maybe these people are struggling and TLC is just choosing to go with the “cheapskate” angle.
Oh I have to give a shout out to this 96 year-old lady on YouTube that shares simple inexpensive recipes she learned from her mother during the Great Depression. Her Youtube channel is called Great Depression Cooking and she has a book called Clara’s kitchen. Here’s a recipe for pasta with peas. At about 4:00 she tells an awesome story about people renting their garages to bootleggers in the 20s during prohibition.
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