Eating as nature intended...and on a budget

Long ago I began the process of moving our family to a healthier way of eating.  It all started with Rubic being diagnosed with multiple allergies, both environmental and food, but primarily corn.  Corn especially in the form of High Fructose corn syrup.  That stuff could set him off in hives faster than anything.  In my enthusiasm to help my son I spent all of our grocery money at a health food store, and received very little food as a result.  It was just too expensive.  So I then thought I would just have to read labels to get all the allergens out of his diet.  This also began my foray into ultimate scratch baking.  Anyway, It was while reading labels and baking something that made me about give up.  Corn is in baking powder.  I know right!  I didn't give up entirely, but I did have to moderate my expectations some.  HFCS was the main culprit.  I had to make sure that was out, but the other stuff I just had to do the best I could.  Money was tight.  Whole corn products seemed to have less effect on him, so HFCS was my primary focus.

15 years later, I'm still not where I can do everything I would like, but I have made progress and feel we are in a better place now.  Eating organic has become "all the rage", and so you really need to be able to get the most bang for your buck if you're going to try it.  While his allergies opened my eyes to better eating options, It's been a work in progress.  Changes have been made in steps rather than all at once, and that is my first point.

1)  Small changes over time-  Ours started with trying to remove High Fructose Corn Syrup out of our diet.  I wasn't worried about organic or all natural at the time.  I was just wanting to buy items my family would eat that didn't have that stuff in it.  If I could, I avoided corn in general, but primarily HFCS.  Funny though, while trying to remove the HFCS, I found we were eating items on a healthier scale.  If I bought boxed cereal, it was rice, wheat, or oats.  Nothing sweetened because that meant HFCS.  It was a minuscule  change in the big scheme of things, but a change.  Then I began to read about margarine and how it wasn't such a good idea.  We switched to butter.  I buy it when on sale and stock up (Usually around the holidays).  Dh was dealing with high blood pressure and cholesterol.  We switched to Extra virgin olive oil (I buy it at Sams).  Both butter and Olive oil are more expensive.  You can't fry with Olive oil so, guess what, we ate less fried foods.  Each small step we took led to another small step we tried.

2)  Make your own-  In my effort to not only get HFCS out of Rubic's (and my families) life as well as save money to afford the changes I was making; I began to do a lot of scratch baking.  There were items my kids liked that I wanted them to enjoy, but the store version was not a good option.  It's a real eye opener once you start to read labels.  Boxed cereal was replaced with homemade granola.  Cookies, granola bars, bread, Chocolate syrup, etc; are now made at home.

3)  Learn -  This can be used multiple ways.  Learn a new skill:  canning, bread making, gardening, and cooking in general.  Also, learn about the food you purchase and how it affects you and your family.  Look up those unpronounceable ingredients.  In a world of google,  information is at your finger tips.  As I have learned about what goes into the foods we buy, I have felt compelled to make the changes where I can.   On that same note, and not to only make it look like I'm picking on processed food, Just because something says "organic", "whole grain", or "all natural", doesn't mean it's good for you.  If you buy organic boxed macaroni and cheese, you are still dealing with powdered cheese, white pasta, etc.  My main pet peeve right now is Kroger's "Simple Truth" chicken.  You really need to watch the label.  Their "simple truth" chickens are labeled "organic"or "all natural", but the labels are identical and both types are in the same bin.  Both are priced higher than the other brands.  The organic I can understand, but all chickens are"all natural'.  Good Grief!  You need to know about what what you're buying, especially if your dollars are precious and you are trying to spend wisely.  Be an informed consumer.

4)  Grow what you can-  I have been gardening pretty much since we have lived here (bout 20 years).  My garden has expanded from just a garden to a garden, fruit trees, blueberry bushes, blackberry bushes, strawberries, and herbs.  When I first began gardening, I used pesticides because that's what I knew.  Over the years I have made a move away from pesticides in favor of companion planting, or scheduling my planting in such a way as to mitigate the damage from pests.  I've moved away from using commercial fertilizers to using compost and chicken manure.  Having chickens has provided us with farm fresh eggs, and a better garden.  While I don't (yet) grow everything we eat, I do grow a good chunk of it.  What I have grown in the past 2 years has had no pesticides or commercial fertilizers.  While I am not certified organic with a label and everything, it's good enough for us.

 5)  Buy local.  You can call your county extension office, or just google where the nearest farmers market will be.  We have several in our area.  Prices tend to be the same here in Georgia as the prices are set by the Dept of agriculture.  That is up to a point.  If you're buying a large amount to can or freeze, many farmers can set their own price.  It's worth it if you will put these items up.  Also, they will tend to reduce their prices near the end of the day.  You can also google local produces of honey, milk, eggs, etc.  Just keep an eye out.  If someone offers you eggs or veggies, or even plants, thank them very much and enjoy your prize.  What they have given you is priceless.

Here are the changes we have made over time.  This list might help some of you in starting out.

1)  No more HFCS-  there are alternatives just as cheap.  In fact many companies are moving away from using it now.  Never assume it isn't in something.  Read your labels.

2)  No processed foods-  Three exceptions; turkey bacon (Einstein likes it and it's cheap), powdered coffee creamer, and chips for Dh lunches.

3)  Butter replaced margarine, and olive oil replaces other oils.

4)  No more American Cheese-  I buy Cheddar, Mozzarella, or other hard cheeses.  No low fat or nonfat cheese.

5)  No artificial sweeteners or anything with them in it.-  we use Stevia or sugar or a mixture of both.  True confessions.  Once in a blue moon I still succumb to a Diet Dr Pepper.  But that is more the exception than the rule.  Rare, maybe 2 a ear if that, but I want to be honest.  But I know it needs to be never.

6)  Whole milk, and whole milk products-  No more skim milk or other non fat dairy.  Skim milk used to be the waste from milk processing.  It is blue normally.  Chalk is added to whiten it.  YUCK!  I can't afford organic and if I could I would opt for raw milk (Unpasteurized).  That is only sold in Georgia for Ahem pet consumption(eye roll).  I buy whole milk and mix half and half with water.  Reduces fat and calorie content and tastes like 2%.

7)  Whole wheat flour- I use mostly in baking bread in about a 4 to 1 ratio with all purpose.  It's used entirely in cookies, crackers, and quick breads.

8) Farm fresh eggs- some what free range with our chicken tractor, but not totally because of predators and my garden.

9)  Pesticide and chemical free fruits and veggies from the garden.  If I buy organic, it has to be a price I can handle.  I also don't buy organic for things where the peeling is discarded (like bananas).


Changes I want to make:

1)  Buy more organic meats when possible.  Eventually I want to raise pastured chickens for meat.  We thought about this year but there was a bird flu out break close to Georgia and we decided to wait rather than bring any new birds into our yard.  Those organic whole fryers I bought a few weeks ago made the best broth and the most flavorful and tender meat.  Sold me!  I just can't afford the prices all the time, but when I can, I will.

2)  Try and begin to use raw milk when possible.  I'm hopeful when we do this, the powdered creamer can go.

3) Master the art of bread making where no white flour is used.

The idea is to start where you are making small changes as you can, and adding new changes when you can.  It's taken many years to get to this point in my grocery buying, and I still have things to change.  You can make the changes too.  A little along.

Squeezing out every last bit of use

I think one of the best weapons in your frugal arsenal is making the most of everything you have.   With every new use, the initial price goes down.  Granted the uses get smaller as more of the item is utilized, but you're still getting more bang for your buck.

Here's a good example.  A week ago I came across three organic whole chickens, marked down at my local grocery store.  They were marked down to $1,74 lb because they were nearing their expiration date.  Now that's about twice what I would normally pay for a whole chicken, but in my range when it came to buying organic.  I can't afford to buy organic very often, so when the opportunity arises, I try.  I bought all three and took them home.  Once home, I immediately removed them from their packaging and put them all in a crock pot to cook.  By using the crock pot, I didn't have to add additional water.  I was very please to see there was not a lot of additional juices added to these birds like when you by the standard birds.  I was also pleased to see the gizzards and organs were included.

***Dh fishes and the gizzards and organs make great bait for him.  These were immediately frozen for him to use when fishing time comes around.  It will keep him from having to buy bait separately.

Anyhoo, The chickens cooked, cooled and then I deboned them, putting about 8-12 oz in each freezer bag.

I then took all of the bones, 2 large carrots, the tops and bottom off of the celery in one package (including the leaves), the tops and bottoms of two large onions (skin included).I reserved the rest of the onions in the fridge for later use in other recipes, and the rest of the celery was chopped and frozen.  BTW, it goes without saying that I washed the veggies first!  I put all of this in the larger crock pot along with 1 tsp salt, 2 Tbs of vinegar, and water to cover all.  I turned the crock pot on low and it cooked for about a day to a day and a half.  I checked it periodically to make sure it wasn't boiling, or to see if the bones had softened.  The vinegar draws the minerals out of the bones and puts it into the stock.  Once the bones are soft, you can take up the stock.  Once the stock was finished, I strained out the veggies and other scraps.  The broth was allowed to cool and then frozen.  Once somewhat frozen, I removed the stock and removed the fat from the top.  I then reheated the stock to thaw it out and then divided it into 2 cup (pints) portions.

***I ended  up with 7 pints of stock in my freezer.

Not done yet, I took the fat I scrapped off the stock, and added it to my doggies "cookies" as she knows them.  I used the fat instead of the oil called for in the recipe.  You can find the recipe in my "recipe" page.  Oh. plu she got the leftover veggies from the broth.  A very happy dog.

*** The recipe made 16 large "cookies for her".  She was pretty comical.  She had no idea what I was making, I think, but as I started making them, she came out and laid on the kitchen floor watching my every move, until they were done.

Mona waiting for "cookie" dough.

So to sum up, from three whole birds I got

3 fishing trips
6-7 bags of chicken
7 pints of all natural, unfooled around with broth
16 large doggie treats.

Well worth the time and cost of three initial birds.

Homemade Graham Crackers

Yes!  She went there!  Yesterday I made homemade graham crackers.  I have to say the internet is a great tool when it comes to finding recipes or how to's.  Not a big techno geek, but I will give them that.  I found a recipe  for graham crackers.  I had tried it a week or so ago and found the recipe was much like snicker doodles, just flat.  They were good, but they weren't graham crackers.  They did, however, give me a base to make the recipe my own.  I have since tweaked the recipe more to my liking and decided to share it with you.  So here goes.

12 Tbs butter softened ( 1 1/2 sticks )
1 cup brown sugar
1/3 cup honey
2 eggs
1 1/2 cups all purpose flour
1 1/2 cups whole wheat flour (white wheat)
1/2 tsp salt
1 tsp baking soda

In a small mixing bowl, place all your dry ingredients, except brown sugar, and mix well.  Set aside.  In medium mixing bowl, beat the butter, sugar, and honey til fluffy.  Add the eggs and mix well.  Add the dry ingredients.  You may need to mix this with a large spoon or even your clean hands.  The dough will be dryer than cookie dough, but it will still stick together well.  Refrigerate the dough for at least an hour.

Preheat your oven to 350.  Using about 1/8th of the dough at a time, place dough onto a well floured (use all purpose) sheet of wax paper.  Mash hard with your hand to flatten some.  Dust the top of the dough well with more flour and cover the top with wax paper.  Roll the dough between the sheets of wax paper, turning periodically to kind of square things up.
*** Note, you may need to pull the top sheet of wax paper back and dust will more flour in order to keep the dough from sticking.

Once flat ( like 1/4 of an inch at most), you can be obsessive like me and cut it with a pizza cutter into nice neat squares, or you can just cut it into pieces in whatever shape it happens to be in.  Your choice.  Either way, it needs to be "Crackers".  Brush the top of the cracker with a little water.  This will also remove some of the flour.  Then sprinkle with sugar.  Bake 6 minutes.  Cool on a wire rake.  I store ours in the freezer, using a few at a time.

Options:  You can add 1 ts cinnamon to the mix, and sprinkle with cinnamon sugar for the cinnamon graham crackers.

I take two of the homemade graham squares and put good spoonful of cool whip in between.  Then freeze for some really good ice cream sandwiches.

***  If you are so industrious, you can try this recipe, but I will say that graham crackers, especially if bought at Aldi , are really cheap when it comes right down to it.  I will also say the homemade crackers make the best ice cream sandwiches.  So, again, your choice.

Just now have my head above water

As of last night I am finally caught up with what is listed in my Etsy shop.  I put the final snaps on three little slip sets.  Now my focus can change to making the little creative outfits I truly enjoy.  I have a few of those in the works.  My store stock fell to 13 items from 30 and that was with me continuing to add items.  The last week before Christmas, however, I put the sewing away and focused on the holiday with the family.

I made 110 sales before New Years Eve this year.  It is my first year on Etsy.  Not to shabby.  My bread and butter were the doll diapers.  I sold 57 sets of those in various sizes.  My goal for the coming year is to have 65 diaper sets of various sizes in stock going into next years Christmas season.  That's 185 diapers ya'll.   Yikes!  In addition, I would like to have my store stock level be at about 50 if possible.

Lest you think all I would talk about is Etsy (My sons says I'm a spokesperson), I have ventured into a few normal things again.  I've started making bread for us again.  There for a while it was too crazy and I bought bread at a local bread thrift store near us.  Still not as cheap as making bread, but cheaper than at the grocery store.  I am bummed to hear the Sams is no longer carrying the 80 oz packages of regular honey.   Now all they carry is the raw honey half that size, but the same price of 13.98.  I know why, apparently raw honey is all the rage.  I get that, but if you are baking with it, then you might as well use the regular.  Once raw honey is heated up past 95 degrees, all those wonderful attributes go away.  I use raw honey to make our cough syrup (Which is never heated up), but other than that, I use honey for bread and granola.

Here is the cough syrup recipe lest I forget:

COUGH SYRUP

3 TBS FRESH THYME-  I use lemon thyme, but you can use whatever you have on hand.  I just like the lemony taste with the honey.
1/3 CUP RAW HONEY
2 CUPS WATER

BRING THE 2 CUPS WATER TO BOIL.  ADD THE THYME AND REMOVE FROM HEAT.  LET STEEP AND COOL DOWN TO BELOW 95 DEGREES.  POUR THE TEA THROUGH A STRAINER TO REMOVE THE LEAVES.  ADD THE RAW HONEY TO THE TEA AND MIX WELL.  YOU CAN ADD EXTRA LEMON JUICE OR CHOP A FRESH LEMON TO PUT IN THE JAR.  STORE IN THE FRIDGE FOR UP TO 3 MONTHS.

The best thing about this cough syrup, is it is non toxic.  You can give it to small children, just not children under two if you use raw honey.  If you make this with regular honey, you can give it to any child, though many of the benefits are lost if you aren't using raw honey.  The Thyme is still medicinal.

In addition to the few things I've managed to accomplish aside from sewing, I have managed to start some of my seeds for gardening in 2017.  The tomatoes are doing fine.  I have about 36-40 plants right now.  I had to replant the broccoli and cabbage and a few snow peas.  The cold weather stuff I'm hoping I can start hardening off soon.  Soon will be the time of warmer weather.  With a temp of 15 degrees this morning and a projected low tonight of 9, I will take whatever warms thoughts I can get.

So not a barn burner, but hopefully this post is a start back on a new year.  How are things in your neck of the woods?

Black belt grocery savings Part 1

I have been without a computer monitor since friday before last.  We finally got a monitor Friday, but I had to work this past weekend and  so was unable to post anything.  So finally it is monday, I have 2 loaves of bread rising and the dishes are somewhat done(can't wash my bread bowl yet) so I am on here catching up.  Not much to tell I guess.  Last week was grocery gettin week and so I spent a lot of time oranizing my fridge, pantry, and freezer.  I tried using up as much stuff as possible so nothing would be wasted and I believe I was successful.  I have to tell ya, I have sticker shock everythime I go to the store.  Even at Aldi I was rethinking just about every purchase.  I still need to go to Sams today, but even that I am having to pare down my list to stay in budget.  Pretty soon my tricks won't work as well and I will have to increase my grocery budget again.  While at Kroger Thursday I saw a lady with about 8 kroger all natural peanutbutter she had purchased.  I said something about she must like peanutbutter or something to that effect, and she said she had heard that peanutbutter and peanuts (and pretty much anything that has peanuts in it) is about to spike due to a bad harvest this past season so she thought she should get some extra.  Very prudent I must say.  I am thinking I might grab a few extra.  I use alot of peanutbutter and I also buy the all natural.  Not cause I am a food snob, but I have one child allergic to HFCS and another that is on the autisim spectrum.  I want to be careful with what they eat.  Can't do it all the time, but I can do it with what is feasible for us.  Can I share some money saving tips on groceries?  I hate those magazine articles that say they can cut $100 from your grocery bill.  I laugh at thier tips: buy generic, don't shop hungry, shop with a list, stuff like that.  Those are fine for someone that has never tried to save on their grocery budget ,but what do you do when you have done all you can and still the ends aren't meeting.  These are the blackbelt grocery saving tips.  These are tips for when you are willing to put the time and energy into saving money.  Your abilities and your willingness to put effort towards providing food for your family are free to you.  It is what you do when you have nothing left to spend. 

MAKE YOUR OWN-  Alot of the items we buy at the store we can make ourselves.  The resources to learn are abundant and easy to find.  It is much more cost effective to buy a 5 lb bag of flour at the grocery store, and a 1lb bag of yeast at a warehouse store (keep it in your fridge or freezer it lasts longer) to make about 6-8 loaves of bread per 5 lb bag of flour as opposed to spending the same amount of money for 1 loaf of bread.  The pay off is awesome tasting bread(storebought can't compare) for pennies, strong arms (from kneading), and you know what things are going into your families body.  Things like bread I understand are labor intensive and you need to aquire a knack for making bread.  If you are nervous about making your own bread, go to a thrift store and aquire a bread machine to start with.  I used to use mine for making pizza crust, but when it finally died I just went to making the crust by hand.  Breads I make are: sandwich, french, quick breads, dinner rolls(cinnamen, hamburger and hot dog, donuts, etc, ), as well as my pizza crusts.  The easiest way to begin making your own breads is to start with something easy like white bread and /or a pizza crust.  Here is my recipe for pizza crust:

PIZZA CRUST

1 1/3 CUPS  WATER SLIGHTLY WARM (ABOUT 105 DEGREES)
1/4 CUP DRY MILK
1/2 TSP SALT
1 TBS SUGAR
2 TBS OLIVE OIL
2 TSP YEAST
4 CUPS FLOUR

You can put everything into a bread machine on the dough setting or you can do it like I do.  Take your water and put into a large mixing bowl.  Add your dry milk, sugar, oil, and salt.  Sprinkle your yeast over the top and let it bubble a second or two.  Add about 2 cups of flour and whick it really well, then stir in as much of the remaining flour as you can with a spoon.  Turn onto a floured surface and knead a couple of minutes using just enough flour to keep your dough from being sticky.  Pour a little bit of oil back into your mixing bowl.  Take you dough and put it back into the bowl turning a few times to make sure you cover the dough well with oil.  Let rise in the bowl for about 25 min.  It won't rise too much, but punch it down and knead it a little more.  Cut into two crusts.  Press the crusts into the pizza pans.  This will take a bit cause you will press a few minutes and then let it rest a few minutes, then press some more til the pan is covered with the crust.  Put your sauce and toppings on and bake at about 425 for about 10 minutes or util the cheese is good and bubbly.  This is even more economical if you use your own homemade tomato sauce.  I will include mine in the next post. 

Other items I make are pancake syrup, choc cyrup, granola, ready to bake biscuits, spaggetti sauce, salsa, wheat thin crackers, doggie treats, english muffins, as well as the normal things most people would make like pancake and biscuit mix, muffins, and white sauce mix (use it in place of cream soups).  Aside from the bread which I will say takes a litte more time, but I haven't noticed a problem on my end, these other items take literally seconds to minutes to make and I believe well worth my investment of time and energy.  It is because I do these things that I have been able to keep my grocery budget as low as I do and still  maintain a pantry; which is another tip I will go into at a later date. This is becomming a long post so I will continue this in my next post and include more recipes for those interested.

For Cary Ann and Teresa, and anyone else interested

Apparently I am unable at this time to comment on my own blog.  How wrong is that!  Anyway, Cary I wanted to thank you for being my first commenter.  YAY!  Now you will live on in infammy(smile).  Teresa, my recipe for cream soup mix is as follows:

Cream soup mix

1 1/2 cups dry milk
3/4 cup all purpose flour
1 ts salt

mix all together then cut in

1 stick of margarine or butter.  store in an airtight container in the fridge.  To use for plain white sauce just use 1/3 cup mix to 1 cup of water.  If you want cream of chicken, use chicken broth, cream of muchroom: open a can of muchroom, s and drain, add water to the muchroom liquid to equal 1 cup fluid. Then follow the rest of the recipe.  You can also add 1 cup of cheese and 1 ts yellow mustard to make cheese sauce. 

Getting ready for fall

I already feel the dryer air and we have actually had some days in the 80s.  Today will be in the low ninties, but after today it looks like at least a week long stretch in the low to mid seventies for highs.  I love, love this time of year.  Cool weather means baking (not good for my waistline), but fun none the less.  Two days ago I made my first ever batch of english muffins.  In the middle of the process I had a light bulb (or should I say Duh) moment and thought I should take pictures to post on my blog!  So next go around I will do two things.  First is take pictures of the process so those of you that want  to know how can, and second, make the muffins larger.  The recipe was supposed to make 18.  Mine made 22.  I used a biscuit cutter to cut them out.  Next time I am going to just divide the dough into 18 pieces to make a decent sized muffin.  However, this batch did turn out really good.  I will use half wheat and harlf white next time as well.  Since this was my first try I wanted to make sure they had the best chance possible of succeeding.  Using white flour is easier to me anyay.  I know they reccommend using white flour to learn how to make bread so I just extended that to cover english muffins. 

Grocery day is Friday and I have plans today to get my fridge cleaned out and organized.  I also want to organize my refridge freezer.  I need to make my list and check it twice.  It is harder to get the good deals out there right now.  Hence the reason I am making our bread products.  Whatever I can make from scratch saves money to be used to buy other things that are still rising in price right now.  Items I make from scratch include: loaf bread, french bread, pizza crust, hamburger and hotdog buns, english muffins, cinnamon rolls, dinner rolls, Cream soup mix (aka white sauce mix), chocolate syrup, pancake syrup, salsa, wheat thin type crackers, spaggetti sauce, cake mix, frozen biscuits, season salt, granola, yogurt and shake &bake mix.  There are other items I have recipes for, but these are the ones I make consistently.  It is an amazing savings to be able to make these things as opposed to buying them.  The ingredients are much less than the premade item.  Plus I know what is in it and that makes me feel good giving it to my family.  And dont think I dont have conveinence.  It takes seconds or minutes to make these things up and then I have them on hand.  I get the benefits of conveinence, but cost savings as well. 
I will be waking the youngest offspring momentarily so he can get breakfast and be ready to begin school.  This is the first normal school day we have had this week.  He had a mild asthma attack Sunday night, which kept him up, so I let him sleep in and we had a light day on Monday.  Yesterday was test taking and we had school at my mothers.  So today is back to the routine. I hope everyone has a great day. 

Psalms 104 vs 33-35

"I will sing to the Lord all my life;
 I will sing praise to my God as long as I live.
May my meditation be pleasing to him,
 as I rejoice in the Lord.
But may sinners vanish from the earth
and the wicked be no more.
Praise the Lord O my soul.
Paise the Lord"