Corona Diaries Day Four: Stretching Meals

A little early 20th century ingenuity can keep you out of the grocery store.

One of the most worrying things happening right now are all the runs on the grocery stores.  People are buying and hoarding like crazy!  A lot of it, I think, has to do with our single-use prepared meals, and lack of kitchen skills.  I'm sure, for the parents who still have to work AND home educate their children, now, time constraints limit their kitchen creativity.  

The problem is that this craziness could lead to that which we are trying to avoid, which is the government having to mandate rationing.  We've already seen time rations as businesses open doors to vulnerable society before anyone else can shop.  If we keep our heads, now, we can avoid bigger problems later.

Keep in mind ways you can save foods.

For example, if you purchase a whole chicken, you can stretch it into 3 or 4 meals.  Here's how:

Day 1:  Roast chicken with mashed potatoes and gravy.  (You make the gravy out of the drippings)  Pick any good leftover meat off the bird, then place the carcass in the crockpot and cover with water.  Let it cook overnight.  In the AM you'll have a lot of good bone broth.

Day 2:  Chicken, biscuits and gravy.  Combine the leftover gravy with the leftover chicken.  Heat, and serve with biscuits or bread or noodles or mashed potatoes.

Day 3:  Leftover chicken and gravy goes into a stock pot with the broth you made.  Add potatoes, veggies, seasonings, and turn it into a hearty stew.  This stew could last more meals and can even be thinned out and noodles added to make lunch-worthy chicken noodle soup.

You can do similar with a beef roast.

A pork roast can be roast pork one day and then make plenty of pulled pork to last a couple of meals.

If you have bone-in meat, make broth out of the leftovers attached to the bones.  

If you use canned fish, save the juices and make a fish chowder when you have enough.  

Save the fruit of canned juices to water down for juice for your kiddos, or thicken up with corn starch to drizzle on pancakes (another cheap and easy food to make).

Vegetable waste...ends, peels, cores can be saved and made into vegetable broth before discarded.  

(Can you tell that soups are the most economical way to go when it comes to an emergency meal plan?  Plus, they are super nutritious!)

Before you throw any food away brainstorm how it can be used first.  

Also, consider these Depression Era make-dos:

1.  Cheese moldy?  Unless you have an allergy to mold, you can slice of the moldy parts and use the cheese in cooked dishes just fine.  Homemade macaroni and cheese, or rice and cheese is super easy to make.  Or even mix some flour, water, salt, and a bit of oil until you have the consistency of thick pancake batter.  Spread by the large spoonful in a hot, lightly greased frying pan and cook on both side.  You'll have tortillas!  Spread shredded cheese between two, return to frying pan (or microwave, or oven) and quesadillas!

2.  Milk sour?  Still great for pancakes, coffee cakes, or pour into a heavy-bottomed stock pot and heat to near-boiling.  Add vinegar slowly, stirring, increasing the amount slowly until the milk separates into small curds and the yellowy-whey.  Pour into a cloth-lined colander and let drain.  Salt to taste.  This makes a great cottage cheese or farmer's cheese.  You can leave it more moist for cottage cheese or ricotta style cheese, or drain and press it for a more solid farmer's cheese. 

3.  Bread getting moldy.  Catch it quick!  You can still use it!  Unless you have a mold allergy (penicillin), just cut off the moldy part and discard.  Use the rest to make things like bread pudding, garlic bread (butter the bread and season with dried garlic and Italian seasoning, and toast), French toast, bread crumbs, croutons, baked strata...

4.  Fruit starting to go bad?  Cut off the worst parts and use the fruit in things like pies or muffins.  Don't have enough for those?  Just cook the fruit and mash into an easy fruit spread or drizzle for oatmeal or pancakes.  You can thicken it with corn starch for a more jelly-like spread.  

5.  Veggies starting to go bad?  Cut off the worst parts and then cook the veggies in a yummy stir fry, or roasted veggie pot, or put in a soup or stew, or shred and add to spaghetti sauce.  

6.  Fresh broccoli or cauliflower?  Use the stem portions you normally throw away.  They're edible!  Cut them up and cook them.  If you don't want them that way, you can puree them and blend with egg, nuts or parm cheese, or some type of flour, then spread on a pan lined with greased parchment paper and bake at 350 F until you have a pizza crust/flat bread.  

Use what you have.  Get creative with the cans in the back of the pantry.  Anything to avoid the grocery stores and avoid contributing to the over-buying going on now.  

You got this!!