A Green Fire

We finally got some rain.  The blueberry bushes are bursting with fruit and the blackeyed peas are growing like crazy.  I spent last night and the night before shelling peas.  Tonight, I will blanch and then freeze them.  I am excited because this is the first time I have ever put up my own vegetables.

Last night, I made the most wonderful soup.  My friend came to visit and she brought me some smoked deer hindquarter.  I decided to put it in the crock pot with crowder peas, diced tomatoes, string beans, lentils, and black beans.  For the liquid, I used homemade chicken stock.  I put it on at six pm, and cooked it on low all night.  This morning, I had rich, flavorful soup.  It tastes heavenly.  I brought some for lunch, and I have enough for lunch for the rest of the week, and maybe a supper or two.  I know most people cannot handle the same meal that often.  If you have a family, you can think of it as seven to eight servings, so depending on your family, it is probably only one or two meals.  I plan to eat it with a few crackers.

Recently, I boiled a five pound chicken.  I had a great recipe for a 3 1/2 pound chicken, but my five pounder was too big, so I just cut it up and boiled it.  This gave me six meals.  I shredded some, and had a super yummy salad.  I mixed some with barbque sauce and had a sandwich for lunch.  I ate one leg and thigh for supper the night I cooked it.  Last night, I shredded the last of it and made chicken enchiladas.  It made enough for  three meals.  Also, I saved the water I boiled it in, and I have plenty of chicken broth for future cooking needs.

I think six meals from one bird is pretty darn good.

Another frugal meal was a box of generic stroganoff hamburger helper.  I cooked a medium onion, a heaping tablespoon of diced garlic and one pound of ground turkey together.  I followed the box directions for the rest of the cooking.  That made 5 meals.  I ate one portion for supper, and refriderated the rest in single servings.  I have four lunches.  I also cut up a cucumber, and a garden fresh tomato.  I put them in single serving containers with a little bit of italian dressing.  Now I have a great lunch for the rest of the week, with raisins for a snack.  I only needed four meals for this week, since I have Friday off.

Best of all, I don’t have to cook again until Thursday night, and even then, I already have a plan.  I have in the freezer, filleted fish, caught this past weekend.  A nice side salad and I’m set for at least two more days.

The best way to stretch your food dollars is think beyond one cooking.  How can you stretch it?  How can you make leftovers interesting each day so you don’t get tired of them?  One new thing I will be doing is smoothies for breakfast.  Usually, I eat the same thing every day, a granola bar and a piece of string cheese, and coffee.  Well, the blueberries are ripe, and I’m getting a blender.  Soon, it will be smoothies for breakfast.  I’ll let you know what I’m blending up, and how they are turning out.

Do you have a favorite cheap meal? I’d love to read about it in comments.

I thought this article was interesting, and thought I would share it with you.

Yes, We will have no bananas

Go read it, I’ll wait.

I certainly learned a lot from this.  I knew all bananas were the same, but I never really questioned why there are different apples, different potatoes, different onions, and different varieties of all the other fruits and veggies I shop for, but only one kind of banana.   It makes sense to me now, but now I’m extremely curious as to what those other flavors of banana tastes like.  Unless I travel to where they grow, I don’t think I will ever find out.

I don’t think I will miss bananas too much if they are no longer shipped here.  I don’t eat them that much now.  I am moving in a eat locally direction, and bananas sure aren’t ‘local.’  I wonder if the prices go up to truly reflect the effort that goes into their production; the demand will drop so much that shipping will cease long before the fungus kills them off.

How about you?  Will you still eat banana’s if the price dramatically rises?  Will you miss bananas if they are no longer shipped here?

Yesterday, I found a site with plans for all kinds of solar ovens. Actually, the site has all kinds of information about solar cooking. Solar cooking is something I first encountered years ago on 3-2-1 contact, a PBS science show.  I am interested in it now, because I really like camping, and another way to cook food without having to find wood and build a fire, or to bring charcoal sounds wonderful to me.

Also, memories of hurricane Katrina are still fresh with me, and seeing all the flooding going on in Iowa reinforces that disaster can happen at any time, anywhere. I was lucky after Katrina, my power came on pretty soon. What if it happens again, and what if the disaster is more widespread? Having another way to cook will be pretty darn handy.

So, a solar oven is basically concentrating the sun’s rays onto a pot or cooking vessel by using several reflective panels. These can be incredibly simple or fancy. I was so excited to find that you can make a solar oven using the silver sun shade that usually sits on your car’s dashboard. Another example was made from a large umbrella. Basically, almost anything can be made to work.

Looking at videos on youtube, a man showed how he turned an old satellite dish and some mylar into the reflector for an oven.  I also have an old satellite dish and some Mylar, and glue.  I sense a weekend project coming up.   Once it’s finished, what should I cook first?

Most everyone knows the basics of saving gas, or improving gas mileage. One of the fist tips always mentioned is to carpool, or share rides. I am happy to report I have started doing this. My commute is 66 miles. I found someone in my building who is will to split the driving. This week, he found out about another employee who is interested in sharing rides as well. If we add a third person, I will only have to drive every third time. Some weeks, that will work out that I only have to drive one time. I am so excited about that possibility.

When I bought my car, I got a silver Pontiac Vibe because it combined many of the features I was looking for. I wanted a high MPG rating, and storage options. As a hatchback, I am not fighting with a trunk. I just load the items in the back, and if I need more room, I fold the seats down. It is silver, which in the hot climate I live in, means it reflects more heat, and it is easier to cool. Less A/C use means less gas wasted.

If you are unsure of the best way to conserve gas, check out The Drive Smarter Challenge. This site lets you input your car and tells you how much money you could save annually by following their tips. It’s pretty fun. I already took all extra weight out of my car, keep the tires properly inflated, and combine errands. They have a tip to “drive sensibly” in town, but they don’t define what that means. I’m pondering that one.

Another tip I put into practice when gas hit $3.50 a gallon is to drive the speed limit all the time. I used to speed around 10mph over, no matter the road. Now, I set my cruise on 65 or 55, depending on the highway. I get where I’m going on time, and as a bonus, I’ve noticed I’m calmer now when I drive. Before, when I sped, I was always looking for the cop. Now, I don’t ever stress. It has really made the commute more pleasant.

Another tip they suggest is to telecommute or to stagger work hours. This second option has worked great. I normally work 8-5, but my commuter buddy works 7:30-4:30. I asked if I could shift my hours and it was not a problem. This has worked great for the commute. Just that half hour difference makes a HUGE positive difference in the traffic. I sit a shorter time at stop lights, and I brake/accelerate/brake much less when we get into town.

There are also more extreme measures a person can take, and those I have yet to implement. Some people coast to stop signs instead of braking, turn off their A/C when going up hills, turn off their car at stop lights, and I have heard of turning your car off when going downhill. That last one is too dangerous for me.

What’s your favorite gas saving tip?

I barely knew you.

My lettuce is being devoured by tiny green worms.  I thought it was just a few worms, and that I had gotten rid of them, but no.  There are LOTS and LOTS of worms and they are FEASTING on my lettuce.  All the leaves are infected.

I am so bummed.  It was just getting big enough to really look forward to eating.  This weekend I’m dumping the whole thing in the compost, washing the planter, and starting over with something else.

Part of growing my own food is learning, and this is a good lesson.  Don’t plant all your lettuce in one basket.

Last night on The Story, Dick Gordon had an interview with a woman living in Atlanta.  The point of the interview was how hard it is for a regular working family to make ends meet even when both parents work.   You can hear it here.

To recap, Melissa Hilliard works full time and still gets money for food and goes to a food bank monthly.  Her husband works full time and they have three kids.  She said growing up, she never went without but her parents never discussed money with her and she did not know how they did it.

The story really got me to thinking. I think one answer is family gardens.  My grandparents had huge gardens, and my parents had a garden all my life.  My maternal grandmother lived in town, in a subdivision, and she devoted over half her yard to food.  She worked full time in a factory, raised three kids, and still had a garden.

My grandparents had a family garden, plus they raised crops to sell.  My parents had a big garden that we worked every year.  We grew peas, butterbeans, tomatoes, okra, squash, eggplant, peppers, and corn.  We canned and froze all that we could.  I remember the freezer being full of food, and the pantry being packed with colorful glass jars.

The trick that most people my age miss is that you don’t have to have a huge space to grow food.  A windowsill can get you started. I am starting with one raised bed, and one hanging pot.  It seems to be going well, and I plan to expand next year.  There are peas and corn planted at my grandparents, more than they can eat.  I will pick what I can and put up my own canned and frozen produce this year.

I have been thinking about that struggling woman and her family in Atlanta.  She said she doesn’t know that many people in Atlanta.  I wish I could send her some seeds.

I recently redid my bathroom. Today, I addressed an issue that has been bothering me for a while.

The hairdryer.

The hairdryer has never had a home. Usually, when it is not in use, it lays on the floor. This looks messy and poses a tripping hazard. No one lives with me, so I am the one tripping, hence, I wanted a solution. Today, I installed a hook and now the hairdryer has a permanent home.

This was a super easy fix and I have no idea why I did not do it sooner. Wonder what else I can hang on hooks?

My second home improvement act was to apply weather stripping to my front and back door. This was more of a challenge than I expected because I had to go to three different places to find it. Granted, I could have started with Wal-Mart, but I try to shop local owned stores first. Third time was the charm, and I was able to get what I needed at the Pack Rat. I know, I was surprised too.

My air conditioning is pouring out cracks in my doors and since I want to keep ALL my AC inside, it had to be done.This was also a cheap fix because weather stripping just does not cost that much. I managed to do my back door Sunday. I ran out of time this weekend before doing my front door. It was a total success on the back door. Now, there are no light, thus no air cracks for my expensive AC to escape from. This week, I will finish the front door.

I mentioned before that I started some lettuce in a hanging basket. It has come up wonderfully.

It is crowding the basket, so I thinned it down and planted nine of the strongest plants in my raised bed. I did have cucumber planted here, but an armadillo ate it. So, I bought chicken wire and put that over the plants hopefully to deter any intrepid armored mammalians.

The lettuce looks a little puny right now, but I hope once it soaks up some water, it will perk right up. Also, I expect my plants in the basket to grow bigger now that they have a little more space and less competition for nutrients.

My other plants are also doing very well. Here is my outside dill.

I don’t know what this is. It doesn’t die. I thought it was dead and threw it “away” twice and it came back. This year I broke the roots apart making four different plants. It is by far the most hardy plant I have ever had.

My flowers are doing ok, my ivy is growing beautifully and my inside dill gets bigger every day. Maybe this year, I will have some gardening success. I certainly hope so.

I haven’t talked to much lately about how to be frugal.  I recently combined several methods.  1-I made a vegetarian meal 2-at home, and 3-I ate all the leftovers over several days, many of those as 4-lunches I brought to work.

I made this soup in the crock pot.

One cup of dried lentils

One can of string beans, black-eyed peas,  English peas,  black beans,  and diced tomatoes.

One tablespoon diced garlic

Salt and pepper to taste

I used frozen chicken broth (made myself earlier in the month) as the base, and added just a little bit of water.  I put it all in the crock pot and put the lid on.  I cooked it on low for around four hours, then I added the tomatoes.  While the tomatoes were heating through, I cooked cornbread.

When the cornbread was finished, I crumbled a piece in my bowl and spooned the soup over the top.

YUM!

This made seven servings.  If you are the kind of person who cannot eat leftovers, this would easily freeze.  Just store the soup in single servings and you can then reheat on the stove later.

SAVINGS:

If you figure I would have spent $5 a lunch for 5 days, that’s a savings of $25 dollars.  Also, I stayed in one place, instead of driving to buy lunch.  That saved 30 miles for the week.