Lunch today.

Today we cleaned out the refrigerator. Ed got an odd. I got an end. The kids divvied up the middlins.

Cost: 1 minute and 40 seconds of microwave reheating. Also time invested in deciding who gets what.

Payback: The creative part of your brain gets a gold star. The delayed gratification part of your brain will get a gold star……on Friday when you go to the store and have enough money left in the budget to buy a nice end of the month splurge.

Bon Appetit!

That creamy sauce.

Every home-ec student of yore learned how to make white sauce. Chefs learn how to make bechamel sauce. The rest of us typically run to the store and buy a .99 can of Cream of Blech soup, the low fat version. But good heavens! Have you read what’s in the can? I’ve been delivered from Cream of Blech soup. Please let me deliver you from being a slave to the fake soup aisle.

White Sauce/Bechamel Sauce:
While your 12 ounces of pasta is bubbling on the stove, get out a saucepan.
Heat 3 tablespoons of real butter and while you are watching your butter glisten, heat up 2 cups of milk. Any kind of milk will do. If you need Timmy to milk the cow, you might want to start that before you start the pasta.
Your butter is melty–now stir in 3 tablespoons of flour and just stir long enough to thicken. You won’t be browning this flour. Pour in your hot milk and whisk. Cook until your sauce thickens.  I’ve found that using hot milk keeps the sauce from tasting gritty or lumpy. Add salt and pepper to taste. I love to add fresh herbs as well and just as it is finishing, a clove of freshly minced garlic. I’ve also added cheeses at this stage.
Drain pasta, pour back into the pot or into a big bowl. Pour your thickened sauce over the top and stir.

The bottom line:

Here is what you spend, here is what you save:
Cream of X Soup:  Open and go anywhere from .99 to $1.50. For that price you get the ready made convenience of dumping the contents directly into the pasta pot. You still have the  expense of adding in milk and cheese. You also take into your body all of the unpronounceable ingredients from the BPA lined can. Don’t forget the teensy hassle of rinsing out the can and putting it in the recycle bucket or the guilt of knowing that you just made the landfills one can taller.

White sauce: +1 on the hassle factor. Yes, you have to wash an additional pan. But here is what you get in return: 1) Most likely, you have butter, flour and milk on hand, so you are just minutes away from a smooth creamy white sauce. No need to run to the store to buy Cream of Mushroom soup and American cheese slices. 2) You know what you are eating. 3) Three tablespoons of butter is $ .38, three tablespoons of flour is $ .08 and 2 cups of milk will run you about $ .50. Have your second grader do the math on that one.  4) You can sing, “I’ve Got The Power,” as you whip up a pasta dish from scratch.

My kids beg for this pasta.  They love it. 

It all began with Cream of Blech Soup.

It’s been a long time since I’ve written.
But I have been cooking, cooking, cooking, and cooking.
I stand at my stove, watch the pot bubble and think about the things I am so excited to share.
A nation blinded by full-color marketing needs to know that Cream of Blech soup is not a staple. It’s not necessary. And moreover, you and I both know it doesn’t even taste good.
You can have marinara sauce without corn syrup and soy bean oil–if you make it yourself.
Good, healthy food is affordable. If you like beans.
Cookbooks are free at the library.
Cooking = Adventure.

Recipes, cook book reviews, food mishaps and laughs will be served up shortly.

Spoonbread: glorious humility.

Occasionally I find myself standing in front of a pantry that I think looks scary empty; it feels like I am in a dark pit with giant spiders chasing me, all squealing for snack, supper, sustenance. In my weakest moments, I throw up my hands and trudge off to the store to find a quick fix.  In braver moments I pause and think.  And think.  And pray.  Surely the one who invented the idea of food can help me:  a  light in a dark pantry.

The truth dawns on me that the pantry is not empty.  I have flour.  I have milk.  I have the ingredients to make baking powder even if I don’t have baking powder.  I have any number of basic ingredients to make lovely food.  Crepes.  Biscuits.  Silver dollar pancakes.  Homemade syrup.  Spoonbread.  Suddenly I find that we are not desperately out of food, rather, I was just out of fresh ideas.

I give you spoonbread.  Glorious humility.

Andrea’s Spoonread

2 c. milk

2/3 c. yellow cornmeal

1 T. unsalted butter

1 t. salt

4 eggs separated.

Separate eggs and whip the whites until they form peaks.  Gently beat the yolks and set aside. Combine milk, cornmeal, salt and butter in a 3 qt. saucepan.  Whisk over medium to medium low heat until the mixture begins to bubble and then thicken.  Remove from heat and stir in egg yolks.  Sitr the egg whites into the mix.  You can gently fold them in, but I prefer to have them actually mixed in a bit so that I don’t get a big bite of egg.  Pour mixture into a buttered casserole dish, about 9 inches round.  Bake at 425 for 20-22 minutes, until golden and puffy.  Serve immediately.

NOTE:  I also enjoy adding corn to this recipe.  During cooking time, just add 1 to 1 1 /2 c. tasty sweet corn (fresh, frozen, or as a last resort, canned.)   You can find other spoonbread recipes online:  Gourmet.com and Martha Stewart have  great suggestions.  Steer clear of the spoonbread recipes with jiffy corn bread mix and sour cream–tasty though they may be, they really aren’t spoonbread.  Give the authentic southern version a go first.   

Friends Don’t Let Friends Drive-Thru.

Supper comes everyday.

I know this.

Small children must eat every 2 hours and 47 minutes.

I know this.

Afterschool sporting events run late and make it difficult to shop for food, cook a healthy supper, and feed little (and big) people before they melt down into a hysterical tantrum.

I know this.

But I don’t always prepare, and so I find myself sending the troops into “It’s Hot and Waiting For You Pizza Joint.”  We order our favorite salty preserved meat pizzas and start licking our lips for our other favorite, “naturally” butter flavored breadsticks.  I walk next door to Food Emporium to pick up salad and leave with salad…and strawberries, and eggs for breakfast, and a 2 liter bottle of root beer.

$17.54

+ 14.72

__________________

= bacon and corn syrup euphoria

(comes free with morning-after re-budgeting)

Oh, honey, red beans and rice!

Let’s kick it!  One of my favorite dinner parties ever was a big group of friends huddled around our table all sharing a giant pot of red beans and rice.  I think it’s the subtle red pepper flavor that warms me up and makes me want to come back for more.

Soak up your red beans the night before.

FIll up a big pot with 6 c. water and the red beans.  Add 1 or 2 c. chopped onion, 3 cloves garlic, minced, 2 bay leaves, and 1/2 t. to 3/4 t. red peppers.  Simmer your beans for a couple hours, checking to see if you need water.  Here’s the tricky part:  you want the beans to cook down with a lovely thick “bean gravy.” You’re not aiming for soup.  Ideally you want to be able to serve your red beans on rice without needing to drain off water.  I cook my beans until they are tender and then, if I so choose, I add meat.  We like to use a ButterBall turkey sausage, sliced.  For you onion phobes out there, rest assured that 3 hours of cooking tenderizes onions into a fabulously flavorful but unidentifiable character.  You’ll never find them.

I don’t cook beans with salt or salty meat because I’ve learned that salt makes beans tough.  I just add my salt at the end.

Honestly, red beans have a great flavor.  I don’t think they need ham, sausage, or pork hocks.  Pork is expensive, so I just try to leave it on the shelf for Congress.

Here’s the cost:

1 bag red beans: $1.40

1 or 2 onions: $1.00 (at the most!)

garlic:  .30

bay leaves: oh for Pete’s sake, I have no idea.  I have a giant container I keep on the top shelf.

ground red pepper:  FREE if you save two packets from the next time you order out pizza

a sausage, if you must: $3.50.

rice:  .75

TOTAL:  $6.95    A budget deal!  Somebody call the Treasury Secretary.  I’m giving away an economic recovery recipe.

Frittata, eat a lotta.

The hobbits were keeping me hoppin’ in the kitchen every morning asking for second and third breakfasts.  It seems that the usual dose of breakfast cereal and milk wore off by about 8:30 and I was faced with loved ones pleading for another helping of quick sugar.  The sugar grumpies’ culprit:  frosted shredded wheat.  The solution: a balanced breakfast high in protein!

Sausage is expensive.  Eggs are cheaper.  Eggs are really cheap if I buy the ordinary eggs.  The other eggs, the tasty eggs with beautiful golden yolks, laid by happy cage free chickens, are triple the price. I will leave you to sort out your own personal budget-to-conscience ratio.

I was left with the dilemma of finding new ways to cook eggs.  For feeding a crowd, as indeed I am raising, I have learned about the frittata.  I’m going to give you a picture, but let you hunt the web for a recipe that suits you.  Let me just rouse your curiosity with a description.  I saute veggies in our big cast iron skillet, pour over top a dozen well beaten eggs, then gently stir in our favorite cheese.  It cooks till the bottom half sets up and then I place the skillet under the oven broiler.  Oh, the eggs puff up light and fluffy, the top browns nicely, and presto! in just a few minutes breakfast (or supper) is ready.

The cost:  1 dozen eggs, cheese, veggies:  it all depends on what you pick!  This can be a budget meal, OR a gourmet extravaganza with boutique cheeses, organic red pepper and asparagus, and a pound of prosciutto.

The budget version is $1 for eggs, $1.50 for cheese, .50 onion, $2.00 for some other colorful veggie.  $5.00 total!  Add $3.00 for a fruit side and it comes under the Low Budget cut-off.

Black bean and sweet potato quesadillas

The kids love these!  Sweet potatoes and black beans are best buddies, I think.

We’ve been eating and enjoying the combo for a long time now, but the idea to turn it into a quesadilla came from a cookbook that a friend gave me—–”Simply in Season.” I’ve modified it with the low-budget knife and traded out the dripping boiled sweet potatoes for my roasted style.

About 4:00, I turn the oven on to 425 degrees.  I stab a few sweet potatoes with a knife, place them on a baking sheet.  They will bake until they pinch softly when I pick them up with tongs.  Obviously, the smaller potatoes cook up faster than the really big ones.  When they are done (sometime between 5:00 and 5:15), I cut them lengthwise with a knife to let the steam escape. When they’ve cooled at bit, I scoop the flesh into a bowl and mash.

About 5:00, I will make the tortillas–you can find that recipe  on my blog, but I won’t repeat it here now.  When I use thomemade tortillas for quesadillas, I will gently cook one side of the tortilla, flip it, then on the cooked side I will spread the topping.  I sandwich all that with another tortilla I’ve been cooking on another burner.  Obviously, store-bought tortillas save time and energy.  I try to make tortillas because I get to pick wholesome ingredients (whole wheat flour and olive oil) AND save the budget.  Tasty and inexpensive they are.

Heat a heavy skillet.  Spoon the mashed sweet potatoes onto the tortilla, top with a spoonful of black beans (drained from the can).  Top with your favorite cheese and another tortilla.  Cook for a bit, then carefully flip.   Transfer to a cutting board and cut into wedges.  Last time I made these I was in a hurry, so I just baked my “tortilla pies” in the oven.

Serve with sour cream and salsa.

Here’s the budget bottom line:

Homemade tortillas:   .48 for flour and .60 for olive oil and throw in some baking powder and salt = $1.15

Sweet potatoes: 3 lbs. @ .88 = $2.64

Couple cans of my black beans of choice:  ”Ranch Style Black Beans”: $1.60

Cheese: $1.50

Condiments: $1.00

So far, we’re at almost $8.00.  Adding in a vegetable side will add about $2.00 if I make a salad or cook up a couple bags of frozen vegetables.  It looks like this meal ISN”T one of my uber-low budget busters (which by my own definition is $1.00 per person or less), but I still think feeding a family of 8 for $10.00 isn’t bad.  I’m still filing this one under budget meals.

And now for a link to the good folks at “Simply in Season” — http://www.worldcommunitycookbook.org/

Tomato Pie. Serious Southern.

I highly recommend moving to the south and having a baby in July or August.  With any luck, your gracious neighbor will stand in a hot kitchen all afternoon, pouring her love into a fresh-out-of-the garden tomato pie.  It may not cure sleep deprivation or PPD, but the tears you cry will be tears of happy fat rapturous joy.

I give you:  The tomato pie. Oh mercy, the photo is bad.  Bad. But that is ONE HOT PIE.

At this point, you can google Paula Deen and see how she makes it.  You could also keep reading and take a chance on my version. Keep in mind that I only make this once a year—-just after someone loads me up with fresh garden tomatoes.  We enjoy it so much that there is usually  a small loving squabble over the last piece.***  We serve our “pie” with a summer meal of black eyed peas (or purple hulls!), greens, fresh sliced cucumbers, fresh green beans, hot sweet corn, or any other garden produce we can lay hands on.

Prepare a pie crust and prebake.  For heaven’s sake, don’t use shortening.  The trans fats will kill you.

Peel and slice several fresh tomatoes–probably about 4. Place tomatoes in a colander to drain.

Chop 10-15 fresh basil leaves if you can get some.  Set aside.  Otherwise, you can use about 1-2 t. of dried basil.

Slice a big sweet onion and carmelize in a big skillet.  Set aside.

Meanwhile, stir up 1 cup MAYO with 1 1/2c. monterey jack cheese.  Don’t even think about using low fat stuff.

Now you are ready to layer your pie.

Place a layer of tomatoes on the bottom of your prebaked crust.  Top with a smothering spoonful of the mayo/cheese mixture.  Top this with a sprinkling of basil, salt and pepper if you like, and carmelized onions.

Start another layer of tomatoes and repeat with the mayo mixture, basil, spices, and onion.

Repeat again if you have enough tomatoes–After you have ended with your last layer of basil and onions, top with a generous helping of monterey jack cheese and freshly grated parmesan.

Bake in the oven at 350 until the pie is a bubbling mass of ooey goodness.  Maybe 30 minutes?  Maybe more? ( I don’t know your oven.  Mine is slower than a kid assigned to yard clean up duty.)

Blessings on your pie.

*** We all enjoy it but that one child.    Next summer, can I send that one child over to your house to eat hot dogs while we enjoy tomato pie?  Tomato Pie is so much better if someone isn’t weeping while you eat it.  We do want that one child back though, because we love her!

solace in gummy bears

The list:

cheap hot dogs, cheap buns, cheap marshmallows, cheap fake BBQ chips, cheap graham crackers, cheap marshmallows, 2 real Hershey’s bars.

The reason:

I’m getting a little tired of this nauseous shocked sadness.  The people cry to me that they must eat and so I stand in the kitchen and stare into the pantry.  Lentils look back at me with their boring, healthy, regular, 40 minutes to cook faces.  I cannot cook you today, I think.  If I cooked you today, that would mean everything was alright.  It would mean I have the emotional energy to meal-plan.  It would mean that I care enough about next week to want to fix decent food today.

So, instead, I think about the comforting easy saltiness of processed cheese food powder poured over dead pasta.  I think about the tangy burst of high fructose corn syrup wrapped up with love in the arms of  gummy bears.  Yes, and fill up my constant blue cup with hot, black coffee.  What else do I need besides coffee and gummy bears?  Do the kids need something besides mac ‘n cheese?

Well, the lentils will still be there after the processed-food fetish wanes.  But today, friends, I pass the chips and roast the mallow.

Cheers.