Something I decided to do when I got serious about eating healthier and spending less money was relying less on convenience foods. Last year I did a pretty good job cutting out delivery and eating out, but I was still such a sucker for higher priced items at the grocery store—the “oven ready” kits, the fresh sushi in the prepared foods section, the artisan bread loaves that always smell so tempting…the list goes on. In January, I resolved to cut back on these and make as much from scratch as possible.
I’ve long been a fan of making my own beef broth; making broth means you get to pick exactly what flavors your broth has, rather than the cookie-cutter standard broth you can buy in the store. That may not sound like a big deal, but the first time I made beef broth with ginger, garlic, cinnamon, and cloves, I was hooked. There was no way I was going back to those little broth cartons (or dehydrated cubes).
But this winter, I branched out from just beef broth. In December, after we cooked the Christmas turkey and finished eating, I threw the turkey carcass, any leftover scraps/innards, an onion, an orange, some garlic, ginger, and cinnamon in a massive stock pot, I froze gallons of broth in single servings and it’s delicious! It’s now my go-to lazy dinner, with some rice noodles and a random veggie thrown in for nights when I don’t want to cook. Then, I made my first batch of vegetable broth, which was surprisingly satisfying—I used scraps of veggies from other meals, threw them in a giant pot for about 4 hours, and voila! Delicious broth. For me, a bowl of noodles in any form has always been the ultimate comfort food, so having this broth in the freezer means I’m less likely to go to a restaurant to get pho when I’ve had a bad day or I’m not feeling well.
But I wanted to also find ways to make other things in my grocery cart. I started with cooking beans instead of buying canned. The first batch of black beans I made blew me away—the flavor was so much better! And that’s saying something coming from me because I’ve always just tolerated beans in cooking as a healthy, cheap filler food. By cooking them from scratch, I could get them perfect—with garlic and onion that isn’t included in the canned beans. It also made me feel like I had accomplished something; I love that I can pull cooked beans out of my freezer now with ease. Once I cook up a big batch, adding them to recipes is just as easy as with the canned variety (or maybe even easier because I don’t need a can opener and I don’t have to rinse them).
But the coup de grace of my frugal cooking January is the bread. Through a high stakes secret mission involving coercion and sneakiness (basically I asked my coworker), I got my hands on a very healthy sourdough starter. I wasn’t sure how I’d feel about using it (again, I tend to err toward the convenience side of cooking, and you have to actually keep starter alive), but this thing is now one of my babies. I get so excited about making something with my starter every weekend and seeing the bubbles after I’ve fed it. I’ve gotten in the habit of making 1-2 loaves of bread every weekend, and if it’s an artisan-style sourdough loaf, that’s an all-day affair. But it’s immensely satisfying to have fresh sourdough bread to accompany every meal, and the photographic results are worthy of Instagram stardom. Case in point:
This is a huge deal because buying a loaf of bread like this at the store would easily cost $6 or more, and it wouldn’t even taste as good! The chewy, sour bread is now the highlight of my breakfast, and a small slice with a little drizzle of honey makes the perfect sweet note at the end of dinner.
I started this cooking experiment with the main goal of saving money, and I’ve accomplished that, but all three of these cooking habits will be staying with me not only because they’re frugal, but primarily because they make me happy. I like cooking them, they aren’t difficult, and I love the sense of accomplishment that accompanies each cooking success. All in all, I’m glad I’m spending more time babying my sourdough and less time mindlessly watching TV (because that is the trade-off). Once I’m on my feet in the kitchen, I’m more likely to tidy as I go, or cook other things I need throughout the week. And that sense of accomplishment cascades into other parts of my life. Not all at once, and not every time, but I have noticed that as I make small changes, I’m excited about tackling bigger changes in my life. I think I’ll write more about this in a future post because it’s an idea I want to flesh out more, and this is (hopefully) just the beginning.
Any other suggestions for how I can step up my frugal cooking game? Any sourdough recipes to recommend? Let me know!