The frugal gourmet

[Sachita]

like many here I grow in season which can be pretty long here in southern virginia. There is no way i could afford to eat what i eat if I had to buy it fresh. But off season or if I'm busy and can't grow as much as I consume I bake a whole chicken once a week. I eat two meals from this and then prepare a noodle soup. Whatever chicken is left I can pretty much get a quart or two of soup so one batch I might make a broth and meat with coconut milk, lemon grass and curry. I'll add hopefully shitaki mushrooms I buy in a can from Ollie's for a buck a can (I buy 20 cans use them all the time) I add roasted red pepper I also buy at ollies unless its season and I'm growing them. I then add some kind of Japanese Somen, rice noodle or the like. I love this soup.

I make another batch with big egg noodles or ziti, chopped celery,basil portabella mushrooms. More of an Italian chunky soup.

Sometimes a Chicken Cacciatore. It's light on chicken but I can get at least 2 meals from a left over chicken.

So I eat the legs and thighs, my favorite, 2 meals and the rest goes towards meals I freeze. Lots of bang for your buck and everything I cook and eat is gourmet. I never skimp on ingredients.

[Bit]

Originally Posted by June

My Grandma's Noodle Recipe

I may have posted it before, I have never tried milk, but this is what I do, except I use a food processor, which Grandma didn't have.

3 Eggs
Salt - about 1/2 t
About three cups of flour

How interesting, June! Do these come out tasting more like the egg noodles in the store? And does the recipe make a lot of noodles? It looks just from the flour amount like it's double my Gram's recipe, which makes enough noodles for a HUGE pot of soup that lasts two hungry people several days.

Anyhow, if it does make loads of noodles, have you tried drying them? How well does it work?
~~~~~~~~~~

Ursy, I hear you about ravioli being fiddly. Have you tried a ravioli press? I saw them when I ordered my pasta machine. There's even a ravioli rolling pin, and a ravioli stamp like a cross between a biscuit cutter and a cookie stamp! Here's a link to an amazon page. [ame="http://www.amazon.com/Norpro-Ravioli-Maker-and-Press/dp/B000BBGV0G/ref=sr_1_1?ie=UTF8&s=home-garden&qid=1274371466&sr=8-1"]Amazon.com: Norpro Ravioli Maker and Press: Home & Garden[/ame]
Someday after everything has settled down financially, I want to try one, probably one of the mold-type pans that makes a bunch at once.

edited to correct the link, again and again... oy... maybe this last one will go somewhere.... *crossin fingers*

[Ursy]

How cool is that ravioli press?! I am going to keep an eye out for one of those!
Thanks Catie! xx

[Ursy]

Oooh, ooooh, OOOOH!

I just came across this and I had to share it -
http://www.aldenteblog.com/2009/03/f...g-horrors.html

[Bit]

Originally Posted by urs

Oooh, ooooh, OOOOH!

I just came across this and I had to share it -
http://www.aldenteblog.com/2009/03/f...g-horrors.html

AAACCCKKKK!!! My eyes, my eyes!!

My "favorite" (NOT) was the armadillo.

[Ursy]

I just discovered this tomato sauce recipe and I'm dying to try it.
Just 3 ingredients - a can of tomatoes, butter, and an onion (ok, 4 if you count salt).

It sounds too simple, but so many people are just raving about it (for example, the 3 links below - not to mention the accompanying comments on each post), I have to give it a try -

http://smittenkitchen.com/2010/01/to...er-and-onions/
http://orangette.blogspot.com/2007/0...ato-sauce.html
http://racheleats.wordpress.com/2010...e-of-the-year/


28 ounces (800 grams) whole peeled tomatoes from a can (San Marzano, if you can find them)*
5 tablespoons (70 grams) unsalted butter
1 medium-sized yellow onion, peeled and halved
Salt to taste

Basically, you simmer it for 45 minutes, then you throw away the onion.

[Fancy]

We've made this a couple times for church events and parties last summer. It's been a big hit. It is a little time consuming, but it's fun when multiple people work on it together. The first time we did it, my mom, daughter and I all chipped in and we had an abundance of salsa!

1. Visit the farmer's market! Get locally grown, fresh picked, in season, organic produce... that's made the difference, and what you'll find may vary from time to time.

This made a large batch - adjust quantity as needed!
6 ears of corn
6 tomatoes (depends on size)
2 bell peppers (we picked multicolors when they're available)
2 hot peppers (we found several variations)
2 onions (vidalia, and purple are great for this)
bunch of cilantro
4 garlic cloves

2. Take the silk out of the corn, but leave the husk. Soak corn with attached husk in cold water for 10-20 min. Grill the corn. Cut corn from ear.

Chop the remaining ingredients very small.

Throw it all together and mix well.

Add 1-2 tsp of lemon juice and salt to taste.

Put it covered in the fridge overnight.

[Chancie]

I bought one of these when Pete took me to The Vermont Country Store.

I haven't used it yet, but I can't wait to try it out!

[adorable]

I am currently in lust with all versions of these bagged wonders for the microwave:

[Bit]

I have a pork roast in the fridge. It started life as a New England Boiled Dinner, and it's morphed several times. All the taters and sauerkraut are gone, and the last of the carrots got used up tonight. The broth has made spaghetti a couple times and penne rigata once. I've reboiled the roast a couple times and added significant amounts of water to the broth each time--it still gels, so I know there's still calcium coming out of the bones (yay for us!).

I topped the first two pastas with shredded cheese (4 cheese Mexican blend); tonight I topped it with homemade yogurt and discovered that yogurt is GREAT with pork! I dumped in the carrots, too, and tonight also dumped in a can of generic diced tomatoes w/jalapenos.

The flavor of the meat and broth just keeps getting better. I never knew you could cook like this!

The final destination of the broth (probably a couple batches) will be rice.

The final destination of the meat--after I use some to make burritos or enchiladas or something--will be pulled pork, with honey mesquite barbeque sauce.

I think the label on the pork said "shoulder arm picnic roast" or some variation on that, and it was a ten pounder on sale for $1.39 a pound.

I'll be doing this again!

[Chancie]

I made delicious pasta tonight. I cooked a pound of spagetti, al dente, and added one pint of cherry tomatoes, roasted with olive oil and pepper, one package of pre washed spinach, and garlic sauteed in olive oil. I threw in a little jar of capers that I think I bought at Aldo's when I was there with drvnsnow and some shredded parmigian cheese.

[Bit]

Btw, wanted to share that I've discovered there isn't really such a thing as low-acid tomatoes, only high sugar tomatoes. That makes them like oranges, yanno? So much sugar that you just don't taste the tartness--but the acid is still there.

Gryph is allergic to the high acid content, so I fugured out how to neutralize it--baking soda! One 14 or 15 ounce can of tomatoes + 1/4 to 1/2 teaspoon baking soda = no acid reaction! It does make the tomatoes foam up (just like baking soda and vinegar), so make sure you have enough room in the pan if you try it--and of course, raw baking soda is not exactly delectable, so you want to do this only in dishes that will be cooked.

It's really nice to be able to use tomatoes again!

PS, thanks to PearlsNLace for doing the research about the low acid tomatoes!

[Ursy]

Originally Posted by Chancie

I made delicious pasta tonight. I cooked a pound of spagetti, al dente, and added one pint of cherry tomatoes, roasted with olive oil and pepper, one package of pre washed spinach, and garlic sauteed in olive oil. I threw in a little jar of capers that I think I bought at Aldo's when I was there with drvnsnow and some shredded parmigian cheese.

I so love roasted vegies - really brings out the flavour.
I never really liked sweet potato until I tried it roasted with sour cream on top. That's the best way to have it, if you ask me!

Anyway Chancie, your pasta sounds yum!

Wow Cath, $1.39 a pound is a pretty amazing price. I don't think we'd ever find a special like that here in Australia. The best I've seen is about $4.00 a kilo (now the online converter says 1 kilogram = 2.20462262 pounds, but I don't want to think that hard so let's just say $2.00 a pound) but that's a very rare find. That was for a pork roast.

Meat is getting more and more expensive. The cheapest meat here is turkey mince (something like $2.50 a pound). I imagine it's because turkey meat must be relatively cheap to produce, but I wonder why? Chicken mince and beef mince is more like $5.00 - $6.00 a pound, on average. It would be interesting to do a comparison.

Oh, yeah... but that was Australian dollars... too many variables - I give up!

[Fancy]

Ursy -

When you say mince, is that comparable to what I'd call "ground"? When I read mince, I think something like paste. It can't be the same, I think.

I've been striving to not by meats (as much), or to look for local sources rather than chain super markets. I do buy a lot of turkey (ground), and fish when able. I don't mind paying a little more for the right meats when I know I'm saving money elsewhere (produce).

Originally Posted by urs

I so love roasted vegies - really brings out the flavour.
I never really liked sweet potato until I tried it roasted with sour cream on top. That's the best way to have it, if you ask me!

Anyway Chancie, your pasta sounds yum!

Wow Cath, $1.39 a pound is a pretty amazing price. I don't think we'd ever find a special like that here in Australia. The best I've seen is about $4.00 a kilo (now the online converter says 1 kilogram = 2.20462262 pounds, but I don't want to think that hard so let's just say $2.00 a pound) but that's a very rare find. That was for a pork roast.

Meat is getting more and more expensive. The cheapest meat here is turkey mince (something like $2.50 a pound). I imagine it's because turkey meat must be relatively cheap to produce, but I wonder why? Chicken mince and beef mince is more like $5.00 - $6.00 a pound, on average. It would be interesting to do a comparison.

Oh, yeah... but that was Australian dollars... too many variables - I give up!

[Ursy]

Originally Posted by Freckle-K

Ursy -

When you say mince, is that comparable to what I'd call "ground"? When I read mince, I think something like paste. It can't be the same, I think.

I've been striving to not by meats (as much), or to look for local sources rather than chain super markets. I do buy a lot of turkey (ground), and fish when able. I don't mind paying a little more for the right meats when I know I'm saving money elsewhere (produce).

Oh yes Freckle, I think you guys call it ground. Funny how we have to negotiate different terminologies across the ocean. I read an amusing discussion about biscuits and cookies just this past weekend - here it is:

http://ask.metafilter.com/43569/What...biscuit-abroad

Because what you guys call cookies, we call biscuits. We tend not to have biscuits in the U.S. sense at all. It intrigued me greatly when I first heard of them. I think I'm going to have to try them!

[Gemme]

Originally Posted by urs

Meat is getting more and more expensive. The cheapest meat here is turkey mince (something like $2.50 a pound). I imagine it's because turkey meat must be relatively cheap to produce, but I wonder why? Chicken mince and beef mince is more like $5.00 - $6.00 a pound, on average. It would be interesting to do a comparison.

Oh, yeah... but that was Australian dollars... too many variables - I give up!

Ground/minced turkey is a little cheaper because they throw everything in there...skin, meat, bits of this or that...if it's on the bird, it's in there. Most of the chicken here is specialized. Breasts, skinless breasts, drumsticks, etc. so that ups the cost due to packaging and the machinery required to separate the parts.

[Ursy]

Originally Posted by Gemme

Ground/minced turkey is a little cheaper because they throw everything in there...skin, meat, bits of this or that...if it's on the bird, it's in there. Most of the chicken here is specialized. Breasts, skinless breasts, drumsticks, etc. so that ups the cost due to packaging and the machinery required to separate the parts.

Blurk!
That really puts me off the turkey then. Thanks for the explanation Gemme!

[Bit]

This is a very simple recipe that makes a soft bread-like biscuit, good for butter and jam or for sopping up gravy. (It is not a British tea biscuit at all.) The original recipe came from about.com, in the southern cooking section; this is my version. My apologies about the measurements; I couldn't figure out how to convert them.

Drop Biscuits

3 cups all-purpose flour
1 Tbsp double-acting baking powder
1/2 tsp salt
1/4 tsp baking soda (bicarbonate of soda; very important, don't leave it out)

3 Tbsp butter

1/8 to 1/4 cup lemon juice
1 cup milk

Set an oven rack in the center position. Preheat the oven to 425 F (218.3 C).

Start by souring the milk; measure the lemon juice, dump the milk in on top, and let it sit while you mix the rest of the ingredients.

In a medium size bowl, mix flour with other dry ingredients. Cut in the butter until the particles are the size of peas. You can make them uniformly fine, so the butter is spread evenly through the flour like a commercial biscuit mix, or you can leave tiny lumps of butter--either works.

Pour in the sour milk--lumps are good but not required--and stir till the dough is evenly wet. Make sure you scrape the bottom of the bowl. In order to get tender biscuits, do this stirring with a spoon and NEVER an electric mixer of any kind; biscuit dough is like pie dough and benefits from gentle handling. If it's extremely dry or sticky, you can fix that by stirring in a teaspoon or two of water or a tablespoon of flour.

Once the dough is completely mixed, drop it by heaping tablespoonfuls (or servingspoonfuls) onto a cold, ungreased baking sheet. Leave room for the biscuits to expand. Four rows of three biscuits should fit easily onto a standard 12" x 18" baking sheet. (30.5 x 45.7 cm)

Bake for eight to fifteen minutes, depending on how hot your oven runs and how wet/sticky the dough was. Don't set a timer and walk away--these biscuits need checked every few minutes. They're done when the peaks are just starting to brown. Makes 12.

Notes:

• If you prefer sweet biscuits, you can add up to 1/4 cup sugar to the dough, plus sweet spices like cinnamon and nutmeg.
• If you prefer savory, you can use garlic salt instead of salt, add in dried herbs and spices, and add a cup of shredded cheese with the milk.
• If you prefer cultured buttermilk to sour milk, leave out the lemon juice and use 1 1/4 cups buttermilk.
• The baking soda is important because it reacts with the lemon juice or buttermilk to do a major part of the rising.
• IMPORTANT: If you put cheese in this dough, grease the baking sheet! OY, I didn't the first time... what a mess!

[Gryph]

Originally Posted by Bit

AAACCCKKKK!!! My eyes, my eyes!!

My "favorite" (NOT) was the armadillo.

It doesn't look like an armadillo to me! Put some cheese on it and it would be really good. Just have to keep napkins close by and then when finished wash hands in hot soapy water.

[Bit]

The cheese is INSIDE. Where the bacon should be.

You will ruin your hands, eating the sandwich with bacon on the outside! And anything you touch will get ruined too.

Does TOO look like an armadillo.