Food-centric or recipe-centric? How would you describe yourself?
We tend to be a pretty recipe-centric culture. A big fan of The Food Network, I think you'd find that recipe-centric carries the day ... with the notable exception of one of my personal favorites, Iron Chef America. If you've never watched it, the challenge is to make 5 dishes featuring a particular ingredient in under an hour. Extraordinarily food-centric!
Even here in North Dakota, as I explored the Department of Agriculture's Holiday Showcase last fall, I noticed that most of the food entrepreneurs were recipe-centric. Not what I'd expected in this state where land is plentiful and agriculture is king. Nonetheless what was there.
Healthy on a budget says "Think Food-Centric."
Just tonight, I heard part of an interview with Barbara Kingsolver, author of Animal, Vegetable, Miracle: A Year of Food Life
That's the food-centric approach.
Here's how it will save you money, enhance health, and keep you in the same jeans tomorrow that you fit in today. (No, being strapped for cash does not have to make you fat. See the previous post on "Will the recession make you fat?" Plus, food-centric is good for the environment!)
Favor quality foods at a reasonable price. Maybe you buy in bulk. Maybe you shop at the farmer's market or join a naturally food-centric CSA (Community Supported Agriculture) group. Maybe you raise a garden and can or store the extras.
A bargain's no bargain if you don't use it, so limit yourself to things your family likes and will actually consume within a reasonable amount of time. Then ... and here's the key point ...
Use what you have!
Dinner-time approaches and the questions on your mind are these. "What's fresh in the fridge? What ingredients do I have on hand? Anything perishable that needs to be used quickly? What's in the freezer?"
For those on an extremely limited budget, buying ahead may sound like a fairly daunting project. After all, if you're struggling to make it to your next paycheck without going hungry, you don't have extra to spend on stocking up. I know. I've been there. So here are some tips.
Understand that getting started is the trickiest part. Once you have a big stash of, say, canned vegetables from the garden, you won't have to buy vegetables for a while. So you can put away some of your veggie money and apply it to an extra pack of chicken for the freezer.
Another option, if you're lucky enough to live in a place that has one, is to sign up with a "Market Basket" program. You get a box of whatever's fresh by the week.
I suppose it's obvious that I'm going to suggest putting in a small garden. Seed is inexpensive, or in some cases even free. Sometimes, you can get discounted seeds at the end of one season to use the next. Yes, they're dated, but if you keep them in a cool, dry place, you should be fine. If push comes to shove, you can probably find some "open pollinated" (non-hybrid) tomatoes at the farmer's market (ask the vendors what kind they have). Save the seeds and eat the tomatoes. Free seed!
Now let's say you take my advice and plant a bunch of tomatoes. Well, they're all gonna come in at once and you may not be able to eat the fresh ones fast enough. What to do? You can. It's true you'll need a little equipment to get started, but you can probably find a lot of it used if you watch garage sales and thrift stores. I got 3 dozen quart canning jars at a neighbor's garage sale last summer for just $4. The only thing you absolutely must get new is the jar lids.
Space problems? You can come up with something. My gardening buddy Farmer Phoebe has all kinds of stories about growing cool stuff in an urban community garden. Food Not Lawns: How to Turn Your Yard into a Garden And Your Neighborhood into a Community
is a great resource for the space-challenged gardener. While I'm delighted to have my own copy, if you can't afford to buy one, see if your local public library can get you one to borrow.
For the committed newbie gardener with limited funds, there are two more resources I'd like to recommend. One is the Organic Gardening Magazine's reader forum. You can search their archives for the advice, or log in and ask some real gardeners. The other is the easy-to-understand Gardening When It Counts: Growing Food in Hard Times (Mother Earth News Wiser Living Series)
. It's great to have a copy if you can do it, but otherwise check with the library.
So are you feeling food-centric yet? Remember, the key difference is in the questions you ask yourself. "What do I want to fix tonight?" or "What do we have on hand that sounds good?" Once you get into this, the answer to that last question might just be, "Wow! How do I choose?"
Elizabeth Eckert can help you explore how simple everyday choices create health — or undermine even the best of intentions. With a background that ranges from energy medicine to structural bodywork to developmental psychology, this "Stick-To-It Coach" has the experience to support you in creating the healthiest possible expression of — you!
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