What???? Odd Product Rant

 Ok...sometimes products make me stare that them because I. DO. NOT. GET. IT!

They solve problems that don't exist.

Yesterday at the grocery store...scanning the aisles of this particular one for super cheap deals (they do that sometimes).

Once it was mirepoix at a Trader Joe's....WHY?????   Just chop an onion, carrot and some celery. The cost per lb for the prechopped was BONKERS.  

Yesterday....BAGS (like plastic single use heavy bags) for something over 6$ each.  

Bags of....  INSTANT CHIA PUDDING!   Um...what??  A 1pound bag of chia seeds costs me under 5$ and these above bags are about 2 oz of seeds and some flavorings and some odd food processed extracts and products.   There is the incredible "convenience" of putting water in the plastic bag which is designed to stand up.   And then still need to find a spoon or maybe mostly close the bag and squeeze the chia/processedstuff-sludge into my mouth.  EW!  

So...expensive, pointless and saves like NO TIME OR EFFORT.  If you need "instant" chia pudding, put chia seeds and flavors and stuff in a series of little jars (or one big jar with a scoopy thingy).  Then, when you want it, add water or whatever.   
CHIA is already INSTANT.

So, after way too long, like maybe a minute, I managed to wander off and get a good deal on some non-UPF chocolate treat that is a pain in the butt to make.  

Forever Foods Instead of Forever Chemicals #5

 Forever foods instead of Forever Chemicals done so far:

1 Vinegar

2 Honey

3 Chicos 

4 Manoomin

And now.....     

5 DRY Posole.

Related to Chicos but different.  Nixtamalized hominy (field) corn redried to very very very dry.

Like REALLY dry.

They come in multi colors because...corn.   I get them direct from the people who grow and process and dry the corn.   Just got a few more pounds to get through the year.  It comes in little tightly filled zip-top bags.  I repackage into tightly closed jars.  I have never had it go bad and have stored for a couple of years with temperatures ranging from well below freezing to about 100degsF.  I know the fluctuation in temp is not ideal but it is how I live and does not seem to affect storage at least for the first 2 years.

AND they are delicious.   Pre-soak or not and boil up.   They pressure cook nicely at 3000ft elevation.  15lbs on the cooker and for however long the other stuff in the cooker needs to cook.  If it's beans, that are less than a year from picking/drying, I presoak and precook the posole a bit.  If it's delicious smoky meat, just keep it all in there for like 30min or more.  You don't have to pressure cook.  If the woodstove is going, put a pot on in it in the morning, or the evening.  You know what, put a pot on it, some liquid to cook in.  Broth, water...maybe not vodka because it will evaporate off too fast...in the pot and then add the corn.  About half the amount you want to finish with because they will swell up. Quite a bit.  You will need maybe triple the amount of liquid compared to the starting volume of posole.  That's a MINIMUM amount of liquid.  If you are also cooking other dry food like beans, dried vegetables, whatever, ADD MORE LIQUID!!!

These, like chicos, will not cook down to mush.  I've had them in soup and reheated several times.  they sort of explode but will still require chewing.  If you want mush...eat something else.

Forever Foods Instead of Forever Chemicals #4

 Parched Wild Rice

Manoomin.

Also unparched (raw) wild rice.   

It is super dry, easy to store (just keep it dry).   In an accidental test I checked its tolerance for extreme temperatures in storage.  This is because I live off grid and don't heat the place when I'm not home.  So, some stored wild rice in a tightly closed mason-type jar went through a few freeze thaw cycles down to well below zero (fahrenheit) and above 100degs (also fahrenheit!) multiple times.   Then, I found the jar and cooked it up.  Still fantastic.

The parched style costs more, but is also quicker to cook, easier to bust up into a flour type product without fancy grainmill, just a little mortar and pestle or a couple of rocks or a cloth bag and a hammer (put the rice in the bag, use the hammer on it....don't try to bust rice with a cloth bag alone).  

Forever Foods Instead of Forever Chemicals #3

 Chicos

These are SUPER DRY slightly smoky corn kernels from the SW of the US.  

Because they are BONE DRY and a bit shriveled and kind of pre-cooked, once I put them in a jar, they store virtually forever.

"Virtually" partly because I will never be able to test truly long term storage.  They are DELICIOUS so I end up eating them in a matter of months.   

Still, rumor and lots of actual knowledge attests that they are still good after years of dry storage.

To cook: presoak (or not if I forgot to do that and I want to eat).  Cook in water, broth, in soup you already have going.  They need MOISTURE because, as noted above, VERY DRY.   They puff up to about 3x the dry size and add a smoky flavor to whatever they are cooked with or thrown on top of.

Quite chewy and I've never had them go mushy or decompensate even after days in leftover soup or simmered for hours. 

Forever Foods Instead of Forever Chemicals #2

 So....obviously....Honey.

I mean, they find it in tombs and it's still good.

I do keep this on hand.  I doesn't matter if it crystalizes.  Leave it.  It doesn't have huge amounts of vitamins and minerals, but some.  

It's also good for cuts and other owies so more than food!

Actually, that is true of vinegar as well.  Good for what ails you.

If you have bee hives, the raw honey with the leg bits in it is fine.  You won't die of dead bee bits.

The wax is nice to chew, make candles, whatever.  And nice for making salves. 

I cook quite a bit with honey which is different than with sugar, bit more fragile and baked goods are better on the 2nd or 3rd day as they sort of get moister.  But I am rarely able to leave a baked good untouched for that long.

I don't do industrial store bought honey anymore.   Much of it is adulterated.  Local honey costs more but supports local agriculture  The giant bee operations that migrate hundreds or thousands of hives tend to annihilate local native pollinators so I'm trying to get honey from folks who have 5 or fewer hives.   At that level hives can actually support native pollinators. Nothing is perfect so I don't eat as much.   The cost of local small producer honey serves as a good road to overconsumption.

Forever Food Pantry list so far:

Vinegar

Honey

Forever Foods Instead of Forever Chemicals

 I hear and report on "forever chemicals" quite a bit and am trying to find less negative things to think about or at least OTHER things to think about.

Also, this year I am tracking my UPF (ultra-processed foods) intake for the year.   Being conscious of it makes me a bit more aware of my food.  I still eat some UPF.  The point isn't to avoid it more than usual but to see what I'm actually eating.

ANYWAY, UPF has forever-chemicals (let's shorten that to fc's) in it and is one of the vectors of exposure for humans (rumor has it I am one of those).  So, lots of thinking about that.

And of course, I like to cook and am thinking about shelf stable foods, food preservation, and generally things I can in the future produce, store, find, grow, whatever that doesn't include forever chemicals.

Hence...forever foods stored in things that aren't  plastic.

Vinegar...I buy LOTS of it and often in gallon plastic jugs (heh heh....jugs).  Acid liquids in plastic take on fc's.  Especially from soft/flexible plastics according to some research I've been reading at various nerd links to scientific journals.  The vinegar in glass is freaking expensive.  And I do brew my own, or have in the past.  Especially when I'm trying to brew kombucha and then it goes to far and is vinegar.  Cool.

Vinegar, once fully brewed is shelf stable until it basically evaporates away.  It is a forever food (ff....?).

Pineapples were CHEAP at a discount grocery store.  1$ for an entire pineapple.  So, I got 2.  Which is a boatload of pineapple for one person with no space.   I cut one up and ate part last night, rest with breakfast.  I kept the scraps from cleaning it like the skin and core nubbins.  Those are in a jar now (glass...not plastic) with some non-chlorine water and vinegar mother from the jar of vinegar I brewed in the office pantry cupboard from some sparkling apple juice no one was drinking.  It ended up filling a quart jar and over the past few months it has pretty well filled the jar with layers of vinegar mother.

So, pineapple scraps, non-chlorine water, scraps from fresh ginger I was cutting up for other stuff, bit of vinegar from the jar with the mothers in it.  And a chunk of mother.  Yes, I am doing this at the office.  The temperature at home fluctuates too much to ferment very well.

Once this ferments fully, it should be shelf stable.  I like shelf stable.

It cost me 1$ for the pineapple.  The water is from the well so whatever the cost of that was (maybe 20000ish) split across every time I use water.  I know I am more than 20k gallons in to the use of the well for 10 years...per gallon....um,. 50cents?

The jar was 1$ about 100 uses ago so 1cent?

This is the "waste" from the pineapple (which I would normally have composted and will in fact compost after this and I mainly bought it as food so....15cents in lost nutrients to the compost though fermenting actually ADDS nutrients so I'm going to call it a wash and say 0cents for the pineapple scraps).

The start from the other vinegar and mother is from free juice (it was at work and was about to go off and get thrown out), another used jar and the mother grew from the dregs of kombucha I'd had for a while so...10cents?   

And of course, this new vinegar will start more vinegar if it works and recoup some of the "cost".

If it fails and I throw it, but of course not the jar out, it might be costing me 76cents. 

Given that I will get a pint of live vinegar from this if I don't add sugar and it works, and given that live apple cider vinegar (the closest parallel I think in retail because it is in glass and "live") is going at the lowest at $4.99 a quart.  That's $2.495 per pint minus .76.   I am saving $1.735 over having bought it and had a bottle I don't need and would need to recycle.    Nice.  Frugal.

More on forever foods to follow.

That's It...No More Food Delivery For Me

 

So apparently food delivery undermines restaurants, food trucks, etc.

Warning...Potty talks in the vid.

https://youtu.be/aFsfJYWpqII?si=cxiT0_nxIFPegsbb

DAMMIT!!

Ugh.  If I'm going to support good real food I need to let food delivery go.  I never use it myself because a) I am cheap, B) I live 11 miles from any sort of food cookery-servery 3) I don't use a smart phone or have wifi at home.  I partake if others use an app.   Now I have to think about that.  

DAMMIT!  I want the restaurants to get the money and the farmers and so on.  I don't want big-app losing money until they undermine the food industry.  Ugh.

Food Is Good....UltraProcessed Crap Isn't

 So, here's the danger of reading science stuff, sometimes it makes you do stuff that is good for you.  Not always, often, it is BS but this time...it makes sense.

I read and listened to the book UltraProcessed People by Chris Van Tulleken several times and will do that a few more times.

I'd already read/listened to various other books and articles on how the ultraprocessed food messed with our bodies, brains, moods, economies, human rights, farming, soil, weather and on and on.

This one though, it brings it all together and the dude has a nice british accent of some sort so it's an easy listen.

Turns out, frankenfood is bad for you! I mean, I KNEW that but I didn't get scared straight.  I'm getting there now.  

For years I've been working on the diet.  Decades.  And the exercise.

NOW though...I have the means, the time, the motivation and group of friends and colleagues who also are a bit into it in their own ways.  Is that what you extraverts call a support system?

So, last year I avoided cheap grocery store sugary foods.   That made a major change in the diet and budget.  Good for both as it turns out.   If I really really wanted a treat, I didn't buy Reese's (this will be a complete shock to those who know me...I haven't had an industrial candy bar, even an expensive "good" one in over a year), instead, I either made it or went to a business, all turned out to be local, where someone actually MADE the thing.   Like Moscow Candy in Moscow, Idaho where I got a really good peanut butter cup for 1$ or a "Bruttle" (what Butterfingers WISH they were) that is made in Spokane for 1.50$.   They are smaller than the industrial versions, cost about the same or less and are astoundingly BETTER.  Also, there are some  road blocks to getting them.  I'm not in Moscow most days.

Occasionally, I would get a locally made cinnamon roll or piece of pie or cookie.  And occasionally I would make them.

This year, cutting back UPF, ultraprocessed food, as defined by the NOVA system.   None of it is good and it turns out all of it wrecks my health.   

FORTUNATELY I have the means in money and location and skills now to do that.  I have enough $$ to buy eggs and live close enough to people who raise chickens that go outside.  I know people who hunt (and hope to be one of them this year) and trade them informally for game meat.  I know how to butcher chickens and other small things and can them.  I live with enough outdoor space to have a garden and near lots of people who garden.  I have enough money to buy produce from local farmers.  

While it costs more upfront for the food, by avoiding the fast food and convenience foods, my total food spend for 2023 went up very little.  Pretty much on par with inflation.

Recently people at work got into similar things and I talked one into reading the above mentioned book.  Now he and I share labor on processing (not ULTRAprocessing...very different) meat and fish.  For the holidays I gave home made mustard, ketchup, and vanilla extract.  In return I got deer and elk meat, and some smoked salmon.   We are all happy with that.

Now...to buy a 2024 hunting and fishing permit.  The hope is to ACTUALLY use it this year.  Especially for fishing because that's easy and doesn't have to result in 100lbs of meat like killing big game.

A Month of Scratch Cooking

 July I did an experiment...or as Gramma would have called it...did nothing at all.

Nowadays cooking everything I ate from scratch ingredients myself for an entire month is not the norm.

By "ingredients" I mean no premixes (no "cake mix" "pancake mix" etc)flavored coffee, bag-o-salad,  prepped veggies from the store...whole veg and fruit YES, cut veg and fruit NO.

There were 2 exception meals.  I was invited to join friends in a meal made my a visitor from out of state.  They actually made almost everything from ingredients!  I had a few store bought pickles and some pimento stuffed olives.  The main dishes were bean soup from dry beans and chili with meat.  I had quite a bit of chili.  It was great!  I skipped the crackers and bread.

Fortunately I like making mustard so I had that as a condiment.  Along with all the flavored vinegars I make.  I needed to buy some kombucha from the folks who supply me with kombucha vinegar for free.  SO...I re-brewed the kombucha with berries and mango skins.  It re-fermented and we called it good. 

The other exception meal was a pre-committed meal at a work event my department was hosting.  It would be odd to cater a meal and refuse to eat it!  We catered in bbq pork sliders, raw veggies with dip (they were cut and I ate them but I skipped the "ranch"...I hate "ranch" so that was an easy miss).  We also had some coleslaw and another salad.  No pastries or cookies which was a choice by someone else, though I validate it in general.  The sliders were good! 

I definitely appreciated the meals I didn't cook and clean up from more than usual.

It was easy.  I just needed to think through the next day at some point of an evening.  If I had a field day coming up,  I made sure I had a "grab n go" option ready for the morning.  Mostly this was nuts and whole fruit or clean whole veg.   A few times it was boiled eggs and salad in one of my thrifted tiffins (those metal multi-tiered lunch carriers popular in India).  It gets lots of use and even more this month!  One person traveling with me was so impressed he kept asking about the tiffin.  I had a spare, also thrifted, that I use very little so I gave it to him the next day. 

Salad in a mason jar with nuts and chia seeds for protein is another good option.

I've been doing my own salad dressings for years so that's easy.  Just throw vinegar and oil and whatever herbs/spices are handy, bit of fresh ground pepper.  A dollop of my homemade mustard if I'm feeling fancy.  I'm not much on sweetening them.  All about the savory salads.

Once the serviceberries were coming on, a handful of those went in pretty much everything. 

I am growing greens so actually went the whole month just eating my own greens.  The bugs destroyed all but one kind this week so greens options are getting a bit thin.  

For meat/eggs....lots of my friend's free range eggs that she lets me "u-pick" without washing or refrigerating.  I ran out late last week and got a bit creative over the weekend.  At work we had canned a goat and no one seemed to want it so I've been eating up the goat meat to free up the jars.  We also got free salmon at work and I took one, cleaned it and am keeping it in the work freezer (a tiny one).  I took a piece home now and then to thaw and cook.

I have a fishing license and could have made more use of that or any use, if things got thin.  I also have good sources of frozen, local free range meat at a couple of farmers markets.

On days I was home, or going to be home in the late afternoon rather than not until late evening, I set up my simple solar cooker so lunch or dinner would be ready.  Even used it for late morning coffee sometimes but that's normal.  A new favorite meal is solar cooked quinoa and lentils with dried tomato and some herbs and a handful of service berries.  When it is done cooking, I thrown on vinegar, oil, pepper and a bit of salt.

Normally I don't add salt because any food not prepped at home is incredibly SALTY which bloats me up like a tic,  My sodium intake was consistently low to the point that on hot sweaty days, I actually included some salt to compensate.

Another result: I saved a boatload of money!  Came in at about half my usual food spend, which is groceries and all meals out and coffee out. So that helps.  I've cut back on meals out, coffee out is rare now, but I do buy pre-made bread at farmers markets and etc.

One factor in the low food bill is that my serviceberry bushes were bonkers so I ate a TON and have 7 or 8 quarts in kombucha vinegar to keep for the off season.  Critters were eating the free potatoes I planted so I harvested those and ate them.  Then all the canning at work resulted in quite a bit of free protein.  I have had coffee in stock and got a gift of another pound of coffee so didn't need to even buy coffee beans.

Still...what I did buy is clearly cheaper than prepared food.  For example, today I restocked with some ingredients, keep the habits going, and spent:  20$ for 4doz eggs and 8.50$ for a weeks worth of veggies.  

I expect another 30$ this week to stock up my coffee, grains, and dry beans/lentils because those are all pretty tapped out. 

I learned that having nuts on hand keeps me from running to the store for fieldwork lunches when I have low supplies of grab-n-go food.   Nuts or seeds and an apple or orange can get me through a day.

There is likely more but I'm supposed to be focused on a webinar...

I Grew Free Potatoes!

 And it kind of worked!!  

In April I came across free potatoes and carrots at a thrift store in the region.  Some were pretty edible.  But, I figured if they were at all edible in April, probably store well or overwinter in the ground well so I planted some.

3 Carrots in the wee greenhouse...2 of them are putting out flowers for seed (carrots are bienniels..so the seed saver book tells me)

Maybe 10 potatoes with eyes in the ground on April 8.

The gophers or something have been murdering the potato plants and I'm low on veg at the house yesterday so I dug one or 2 plants (hard to tell when the little b*st*rd gopher things eat the tops off!) and got 2-3 lbs of nice red potatoes.  I left a few tiny ones in the ground.   

I had some for lunch today with the goat meat we canned at work a while back.  This had loco-lime spice mix on it, that was a gift...and DELICIOUS!!

My July experiment is cooking from ingredients everything I eat.  Whole raw fruit or veg is allowed...which will help with an all day meeting I need to go to  (and one person's bday dinner has been booked for this month since December so that would be a meal where I make an exception).
Getting free potatoes and having meat that I prepared in the past really helps.   

I got enough greens out of the garden for salad and topped it with some service berries I picked over the weekend and soaked in vinegar, finished it with a vinaigrette that I made.

Over all, a very "local" lunch and dinner.  Breakfast was eggs from a friend's hens so also very local.  Spices for the most part are from elsewhere.  Herbs mostly out of my garden.

Last time I tried to grow potatoes, I got less out of the ground than I put in...sort of like this years corn "crop" (is it a crop if the harvest weighs less than the seeds you planted?)  (perhaps an "anti-crop")

Giving up on 3 local restaurants

 For real!!!

My builder is at the place (YAY!!!) and the crew likes cinnamon rolls.  OK then.  I brought them cinnamon rolls on their first day back on the job.

So.  They needed 6 rolls.  I had to go to 2 places to get a total of 6.  That is fine.  2 from Restaurant G...um...they are OK.  Dry. Frozen and thawed out.  frosting on the side in a little plastic tub.  Meh.

Restaurant Z.  Those were really good.  Not too sweet. Moist.  1 frosted, others plain (which personally I prefer.  If you are hiding the roll under a giant pile of gunk, there must be a problem).  

Today, I tested Restaurant T as they are closer to my place.  Um.   BARF!!!!!!!   They heated up the roll in a microwave which makes the bottom BLAZING hot.  the rest was still frozen.  And the frosting was off brand shortening and powdered sugar.  PUKE!  I threw it out.  I asked for a non-warmed up roll and they said they couldn't because they were frozen.  They served it in a styrofoam container which I am pretty sure had been in the microwave too.  Double barf.   Nothing like the smell of hot cheap plastic to whet the appetite.  I tried a cookie as well.  You wouldn't think you could mess up a peanut butter cookie but alas...it tasted mostly like baking soda and shortening.  Maybe margarine but I'm pretty sure it was shortening.  Also threw that out. 

I am at work today, the weekend, making up a bit of time lost to the construction and didn't remember lunch so ordered "to go" from Restaurant G.  Well, 2 out of the 3 items I ordered were in the bag.  I give up.

Which is fine.  I was going to see if I could do all of July cooking from scratch, minus 2 events that are already booked and a possible birthday dinner with a friend that is pending a date.  No "to go" meals or "I can't be bothered" unplanned outings.  Not even treats from the farmers market.   So, probably good that the restaurants are letting me down.  I won't miss them.

Certainly the value for money isn't there other than bringing the builders treats and getting them to keep showing up.

ACTUAL Caveperson Food...Kind Of

 Remains of a cooked meal or two or actually several, has/have been found from neanderthal times. While neanderthals are not cavemen, or even cavepeople, still, you know what I mean.

I'm basing this off the report in the Guardian

Oldest cooked leftovers ever found suggest Neanderthals were foodies

 Cool.   They weren't "foodies."  It's more that western academics think everyone remotely different or from any time in the past is a stupid savage stuffing grass and bloody meat with skin and hair on it down their gullets.   

Turns out...DRUM ROLL...      WRONG!

 Anyway, the upshot is, these neanderthals from various eras and epochs were mixing and processing ingredients and cooking them before eating.   Not news to most of the planet but still, fun to hear about for me... a recovering academic.

The food find was a mix of pulses, mustard type seeds, a grass seed (read "grain"), and some nuts.  These were most likely mixed, soaked, then pounded or ground up a bit.   Then formed into a patty type shape and cooked on a hot rock.

I had lying around the wee shed, lentils (a pulse), mustard seeds (duh), cracked wheat (a grain) and some chopped walnuts.  So, I mixed equal parts lentils, wheat and nuts, and a bit of mustard seed and soaked it overnight. 

In the morning, I ground it up a little in my way to small for this job mortar and pestle, pattied it, and cooked it inside the wood stove on a preheated tiny cast iron skillet (got that at goodwill...probably part of some cookie kit nonsense).   

It was really good!  Tasted great.  The outside got a bit dry and crusty and did not stick to the pan even though I did not grease it (there was residual grease likely but not much as it didn't smoke or smell of burned grease).  I used green lentils with the skins on.   The pulses in the ancient food bits had the hulls on. I did drain off a little of the soak water but not enough to get rid of all tannins.

The toasty nutty spicy flavor and slightly crunchy outside with still soft inside was just really nice.  I'm going to make it again...and will make or get a bigger grinding stole.  It was a tad messy but I think I can get the hang of it with a couple of tries.

Not sure how long I cooked it.  I put it in and got on with my yoga and making coffee and things (by the way, it went well with strong coffee).  At least 15 minutes.  The inside of the wood stove was probably about 400F based on how long I cared to have my hand in there.

The walnuts were likely the least authentic item.  Almonds or pistachios would be more like nuts used in the samples found.  But, I wasn't going to drive to town for an almond or pistachio.  Used what I had...which was an authentic approach I believe.  

 

I didn't take pictures but next time...must do that.

 

Grocery Debacle

 I'm fine-tuning the budget.  As one does when prices go up.

Beyond tracking my grocery budget, which is at or below the "thrifty" level of the USDA food cost thingy. 

https://fns-prod.azureedge.us/sites/default/files/media/file/CostofFoodSep2022Thrifty.pdf

For one old chick: 51-70 years $51.30/week  $222.50/month.

I thought I could do better.  I have in the past.  

So, I did a couple of things.

In the grocery budget, I made a subheading for spending called "crap" meaning candy, industrial kombucha, sugary treats at the farmers market.  Stuff I can live without or make myself.   

In October the "crap" category was about 27% of the spending!  That's about 50$ last month of my actual spend at the grocery store and farmers market.  Without that 50$ of crap, I had plenty of nutrition and calories and variety.   If I repurpose even 1/2 that amount into DIY treats or some local meat that will be a better option.  Cooking treats at home with the honey/cocoa/etc I have in stock is not "crap", for the record.

We'll see if I manage that this month.  The only trip to a grocery store this month I spent 3$ on crap!  Granted, it was a good deal for what I got, really high quality dark chocolate, but I did not need it.  Damn that discount grocery store.

Incidental Frugality

 I'm doing a month of "no industrial bread type products" as a diet experiment.  I do like my diet experiments...this one did NOT result in intestinal distress.   Suddenly-Keto...that one went bad on me. Oops!

Anyway, this month has been no industrially produced bread, wraps, tortillas, chips, pasta, etc.  No carby things from big factories.  I am buying a bit of bread and maybe a 1x per week sugary treat from local bakers at a farmers market.  As a result, the salt and the processed food are way lower.

As a side effect...my grocery costs are WAY down.

The grainy-carby things I have at home are whole dried hominy and chicos (corn stuff) from a past trip to Santa Fe, some wheat berries (the stuff that comes off the wheat plant before it is ground up into flour), and I recently added some millet because it was cheap and I wanted to try it.

I've been canning dry black beans with the hominy and/or chicos.  EXCELLENT!  It takes the same amount of time and butane to can 4 pints of beans an corn as it would to cook a meal's worth.  I end up with 4 instant meals.  So far I haven't even heated them up.  Just eaten right out of the jar.  I may try it with wheat berries too.  

Lots of lentils with wheat berries.  Cook up in about 30 min and then I take it to work the next day.

Breakfasts have been eggs.  Lately with grated carrot or kohlrabi thrown in and fried up together into sort of a hash thing.   Good.  

I bought a grain mill, manual and small, from thrift a while back and busted that out a couple of days ago.  Turned wheat berries into course whole wheat flour (it's not a great mill but it works and was cheapish).  I added some to a breakfast carrot hash and it made it into more of a fritter.  Then I mixed the rest up like a biscuit dough and slow fried it over a very low flame.  Brought it to work and it was a fine biscuit if a bit heavy.  I'll get better.

The possible downside...is...well...ENORMOUS amounts of fiber.  This is healthy.  And gassy.  Win win??  Not for my colleagues.  But I'm not hungry all the time.

It's making me eat mostly what I cook.  Think before going to a restaurant because there is crappy industrial bread everywhere.  And it's making me really appreciate the local bread makers, especially my favorite guy with his long ferment sourdoughs.  I'm only buying a bit since even artisanal bread is super salty. 

The few times I've eaten at restaurants I've gotten in the habit of going for salad, no croutons.  Then just ignoring any rolls or bread on the side.  Mostly it makes me think before I even go to a restaurant.   A brunch meeting for work was ok. I picked the veggie omelette and skipped the biscuit (those are usually gross anyway).  

My grocery bill is coming in on budget so far and I'd lowered the budget considerably to make room for the increased gas costs.

Good Lord! Food Costs!!!

 So I went in a regular grocery store for the first time in ages.  

And HOLY COW!   $9.19 for a 42oz (not even 4lbs) of quaker rolled oats.

I was going to drop some $$ for the tiny food pantry but not those $$.

Instead, I went to Winco, an employee owned chain with better prices.  Got bulk rolled oats for 1$/lb.  WAY better than those quakers at about $3.5/lb. 

What if I a) didn't have a decent income and b) didn't have access to multiple grocery options c) didn't have transportation to said stores???

I'd have to pay whatever was charged and apparently go broke.  Criminitly.

And watch those quantities on your food containers, and other packaging, for this nutso shrinkflation.  The container appeared to be the same size as the old 4lb one, which I also would not pay that much for, but must have had empty space.  I'm not spending my money to check the empty space quantity.

My weekly exercise of reviewing the grocery store flyers I can't seem to prevent from jamming my mailbox (my actual physical one) to see what I would be eating using the "dollar a pound all year round" guideline.  It can still be done.  If one had a freezer, and power and etc to keep it going, one could save a boatload stocking up on loss leader sales of meat (mostly chicken parts and pork) when it hits 1$ or less per lb.  There is usually basic veg (potatoes, onions, carrots) for that.  And a bit of fruit.  I also know that NOT in the flyer are the regular things like bananas that are generally under the price guideline and past-the prime fruit and veg at good prices.  The "reduced for quicksale meat also often hits that.

You have to work for it, but it can be done if you have some infrastructure.

Canned beans are close most weeks, dry beans usually, and given that they cook up to 2x the dry quantity, are always a better deal than canned (also no salt on the dry ones...) if you have a cooking method available.

Anyway, I'm sorry to those with fewer options, in food deserts, and in urban areas without decent stores and transportation. I will be seeing if my donating or activisming could address the issue in some small way.

Saladify July

 I like my monthly themes even when I fail at them a bit.

This month is salad every day.  Yesterday, I had 2.

I don't like to cook a ton in the summer in the wee shed because it heats up.

Alas this summer, the weather is working against solar cooking most days I am home.  The garden is late but greens are coming on.   This morning I spent about 2 minutes picking some greens including wild greens like clover and golden rod.  FYI: old mature golden rod leaves are TOUGH.  I got tired of chewing.  I threw in some catmint (really mild mint), walking onion leaf, and good king henry leaves from the raised bed.  2 minutes.  Easy. 

I had left over dressing from a trip to the Edgy Veggie salad truck yesterday (those salads are big and good...and no more costly than any other lunch out).  A friend with me went to a cheese steak food truck.  They are delicious, but we were on the way to give a talk in the heat outside...salad worked better.  I wasn't bogged down with half a pound of salty meat.

Anyway, it's going fine.  Need to pick younger wild greens or get stronger jaw muscles though!

So Much for May

 I didn't do "anti-inflammatory may" hence I am puffy and inflamed.

I need an alliterative month name as a motivator, apparently.

JUNKLESS JUNE awaits!  No crap.  Like no industrial candy bars, crappy cookies/brownies, white bread even on free sandwiches (a weak point this month).

Good whole food cooked in small batches are peachy.  Also expensive or time consuming which helps keep limits on it.

Anti-Inflammatory April: The Final Count Down

 Getting close to the end and all is well.

The toe that has the stiffness and inflammation is coming along, but will need work for much longer.

The arthritis in the knee is OK most days, as opposed to annoying most days.

I think I've had 1/2 of a chocolate chip cookie in the last week as a bauble, otherwise, totally on track.

It is a decent way to eat.  I put some stevia herb, not the refined stuff, on the steamed squash I had with breakfast and it tastes sweet.  When I am on sugar/corn-syrup, it tastes bitter.  So the tastebuds must have adjusted.

I have a field trip at work tomorrow but I am bringing whole fruit, peanuts (low or no salt one hopes...will depend on availability) and sandwich fixings for people.   Also cookies and brownies because others will want them.   I can use the lettuce to make a wrap which should work fine.  The others can use the bread.

Remembering to bring stuff on field trips has been one minor issue.   Turns out a bag of salt-free peanuts and an apple are available almost anywhere you stop.  

I still have duck meat, but have been eating lots of eggs because the chickens are laying plenty.  And more gelatine.  Using up a bottle of pure cranberry juice, unsweetened, in the "jello" made with the organic free range gelatine.  Since I'm off sugar, it tastes fine.  Straight cranberry juice is too tart/bitter when I've just had super sweet stuff.

ALSO:  Loving home made popcorn over the wood stove in my little vintage popcorn popper.  It works over the butane burner as well.  1/8 or 1/4 cup of kernels popped in coconut oil is a decent dinner side or snack.  Organic popcorn of course.  Especially good with smoked paprika on it.

The maker is like this:

Apparently getting it for 2-3$ at thrift was a good deal.  It hadn't been used so is in better shape than the one in the picture.  And it makes nice popcorn, BUT...the oil spits out the screen top all over heck while popping so I hold a sheet of paper over it gently, trying not to burn my fingers, while shaking it etc.  It works.  Then the paper goes in the fire-starter scrap paper area after I use it to soak up any extra oil left in the popper.

I'd forgotten how good real, oil popped, popcorn was. I've been airpopping and dry-popping in the microwave.  Those are fine, but bland.   

Eating whole foods also means the calories in the popcorn and oil are not an issue.

This is boring, but it works.  And it is CHEAP to eat whole food.

The apple and peanuts snack on the road was $1.20 or so.  In a gas station one is pressed to get a candy bar for that.  I could have skipped it and not eaten, but figured finding things that work is also good.

So far this month I've eaten mostly pantry food and freebies from friends and a couple of meals out.  Grocery spend this month is currently 49$. 

With a work field trip tomorrow, lunch provided (I'm the shopper so I know I will have stuff that works), that's another meal filled in.   

Enough of this.  Back to work!!

Anti-Inflammatory Update 3: The Minor Sugar Intake

 Still sticking with the anti-inflammatory April as I define it.  No sugar, no refined carbs.  Bit of organic whole wheat flour, plenty of veggies, eggs, and whatnot.

It is going well.  My owie toe is getting mobility back. I have no idea if it would have gotten better at this rate without the diet, but I had been working on it for 2 months before this and only made a little progress.  I COULD drop a log on the same toe on the other foot and start eating crap to see how long it takes that to get better, but I'm not going to.  

LOTS of potatoes this week because that is what I have and they are getting soft so have to eat it up. Also, carrots and onions.  I'm eating nearly an onion a day and lots of soups.  Soups are easy and tasty...NOT NEWS on that.  Mostly boiling the diced onion directly in the water rather than frying it, as noted before, because I do not want every thing I own to stink of fried onion.

I'll have garlic for next week if I run out of onions.

It is easier to keep salt intake low when one cooks for one's self.

And, as with previous food experiments, it is making more creative.  You can do lots of things with a potato.

As I run out of potatoes and the quinoa is getting low, I've started adding in a bit of whole wheat flour doing countertop dough, because I do not have a fridge.  I add dried yeast bought YEARS ago, that dry stuff cheap by the pound, to some whole wheat organic flour.  Then add water (no salt, keeping sodium low) and leave it at least over night.

When it came time to bake the first try at the dough, I greased up the tiny skillet (from thrift, obviously) formerly probably in a cookie kit gift thingy, and put the dough on it and stuck it inside the wood stove.  That worked great!  I spun it around after a while, because one side was toward the coals, then flipped it when the top was pretty brown.   It was good!  Bland because no salt so I will probably try putting herbs or spices in it eventually.  Or fermenting it longer.  I have vital wheat gluten to boost the protein etc and have used that a time or two.

Eggs...buttloads of eggs are being consumed.  4 today.  The hens are laying so free range pastured eggs are available to me.  And delicious.   Boiled, fried, scrambled.  Not poached or soft boiled because that is GROSS.  Also did some muffins at work in the toaster oven with a bit of that flour in some eggs with some olive oil and service berries stored in vinegar all winter.   Service berries have also gone in some gelatin, unflavored organic beef gelatin.

I'm out of lentils, garbanzos and peruana beans.  Down to split green peas and working on learning to cook those.  They are fine.  Will probably do a pea and quinoa pilaf next week when the taters have run out.  

Yes, I could buy more potatoes or whatever but I want to do a clear out on my stored food before the farmers markets start up in May.  

Eggs with the anti-inflammatory spice mix has been most breakfasts.  A few I just put in a lot of cocoa powder.  Also good!  2T of either of those with 2 eggs beaten in makes more or less a pancake whether fried or microwaved in a bowl.

As for new recipes...other than the woodstove firebox baked bread, nothing new and there only the location of the baking was new.

If I come up with a good way to make green peas, I will share.

That is all pretty boring!  But, it's going well.

So...the minor sugar intake.  Yesterday a long time friend and colleague defended her PhD Dissertation via zoom and in person, I was in person.  She had made cookies and zucchini or something bread.  I went with 2 reasonably sized cookies.  I meant to take one, but maybe muscle memory defeated me??

Anyway, less than 40 carbs/sugars and under 40 sods based on the recipe she seems to have used.  Very good.

I've run out of some teas (like that rooibos from Paris...sigh) which motivated me to use up the nettle and other herbal tea supply, or start on it.  The nettles are a diuretic so the first day drinking that I got extra steps in running to the turlet.  But my cankles looked great!

Even with a bit of sugar yesterday, I am not having cravings today which is good.  

I've also managed 2 lunches out without blowing it.  Going to a restaurant that specializes in locally sourced ingredients and has healthy salad and soup options, then skipping the bread (salty even if local and organic flour is used and I have the salt issue...thanks old age!)

Not bad over all.

 

Anti-Inflammatory April Update 2: Cauliflower Stem Soup Recipe

 So, it's going really well.  Guts are sorting themselves out.  Arthritis less annoying, still there, I mean, it's not a miracle cure but I did a whole workout at the gym with weights this morning without thinking about my arthritic knee or my owie toe (pro tip--do NOT drop logs on the joint between your big toe and your foot and then ignore it because it doesn't bruise.  Damaged all the tendons/ligaments which froze up and now I'm like 3 months in to trying to get the mobility back to what it was.).  The toe mobility is coming along, I suspect the lower inflammation level is helping.  Maybe it is placebo effect and I don't care.

Also, not as itchy.  I have the driest skin on the planet according to a healthcare provider and it is often itchy.  Less so now.

I've made my own chocolate treats like mochas with dehydrated coconut milk powder, just coconut bits, home brewed coffee (drinking 1/2 as much as before...2 cups per day rather than 4), and cocoa powder.  No sweetener.  It's quite good.  So that helps with the skipping candy bars at the store even when on super sale.  I stocked up on cocoa powder just for this.

The chickens are laying well now so eating more eggs.  Some people find them inflammatory but I seem to do fine on them.

Eating a tiny bit of whole wheat organic flour.  About a cup a week cooked into things like chocolate service berry bannock made with no-sodium baking soda or no-sodium baking powder.  I have a bit of vanilla extract, organic real stuff, if I want to kick it up but so far haven't bothered.

Having banana eggs or just eggs and anti-inflammatory spice mix for breakfast most days.  

To support my good diet, I'm buying more produce, while keeping it frugal.   Last Saturday I had to be in town for a thing so I combined that with my grocery run and laundry duties to minimize trips.   

I got organic purple and green cauliflower heads, one each, for $1.50 each!  Since they each weighed over 1.5lbs, I hit my "Dollar a pound all year round" (that's a Jeff Yeager guideline for saving $$ on groceries...buy what is cheap and use it all).

I made a critical error when cooking up the first head, the green cauliflower.  I cut out the stem and leaves and put it in the chicken bucket (a pan that holds food scraps that the chickens can eat...then I add water and let it cook on the wood stove if that stove is going, because chickens don't eat raw onions).  OOPS!  I Don't keep that pan clean enough for human consumption of contents so...darn it!

I had forgotten that the stems are fine diced up small and put in soup or mashed potatoes or whatever!  Even fried up.  Same with the leaves and the ribs from the leaves!  It was like 1/2 the weight of the cauliflower.  

SO, yesterday I had the purple cauliflower florets for lunch with some boiled eggs and a dressing made from the dregs of fancy mustard, vinegar and olive oil.  It was good.  

I KEPT the stem and leaves in a bag and took them home.  Last night I diced them up into a pan.  There was about 1.5 cups of usable food.  The chickens just got those dry hard nubbins from where there were cuts/trims.  I added water, a chopped onion, a couple of carrots (saved the top bits to regrow the greens in little cups of water because that is fun and carrot tops are my go-to version of parsley), a 1/4 cup of dry green split peas.  This is my first attempt at cooking split peas. Seasonings: marjoram, thyme, fennel (the stuff I have the most of...that's how I chose)  We'll see at lunch today how it is.

Brought it to a boil and simmered it until I got sick of simmering it.  No, I did not fry the onion. I could have but then everything I own stinks of fried onion. It's in a jar in the work fridge.  Most of it.  There was like 3/4 of a cup of soup that would not fit in the jar so that's at the house (which was 34degs F when I lift this morning, basically the whole place is a fridge today) waiting to become tomato soup tonight.  I'll add more water and a can of (low sodium) tomato paste.  Again, tomatoes inflammatory to some but I do well on them.  That usually makes a decent tomato soup.  Pepper and vinegar can fix most crappy soups.

Lesson:  cook up the stems.  If you want, you can peel them.  The peel is usually the hard, fibrous, bitter part.  ALSO full of vitamins and whatnot.  I left it on this time.  Of course I wash my veg too.  If I don't care for the skin in this soup, I might leave it out next time.

My groceries, being INGREDIENTS and PRODUCE was cheap!  I threw in some probiotics which were on a rare 20% off sale and might encourage the guts to improve.  My Dr. (jesus I'm old...I still BLOG and I quote my Dr...) approves of them.  Also stocked up on the powdered coconut milk.  It was on the same 20% off sale and I don't tend to binge use it if I stock up.  Unlike nuts and dried fruit...I don't dare have a back stock of nuts, nut butter or dried fruit because apparently that is my kryptonite.  I just eat the entire stock way to fast and throw my guts out of whack.  

Groceries, for 2 weeks plus some restocking, was about 27$.  That is being used with my pantry staples like the flour, cocoa, coffee, tea, and fresh eggs.  I spend about an hour in the evening making something for the next few days lunches if need be.  That keeps me from spending that evening sitting in a chair spiraling down a youtube rat hole.  And of course it saves me running to the store for something for those lunches which happened now and then before.