• Making crackers, eating through the freezer, and generally being odd

    Posted on March 10th, 2010 Saver Queen 11 comments

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    So I’ve been challenging myself to eat through my pantry and freezer.  I’m waiting to go shopping until my next garden fresh box arrives at the community centre.  My best money-saving and waste-reducing shopping strategy is to wait until my garden fresh box arrives, and then plan my meals and pick out my items at the grocery store based on what food is in the box.  I’ve also been wanting to eat through the freezer/pantry because I don’t want any food to get feezer-burnt or stale, and as a single person who buys and cooks in bulk, it’s easy to let food go to waste if you don’t consistently eat up what you’ve got.

    I’ve lost count of how long it’s been since I last went grocery shopping and I can’t believe how many meal ideas I’ve been able to come up with, solely focusing on what I have.  I’ve had lots of tasty, nutritious soups, lasagna, and cabbage rolls (all made from scratch by yours truly) and I ate up some meat and vegetables that I had preserved from January’s fresh box.

    I also had plenty of baking supplies.  Why go out to the store to buy crackers, bread, and pizza dough when I had all the ingredients to make these items?  I made them all myself – delicious bread, outstanding pizzas, and Alton Brown’s seedy crisps.  These crackers are super easy to make.  I made a couple of mistakes – I used hard whole wheat flour, added a touch too much salt (I think Alton’s recipe is a tad too salty) and would probably increase the amount of sesame seeds and make extra sure to roll the crackers as thin as possible.  That being said, the crackers had potential, and were fun to make, so I will try making them again.  With some blue cheese and honey, they were still salvageable.

    There is so much joy in using up what you have.  It really pushes you to try new things.  Another tasty gem was my homemade pizza, topped with roasted garlic and olive oil (my go-to substitute for pizza sauce when my pantry is devoid of tomato paste), with sweet corn, green beans, tuna and sundried tomatoes. Drool-worthy.

    I also made up a couple of soups.  I discovered a container of frozen black beans in the freezer (I like to soak an entire bag of beans and freeze what I don’t immediately need for easy use – it’s much more convenient than doing it batch-by-batch) and turned it into black bean soup, a la Martha Stewart (omitting the garlic-pepper sauce for garlic, onions, and spices such as cumin, coriander, pepper and cayenne) and I made my favourite carrot ginger soup, using up January’s supply of carrots.

    I’m probably an odd person.  Most people seem to crave convenience and choice.  Entire companies and industries are devoted to maximizing convenience and choice for consumers. For some reason, I seem to thrive by limiting both convenience and choice when it comes to cooking.  I guess I like the challenge.  I like being pushed into DIY, where I get to try something new, learn new skills, and use my creativity to come up with a meal seemingly out of nowhere.  Maybe that makes me a little strange, but it also means that I get to enjoy freshly-baked pizzas with roasted garlic, and “seedy crisps” with honey.

    Groceries, Recipes
     

    11 responses to “Making crackers, eating through the freezer, and generally being odd”

    1. Amber March 11th, 2010 at 00:48

      I do enjoy convenience, at least some of the time, but I don’t really enjoy choice to be honest. When I cooked only for myself I ate pretty much the same thing every day. I like knowing what’s for lunch. So maybe I’m strange, too. :)

    2. PamelaMac March 11th, 2010 at 11:34

      You make me drool every time you talk about one of your food journeys! Also, it makes me a little sad that I don’t do more of this for me. The problem in my apartment is the freezer attached to the fridge is much to small to batch cook and save.

      I truly miss going to the freezer, pulling out a pasta dish, or soup or fruit for eating in the morning before work, and returning to enjoy it afterwards.

      I do a little bit of batch cooking when I do cook, to enjoy easy left-overs for a few days afterwards. But I truly miss spending a Sunday with a big pot of spaghetti sauce, or soup on the stove and filling containers for those later days when I don’t want to cook but want something nutritious, healthy and homemade.

    3. Catherine March 11th, 2010 at 14:52

      SQ~if you are odd, then there are lots of us in the same boat. I, too, like to cook/bake from scratch. And, I am more odd than you because I rarely can eat any of it.
      I’m just reading ‘My Life in France’ by Julia Child and I think she is the captain of our boat!
      I’m trying to eat down our freezer – want to clean it out top to bottom. Hubby keeps telling me about specials we should get to put into the freezer so it’s a work in progress.

    4. wendy March 11th, 2010 at 16:52

      I really enjoy reading about your thoughts on using up what you have. I eat a lot of beans, and what works for me is cooking the beans and then freezing them on cookie sheets. Then I put them in ziplock bags and scoop out how ever much I need without having to defrost a big chunk. No cans to throw away and no rinsing off the goop.
      w.

    5. dinah March 11th, 2010 at 20:04

      that blue cheese and those crackers look marvelous!

    6. Roxy March 12th, 2010 at 09:09

      I really enjoyed reading this post.I’ve been trying to be better about not wasting food lately, and working through my own packed freezer: frozen leftovers from two weeks of catered lunches for 120 at work (the amount of waste would have been horrific if a few of us hadn’t bagged up the excess- on one day alone, we had two untouched platters of tortillas, stacked three inches high!). More leftovers came from hosting a party for a club I’m in; and even more from a friend who moved away and gave me the contents of her freezer. Some of it is stuff I wouldn’t normally buy, and I’ve had fun being creative with it; the can of crescent rolls were sprinkled with shredded Asiago cheese before being rolled up and baked; the tater tots became the topping for an egg and spinach strata; and the frozen carrots went into a pot of bean stew. Alas, I’m at a loss with the three containers of “whipped topping”. It’s such nasty stuff that I fear it will all be relegated to the trash!

    7. Saver Queen March 16th, 2010 at 22:44

      Amber, in a way, I guess I do enjoy convenience; I just enjoy creating it for myself, because I make a lot of quick, convenient meals with my batch cooking. Hmm.

      PamelaMac – nice to hear from you! Yeah, small kitchens and freezers can make a big difference. I used to be in your shoes. Now I definitely appreciate the ease of an open kitchen and full size appliances.

      Catherine – it’s hard to stay away from the sales, eh? I like to take breaks from shopping and bargain hunting, just to focus on what I have now. It’s a nice break, and I figure if you never eat through the food you have, you run the risk wasting food. I’ll have to read the Julia Child book!!

      Wendy – that’s a great idea. I’ve actually frozen them on cookie sheets like you suggest. I’ve never put them in ziplock bags though. That’s a great tip!

      Roxy – isn’t it horrific how much food gets wasted at events? I’ve seen it too and i try to salvage as much as I can for myself or for others. I love your creative solutions, especially with the tater tots! it reminds me of a “top chef” episode where the chefs have to come up with tasty snacks out of crappy convenience foods. Good luck with the “whipped topping”!

    8. Bente March 18th, 2010 at 10:11

      I don’t think you’re odd – I think you’re pretty awesome

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    10. dj April 11th, 2010 at 19:46

      I think there are a lot of people like you, we just aren’t in the mainstream media. Don’t let it stop you though. Go for it! I like the “spirituality” of preparing food. I’m definitely going to try the cracker recipe. Although, I only have whole wheat flour in the cupboards, by choice. I want to keep things simple and healthy. I use the site: “www.recipezaar.com”. I try to stick with recipes that use common ingredients, so I don’t have them sitting in the cupboard for ages. Long ago, I signed up at a health club, the best thing I got was a referral to buy the cookbook, “Lower your fat thermostat”. I still use it today. The book’s philosophy is very similar to Zonya Health bites. She has a web site and has been on PBS. The bean council recommended, “Easy beans”. I’ve found that helpful. I have recipes for my own bbq sauce (w/out high fructose corn syrup), taco seasoning. I’ve come to the conclusion good food is all about the seasoning and sauce :-)

      What’s your recipe for pizza dough? I haven’t masters the dough handling yet. I end up with a lot of it stuck to my fingers :-) We currently buy Tombstone pizza’s on sale, but I’d like to make our own to improve the health quotient.

    11. Saver Queen April 12th, 2010 at 21:35

      dj,
      thanks for your fabulous comments! I agree, there do seem to be lots of us who enjoy scratch baking and cooking and doing this DIY style. Thank goodness for the online community, where we can all find and connect with one another.
      Unfortunately my pizza dough recipe is a bread maker recipe. I never would have bought a bread maker but my grandma had one lying around she never used and handed it down to me. As far as making it on your own, without the assistance of a bread maker, well you could probably adapt the pizza dough recipe I use in my “homemade pizza pops” http://saverqueen.com/2009/05/22/homemade-junk-food-part-one-pizza-pops/ or keep looking online for a recipe you trust. If it gets too sticky, perhaps you just need more flour??

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