New dishes, cheap dishes
Saturday August 2, 2008
Categories: Food
Inspired by the thread below on low-cost family cooking strategies, I decided to try a couple of simple lentil recipes today, cooking enough to store for the week ahead (we Orthodoxes are in the Dormition fast now through the middle...
Filed Under: cooking, Vegetarian
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About Crunchy Con
Rod Dreher is an editorial columnist for the Dallas Morning News, and author of "Crunchy Cons" (Crown Forum), a nonfiction book about conservatives, most of them religious, whose faith and political convictions sometimes put them at odds with mainstream conservatives. The views expressed in this blog are his own.
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I read through this post once, and savored every word. Love it.
Read through it again, though, and I started thinking "bad thoughts" (as I am wont to do from time to time). Namely, I can't help but notice from the quality of writing and the story itself that it's a fair bet the writer is in the top 10% of IQ, even top 5%.
So while the instructions are mighty simple and anybody really could cook like this every day...it just isn't likely for most because the average person (who is in the middle to left side of the bell curve) must rely on culture for their food choices, not their untrustworthy frontal lobe. So it's a sad reality that the only people who will ever cook like this in our era are going to be the high-IQ upper class who plan ahead or those who come from culturally intact families with a cooking culture...the very type who can afford to eat well without pinching pennies. So it's all kind of sad and ironic.
But it's a great story!
Every time I have been either poor or unhealthy I have lived on lentils as a matter of course for 4 decades. Brown rice and lentils and whatever green veg is in season and cheap...You can eat for a week for $10. Most recently I did this to pay off my medical bills from 2003-2006; 3 times a week........ With split pea soup with whatever is cheap to toss in there. Add ginger one time. Curry the next. It's the a,b,c of counter culture Vietnam era maintaining. Then when feeling ‘flush’ making peanut butter (home made...it's easy in a blender) on Whole Wheat Ak Mak crackers with tahini.
To this day....... that is no small part of at last I am debt free and the picture of health and vigor even though I'm a free-lancer paying off six figures in bills. Just go to the old Bibles of counter culture feeding: Google Adelle Davis. Her books changed my life in 1968. Even when I lived out of a backpack for 4 plus years (’69-74) I remained vital and healthy following the simple nutitional A,B,Cs Davis spelled out that America is still just beginning to accept as the 'new age' norm.
EXCERPT Davis BIO: Mind you we're talking 40 years ago and read how true this rings:
Adelle Davis was an American pioneer in the fledgling field of nutrition during the mid-20th century. She advocated whole unprocessed foods, criticized food additives, and claimed that dietary supplements and other nutrients play a dominant role maintaining health, preventing disease, and restoring health after the onset of disease:
"Research shows that diseases of almost every variety can be produced by an under-supply of various combinations of nutrients... [and] can be corrected when all nutrients are supplied, provided irreparable damage has not been done; and, still better, that these diseases can be prevented."
Davis is best known as the author of a series of books published in the United States between 1947 and 1965. One of her books, Let's Have Healthy Children (Signet 1981, revised edition) states her scathing criticism of the food industry in the United States.
We've been using the crockpot for low cost, healthy dishes. A useful website is http://crockpot365.blogspot.com/ She's the lady who was on Rachael Ray and is trying to use her crockpot every day for a year. Some of her dishes aren't that great---and she rates them herself after trying them. I like them because they're not your typical cream of mushroom soup/hamburger recipes.
Happy cooking!
texasaggiemom
I just bought this cookbook! We try to go meatless 3 or 4 times a week...I cant' wait to try some of the recipes!
I dunno, it was a small thing, cooking these lentil dishes tonight, but I feel good about having taken the time to do what we were talking about doing in that earlier thread, and cooking cheaply and thoughtfully.
I know what you mean. It is a very good feeling to be able to feed oneself and family inexpensively and healthily.
A big pot of beans cooked on Sunday afternoon can last several days in our house. We like them:
-in tortillas as burritos
-sauted with rice and peppers, onions, etc.
-eaten with scrambled eggs and hot sauce
-as bean fritters
-made into a hearty soup with some veggies and potatoes
By mid-week, everyone is somewhat tired of beans, if there're any left over they can go in the freezer.
I want to thank the person who recommended the Simply in 'Season' cookbook in the healthy eating thread. I picked it up yesterday -- going against my new-found frugal habit of borrowing books from the library instead of buying them at the bookstore -- and it was so worth it.
The cookbook is arranged by season. I turned to the 'summer' section and found a gazillion recipes using all the stuff I have in my fridge from the farmers market, and from our garden, which I was worried about not using up in time. Tonight I'm making ratatouille from the tomatoes, squash and eggplant. So thanks again for an excellent recommendation.
Once again, I state on the record, my threat to invade the Rucker household with a couple of cold six packs of Saranac, and a willingness to beg shamelessly and annoyingly for dinner. Nobody expects the Crunchy Inquisition! ;-)
I've read that the Romans considered a wealthy man eating lentils to be a sign of good character. I hope that maxim applies to modern middle class Americans as I love lentils. During the winter months we probably eat lentil soup once a week for dinner and take it for lunches until it is gone. It's great with the no knead bread dutch oven bread recipe you can find on the web.
Thanks for the link to the Crockpot cooking blog as it looks like it will come in handy.
My local Lebanese restaurant makes a terrific kidney bean dish called fasoolia - simply delectable (great spices) and filling. Don't know if it's in Bittman's book, but here is a recipe:
http://www.recipezaar.com/202385
So, given the economic and health reasons to eat beans, does anyone also have suggestions for the..mm.. digestive upsets that can result? (And yes, I already know about soaking *grin*). That is part of what stops me from eating them as often as I would like.
Karen: When cooking any beans, the tip is to toss in an unpeeled potato. It neutralizes all the gases.
Another Rawlins oldie but goody is to grind up all hard veggies into a rough pulp...beets, turnips, carrots, whatever....squashes also...and season mixture with dill and again very little curry,,,a dash...or other spices you use on seafood... and steam all this mixure together with the innards of the eggplants....and then backfill the eggplant shells and bake them at 300 degrees with breadcubs seasoned atop until they are firm to touch and crumbs are toasty. These stuffed eggplants taste like deviled crabs. This was my commune special occassion dinner during summer months when vegetables were fresh and plentiful. You can literally add any vegetables to ground micture...including sweet potato...and the result is the same. In fact you can add lentil and split pea pulp you have reduced to be thick.
The same filling I describe can be used with breadcrums added to become veggie patties. Added egg for holding together optional if vegan is not strick. Otherise, slow bake patties. Healthy and oh so satisfying.........
Great! I've got to try that. A pretty simple fix. As cheap as beans are, and I actually like plain old bean soup (with the chopped onions, carrots, sometimes a little tomato). So, being able to eat it more often would be a definite plus.
And the eggplant dish sounds good too. I love eggplant, so always look for new ways to use them. Given the time of year, maybe its a good idea to look for more zucchini recipes. *laugh*
My friend's mother planted her first garden, did a whole ROW of zucchini. She couldn't eat the stuff for years after that. So sick of 'em.
A HUGE dent was been made in our food budget when we started to freshly mill our flour for our "daily" bread. I usually make about four loaves of bread a week for the three eaters that we have in our house. I buy wheat berries in bulk, and grind them in the morning and make bread within half an hour of the grind. SO good for you! And the bread TASTES amazing, which is 3/4 of the point. It costs about 75 cents a loaf to make, excluding time and electric.
Rod, you shouldn't buy vegetable stock. You can make vegetable stock by boiling a couple of carrots and onions (and if you have it, a few celery sticks), with salt and pepper corns, a few herbs and a pint of water.
Best thing ever for keeping the fasts and cutting the food budget: a really good rice cooker. I dropped $56 to get my Sanyo on Ebay. I wish I'd really taken the plunge and gotten the Zojirushi my friend has. I love this gadget. It makes fantastic rice- white, brown or sushi- and you can pre-program it to cook hot cereal for breakfast. You put in all the stuff the night before and you wake up to breakfast. similarly you can set it to cook your rice for supper at a specific time. Pair the hot rice with a quick thai curry - on the back of the Thai Kitchen green curry paste bottle - only made with shellfish or squash during a fast and you've got dinner in ten minutes. We have nine kids and they all love this curry.
I state on the record, my threat to invade the Rucker household with a couple of cold six packs of Saranac, and a willingness to beg shamelessly and annoyingly for dinner.
LOL. We love Saranac around here but my husband would absolutely insist on serving his homebrew.
Rawlins,
my husband wants to know if you can eat the potato, or is that a really bad idea? :) (find the man whose heritage is Scottish and Dutch -- he can't waste food without a struggle.)
Made the Spanish Style Braised Lentils from the Bittman book this evening. Quite good. Will be a staple for the Dormition Fast this week. Another fast staple is the African Sweet Potato Stew with Red Beans easily uncovered via Google. Both dishes are cheap dishes.
So moved by Rod's leguminous post, I've drafted a screenplay unto which I hope to capture both the yeshiva and vegetarian demographics.
And as long as the studio bosses can once more visualise a crossdressing Barbra Streisand, my new pride and joy, *Lentl*, is assured of greenlighting and slating forthwith at both Theaters Near You, and PBS, the better to reward tote-bagging Viewers Like You...
Nice to see Rod's plug for Saranac. About ten years ago, my local chain druggist in Buxton, Maine, used to sell six-packs of the Raspberry Wheat and the Pale Ale (I think) at the even-then eye-rubbing price, for whatever deal-derived reason, of only c. $3.39 plus deposit. With my second purchase, I was a bitter-end subscriber on that deal, for regarding future offers so depth-slashed in price, Never Again is what I swore, the time before...
Rod, you might also be interested in a book titled "Twelve Months of Monastery Soups" (it's available on Amazon), by a Benedictine monk. The soups are mostly vegetarian and are arranged by month, so that you can use ingredients that are proper to the season. Given the heat in Dallas today you might think soup is the last thing in the world you want, but he does have some nice chilled soup recipes during the summer months. He also has a similar book just for salads and general cookbook that's a classic. We've really enjoyed the recipes, which are tasty, healthy, inexpensive, and last for a few days.
MJS, in answer to your question I bet yes you can eat the potato. I believe it is the chemical combo that neutralizes the gas provoked by beans, not that it absorbs it all into the potato making that spud a possible launching pad for at-home launchings.
I'll second the motion on the "Twelve Months of Monastery Soups".
I'm really suprised that you are just discovering this now. Beans have been a cheap staple across the world since the beginning of time! I've been making dal and veggie curry and many other similar dishes for 20 years. Certainly does cut down on the grocery bill--even when food is at normal prices.
Also to Karen, lentils and split peas are very gentle on the disgestive system. For other types of beans it helps if you work your way up to a full pot. Try cooking a pot of palin white navy beans with just a little onion. Then freeze them in an ice cube try or something similar. Slip a cube into the next soup or cassarole you make. Then 2 cubes and work your way up to a full bean meal--your body will get used to it. Yogurt also helps if you eat a bit at the same meal--either as a savory sauce or sweetened for dessert.
Karen--another help for the digestive issues is the herb epazote, added while the beans cook. I also second the suggestions to start with small amounts and increase, and that lentils are easier on your system than other, longer-cooking beans.
Thanks for the tips. I have heard the body gets used to it eventually, it was just a matter of getting through the process that was less than enjoyable. Hmm, woncer if they have that herb at the local natural foods store? Have to check it out.
Karen,
no idea where you live, but every hispanic grocery I know of carries epazote. The Mexicans I know wouldn't cook beans without it.
Soup? When it is 100f out? No. Especially not when the tomatoes, peppers, cucs, basil, zucchini, etc. etc. etc. are peaking and cheap.
Especially not when the tomatoes, peppers, cucs, basil, zucchini, etc. etc. etc. are peaking and cheap.
You've got the makings of a good, cold, gazpacho soup right there.
No soup for you!
[the "Soup Nazi", *Seinfeld*]
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