The Insanity is Stopping

Lean Cuisine is ending its Delicious Rewards loyalty program.  Thank God!

I had been an early adopter of this program.  The rewards program started just when I thought I'd try another diet, and if you ate 20 of these frozen meals in 3 months, you got a free lunch bag.  It was also at the same time that I was obsessed with free mail-in offers.  With 5 meals a week at work, I managed rater easily to collect two free lunch bags, and instead of going from brand to brand to brand, I stuck by lean cuisines, leading to some epic skills in microwaving cardboard pizzas and faux paninis.  In the darkest days, when the husband was out of country, I would seriously eat 3 per day, rationalizing this as being more efficient than cooking for myself.

But, sometime in grad school, I realized that this was probably not the healthiest way to feed myself.  Mainly, these are not full meals, and being starving immediately afterwards led to more snacking than if I just would have made myself a real lunch.  But, you know... points.

Being addicted to the points, I kept buying these meals.  Even after the price increase that made it impossible to find the actual tasty ones on sale for $2 each, I still bought the unsatisfyingly bland and meager "simple favorites" collection ones that were comprised of 4 bites of paste-y pasta.  And, it wasn't as if the rewards catalog had anything in it that was worth redeeming these points for.

So, I'm buying food I don't like to accumulate points that I didn't redeem for anything.  On occasion, they actually would have the Amazon gift card in stock (which did help buy some textbooks in grad school), but poor quality ugly kitchen ware should not be driving my behavior.  But, somehow it did.

Looking forward to the end of this program in order to restore some sanity to my lunch experience.  Now, to remember how to make a sandwich again.

The Sadness of Lean Cuisine Mac & Cheese

I do love me the Lean Cuisines.  For $2.50, I can microwave a semi-satisfying hot lunch which is only slightly less good than the overpriced food court in the basement of the train station across the street that's teeming with 14-year-olds on class trips to Washington.  It's a function of convenience, and inability to afford (both economically and calorie-wise) to eat at Chipotle every day.

I find the Lean Cuisine meals to be manageable, much in the same way that arranged marriages are manageable.  Sure, you'd love to be in love with the meal/spouse, but you have no belief going into the event that this is the perfect meal/spouse, and life will be fulfilled afterwards with all of your cares swept away.  Contentment comes from lowered expectations.

I don't expect a Lean Cuisine Mac & Cheese to be amazing.  I expect it to be palatable food.  Yet, somehow I am disappointed.  The sauce is both watery and chalky, and manages to leave a film over your tongue.  The noodles are devoid of taste, and have some strange texture that makes me wonder if I'm really eating shredded kitchen sponges.  It's just not good, and it makes me sad.  When all you want is some approximation of comfort food, it should at least be comforting.  If the answer is that you can't make a low-calorie frozen mac & cheese that tastes good, then the answer is to not make these at all and give poor homesick office workers the hope that this is edible.

Excuse me... I think I need to run out for a burrito bowl now.

I Can Pickle That!

Year round farmers' markets have a distinct upside: year-round fresh produce.  Without a hard freeze yet, there's still late summer veggies available.  Sure, tomatoes seem to be limited to the grape and cherry kinds, but still... this is November.  The glut of the large peppers, tomatoes, and cucumbers from August and September sometimes makes you overlook the steady production of the hot peppers, cherry tomatoes, and pickling cukes that seem to keep right on producing their tiny versions up until the first frost.

Kind of felt like a pickling day yesterday, so I made a batch of bread and butter pickles.  Seriously, though, how much longer will you find cucumbers in DC?

Just waiting for these bad boys to fully cure!

Pot Pie

The weather turned for the worse last week, and while Sandy did not do too much damage in the area, it did end up producing a decent storm.  However, it did really drop the temperature, and we had our first little flurries today.  Major snow is expected on Thursday, but for now, I'm just getting into a nice, cozy, late fall routine.

Yesterday, I roasted a chicken with some mashed potatoes, then made some gravy from the pan drippings.  This means... LEFTOVERS!

Behold, my chicken pot pie...

1) Get a really deep dish.  I have an Anchor Hocking round glass bowl that fits in a carrying case, which ends up being perfect.  It's the diameter of a pie plate, but a couple inches high.  

2) Unroll one premade pie crust into your bowl/dish/pie plate.  I am not gifted in the world of pie crusts.  Or, rather, I really can't tell the difference between my best pie crust and a refrigerated store bought crust.  Also, moving to New York, I have no counter space to roll out a crust.  

3) This is why you want a deep dish: Add 1 cup leftover chicken, 1 cup thawed frozen peas, a cup of diced carrots, a finely diced onions, maybe a cup of diced celery, and a cup of leftover gravy.  Gravy should be such that it's practically solid coming out of the fridge.  This is not a low-fat recipe.  Basic rule is at least two cups of veggies for your cup of chicken.  Combine all of this together, and throw this into your pie crust.

4) Grab the other crust.  Lay it over the top, crimp, and make the edge look pretty.  If you have no idea how to accomplish this, just roll the one crust into the other.  Pierce the crust to allow the steam to escape... 8 times should do it, making sure to space them evenly.  

5) Bake.  This is where it really depends on your brand of dough.  General rule would be to see what temperature the package recommends, then bake until the top is browned and flaky.  Otherwise, 375 for 30 minutes, check it, then adjust the time.  Because everything is pre-cooked, your main concern is cooking the crust through.

Back to Basics

I'm finding myself enjoying a lovely Sunday morning / early afternoon in Upstate New York.  It's a little adjustment (my local paper has no Sunday edition?  Seriously?), but all in all, I'm adjusting pretty well.

One thing I haven't quite gotten down is my eating habits.  I've been in my new home for a grand total of 32 days and have had my new work schedule for 11 days, but I still am not really cooking or exercising or doing house cleaning with any sense of regularity.  The cat is being fed, and I've gotten to church a couple times, but I'm not really taking care of myself very well.  Part of this is the uncertainty involved with moving, the other is the expense.  Having burned through a significant chunk of savings between security deposits, hiring movers, renting Uhauls, arranging new utilities, and the like, I really don't have a lot of money, but my routine is starting to settle down.

Last night, I found myself watching Julie and Julia, a tale of modern-day stalking and obsession.  Or, an endearing plucky young writer pays homage to her cooking heroine.  I grew up watching Julia Child on PBS, but I think that may be where this movie falls flat for me.  I liked her as a cook and a part of my Saturdays, but I wouldn't want to become posessed by her in the way that is depicted in the movie.  Julia's show was never really about what to make on a daily basis, but what to cook when company comes over or for a special event in the family.  The Frugal Gourmet was much more along the lines of what to cook on a Tuesday.  Those two, and Justin Wilson's Louisiana Chef, were my only real insights into how to cook growing up before the Food Network. 

Wondering if I could get some inspiration to rid myself of my current cooking cunnundrum, I'm watching the Food Network.  This is Food Porn.  I'm watching cuts between the chef and close ups of herb jars, and a slow pan over a pan of slowing sauteeing meat, over to a beautifully lit jar of McCormick's spices which will eventually be the key ingrediant to this recipe.  Then, you do have the shows that are about being in the kitchen cooking (not arranging flowers and setting tables that overlook the ocean), but the recipes are horrible.  Even post-diabetes, Paula Dean is cooking with butter and pork fat, and there is a curious lack of vegetables.  There's also no sense that people have food budgets.  I just watched someone burn through $5 worth of fresh limes when you could have bought organic lime juice for a fourth of the price.  So who today is cooking really healthy meals, quickly, and without burning through stacks of cash? 

It seems like we are in the middle of changing the food culture of the United States into something that celebrates local foods, fresh produce, and healthy food choices.  But, how do you do this in a budget-conscious way that does not become a full-time job?  Figure out how to combine these three competing interests, and you've created a show I want to watch.

Mr. Obvious

The New York Times featured an article on mathematical models of losing weight and obesity.  Turns out, to lose weight, one needs to eat less and exercise.  However, this group is all sciency and has charts.

As part of the 97% of American women who want to lose 10 pounds, this sounds familiar.  Can we somehow use math to figure out why it is so hard to eat less and exercise more?  A comprehensive, easy to follow plan would be the break-through of break-throughs.  Until then, I'll just feel mildly disappointed each time I skip the gym to run errands.

Leftover Turkey Ideas: The Turkey Burrito

Almost a week later, and I’m almost done eating the turkey.  All that remains is the turkey carcass in the freezer that will be made into broth this weekend.  I had a stroke of genius on Monday that resulted in the amazing Pilgrim-Mexican fusion dish that I like to call the Turkey Burrito. 

Take about 2 cups of the scrap turkey meat that is clinging to the bone, white meat and dark meat, and don't worry if the meat is a little tough.  Add to a saucepan with a can of tomatoes with the juice.  I like the ones with the jalapenos in them.  Add a dash of paprika or red pepper (powder, not flakes), cumin, and lime juice (1/2 teaspoon or so if you want to measure).  Set the saucepan to simmer on low for 30 minutes, stiring occasionally and adjusting the heat to make sure it is not boiling, but still staying hot enough to steam.  When the majority of the liquid has evaporated, add half a can (1 cup) of vegetarian refried beans and stir.  Voila!  Burrito filling!  Stuff a tortilla and add cheese, more veggies, and rice if you'd like.

We take Maple Products very seriously.

When McDonald's introduced its Fruit & Maple Oatmeal last winter, Vermont was not happy.  In order for something to be labeled as "Maple", it must include natural maple syrup.  Now it appears that Faux-Maple outrage is growing.  Vermont and Maine have teamed up to crack down on fake maple syrup by introducing the (what else) MAPLE Act in the Senate.

I'm okay with this, mainly because maple syrup is yummy, and I was forced to eat some type of chemically flavored corn syrup when I was a child.  If you want to incorporate more maple syrup into your diet, how about this for dinner:

1 Butternut Squash
1 Tbsp of butter
2 Tbsp of Maple Syrup

Preheat oven to 350.  Slice butternut squash in half the long way from the blossom end to the stem.  Remove seeds.  Melt butter, and stir in maple syrup.  Brush exposed surface of squash with liquid happiness, pouring excess into the seed well.  Place on baking sheet for 35-40 minutes, or until squishy.  Mash.  Enjoy.

My Coffee Is Destroying the World. Whoops. My Bad.

As I drink my fourth cup of coffee this morning, I'm reading some rather disturbing news:  I'm totally destroying the environment.  Whoops.

It's not like I thought coffee was an environmentally friendly product.  Even buying the organic, free-trade stuff, there's a lot of energy involved to get that cup of coffee to me.  It's not like coffee can be grown in Iowa - oohh... a potential use for Iowa if it could - but instead, it requires shipping, then roasting, then packaging, then shipping again.  Then, I have to use a nifty appliance to make it potable because research scientists have not found a faster way for the caffeine to enter my bloodstream.

Still... at work, we have the 2 gallon pot of nasty black stuff that requires creamer before I'd consider drinking it, and the free Keurig machine with its gourmet selections of exotic and fair trade coffee.  Newman's Own, organic coffees from Sumatra, life is excellent.  Hook me up.

What I never seem to notice before drinking my coffee (which is, pretty much, everything), is that those little single-serve coffee filter systems add up, and none of them get recycled.  CBS News is reporting that Clean Water Action is getting after Keurig for making a pretty environmentally awful product.  *Sigh*  They are right - you take a traditional coffee brewing process where an unbleached filter and coffee grounds can go directly into the compost pile, and you replace it with a plastic system made from too many components to be separated.  I guess I'll be buying a reusable filter and my own coffee now.  Thanks a lot, environmental lobbying organization.  How dare you make me want to do the right thing!  :-(

Abundance

Quick trip to the Farmers Market this morning yielded a full chicken, football sized zucchini & summer squash, cucumbers, plums, quart of cherry tomatoes, a couple green zebra tomatoes, a variety of bell peppers, a cantaloupe, but sadly no eggs or sweet corn, because these had sold out at a time where I was still firmly asleep. Still, a mountain of fresh local produce and meat for $30.

Thankful for a bounty of fresh, affordable food.

Budget for Food

The Associate Press had an article out today on a study in the journal Health Affairs on the increased cost associated with purchasing food that will satisfy the new American Food Plate guidelines for potassium, fiber, vitamin D, calcium, etc. According to the researchers, getting all of these nutrients in the new amounts will cost each American an extra $380 per year, or $1,520 for a family of four. The AP tries some tips for how to cheaply increase your potassium intake by eating more potatoes and beans, and interviews some public health experts, and makes a great point... deeply buried: "Recent estimates show 49 millions American make food decisions based on cost."

When I first read this article, I was completely ready to do a quick post on cutting your food bill. The standard, garden, eat fresh foods, stop buying junk food, embrace leftovers, plan your meals, shop sales, use coupons, yadda yadda yadda... but there are plenty of these types of articles out there if you look for them. Instead, I was wondering, "What do you do when you've done all of this, and still can't buy food?" While it talks about the money budget, eating fresh foods involves prep time. If I'm working both a full-time and part-time job, do I have time in the budget to chop up vegetables and make a special run to the farmers market?

With over 45 MILLION Americans currently receiving food assistance (no, that's right, about 15% of the population), there is a substantial portion of the population that just can't find extra money for food. Food banks are finding their budgets slashed from federal grants, and state and local sources. So... where WILL Americans find the money to eat well? Especially since a poor diet is often contributing to the chronic diseases that are inflating health care costs? Answer this question, my friend, and I will personally nominate you for a Nobel Peace Prize.

Meanwhile... if you want to eat more beans to increase your fiber and potassium intake, try my recipe for White Bean Chicken Chili (along with prices):

• 3 small onions (grown in my garden, bulbs cost 1c/each: $0.03)
• 4 cups chicken broth (from leftover chicken bones: cost = time)
• 6 assorted peppers (also grown in garden, with one 50c from farmers market)
• Half a bag of frozen corn ($1.00 for bag, 50c used)
• 2 cans of white beans (Great Northern and White Kidney, 60c each)
• Cumin, tumeric, paprika and other spices from the rack that smell good
• Half a leftover roasted chicken. ($6.50 in chicken from the free range organic local farmer, but half a grocery store rotisserie chicken will work at $2.50)
• 2 tomatoes (Grown in garden. If you live in the Midwest in August, at least one of your neighbors is complaining about having too many tomatoes. Steal 2 from them.)

Saute the onions in a little olive oil until they stop making you cry and are a bit translucent. Add chicken broth, diced peppers, frozen corn, beans, and spices. Shread chicken. Add to pot. Let this simmer for 20 minutes. Dice tomatoes. Add, and simmer for 5-10 minutes. Eat. Enjoy.

Cost: $8.73. $4.73 if you go cheaply. The big cost with this is time. Time to shop the farmers market for deals, making giant batches of chicken broth, plan a garden, start seeds, transplant, weed, water, and harvest plants. So, make sure you budget for it.

It's Cream Puff Day

Today marks the beginning of the Wisconsin State Fair, and the first of 11 days in which I try (desperately) to come up with a good excuse to get to Milwaukee to purchase a dozen Cream Puffs.

Mmm... cream puffs...

Zucchini Season

Right now, the going rate of zucchini at the local farmers market is 3 for $1. Each zucchini is approximately the size of a football, and can feed a family of four for a week and a half. This is a very, very good thing. Sunday dinner has become a gentle saute oof green and yellow zucchini, some home grown tomatoes, and a slight handful of rotini with a dusting of Trader Joe's Organic Vodka Sauce and some shaved Parmesan. Crack open a bottle of chilled Pinot Grigio, and that is summer. Right there.

Found a quick recipe on Eating Well for Tortellini & Zucchini Soup (medium zucchini? What is that?), which sounds like a fabulous way to combine the pasta-zucchini-tomatoe triumvirate in a slightly different way. Need to swing by the local bakery for some crusty bread. Served with a basic salad topped by some cucumbers and olives, and I really have been eating well this summer!

Trying to use Coupons

I'm a little scared to return to the grocery store.  The last time I did a major grocery run for staples, the check-out clerk asked whether I had heard of food hoarding, and then started a discussion of some show he had seen on TV where people could not open doors or use their kitchens because there was so much stuff in there.  I'm pretty sure he just meant "Hoarders", but besides 10 boxes of whole wheat pasta, I'm not sure what was so strange about my grocery purchase that would merit comment.

Okay, I do know - I bought over a hundred dollars worth of food for $30.  That's right, I'm a couponer.

Sadly, since mid-March (when this happened) and now, a little show has begun called "Extreme Couponing".  And, yes, I have had a grocery run where $50 of food cost me 99c, plus I had a $10 mail-in rebate (getting paid to shop!).  However, I don't really agree with what these people are doing in the stockpiling sense, but I also do not agree with a lot of the criticism that coupons are only for foods comprised of empty calories.

It happened that the episode I watched took place at Kroger, during one of their Buy 10 Items, Get $X Off.  It this case, it was $5.  So, while the show was making it sound like this woman was buying 62 bottles of mustard at 39c each, in reality, with the extra discount, Kroger was paying her 11c each to take the jar off the shelf.  Or, was giving her $6.82 to use on other groceries, depending on how you look at it.  I know - I bought a bottle myself with that sale.  My major coup was the 10 boxes of whole wheat pasta... each on sale for 99c, with a 50c coupon that doubled, and an extra $5 off all 10.  A grand total of  negative $5.10 for 3 months of whole wheat, whole grain pasta for all of my Meatless Mondays and homemade chicken noodle soup etc.  Sure, every coupon isn't going to be for something useful, but don't pooh-pooh the whole system because the majority of coupons are for Hamburger Helper and Kraft Singles.  If you hunt around the brands, there's usually ONE or TWO of the 30 varieties which doesn't suck (ex: Mott's makes an all-natural apple juice where the ingredients are seriously: Water, Apples.)  Living in the Midwest, fresh produce doesn't really happen around here until June, so unless I want a tomato that's been trucked half way around the world, a can of tomatoes processed an hour down the road is a pretty acceptable substitute.  If I can get that can for 29c, all the better.

So, at some point, I'm pretty sure I'm going to have an in depth discussion about this show at the check-out counter.  *sigh*  At least I don't need pasta any time soon.

Food Deserts

Found this amazing graphic on food deserts on Slate.  For some reason, I keep thinking that the term "Food Desert" really applied to inner-city neighborhoods where there are no grocery stores, yet very vocal leaders working for change.

Turns out, it really looks like a rural issue.  And in truth, how does one live in rural America without a car? 

Leftover Turkey Idea No. 1: Eat Them.

Turkey is awesome.  It seriously should not just be eaten around the holidays.  A couple weeks ago, I made a honey mustard turkey tenderloin on a bed of dressed turnip greens, and it was a moment of heaven.  Sadly, many people find the task of making an 18 pound chunk of meat too taxing and demanding, so they try it once a year - fail at it - and eat out the rest of the year.

It really isn't too hard - low oven, baste with butter every half hour, stuffing is awesome despite what the USDA says, and rely on a meat thermometer instead of instinct to tell you when it is done.  I find that my grandmother's stuffing recipe (no, you are not going to see it here) stuffed in both the body and neck cavities helps the meat stay moist, and a bit of butter on the breast under the skin helps too.  When the center of the stuffing hits 165, it is done.  Start checking every 15 minutes, about 30 minutes before the USDA guidelines say so.  I totally flaked on this detail this year, and waited until the minimum time.  At that point, the thermometer read 175, and the outer portion of white meat was starting to dry out.  However, the rest of the bird was absolutely perfect.  What wasn't good was the family thanksgiving turkey, which had been cooked within an inch of it's life, then placed in a shallow dish and shoved into a dry oven to keep it warm... thereby sucking out any remaining moisture.  If that was the turkey I had eaten growing up, I'd never make a turkey - because I'd assume that turkey is dry, flavorless, and unchewable.  Mine is much better, due to butter, basting, and worrying about the moisture content of the stuffing:

Mmm... turkey... a little foil protects the wing tips, but they can also be tucked under the bird to prevent burning.

Turkey, as a meat, is exceptionally cheap and pretty abundant... for two months a year.  Even if cooking a 12 to 28 pound bird does not scare you, what do do with an extra 20 pounds of meat that has to be eaten in the next three days can be enough to make you think that this isn't a wise use of resources.

So what do do with the leftovers?  Here are my ideas:

Number 1 - Eat Them.

Just eat them.  Put some turkey on a plate, ladle some gravy on top (or a splash of chicken broth), grab a spoonful of the extra sides, and microwave.  It was awesome when you first had it, why wouldn't it continue to be awesome?  Enjoy!

What I wouldn't recommend: Putting all of the dishes in the oven for "everyone to grab a plateful".  If you learn anything from the paranoids over at the USDA, it's that you keep hot foods hot, and cold foods cold.  It also keeps the textures from breaking down from repeated reheatings.  Load up a plate, nuke for a minute, check the temperature, repeat until hot.

On Thanksgiving

I love Thanksgiving.  To me, it is the quintessential American holiday.  Secular in design, but can incorporate spiritual elements if you'd like, the point is to gather with family or friends, overindulge in the bounty of the harvest, and get a Thursday off work.  Add the prospect of four solid back-to-back days of college and professional football, and I really cannot find a downside to this holiday.  You are supposed to take a moment to appreciate all the good things in your life, which few people do as often as they should - bonus!

My attempt at the traditional Thanksgiving meal.

Thanksgiving is also the end of Fall, my favorite season.  I don't know if it is climate change of just freakish weather, but summer seemed to have stuck around until Mid-October, and our first frost did not happen until November.  Even without this, the moment that Halloween is over, the Christmas/Winter season starts.  When you know that you have a hard 4 months of winter coming, it really is rather mean to try to force 5 months.  November is the last hurrah - the last chance to spend days outside, the end of the college football season and the ability to drink beer in parking lots without fear of criminal prosecution, the end of local fresh produce.  It's also the month with the smell of burning leaves in the air.  Where the house smells like roasted squash and nutmeg.

Thanksgiving is the celebration of fall.  A giant roasted bird that needs the oven turned on for 4 hours (which you are NOT going to suffer through in July), the sweet potatoes and mashed potatoes and root vegetables which can be taken out of their cold storage bins and roasted.  That final crop of green beans - planted after the Mexican Bean Beetle has died and harvested right at the last frost.  At today's farmers' market, the last outdoor market of the year, it was obvious that the growing season was over.  Until April, possibly May, we will have to content ourselves with the frozen food, canned food prepared at the height of the growing season, and those waxy texture-less imports from Chile.  Boo.

Thank you, Fall.  I don't always appreciate you until you are over, but I will miss you.

Expensive Compared to What? Part II

Yesterday, I bought 2 dozen eggs from my chicken guy, but not my standard free-range chicken (I have a 12 pound turkey thawing for the next week.  Maybe 2), and I had to ask where the hens go when it gets cold out.  Truthfully, I said where the chickens went, and he responded that they were dead and in the freezer.  The hens, on the other hand still live in their portable hen houses, but when they venture out, they huddle together and graze in little chicken mobs, keeping warm while eating bugs.  He then showed me the pictures.  You can meet them here.  I love the transparency of the operation.  Their website gives you driving directions if you want to cruise past the farm, and even detail how their animals are slaughtered in their newsletter.  When we do buy our bird, we pay $3.35 per pound for a whole chicken... whoa.  Crazy expensive.

I'd like to posit that it is not.  For my husband and I, one 4 pound bird ($13.40) is the basis of 3 meals.  I will agree... it is twice the price of a conventional bird in the grocery store.  However, when we are in the grocery store, we don't always buy the whole bird... we tend to gravitate to the bags of boneless - skinless chicken breasts that have taken over the fresh and frozen sections of the store.  Where do these mystical, magical legless chicken breasts come from?

My main problem with those who claim that eating organic is too expensive are the same people who will also claim that fast food is so cheap.  (Okay, not all... but on a Venn Diagram, there would be a significant overlap of the two populations.)  Assuming that 30% of the chicken is lost to bones and fat and skin, the effective rate per pound of my pampered free-range chicken is $4.79.    Over at the drive-thru, the 10 piece Chicken McNugget is 5.75 oz of chicken that sells for around $4.00.  $4 for a little over a third of a pound of chicken means that the effective price per pound of the McNugget is $11.14 per pound.  Doesn't look so cheap from that perspective.  Especially since I get free chicken broth from the whole chicken.  The only cost is my time.