Cheap Eats

Frogleg said:

sf said:

Frogleg said:

I guess if you can't cook, you can't cook cheap. At least I've gotten some guidelines.

So, what kind of "cheap" do you want? Meat or no meat?

Both. Either. I wasn't even thinking of strictly main dishes. Anyone have a veg timbale favorite?

Dinner was supposed to be bean soup... not the fancy multi-bean kind, just pinto beans.

Unfortunately, although I soaked the beans last night - I got home way too late to cook them
properly before midnight.... so I made (brown) lentils for dinner instead. I added a can of stewed
tomatoes, added lots of garlic, onion and some Italian Seasoning to the lentils. I let it cook for
an hour in a minimum of water, then added zucchini slices at the last minute - I let them cook for 5
minutes or so and served it over rice.

The pinto beans are cooking over low heat tonight and they'll be a thick soup tomorrow. I've added
garlic & onion so far. Later, I'll add a tomato & SALT to taste.

I'll serve the soup with a garnish of chopped fresh cilantro & a dollop of salsa.

Practice safe eating - always use condiments

Frogleg said:

What's cheap? Potatoes, onions, cabbage, beanz&rice, loss-leader meat items. Frozen veg. Cheese on
sale. The price of eggs seems to have gone way up recently, but butter has been $1.50/lb.

grocery shopping has been depressing of late.

your pal, blake

Ariane Jenkins said:

On Sun, 01 Feb 2004 21:22:37 GMT, Frogleg <[email hidden]> wrote:

Quoted message said:

Quoted message said:

Don't want 'frugal.' I *know* how to make 1 (half) chicken breast extend to a 4-person meal. I
want inventive, delicious, gourmet cooking that doesn't require a pound of lobster meat as a
contributory ingredient to, say, 2 dozen Long-Island oysters.

I think you may be a little mistaken about what the term "frugal" may mean to different
people.

Well, when the 'Frugal Gourmet' started recommending an $80 Turkish brass pepper grinder, and
casually included half-a-dozen artichokes as a side dish (or perhaps *ingredients*) for a meal, I
figured out he wasn't demonstrating *my* kind of frugal. I *do* know you can't make a silk purse out
of a sow's ear. but if a salad can't be made without gen--u-wine Kalamata salt-cured olives and
imported feta cheese, it ain't frugal, to my mind.

I have a friend who could make a delicious meal out of sand and clover flowers. She wastes *nothing*
and produces fabulous food. The veg from tonight's dinner show up in tomorrow's salad. In fact, she
taught me that thoroughly scraping a pan or bowl may yield an extra half-serving, I watch the
cooking shows for this -- some scoop out the majority of ingredients and then put the container
aside for cleaning. I prefer those who use make a few extra strokes to get *everything* from the
bottom and corners.

Quoted message said:

Some of the regulars at MCFL are excellent from-scratch cooks, because that's how they can get
great meals for the least amount of money.

Worth looking into. I believe I *did* subscribe to a 'frugal' group some time ago, and too many
posts were about cheap long-distance services. I'll look again.

Thanks for recipes and suggestions.

"blake murphy" <[email hidden]> wrote in message
"]news:[email hidden]...

Quoted message said:

Frogleg said:

What's cheap? Potatoes, onions, cabbage, beanz&rice, loss-leader meat items. Frozen veg. Cheese
on sale. The price of eggs seems to have gone way up recently, but butter has been $1.50/lb.

grocery shopping has been depressing of late.

your pal, blake

We pay over $4.00 a pound for butter. That's why I go to Costco for that stuff.

kili

Frogleg said:

Well, when the 'Frugal Gourmet' started recommending an $80 Turkish brass pepper grinder, and
casually included half-a-dozen artichokes as a side dish (or perhaps *ingredients*) for a meal, I
figured out he wasn't demonstrating *my* kind of frugal. I *do* know you can't make a silk purse
out of a sow's ear. but if a salad can't be made without gen--u-wine Kalamata salt-cured olives
and imported feta cheese, it ain't frugal, to my mind.

I believe Smith's philosophy was making the most out of the ingredients, and sometimes that
meant expensive ingredients. It wasn't really frugal in the "cheap eats" sense. I have found
there to be good, simple ideas in his cookbooks, though. They were very helpful when I was
first starting out and couldn't handle complicated recipes.

Quoted message said:

I have a friend who could make a delicious meal out of sand and clover flowers. She wastes
*nothing* and produces fabulous food. The veg from tonight's dinner show up in tomorrow's salad.
In fact, she taught me that thoroughly scraping a pan or bowl may yield an extra half-serving, I
watch the cooking shows for this -- some scoop out the majority of ingredients and then put the
container aside for cleaning. I prefer those who use make a few extra strokes to get *everything*
from the bottom and corners.

I picked up a couple large rubber scrapers at the dollar store
(2/$1), one of them being the kind that's slightly scooped out so it's almost a shallow spoon. It
comes in very handy for getting the last bits of spaghetti sauce out of the pot, etc. and it's
much sturdier than regular scrapers. Not bad for a .50 investment!

Quoted message said:

Worth looking into. I believe I *did* subscribe to a 'frugal' group some time ago, and too many
posts were about cheap long-distance services. I'll look again.

Well, like RFC, it can be a mixed bag. :-/ There was recently a thread about frugal
soups you could Google for, however.

Ariane

In article <[email hidden]>, [email hidden] says...

Quoted message said:

In fact, she taught me that thoroughly scraping a pan or bowl may yield an extra half-serving, I
watch the cooking shows for this -- some scoop out the majority of ingredients and then put the
container aside for cleaning. I prefer those who use make a few extra strokes to get *everything*
from the bottom and corners.

Oh my god...you hit on one of my pet peeves. It irritates me how wasteful some of those TV
cooks are!
--
Donna A pessimist believes all women are bad. An optimist hopes they are.

To reply, remove the SPAM BLOCK

Frogleg said:

On Sun, 01 Feb 2004 22:23:00 GMT, Ariane Jenkins <[email hidden]> wrote:

Quoted message said:

Quoted message said:

I think you may be a little mistaken about what the term "frugal" may mean to different
people.

Well, when the 'Frugal Gourmet' started recommending an $80 Turkish brass pepper grinder, and
casually included half-a-dozen artichokes as a side dish (or perhaps *ingredients*) for a meal, I
figured out he wasn't demonstrating *my* kind of frugal.

<smile> the "frugal gourmet" even had a show where he clearly stated that (his kind of) "frugal"
doesn't mean it's going to be inexpensive. Luckily, the two ideas converged many times.

Practice safe eating - always use condiments

Ariane Jenkins said:

<snippage>

Quoted message said:

I picked up a couple large rubber scrapers at the dollar store
(2/$1), one of them being the kind that's slightly scooped out so it's almost a shallow spoon. It
comes in very handy for getting the last bits of spaghetti sauce out of the pot, etc. and it's
much sturdier than regular scrapers. Not bad for a .50 investment!

Ariane

Thank Goodness!!! I'm certainly glad to see that you have given up that disgusting habit of licking
all the containers clean, like you do at cookins. 🙂

Boli

Ariane Jenkins said:

I picked up a couple large rubber scrapers at the dollar store
(2/$1), one of them being the kind that's slightly scooped out so it's almost a shallow spoon. It
comes in very handy for getting the last bits of spaghetti sauce out of the pot, etc. and it's
much sturdier than regular scrapers. Not bad for a .50 investment!

<S>If you'd invested in a silicon scraper... which can be can be bought for a lot less money than
you'd normally expect (at Target for instance) - you'd be the right type of Frugal.

Practice safe eating - always use condiments

Donna Rose said:

In article <[email hidden]>, [email hidden] says...

Quoted message said:

In fact, she taught me that thoroughly scraping a pan or bowl may yield an extra half-serving, I
watch the cooking shows for this -- some scoop out the majority of ingredients and then put the
container aside for cleaning. I prefer those who use make a few extra strokes to get
*everything* from the bottom and corners.

Oh my god...you hit on one of my pet peeves. It irritates me how wasteful some of those TV
cooks are!

It irritates me too, but I keep in mind that they are on a TV schedule, not a home schedule.

Practice safe eating - always use condiments

Bolivar said:

Thank Goodness!!! I'm certainly glad to see that you have given up that disgusting habit of
licking all the containers clean, like you do at cookins. 🙂

Hey now!! You know very well there's nothing left to clean up after you hit the buffet table.
;P

Ariane