Posted on 06/12/2007 4:07:45 AM PDT by Kaslin
Growing up in a family of seven posed all sorts of culinary challenges. It was impossible, for instance, to divide a 12-pack of Popsicles evenly, or a cherry pie, without angering somebody. Bruised feelings were also inevitable whenever my mom pulled out the cookie sheets or a Duncan Hines cake mix. After she finished making the batter, the kids fought for the beater, spatula and bowl.
To end these kitchen free-for-alls, I decided to become the cook so I could claim ownership over any leftover cookie dough or icing. I started cooking in grade school and never stopped. In journalism school, my goal was to one day replace Craig Claiborne, the longtime food critic of The New York Times. I abandoned that idea after concluding that if I wrote about cooking for a living, I'd probably stop enjoying it.
What does this have to do with personal finance? Well it's a stretch, but since this is the third anniversary of my column, I thought I'd mix my love of cooking with my love of saving money. With gasoline prices rising, budgets are even tighter, but I see little evidence of people saving money by cooking. Look at any grocery store today and you'll find the expanded freezer sections stuffed with foods like pot roast, french toast, fried chicken and vegetable soup that people used to prepare themselves.
This willingness to spend more and get less is just as evident in the produce section where you can buy fruits and vegetables already sliced. When I was at the grocery store last week, I was amazed to find red potatoes that were already chopped. Who knew people couldn't cut up potatoes themselves?
The potatoes were near other unnecessary items like diced bell peppers and snack-sized packages of celery for lunches. The little package of celery costs $2.29, or about 33 cents an ounce. That might not sound so horrible unless you realize that buying a stalk of celery at that price would cost you more than $5 a pound.
While I was at the store, I paid $1 for a cantaloupe that weighed two pounds, but steps away from the pile of fat cantaloupes, I found precut cantaloupe that would have cost me $6.99 for 20 ounces. I can't help but wonder who buys precut fruit at these prices.
All this convenience comes with a higher price tag - and in the case of frozen entrees - less taste. I found lots of expensive food in the freezer case too, including a two-pound package of frozen pork ribs for $13.59. A few aisles away, the store was having a great sale on fresh pork ribs for just $1 a pound.
Some people assume that clipping coupons is all you need to do to save money at the grocery store, but that's not true. It's often the processed foods that offer coupons, which is why I rarely find any worth clipping. Instead, you can save money by buying healthful foods and cooking them yourself. If people tried cooking good wholesome meals from scratch, even just once or twice a week, they could probably shrink their grocery bill.
To get you started, I'm sharing my recipe for roasted chicken and mashed potatoes, which I've been making for my family for many years. It not only tastes good, but it's pretty easy to make and it costs much less than a frozen chicken dinner.
ROASTED CHICKEN
Most people dry chickens out by roasting them on low heat. Unless you enjoy chicken shoe leather, broil the chicken first to trap the juices.1 chicken (I buy mine at whatever grocery store is selling them for 99 cents a pound or less.)
Set oven for broil. Sprinkle chicken with salt and broil in roasting pan for 10 or 15 minutes. Reduce temperature to 425 degrees. Bake until the chicken's drumstick is easily pulled out. For a 4.5-pound chicken, the bird should be done within 90 minutes.
MASHED POTATOES
3 pounds potatoes - Idaho or Yukon Gold
1/2 stick butter
1/4 cup cream, half & half or milk
Peel potatoes, cut in large chunks and simmer in pot of water until barely soft. Drain thoroughly. Beat potatoes and butter together with a mixer or use a potato masher. Add liquid and combine. Salt and pepper to taste.
GRAVY
Most people would require hypnosis before they'd believe they can make gravy, but it's not hard. And making your own is far better than the jarred gravy glop that stores sell.1 cup drippings from roasted chicken1/3 cup flour1 can chicken broth
Heat chicken drippings in a pot on medium heat and then stir in flour. Continue stirring over medium heat for about a minute. The mixture should become a paste. Gradually add the broth. Continue stirring until the gravy combines and gets thicker. Season with salt and pepper.
If you don't have a cup of drippings, I generally use a ratio of three parts drippings to one part flour. If the gravy seems too thick, add a little water.
Use leftover mashed potatoes for potato soup. Refrigerate mashed potatoes, lightly brown some finely chopped onions in butter, add finely chopped carrots and celery cook until softened slightly... add the mashed potatoes..stir cook a few minutes and then add 2C warmed milk. Season with salt, pepper and a little rosemary. Simmer a few minutes...enjoy. A 75+ year old family recipe.
You don’t even have to mash them. When you boil them, they are soft and will split, just put a little butter and salt on them, YUM!!!
Well $ 2 is still better then paying almost $$7 for 20 ounces of cut-up Cantalopes
Cool! I remember driving through the area, the number of chicken barns is staggering.
I won’t forget about driving through southern indiana into kentucky, though, and the snow on the road in August, but it was really chicken feathers from birds going to the processor there.
She totally blew it at the end when she added a can of chicken broth to the gravy. If she’d just bothered to boil the bones from the previously roasted chicken and packaged it into serving sized containers for the freezer, she’d have saved $ on store bought broth.
It not only saves you money, it can save you pounds as well.
Last fall we started making home made soups and freezing them in individual serving sizes for me to take to work as lunches.
Chili, beef vegetable soup, and chicken noodle soup.
Now keep in mind, a burger, chips, and a drink costs on the order of $6 to $7 dollars at the cafeteria.
Since starting to bring these soups, and saltine crakcers, for my lunch and drinking water with them I've lost a total of 25 lbs.
It costs about $13 to make a pot of soup that creates about 10 to 12 individual servings.
5 lunches at the cafeteria = $30 X 2 weeks = $60.
One pot of soup = $13 = good for 2 weeks.
$60 - $13 = a savings of $47 every two weeks>
$94 a month X 9 months = $846 in my pocket. Let's even take out $47 for crackers. $800 in my pocket in 9 months.
Save money, lose weight, and tastes better.
How can you lose?
Two words: Crock Pot.
I prefer to take my cooking tips from Giada DeLaruentis-yummy!
Yeah, it sure can seem that way, except in our case its NOT during hockey season (which for us runs early Sept through March). I'm the house cook, and with three boys playing hockey, wow, coordinating a home cooked family meal takes some effort - but we manage almost every night to eat together during the season. Its not as hard as many think, just takes some planning. There are quite a few nights where the last thing I do before I go to bed is put together a crock pot meal or cassserole and throw it in the fridge. The next day my lovely wife fires up the crock pot at the appointed time of day or when I get home all I have to do is toss the casserole in the oven and make some sides. Kids do table setting/clearing dishes.
there are 2 processing plants in this county, Tyson and Perdue, I pass the Tyson plant at least twice a day because it is only about 3 miles from home.........believe me with all the chicken trucks around here, I understand exactly what you mean about the feathers.
It’s even worse when one of them happens to overturn, but fotunately it doesn’t happen to often.
We eat a lot of chicken in our house, always have, but it irks me to no end that with all of them growing around here and the number of plants in the region, chicken is still higher priced here than in other areas.
No argument there :)
Food prices are going up. Thanks for a thoughtful post.
Do you have room to grow your own? I told my kids I was going to do that, but they said they would refuse to eat the eggs and chicken from pets.
I have enough room that I could raise some myself, however I value my marriage too highly and my husband has drawn the line at livestock of any sort. He doesn’t care how much square footage I want him to till up, or how many hundreds of veggie plants I put in, but no animals.
Do you do a lot of canning, etc? I have a big garden this year for the fist time, and I am considering canning stuff.
Why would anyone want to burden themselves with seven children? I do not understand. I have two and that is freakin work. God bless vasectomies.
“I can’t help but wonder who buys precut fruit at these prices.”
A John Edwards staffer? They stop at the Pic-N-Save for cut up fruit right after they do his errands at Wal-Mart.
*SMIRK*
Bless you you have a good $$$ purse
Yes, and this year I'm planning on selling a good portion of my crops.
I make jelly from hot peppers and so as they start coming on I bag them up and freeze them for when I get in the mood to make a batch, or I run out.
You are sooooooooooooo bad!
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