eclaire (what’s in a) name?

unless you’ve been living in a cave for the past several months, i’m sure you’re all quite aware of the economic crisis facing our country.  while mike and i are lucky enough to remain in our excellent places of employment, and the majority of our friends are still working and not impacted by the tough times, it has brought up a new awareness for me about finances.  now, mike and i are no financial gurus, but we’ve been using the website mint.com to set budgets and watch where we’re spending our hard earned money.  it’s been eye opening to see how much of our money goes directly to food.  and while this amount spent on food isn’t exorbitant, there are definitely a lot of take out sushi expenditures, and we often throw uneaten produce into the worm compost bin.

recently, a good friend sent me an article from cnn.com with ideas for $10 meals and challenged me to “better and more vegetarian friendly version.”  so i am responding to the challenge with my own twist on saving money in the food realm, because i got frustrated quantifying how much money i spent on a specific meal, mostly since i pull lots of ingredients from my stocked cupboard (spices, flours, bouillon cubes, canned beans, etc).  let’s just say this post was inspired by the article above, but does not direct speak to it…and i promise to hone my pricing skills and get back to you.

ok, so as i sidestep the challenge and share some of my humble tips to keep food costs down to save as much money as possible, as well as reduce the amount of food waste we produce each week, please keep in mind that you have to do what works for you and your life.

i start out by sitting down on sunday and writing out a menu plan for the week.  i write down what outside events we have going on, and count how many meals we need to make to cover lunches and dinners from sunday night through friday lunch (we almost always eat out on friday and saturday nights).  i then start flipping through my recipe box and cookbooks and mike and i discuss what sounds good for the week – because if you’re not going to enjoy the food, what’s the point in cooking it?  we try to vary the proteins, veggies, and starches to create a well-balanced menu as we pick and choose what we want to make.  we also often try to finish off partially used perishables with the recipes we select as well (for example, if we make a prepared-pesto topped pizza one week and didn’t use all the pesto, we’ll choose a recipe that can use up all the leftover pesto the next week). once we’ve settled on several dinners, i ensure that the number of servings they will make matches the number of meals we need so that nothing is wasted.  then i write up the grocery list and voila, we’re ready to go for the week.

planning aside, i always go to the store with a semi-full stomach so i don’t do lots of impulse shopping.  at the grocery store, i try to buy as many items as possible out of the bulk bins, so i leave with the right amount of beans, grains, nuts, spices, etc, so i don’t end up with random dribs and drabs of leftover food we probably won’t consume. the bulk bins also have the least expensive breakfast cereals, chocolate chips (which i need to have on hand at all times!), flour, and sugar.  yay for bulk!

also, if we get our act together on saturday morning, we head down to the farmer’s market where produce is much cheaper (and locally grown!), which reduces our food costs, keeps us eating seasonal food, and inspires recipes.

i think the biggest change i have made overall is that with careful meal planning, we now make less dinners overall. instead, we make a few big meals that can be reheated throughout the week.  i think it’s it’s always cheaper to make food in large quantities, and it saves a lot of time on weeknights if we make some big meals on the weekends and reheat as available.  i know this isn’t an original idea, but it’s a huge shift in the way i used to approach dinners, and i think it’s been the main contributor to our lower grocery bills.

with that in mind, the recipe i would like to share with you is called wild chick soup, from eat, drink, and be vegan, and it makes about 6-7 servings in one pot. the soup is full of veggies, plus wild rice and chick peas, creating the clever title and make the soup as hearty as i remember chicken noodle being way back when i still ate meat.  there are also lots of herbs and nutritional yeast involved, which will fill the house with warm aromas as it boils.  a bowl of this with a slice of warm, crunchy toast is very satisfying on a cold winter day – and won’t hurt the pocketbook much either!

wild chick soup

adapted from eat, drink, and be vegan
yields 6 servings

• 1T olive oil
• 1 medium red onion, diced
• 2 carrots, peeled and sliced
• 4 stalks of celery, ends trimmed and sliced
• 3 large cloves of garlic, minced
• 1/2c uncooked wild rice
• 1/4t salt
• 1/4t pepper
• 1t dry mustard
• 1t dried thyme
• 1t dried sage
• 3½c cooked or caned chick peas
• 4c vegetable stock (we use bouillon cubes)
• 3c water
• 2 bay leaves
• 2T nutritional yeast
• 2T fresh sage, minced
• more salt and pepper to taste
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1. heat oil in a large pot over medium heat and add onion, carrots, celery, garlic, wild rice, salt, pepper, mustard, thyme, sage, and stir for 5 minutes
2. add 2½c chickpeas (save 1c!), stock, water, and bay leaves and bring everything to a boil
3. once the mixture is boiling, reduce heat and simmer for 50 minutes, or until rice is fully cooked
4. with a hand blender, pulse the soup 5(ish) times to create a thicker texture (i under did the pulsing because i was afraid i’d lose the large pieces of veggies and texture of the rice, but once i sampled i went back and re-pulsed – don’t be afraid to pulse away!)
5. stir in the 1c chick peas, nutritional yeast, and fresh sage, and cook 5 minutes longer
6. serve your bowl full and save the rest for later meals!