My dinner last night was an improvised Thai Massaman curry with chicken tenderloins and red bell peppers. I had actually expected to make a red curry, but found that my curry paste (which I bought long ago) was a massaman curry paste. Massaman curry often has potatoes, but I didn’t feel like that, so I just went with sliced red bell pepper, and a sliced shallot. I didn’t even have any limes, fresh herbs, or fish sauce.
Out of all the cookware I own, the ones I like best are made out of cast iron. They’re the most versatile cooking vessels I have. I started using cast iron 4 years ago, when I moved in with someone who preferred cast iron for a lot of his cooking. I had been wanting to try it out ever since watching Alton Brown use it to cook a ribeye. In 2006, I got my own cast iron skillets and began using them daily.
I’ve had meatballs in my freezer for a long time now, and never got around to using them. Today I decided it was time to use them for a quick lunch.
With canned plain tomato sauce on hand, making a tasty sauce to go with pasta, bread, or meatballs is really simple and fast. Today I chopped up the remains of an onion, and smashed and roughly chopped three garlic cloves, then sauteed those in some California Estate olive oil.
Once they started to get fragrant, I added a good amount of red pepper flakes, some pepper, and a bit of dried oregano. I let it continue to saute until the onions just started to brown, then I added one small can of plain tomato sauce, just enough water to rinse the sides of the can, and a glug of balsamic vinegar. I let that simmer uncovered for ten minutes.
After simmering, I tasted it, and decided it needed some sugar, a bit more vinegar, and more oregano. Once that was stirred in, I added the frozen meatballs and about 1/2 cup of water, and partially covered the pan to let the meatballs cook for 20 minutes.
When the meatballs were done, I removed the lid and raised the heat to thicken the sauce. In the meantime, I toasted some pieces of sourdough bread. It all finished at about the same time. I put the meatballs and sauce on one side of the plate, and the bread on the other. The whole meal required about 15 minutes of active work, including cleanup (nonstick pans, while not great for everything, make cleanup of simple meals very easy).
Recently I had a craving for Southern-style vegetables: cooked for a long time with a cured pork product. I saw some nice Romano beans at the market, and decided they’d be just the thing. I had wanted to cook some when they were in season last year, but never got a chance.
Romano beans are a type of broad, flat snap bean. Depending on when they were harvested, they could be suited for either fast cooking, like most green beans, or long cooking. The Southern style for snap beans is to cook them for a long time with cured pork. This recipe is my take on a standard, simple Southern recipe for snap beans.
Continue reading for a method to check if your beans need stringing, and a recipe for romano beans »
One way to save money on food is to shop at local, independent markets, especially ethnic markets. When I was living in Santa Barbara, I did some exploring of the local markets, and found that prices on most real food were cheaper than prices at the chain supermarkets. Here in the LA area, I have a large ethnically-biased produce market that I do a lot of my shopping at.
Sunland Produce is a supermarket-sized business on the corner of a major intersection. I believe it’s owned by an Armenian family, and they seem to cater mostly to the local population of Eastern European, Middle Eastern, and Hispanic customers. Aside from the namesake produce section, there are aisles of ethnic pantry items.
Olive Oils
Some of the interesting things are the varieties of olive oils and vinegars. exotic pickles and peppers, cans of hummus and baba ghanoush, and all kinds of spices. There’s also a great bread aisle with all varieties of Mediterranean and Middle Eastern breads and pitas, and lots of interesting little cookies and desserts.
Continue reading to see the deli, meat counter, and huge produce section »
When I was young, I used to eat a quick breakfast of cold cereal, instant oatmeal, or a toaster item like frozen waffles or a Pop-Tart as soon as I got up, before rushing off to school. I was never especially hungry, but I knew I needed to eat something, because I wouldn’t have another opportunity for a meal for several hours. My first year of college, I had morning classes, and managed to get up early enough to get to the dining commons and have breakfast. Sometimes it was cereal and coffee, but often it was a larger breakfast of hot foods – eggs and pancakes, or a big bowl of oatmeal, or whatever else they had that day. After that, I started sleeping in more often, and eventually stopped really eating breakfast. When I did get up before lunch hours, I’d just have some coffee or tea.
More recently, I’ve gotten back to eating shortly after waking up. Many days, I find myself actually hungry in the morning. I think it has to do with my appetite being much better now that I’m getting adequate dialysis.
Several studies have shown that eating breakfast can help you eat fewer total calories during the day. Not only does that help a diet, but it means you probably also spend less on food. Not only that, but breakfast can often be made much cheaper than lunch or dinner. If you split your calories between three meals instead of two, and one is significantly less expensive, you save money.
I’ve worked out an example to illustrate my point. Let’s say you eat 2000 calories in one day. Let’s split that between lunch and dinner. For the sake of argument, we’ll say that lunch is constant, and you eat enough dinner to make up calories to reach a total of 2000.
Now let’s add a typical hot breakfast, and adjust the amount of dinner eaten to stay at 2000 calories total:
You can see that, even though you consumed the same number of calories, there’s a 17.7% savings when you eat breakfast. Now, that’s not considering that you’ll tend to eat fewer calories. You might still be sated enough from lunch that you won’t eat that whole cheeseburger for lunch, or maybe you’ll snack less through the day (I haven’t accounted for snacking here, but if you snack, you could potentially save even more, as snacks tend to be more expensive per calorie than full meals).
Simple breakfasts are pretty cheap. Two eggs and toast comes out to a few cents (okay, maybe 50 cents). If you utilize leftovers, it gets even cheaper. An omelette using leftovers in half-free. Oatmeal is very thrifty too, as long as you don’t pile on the butter and out-of-season berries.
The Sushi Bar
One of the reasons I want to save money is to be able to splurge every now and then. One of the things I like to splurge on is good sushi. Eventually, I’ll be able to have my kidney transplant, and unfortunately, the resultant anti-rejection drugs will cause me to not be able to eat raw fish ever again. So before I have my transplant, I’m planning a huge splurge at a top-quality sushi restaurant.
Over the last couple months, I’ve visited a few sushi restaurants in the Santa Barbara area and had some of their best. I’d like to write about the sushi I’ve had.
Continue reading for pictures of all kinds of sushi and sashimi »
Free leg, thigh & tortillas on April 28
I’ve been hearing about this all day, and only now did it occur to me to blog about it. Today, KFC offered a free piece of their new grilled chicken to everyone who visited a location. Unfortunately, I missed it today. Not to be outdone, El Pollo Loco, a regional chain here in California and the Southwest, is giving two pieces of chicken, two tortillas (corn or flour, your choice), and salsa to anyone who asks for it tomorrow until 8:00 PM.
Free food deals like this are a great way to save a bit of money. If you were to buy the equivalent food at El Pollo Loco on a regular day, it would cost you somewhere around $2.50 – though this is an estimate, as they don’t post the price of tortillas on their menu. Unlike KFC’s offer of a single piece of chicken, El Pollo Loco’s promotion is enough for an actual meal. A drumstick, a thigh, two corn tortillas, and house salsa comes out to 436 calories, 21 grams of fat, 28 grams of carbs, and 35 grams of protein. That’s perfect for a light lunch. If you can find multiple El Pollo Loco locations to visit, you can try to take advantage of the offer multiple times (although it’s against the rules, so don’t tell them I gave you the idea).
