Day 1: Arroz con Pollo and Black Bean Soup
So, Day 1 report. My daily allowance for 2 people is $7.14 to equal $50 for the week.
What we ate Monday:
Breakfast: Brown Bread = $.23 x 2 servings = $.46
Lunch: Leftover Arroz con Pollo = $1.58 x 2 servings = $3.16
Snack: Orange (already accounted for cost in scone recipe)
Dinner: Black Bean Soup = $.74 x 2 servings = $1.50
Total: $5.12 – wow! under!
The Arroz con Pollo recipe, which I made for dinner Sunday, was supposed to serve 4, but definitely came out to 6 servings (and I think I put in 1/2 the chicken it called for!). So that brings my per meal price down significantly. The Arroz con Pollo and soup are also combined to nice effect for lunch — a little bean & rice action. Last night I made cornbread to go along with the soup…but first things first. Continue reading Day 1: Arroz con Pollo and Black Bean Soup
By Rachel Crawford on June 25, 2009 | 0
Using Every Last Drop
The other day, I was commissioned to make a friend his birthday cake. I settled on red velvet, my old standby, but after baking I had at least a cup of buttermilk leftover in the quart-sized container I had purchased. Somehow, it is impossible to find buttermilk in pint-sized containers, so whenever I purchase it for a certain recipe, I find that about 95% of the time, the stuff that’s left ends up rotting in my fridge (and let me tell you, buttermilk that has gone bad is not something fun to dispose of).
This time, however, I vowed that I would not let my buttermilk go to waste. So, I looked in my refrigerator and pantry to see what could be made with my leftover dairy.
Cornmeal. Check.
Flour. Check.
Eggs. Check.
Agave nectar. Check.
An almost-bad jalapeno. Check.
These ingredients could only mean one thing: cornbread. After reading through cookbooks and after an online search, I decided to experiment by combining several recipes that I had found and altering them to use what my pantry provided.
Often, I find that cornbread is overly dry and, after consumption, leaves me yearning for a large glass of milk or water so that I don’t feel like I have cement forming in my gullet. This cornbread, however, is dense, moist, and light. Slightly sweet with a spicy kick, it makes for a perfect accompaniment to chili, Mexican baked beans, or on its own as a snack. Best of all, it takes only a few minutes to prepare. Continue reading Using Every Last Drop
By Erin Patinkin on June 24, 2009 | 0
Meal Planning: Prep Time!
Probably the most essential part of keeping to a tight food budget is planning ahead — something that seems nearly impossible in the city. Any night of the week you may be called out to some event or another, sidetracked at work, or otherwise engaged. But as soon as you let last-minute plans take over your life, you find yourself spending a lot of money on quick or portable (and not usually very satisfying) meals.
Compiling a bunch of recipes ahead of time for the week was really difficult for me. I tend to cook on a whim, which of course leads to a lot of impulse buying. For inspiration, I pulled out my copy of How to Cook Everything, and just started flipping through the pages. I think I came up with several inexpensive, delicious dishes to cook, and I will have the flexibility to swap days or delay cooking something if I have more leftovers than I anticipated. Here’s what I started with on Sunday. A day of planning and prepping was necessary. Continue reading Meal Planning: Prep Time!
By Rachel Crawford on June 23, 2009 | 0
Budgeting Extravaganza
Starting today, I am embarking on a 4-week food budgeting exercise. For anyone who loves food, loves to cook, and/or reads or writes about food all day long, resisting that amazing $10 triple creme cheese or $6 box of farm fresh berries is nearly impossible. These days, however, it’s become necessary. My goal is 4 weeks, $50/week, 3 meals a day for 2 people. This is not the most ambitious goal out there, but I think it’s realistic. I am not trying to set myself up for failure, rather, to reorient my thought process when I hit the grocery store or farmer’s market. Ask myself not just “do I want it?” but “do I need it?”. Force myself to be more creative to create delicious food, because if there’s one area I’m not willing to compromise on, it’s taste. Here are my ground rules:
- My budget of $50 per week will feed 2 people 3 meals a day. That is an average of $1.20/serving.
- My goal is to make the most diverse, delicious things I can on my budget, not just ketchup sandwiches and ramen noodles.
- I will not count the most common “pantry” items toward my costs (salt, pepper, sugar), although I will try to estimate price if they are not as common.
- Beverages are not included in the budget, although I am on a month-long booze hiatus anyway, and make coffee at home in the morning to save money (and the environment). Continue reading Budgeting Extravaganza
By Rachel Crawford on June 22, 2009 | 3
Decadent Summer Drinking Without the Headache
There are a couple of rules of thumb for summer drinks: one, tone down the alcohol content unless you want a dry mouth, thudding headache, and the possibility of a psychotic episode if booze is fused with sunstroke; and two, a drink sipped under a hot sun has to be lip-smackingly refreshing.
There is a drink that lets you observe these rules and also chucks a twist of decadence into the mix: moscato. Often derided in my home country of Britain as a sweet drink for teenage girls, in the hands of a half-decent winemaker moscato is an unmistakably adult drink, miles away from the over-syrupy sweetness of alcopops. It’s likely that the first sparkling wines ever drunk by our ancestors several millenia ago would have tasted similar to moscato – the simple fermentation techniques of Fred Flintstone aren’t too far from the gentle handling the grapes receive today. Unlike some of the elaborate conjuring found in many of today’s modern wineries – oak chips, microoxygenation, etc – moscato grapes are picked, crushed, pressed, fermented, and then fermentation is stopped when only half the sugar in the juice has been converted into alcohol. The wine is then quickly filtered and bottled. Continue reading Decadent Summer Drinking Without the Headache
By Jamie Grafton on June 19, 2009 | 0
