How can I eat Paleo/Primal on a budget?

This is the question that everyone I know has been asking me lately.  I get it, you guys. The kind of meat and veg we think is best to eat is more expensive than their conventional counterparts.  I have a family of four (soon to be five!), a part-time job at a non-profit, and my husband is a public school teacher.  We don’t have money coming out of our ears, at all.  But, I’ll begin with the phrase that has become a sort of mantra for me, when it comes to this issue:

If your health, and that of your family, is not important enough to spend your money on, what is?  Food is fuel for your body.  If you put crap (pesticides, additives, preservatives, grains, sugar) in your tank, you will get crap (illness, fatigue, skin conditions, headaches) as your output.  

So, assuming this fact as our guiding principle, let us begin.  I have some practical suggestions to help you, some of which relate directly to saving money, and some indirectly related.

Things you can do asap to make a difference in your wallet:

1.  Invest in a separate deep freezer.  This might not make sense right off the bat, but if you invest some hard-earned savings in a deep freezer, you will be able to buy your meat in bulk- as an example, the grassfed beef I buy from Hedgeapple costs $5.95 per pound.  When I buy the 21-pound box, though, the price per pound drops to about $4.25 per pound.  My other source for grassfed meats, US Wellness, also gives quantity discounts.  You can take full advantage of sales when you have somewhere to store all that meat.

The second advantage to having a deep freezer is that it allows you to be able to create your own “convenience” foods.  We all have busy schedules, at least at some point or another.  If you’ve got a place to put them, it’s easy to make double your dinner for foods that freeze well (meatloaf, meatballs, stews, soups) so that you’ve got something to pull out on a busy evening, rather than stopping somewhere for bun-less burgers or Chipotle.  You can also freeze your homegrown produce when you’ve got a deep freezer, everything from shredded zucchini to tomato sauce.  Save up and invest in a good one.

2.  Join a CSA.  Community Supported Agriculture is the best way to save money on organic produce, but it also accomplishes other awesome things- it forces you to flex your creative muscles in the kitchen (kohlrabi, anyone?), makes it easy to eat in season for your geographical location, and it supports local farmers.  You’ll definitely save money in the long run, but again, you’ll have to plan ahead, as you pay for the whole growing season at once (some big farms offer payment plans, though, and don’t be afraid to ask!  Farmers are such nice people!).  I also get my eggs from a local farmer, and although it’s not a csa setup (yet), it’s a friend of my mother’s who raises the eggs, and since I’ve been such a loyal and high-volume customer, she gives me a price break.  I pay only $2.50 per dozen for foraging, free-range, cage-free eggs.  At Trader Joe’s, which is the next cheapest I’ve found, similar eggs (which have likely sat around on a truck and in a warehouse for a lot longer) cost $4.50 per dozen.

To find a CSA near you, visit Local Harvest.  *See item number 3 for more info on how to make a CSA work for you.

3.  Spend one afternoon (or several evenings) each week doing a big cook-up.  This one is indirect.  Once you’ve got all this lovely produce and meat, you’ve got to process it.  When you let things sit in the fridge, growing ever drier and browner by the second, you’re basically flushing that hard-earned money you spent down the drain.  Don’t do it!  Now, I’m lucky.  I know this.  I have two weekdays off a week, plus Saturdays.  It isn’t difficult (usually) to make time to cook.  But, going to back to our mantra, if you don’t think cooking healthy fuel is a good use of your time, then I’m not sure what is worth your time.  If you turn off the TV, shut the laptop, and just get in the kitchen, you’ll find that your time investment is well-rewarded.

The trick to making a three-hour cooking session work is having a plan, then working your plan.  I’m in the middle of a big cook-up as I’m writing this post.  I started at 12:30, it’s now 3:30.  In that time, I washed and cut four quarts of strawberries, pureed them, and made them into Strawberry Banana muffins (with coconut flour).  The rest of the puree went into the freezer, to be used later.  I also baked four pieces of lemon butter flounder in the oven.  Then, I washed and tore two huge bunches of kale.  Since I had the salad spinner out, I went ahead and washed and tore a head of green leaf lettuce and two bunches of spinach, then stored them wrapped in paper towels inside ziploc bags in the fridge.  Next, I seasoned two pounds of ground pork for italian sausage.  Half of that became patties that I sauteed for tonight’s dinner.  The rest went in to be browned for the kale.  The kale is bubbling away on the stove now, and I’m halfway through cutting up a bag of celery.  Next I’ll move to carrots (these are for lunch prep for the week).  Last, I think I’ll steam some broccoli to go with the fish.  I could have done more in the oven, like roasted some sweet potatoes wrapped in foil, but I already had some in the fridge, so I skipped that.  I hope you see my point, though- you can get SO MUCH DONE in the kitchen in three hours!  Let your kids and significant other help- they’ll be  much more likely to eat things that they helped make.

4.  Stick to this meal-making formula: Protein + Veg + Veg.  The best way to cook paleo, especially at the beginning, is to follow this formula.  When you try to duplicate a lot of old favorites, you usually end up baking too much.  Almond flour, while very nutritious, and certainly delicious, is exorbitantly expensive.   Save the treats for once or twice a month, rather than once or twice a week, and your pocketbook (and waistline) will thank you.  Cook up your main dishes ahead of time (see #3: cook-up, above), and prep your veggies so they’re ready to saute, steam, or roast right when you walk in the door from work.  If you’re a family who always ate dessert before, indulge in some beautiful, in-season fruit with coconut cream instead.  Which brings us to our last tip…

5.  Amazon’s Subscription program.  Just so you know, I’m not an Amazon affiliate, so I’m not making any money by telling you about this program.  I just am a happy user, and want to share.  Now, you can’t get organic produce and grassfed meat here, but you can get coconut oil, coconut cream, coconut flour, maple syrup, Larabars, and tons more.  The trick is, you have to know how much you use those things before you subscribe, but this can be figured out and written down, and then acted on later.  Every little bit you save is worth it!

6.  Break out of your comfort zone.  If you’ve gone to the trouble to buy a pastured, local chicken, why would you ever throw out the giblets?  That package of grassfed beef liver in the case at the farm that’s priced way cheaper than any other cut?  It might as well be solid gold, nutritionally.  Eating offal (organ meat) is the best bang for your buck, again, nutrition-wise.  One really easy way to incorporate these foods into your diet is to grind them together with other meats.  Then, you’re making that pound of ground beef go a little further, and getting all the great benefits the organ meat as well.  My favorite way to do this is with liver and beef, and make meatloaf with the mixture.  My family likes it, and it’s easier on the pocketbook.  Win-win!

I hope these tips help, happy cooking!

 

Yummiest. Burgers. Ever.

No photo, sadly, due to the speed with which my family inhaled them.

SO EASY:

1 pound pastured ground beef (locals, get some here, others, here)

1 pound happy life ground pork

3 TBS Penzey’s Greek seasoning

Mix it all up, form into patties, make a little indentation with your thumb in the center (keeps them from puffing up on the grill), and grill carefully until done.  I can’t say how long, since my grill a’int your grill.  Also, the carefully part is important here- the pork will drip more fat than a regular beef burger, and you don’t want to catch your deck on fire.  Start them on a low flame, get some color going, and then finish them on a sheet of foil placed over the grill rack to reduce flare-ups.

We ate ours sandwiched between romaine hearts “bread” with mayo.  Zander commented, “this is the best meal ever.”  So matter-of-fact, that one.

Enjoy!

New Developments

FAIR WARNING: This post contains highly personal health information.  If you’d not like to read about such things, by all means, back away from this post.

The radio silence around these parts has been due to a knock-down, drag-out fight between me and my intestines. Recently, my son got what seemed to be one of those 24-hour vomiting viruses.  He got sick twice, once in the car (my sweet husband earned a parenting stripe for that incident), and then the next day was bouncing off the walls in his usual way.  Textbook stomach bug.  Despite washing my hands twenty billion times during my son’s illness and subsequent hazmat clean-up, two days later, I woke before dawn with crippling stomach pain.  Now, my stomach woes always tend towards the other end of the body, rather than the vomiting, which (don’t get me wrong) I prefer, and yet, after 36 years of dealing with such issues on a weekly basis, I am so.  tired.  of it.

All that day, I stayed in bed, sleeping a ton and heading to the bathroom in between.  I had to work that evening, and I made it to the service, thankfully I didn’t have a lot of active ‘work’ to do, so I just dragged myself through it.  The next morning, I felt passable.  Not great, but good enough to say “Yeah, great idea” when husband suggested we hit the diner for breakfast.  I had two scrambled eggs, two sausage links, and three slices of tomato.  No coffee, just water.  All that day, I felt mildly off, but I took naps and breaks from cleaning the house, and it was okay.

The next morning was Easter, and when you work at a church, there is no missing Easter Sunday- not that I wanted to, or felt it was warranted, I actually felt a lot better when I got up that morning, on day 3.  We went to service, hunted eggs on the lawn, had all our friends over for lunch, and had a fun trip to the ER to give my son an albuterol treatment for his allergies (he’s fine).  On the way home from the hospital, I felt it.  That familiar acidic rumbling in my lower abdomen, coupled with the feeling of being trapped underwater.  It was coming back, and I was in the car for the next 20 minutes.  Would I make it?

(I did, you can stop worrying.  Thanks, though, you’re sweet.)

I say familiar, because for most of my life, I’ve been feeling this way every few weeks for a few days at a time.  I’ve learned to just power through, but it’s really awful.  I don’t know what happened this time, but something clicked in my head, and as I lay in bed the next day with a high fever, wondering how on earth this could possibly be the same virus my son had almost 5 days prior, I decided I was done with sucking it up.  I was going to get to the bottom of this, once and for all.

Starting around age 10, when I got my period, my stomach woes became a large part of my daily life.  I had (and still have, to some extent) really bad periods- terrible cramping, heavy bleeding, and, every single time it comes around, diarrhea.  This led my GYN in high school to posit that I may have Endometriosis.  Both my mother and older sister had been diagnosed with the condition as well, so it made sense.  A few years later, I would have exploratory surgery, with the intent of diagnosing the condition, and moving forward with treatment.  When they got in there, they found no sign of endometriosis.  Cysts, sure, and fibroids, they were having a nice party in there, but not the spots of tissue growth they had expected to find that would have explained my bowel issues.  I was diagnosed by my regular doctor as having IBS, and I was put on Levsin, which helped nothing.  I stopped taking it about a year later.

Flash forward to after my kids were born- Zander was three years old, and had just been diagnosed with autism.  I am lucky enough to have a dear friend who has dedicated her life to helping kids with autism, and she starts talking to me about dietary interventions.  “I have clients who seem to think it really helped their kids, and then others who swear it did nothing, but you’ve got to try.  As a mother, and not a trained therapist, this is really one of the only things you can do.”  I knew she was right.  Selfishly, I didn’t want to adopt the “autism diet”.  It seemed impossible, but I knew if it would help bring my son back out of his fog, I would do it.  We started the diet the week before Thanksgiving that year.  My son also had been dealing with his own intestinal issues, all very simliar to the ones I had struggled with my whole life.  He also had intense eczema and horrible diaper rash.  I met with some other local moms who were more practiced than I was, and we started cold turkey- we cut out gluten, dairy, soy, preservatives, artificial flavors, and artificial colors.  I realize that recently there’s been a lot of studies published that say dietary interventions don’t work for autism.  I guess for me, they just don’t matter.  For my kid, it was a miracle.  His language came back.  His eye contact came back.  His skin cleared up.  He started singing again.  He was my boy again, but still- he suffered from the bowel problems.  His diaper rash got mildy better, but never went away.

About two weeks into the new way of eating, my daughter and I had a large helping of all of the off-limits foods at a church dinner (I had packed my son’s dinner).  Lasagna, garlic bread, ranch salad dressing, croutons, parmesan cheese.  We were both sick for days and days.  It was like the flu, on crack.  I decided we must also have some sort of issue with these foods, and decided that the “cheating” wasn’t worth it.  My kids were so young when this happened (3 and 4), I just implemented the changes and didn’t look back.

The years passed, and my gut health remained about the same.  Usually, pretty good, and occasionally, really really bad.  I just sort of accepted this as my lot in life and trudged along.

Then, last year, I read The Primal Blueprint, by Mark Sisson.  I talk a lot about how that book changed my life in another post.  Sufficed to say, I was so moved by the arguments laid out in the book, I decided to take my family one step further down the path to total weirdness, and cut out all grains, sugars, beans, and processed foods.  My husband, after about a month, started shedding weight like it was going out of style (and still is).  After 6 months on the new plan, I had lost 6 pounds.  SIX.  I couldn’t believe that was it.  And while my digestive woes had seemed to have calmed down a bit, they were still there, lurking in the background, making their appearance when it was most inconvenient.

Then, the week prior to this week happened.  I got really sick, for almost a whole week.  I ate almost nothing (homemade bone broth, eggs, tea, and one banana).  Then, I stumbled upon this post, by  Peggy of The Primal Parent.  The title caught my eye, as “IBS” was once one of my labels.  Fructose Malabsorption.  Huh.  All the symptoms seemed to mirror what I’ve been struggling with all these years.  Peggy recounts how even after trying a million different tinkers (and i’ve been there, too- GAPS, SCD), she just didn’t feel like she was optimizing her health.  This is exactly how I’ve been feeling about eating Primally!

Yesterday, I decided to give it a go.  I was already eating bone broth, meat, and eggs, now I’d just have to resist temptation with the fruit in the house, and add in the vegetables that are safe- no fructans (onions, garlic, cabbage, and a bunch more), but most things were acceptable to eat on the FM eating plan.

Now, I’m not saying that I have this disorder (yet), but some of the things Peggy wrote in that post really rang true for me, and after 2 days of cutting out fructose and fructans, my intestines seem a whole lot happier than they have been for the past week.  Here’s hoping that during the next few weeks of experimentation, I’ll be able to nail this down, one way or another.

Here’s hoping.

Linky love…

Um, I have been bad about taking photos lately.  But!  I have lots of things to recommend to you today, that others have been posting, and that I have been trying.

First!  My nephew had his b-day party last Saturday, and although my sweet sister went to the trouble of baking Cherrybrook Kitchen cupcakes and making icing from scratch that was safe for the kids (thank you, sissy!), I wanted something for husband and me that was festive and birthday-ish without being so very full of refined sugar and junk.  I ended up making this cookie dough dip, but I changed it up a bit.  I’ve been having a serious craving for truffles lately, for some reason, so I rolled the “dip” into balls (I think I added a little more almond flour to facilitate this), stuck them in the deep-freezer for a couple hours, then dipped them in melted 80% dark chocolate.  They weren’t really hard (the coating was, but not the inside), even after a night time rest in the freezer, but I sort of loved that, b/c it made the coating sort of crunchy and hard, but the filling stayed nice and soft, like… a TRUFFLE.  Which is what I was going for.  I’m really excited to get my pre-ordered copy of Eat Like A Dinosaur, written by the Paleo Parents who came up with this brilliant recipe.

Tonight, I decided it was time to use up the rest of my Coconut Cream Concentrate.  I made chocolate fudge with it at Christmas, which was Very Very Good, but I still had about half the jar left (I got the big one), and it’s been taunting me up there in the cabinet.  I decided to try this recipe, which looks so pretty in the photos over there (go, I’ll wait… weren’t they nice?), but I wanted to dull the coconutty-ness a little.  The fudge was really good, but there’s something very science-experiment about the consistency of the cream concentrate.  It’s like that substance I used to have my students make with cornstarch and water- just when you think it’s a solid, it’s not.  Anyway.  I melted the coconut cream concentrate, melted some super dark chocolate, and chopped up some dried cherries and blueberries (Trader Joe’s).  I poured out the coconut first, then scattered the fruit and some sliced almonds over the top.  Then I topped it with the chocolate and spread it over the top so that it completely covered  the coconut.  It’s setting in the fridge now, I’ll let you know what we all thought of it.

Thanks, internet, for the great ideas!  Next post, I need to outline my family’s new favorite side dish- Spaghetti Squash Lasagna.  With pictures, for crying out loud…

The haps, as of late…

So!  We got some new windows in our house!  I realize this is likely only exciting to me and my husband, but I’m going to show you some photos anywho:

Old windows = Crudsville, USA

Nice packing tape screen patch, eh?  We’re all class over here.

Blech.

Here's the surprisingly unsettling empty window hole

New wondrous window goodness!

Of course, I had to buy new curtains.  The old wood blinds just weren’t cutting it with these new, sexy windows.  I got the kids plain black (above), because I don’t care what their wants and needs might be.  Mother of the year!  Seriously, though, the Target had NO cute curtains that weren’t ridiculously gender specific.  In fact, they only had girly ones, and one “manly” print for a boy’s room that was inexplicably covered in frogs.  Like, anatomically correct, from a biology textbook frogs.  Maybe for the boy’s bedroom in a… hunting lodge?  In the wilds of Canada?  I don’t know, people.  I got the black ones.  I actually like them a lot, cause they block out a lot more of the light than the wood blinds did, therefore facilitating the possibility of the children sleeping in past 7 on a Saturday morning.  And truly, it’s the little things.  I got new curtains for our room, too, wheeee!

They are purple with a white paisley-esque print on them.  Not too girly, though.  They really give the room a “someone gave a crap” kind of a feeling.  I dig it.

Ok, enough about the windows, woman!  On to some cooking… things have been really doused in homemade chicken stock the past couple of days (weeks), since we’ve all been sick in one way or another recently.  I’ve managed to make a few other things, though, including fake Larabars (using this fantastic recipe).  They are approximately 1/16th of the cost of actual, real-life, non-imposter Larabars, which are now dead to me.  Also!  Meatballs!

Here’s how I make meatballs, which I tend to make once a week if not once an hour.  We love the meatballs.

Ground meat (I usually use 2 pounds of ground beef and 2 pounds of ground pork)

eggs (if you’re using 4 pounds, 3 eggs- one pound, 1 egg)

seasonings of your fancy (these had greek seasoning, and dear LORD were they amazing- if I’m doing Italian ones, I’d add a little worcestershire, some garlic powder, basil, and lots of oregano)

Mix the above ingredients together until everything is happily mingling and making small talk.  Then, dust over the top some almond flour.  I can’t give you a measurement here, because it really depends on how moist your meat was (sorry, I hate that word, too, but ‘wet’ seemed even more gross).  You want the mixture to hold together well without crumbling.  Add almond flour a little at a time, mixing as you go, until you can pinch a little bit of meat together in a ball and it holds its shape.

Use a teeny tiny scoop to scoop out meatballs onto a lined (parchment or silpat) cookie sheet.  My scoop is 2 tablespoons, which I think is a great size for soups or appetizers.  I like them smaller because they cook quicker, and hold together better.  Bake them at 375 for about 15 minutes.  Rotate your pan(s) and bake for another 10 or so, if they aren’t browning yet.  Take them out when they’ve got a nice color, and try in vain to hide them from your ravenous family.

There have also been some lovely brussels sprouts:

BEFORE!

AFTER!

AND, I bought myself an apron for Valentine’s Day, because the kitchen was my Valentine.  I couldn’t resist it.

Cook covered in hearts, signing off!

Discipline reminder

I am sick as a skunk today, home from work and everything- all because I couldn’t tell the difference this weekend between eating out and giving myself a much-deserved break from cooking, and eating out CLEAN and giving myself a much-deserved break from cooking.  Saturday, I had a carnitas burrito bowl from Chipotle, sans rice and beans. Totally and completely “clean” (meaning, compliant with the eating plan that doesn’t turn my body into a trash dump), right?  Right!  BUT NOT IF YOU DOWN TWO GIANT CUPS OF HFCS SODA.

Ahem.

Sunday, we went out again (twice in one weekend!), to one of our fav little burger places, and had burgers without buns, with veggies.  Great meal!  One I often make at home!  Here’s the thing, though.  I have a lot of trouble resisting french fries.  And then dipping the non-resisted french fries in HFCS ketchup.  The waitress goofed this time and left the potato chips on the plates too, instead of subbing the fries, so of course I decided to eat a few of those, too.  I didn’t want them to feel left out.

For dinner last night, I made chili for the superbowl in the slow cooker all day, then whipped up some guacamole when we got home to top it.  I also made a sort of frozen yogurt type dessert for husband and me with coconut milk and berries, whizzed in the food processor with a little bit of honey and vanilla.

I went to bed around 10:30, and slept for probably half an hour or so before I was hit with the most intense stomach cramping I have had to date.  It was nearly unbearable, and I couldn’t really lie still or sleep for the rest of the night.  I felt so bad to wake my husband at 4am to let him know I needed him not to go to his early morning swim, because I needed him to rouse the kids and make breakfasts and lunches.  I had a fever, chills, still the stomach cramping, and now a raging headache to boot, along with hardly any sleep.  And now, several hours of sleep later, I still have the headache and a low-grade fever.  Do I think it’s the flu?  Nope.  I think it’s the crap I couldn’t resist eating this weekend.

Now it’s a prescription of lots of tea and water, homemade bone broth, and clean foods when I feel like my body can take them.  There’s some braised kale in the fridge that’s sounding mighty good right now, alongside some scrambled eggs.

In happier news, here’s some things I’ve been cooking lately:

Cauliflower Soup, Veggie Bacon Egg Pie, Pulled Pork

Aforementioned Egg Pie with roasted sweet potatoes and broccoli

Z's fav new snack: Celery filled with apple butter and coconut flakes

Laptop lunches- the breads are spinach garlic almond flour rolls

Canning Adventure!

This last one- Z and I decided to get some little persian cukes at the trader joe’s last week, so we made one little jar of pickles together.  I had leftover brine, so I thought I’d try some giardiniera– Italian pickled veggies, but I only had carrots and cauliflower, so I tossed in some garlic, and we’ll see how it turned out in a couple of weeks.

My dear friends…

Yes.  Your eyes do not deceive you.  This here is a pot of proper comfort chicken ‘n dumplings, totally primal-friendly.  Even Granny would be proud of this one.

Here is the un-recipe (I’m so sorry, I rarely stop to write anything down while I’m cooking, so consider un-recipes more of a guideline than a true recipe):

Chicken Stew with Dumplings That’s So Good Everyone Will Gobble It Up

serves approx 4, with leftovers for lunch the next day.

Ingredients:

For the stew:

cooked chicken (I used five boneless, skinless thighs, baked in the oven with a little salt and cayenne for about 40 minutes), diced

cut up vegetables of your choosing- for this, I used 2 carrots, 4 parsnips, 1 sweet potato, 3 onions, and 4 ribs of celery

4 cloves garlic

arrowroot powder (about three tablespoons)

coconut flour (about a tablespoon)

1 quart mason jar of homemade chicken stock, plus extra water if needed

salt, pepper, rosemary, thyme, all to taste

For the dumplings (or, if you prefer, as I do, dumplin’s):

2 cups almond flour (I used almond meal from Trader Joe’s, cause that’s all I have at the moment)

1/4 cup arrowroot powder

1/2 tsp salt

1 1/2 tsp baking powder

2 TBS grassfed butter, or solid fat of choice, cold, cut into small pieces

2 eggs

a glug (maybe 1/4 cup, probably a little less) almond milk

Step one: Make the stew.  Stew it up right.

Turn the oven on to 425 degrees.  In a large dutch oven, saute your onions and celery until translucent.  Add the rest of the veg and the garlic and cook a few minutes, until the garlic is fragrant. Do not, under any circumstances, let your garlic brown.  Keep stirring!  You can do it!  Next, add in your spices.  Then, sprinkle the arrowroot powder and the coconut flour over the vegetables, and stir to coat.  Quickly stir in your chicken stock, and extra water if it all seems too gloopy.  Let this yum cook for another 5 minutes or so, at a gentle bubble- medium heat, stirring all the while.  Add in your chicken.  Make your dumplings in between stirs.  Bring the stew pot up to a boil.

Step two: Make the dumplings.  Dump the dump(get it?)lings in.

Mix the flours, salt, and baking powder.  Cut in the butter with a fancy schmancy pastry cutter, or your hands.  Add in your eggs and milk, and beat gently with a fork until uniform.  Once your stew is really serious about its boil, drop the dumpling batter on top in tablespoonfulls.  I used a one tablespoon measure cookie scoop, which worked best.  This batter is very soft- you can’t mold it with your hands before dropping it in, but have faith.  It will all be fine in the end.

Step three: Bake it all up for baby and me!

I don’t have a baby, but if I did, I would feed this to it.  Just sayin.

Pop the be-dumpled pot, uncovered, into that piping hot oven.  Let it bake and firm up those dumplings for about 20 minutes.  Let it stand outside the oven for at least 10 minutes to avoid giving your family third degree burns in their mouths.  If you skip this last step, I’m afraid they will still be able to sass you.  Ask me how I know.

Step four: FEAST LIKE IT’S 1999!

Or, uh… 2099?

Ye humblest of vegetables…

So, I’ve been eating kind of restricted-ly again, this time really limiting (but not EEEliminating) grains and starches.  I’ve been trying to stick to this equation:

[Meal – starch – grain] + vegetable² = healthy belly

… or something.  I’ve always stunk at math.

It’s sort of working (?).  Hard to say at this point.  BUT!  Luckily, I got a CSA share last spring that makes it really easy to square the number of veg eaten in a meal.  Aaaaand that brings us to our lowly friend, the cabbage.  Much maligned in erudite society, but a friend and ally of peasants (even urban ones, like me!) for centuries.  Also, I love cabbage, so we’re pretty much in biznazzz.

Cabbage use #1: Sauerkraut

This is one small head of cabbage- maybe a pound and a half- and it fills to the brim my crock here, which I think is two quarts.  It’s been hanging out in its briney bath for about a month, and it should be ready to go into the fridge for the winter in about another couple of days.  I use the guidelines from the brilliant Food in Jars blog, and you should, too.  If you like sauerkraut. It’s so good when you make it- not so salty to throw off every other flavor it’s paired with, but definitely pungent and full of good bacteria for your gullet.

Next!

Cabbage use #2: Braised cabbage with add-ins:

This isn’t winning any awards for presentation (for sure), but it’s winning the award for filling my belly, tell you WHAT.  For serious, folks, this is pure comfort food at its finest- cheap, filling, hot, tasty.  MAKE IT.  Here’s the un-recipe:

Thinly slice some onions and a head of cabbage.

Cook the onions in bacon fat (or olive oil, if you prefer, I guess) until translucent.  Add the cabbage, and cook for a few minutes until it starts to wilt.  You want gentle heat here, medium at most.  You could also add (as I usually do) a very thinly sliced apple.  Leave the skin on, it’s good for you.

Once the cabbage has wilted a bit, throw in about a cup (or a little less, this was a BIG cabbage) of water, apple cider, beer, or whatever liquid catches your fancy at that moment.  Add some salt, pepper, and whatever else you want- red pepper flakes, caraway seeds, fennel seeds.  GO WILD.  Live on the edge.  It’s cabbage.

Cover the pot and cook for about 10 minutes on low, until everything is all yummy and melty.  If you desire, you could cook it with the lid off to get rid of some of the liquid, but it’s totally personal preference.  Right at the end, toss in about a tablespoon of cider vinegar (or something else tart and acidic- lemon juice would work, or another kind of vinegar).  You can also stir in some cooked bacon, chopped nuts, brown sugar, or dried fruit- cherries are amazing in this.  Taste for spice and tuck in, friend.

Cabbage use #3: Cole Slaw:

FULL DISCLOSURE:  This is the only way the children will eat cabbage.  Luckily, I love it, and will eat all those other preparations above without any help from anyone.  Here’s my cole slaw un-recipe:

Cut the cabbage (this is just a quarter head) and some other veg you may have laying around- carrots, celery, apple (that’s a fruit, I realize, let it slide), onions- scallions are really good here… whatever.  Cut everything very thinly.  Before you put your veg in the bowl, make the dressing- I use mayo, a splash of rice vinegar, some honey, dill (my kids LOVE dill), celery seed, salt, and pepper.  Just try different amounts until you learn what you like.

Mix it all together, and let it get all cozy in the fridge for some time before you eat it (I like to make this the day ahead).

There you go!  Now, get your cabbage and get going!  Yum!

Come, Labor On

Happy day of labor! Or really, I suppose, happy day of rest from your labors? I’m doing some of my favorite kind of work today, in the kitchen, turning that bounty below into sauce. I am proud to report that while some of that lovely produce came from the csa, and the flat of tomatoes came from a generous neighbor of my mom, two of the peppers were grown in my backyard! I think while I run the sauce through the food mill to get rid of all the skins and seeds, I’ll listen to the cd I got as a present in the mail the other day from my friend Jennie Wayne- it’s so lovely, in a very Americana way- she’s on myspace and YouTube- just search on her name. You can buy her EP, if you have musical tastes of the highest pedigree, l have no doubt that you will, you can shoot me an email and I’ll fill you in. Sauce time!

family happenings

My crafty family, the charm city craft mafia, has announced the date for this year’s Holiday Heap craft show of awesomeness, and applications are posted!  Check here to apply, and good luck to you!  I want to send a shout-out to my girl Rachel, of Red Prairie Press.  Some people work like dogs all the time to get the job done, and don’t get a whole lot of shouting-out, you know?  Holla!  Rach!  Woop!  By the way, this is my new favorite shirt…

Other family happenings include the 20 hour drive that brought my children home from Florida just ahead of the threatening storm that ended up to be kind of a flop, thank GOD.  They got in at 11pm last night, and are still asleep at their Dad’s whilst I type this.  I might have to go over there and nibble on them in their beds, such is my longing.  They were gone almost three eternities weeks. 

School starts on Monday, and while I didn’t have to do a ton of shopping, I did have to get Sage some jumbo glue sticks and a red folder, so of course that warranted buying some school supplies for me.  Ahem.  I got a lunch-on-the-go box from Fit &Fresh (at Target, it’s about a dollar cheaper than on that site), and a Snapware box.  These are both for my upcoming trip to California next week for my friend Kristen’s wedding.  It’s hard enough to fly cross-country and feed yourself well, but add in the gluten and casein restrictions, and it’s nearly impossible.  So, I’m taking a tip from one of my favorite blogs, and packing two and a half big lunches to take with me.  I mean, wouldn’t you rather have this than a tiny bag of pretzels? 

YUM.  Well, minus the bread and the cheese.  Everything else, YUM. 

Next: I think I have to move, again.  I’m not sure what’s happening, or what will happen, but the house we’ve been renting for a year is going into foreclosure, and although I’ve done nothing wrong, I’m shut out of the process, so I don’t know anything about a timetable, or what’s owed on the loan, or anything.  This makes me nervous.  So, I’m looking into options now.  If you live locally and know of anything less than $200K for sale in the greater Hampden area, or if you have a Grandma who’s ready to move into the nursing home and sell her house to a very nice single mom and her angelic children for a song, or if you’ve got a really big cardboard box with a flush toilet, let me know. 

Kidding about the box.  Although, it would make a great fort, so never mind- box havers, speak up.