My daughter, son, and I made Korean pork dumplings (Mandu) today for the first time. It took all three of us as it is time intensive but less so with all of us working, (one person to separate the wrappers, one person to put the scoop of filling on the wrapper, and one person to seal the dumplings shut with egg white), but they were fantastic and well worth it. And it's a nicely balanced little meal with pork, mirin, dark sesame oil, bean sprouts, scallions, ginger, garlic, egg, and cabbage in a goyza wrapper. Protein, veggies, and carb in one neat little package. It should have had tofu, too, but I didn't want to dry tofu, so I left it out. I should have taken pictures. Ah, well, next time I make them I will take photos and post the recipe.

I liked them even better than the ones from the Korean restaurant in our town or the Hawaiian Barbecue franchise. I can make 100 dumplings for $10 (less if I'd not used free range organic pork from the ranch). They sell for $6 for 10, so quite the cost savings there.

I received a check from the food co-op, dividends for the year of $7.43 (I think) so I will deposit that into the Emergency Fund along with all the ones I have saved tomorrow.

I am hoping I can recreate my budget spreadsheets. I don't have a current copy saved outside my other computer, but I do have my 2012 budget and should be able to extrapolate from there. I think I can figure out what money was in which category of the Holding Tank from previous blog posts, too. From now on I am seriously backing up my spreadsheets onto a flash drive every week. I feel stupid for not doing that.

I think I can get through until payday Friday with only spending $30 on food. That should leave me with a bit of money to shunt into the Emergency Fund.

I've been having troubles with Swagbucks surveys. I get all the way to the end, hit submit, and then it goes Oops, we had a problem and it's lost along with all my time and points. Very irritating. I did get Swagbucks to credit me the 150 points for the one, but they said they'd only do it the once and only because I'd spent so much time on it. The survey companies they do business with really need to get their acts together. Fortunately I was able to make the daily goal without any surveys today. I didn't need the frustration.