Good Food is Everybody's Business
This week, I’m finally getting serious about budget-tracking! Fed up with my attempts at calculating the cost of my meals, I invested in an electronic kitchen scale. Suddenly it’s simple to weigh in metric when a recipe calls for it, and I don’t have to guesstimate the amount of nuts or berries to add when they list the amount in pounds instead of cups.
Certainly there’s a certain level of satisfaction in preparing food for oneself. But in preparing and sharing it with others the experience is unparalleled, the satisfaction far greater.
For the past two weeks I’ve gone from a selective omnivore to very selective, teetering in on the brink of vegetarianism. I’m not sure yet which way I’ll fall, but I’ve made a few important decisions to ground me for the time being. One thing is for certain: meat matters. To what extent does it matter? It’s a complex and personal question that each of us must decide for ourselves. If you’re looking for answers, Eating Animals is a good place to start.
I’m living on a budget… I just don’t have one. Somehow, it works. I guess I would say that the trick to living on a budget is not allowing yourself to get obsessed with the idea of something. There’s no guarantee that you’ll find said something on a discount rack or sale section. If you can’t be flexible, you’ll end up paying full price. Bargain Bin Rhubarb
But if you peruse the sales regularly, you’re bound to find something that you want or need.
I’ve been way into baking bread lately. Once a week on my day off, it goes something like this: wake up, throw a loaf of bread together, and let it rise while I shower and get ready for the day. Deflate the dough for a second rise and have a fresh loaf by the afternoon. We go through about a loaf a week, and I’ve been conducting careful weekly experiments in the hopes of perfecting the recipe for a whole wheat bread.
Looking back, this last month has been a little roller-coaster ride. Ian and I have taken on a number of new challenges, some individual and some joint. I took on a new job while he took on more practice hours in preparation for his recital. I launched a new website and we started saving our food scraps for compost. As I mentally ticked off the events of the last few weeks, it was clear that we weren’t wasting time. In between each hiccup we celebrated little successes, and even our low points left us with lessons learned.
Meat and poultry that is conventionally produced to reach the market quickly and in large quantities comes to us at a cheap cost, but it’s a high price to pay for the environment and our health (not to mention animal cruelty issues). Fortunately, there are steps you can take to make it easier; not only for the earth, but for our wallets, our conscience, and our bodies.
It’s not always easy to keep track of the content of your food. You might not always have time to go to the natural foods store, and if want to go out to eat, odds are you can’t afford to eat at the restaurant that lists the life history of every vegetable on your plate. At those times, we usually don’t worry about whether our food is organic or not, but whether it is fresh, delicious, and preferably local (at least supporting a local business).
