Something a recent post reminded me of is how good it is to always have soup or stew around, especially in wintertime. When this is the case it's very hard to go into the kitchen and think "I'm very hungry but there's nothing good to eat"!
A big soup, if brought to a boil once a day, can last for a week at least. (I haven't seen it go past that but it usually is gone by then.)
Beans or legumes are another good food to always have ready as they are very filling and give plenty of energy--they can be added with the soup/stew, after, or eaten by themselves. Fried beans or chickpeas with spices is a good snack that I like to make when there are beans around.
How do you make sure that there is always healthy, nutritious food for when you're hungry?
I've kept perpetual stew going for over a month having never been refrigerated and there are commercial joints that do so for years on end. Right now, it's chili that has enough sweet potato in it that some folks might balk at calling it chili. Anyway, we do the same thing keeping soup or stew around all winter, at least.
We also go through a pot of beans every week starting with a pound or pound and a half of dry beans. Sometimes that goes into the soup, sometimes it becomes a fresh chili or frijoles or beans-n-rice. Occasionally it's chikpeas and becomes hummus or curry instead.
We cook good food for all our meals and don't really seem to have a problem keeping that healthy. Our problem and it's true for everyone in my family is between meal snacks. I've been buying a lot of celery so that I have something crunchy to go after. If I cut it up on the weekend and put it in a tub of water in the fridge, it stays good all week.
think it ultimately comes down to things being convenient and available.
We don't buy convenience foods, so if I'm too lazy to make something, my snack is a piece of fruit (we keep plenty of fruit around) or a cucumber with miso.
I try to keep a lot of leftovers around, so I can have a flatbread with peanut butter or a bowl of rice with pickle or something like that.
My healthy strategy is basically just to not have unhealthy stuff in the house. If we want to eat crap, we go out to do it (and now do it so very rarely.... ice cream once in a while.)
I have this trouble so much. I often rely on frozen vegetables, especially peas as they have protine, fibre, and vegetable goodness. And lots of butter (fat helps us feel full).
Apples and cheese take about the same time to prepare.
But i confess, sometimes 3 minutes is too long or too much effort. I need an easier snack that doesn't spoil quickly.
Stew sounds good. I think I'll put on a pot when the chores are done.
Bump! Nettle soup is very tasty and good to have around. I’ve been having it with nettles, ramps, garlic leaves, dame’s rocket, wild sweet-cicely, miso, and beans.
I should probably have added more beans though.
And I’ve been considering starting a charity to get rid of my piles and piles of vegetables that I can’t help but gather…
M Ljin wrote:Bump! Nettle soup is very tasty and good to have around. I’ve been having it with nettles, ramps, garlic leaves, dame’s rocket, wild sweet-cicely, miso, and beans.
Nettles are a wildly invasive species here. Ten years of hand-to-hand combat. Still I'm willing to don my Viking helmet and welding gloves in a good cause.
But you can't just tell me "soup is nice." I need to know the recipe that will make mortal combat with nettles worthy of the risk. Eat the enemy!
Invasive plants are Earth's way of insisting we notice her medicines. Stephen Herrod Buhner
Everyone learns what works by learning what doesn't work. Stephen Herrod Buhner
In winter, I buy food once monthly so the fresh vegetables go into a soup or stew within days. I keep it vegetarian to ensure it's safe when boiled up daily on a rapid boil.
Once I'm sick of it, I will pile it into used containers and lock it away outdoors where animals can't get at it, and it doesn't need a freezer because it's cold enough outdoors in winter. All those containers go together labeled and dated.
So I tend to have a cruciferous based soup, a root veg soups, squash based soups, and I can pick and choose from these assorted popsicles and make a stew out of the soup bases, adding lentils or peas without having to go through the soaking required with beans, or, I add cooked frozen beans. Cooked meat gets added last if any.
I really enjoy salsa based food as well, so a favorite thing I do is slow cook meat in salsa before freezing which helps prevent freezer burn.
Before springtime I start sorting out what is going in the freezers.
I have discovered frozen baked peas in bone broth and beans baked in salsa that were 18 months old and still as good as the day they were frozen.
I always have nuts around: pistachios, almonds, hazelnuts, etc. I also have (fresh) fruit or canned or frozen. I have been unsuccessful growing goji berries, but I LOVE them dried. I discovered that I can mix some with cashews and unsweetened coconut flakes and even cocoa nibs. This can be dangerous because it tastes so good that I eat beyond my hunger!
Cheese is a quick snack as are seaweed packs. I usually have a batch of yogurt around; sometimes I'll mix thawed fruit and sweetener into a whole quart at a time, although I find that this makes it "too convenient!" I sometimes will settle for a cup of tea if I'm feeling disciplined.
I always cook in bulk. I will make a batch of oatmeal that will last me the week. Into it, I'll add coconut, almond slivers, cinnamon, monkfruit sweetener, chia and pumpkin seeds, raisins...whatever. I discovered that having this cold is like having rice pudding. I can add in milk or almond milk if I want and usually do when having it in the morning.
This time of year, it's all about the asparagus. I have a Revere frying pan that I put the stalks in and steam. It holds about four large servings...again, leftovers. This morning's breakfast was poached eggs on a bed of asparagus! Another discovery: eaten cold, asparagus is even sweeter, reminiscent of corn, so a few stalks make a good snack, too.
Here we relay a lot of homemade convenience foods. Because of my neuropathy, I never know if I will be able to cook or not, so I do a lot of prep-work on good days.
Here is a list of what I do.
- leftovers are always portioned out and frozen
- dehydrated or freeze dried soup cubes or powders makes for a fast snack that feels like a hug from home, and they are so easy to make.
- during the season I can, dehydrate and freeze dry fruits and berries
- freeze dried mixes for dips and homemade chips is something we all love
- gluten free baking mixes, makes fast and easy cookies, muffins, brownies, rolls and so much more
- homemade pudding mixes makes for a fast and easy snack
- homemade hot cocoa mix and homemade instant lemonade are always a hit with the kids
- canned, frozen, dehydrated meals or meal ingredients helps too
- fermented vegetables also makes for a nice snack.
There are more, but these are what I remember as of now. We are also privileged in that our climate enables us to grow food year round, so often a snack is just a short walk away.
I did do one important thing, when I planned the food forest. We didn’t just pick fruit trees based on our preferences, but also on when they are ready for harvest. There are several reasons for that. I wanted us to have access to fresh fruit and or berries all year round. Right now only November and December isn’t covered, and those will be once my sapote trees starts to produce. I grow 4 types of raspberries, 8 different kinds of strawberries, 2 types of blueberries, Boisen berries and mulberries, which gives us access to berries most of the year. By doing this, more than half of what we produce gets eaten fresh, so I have a lot less food preservation work to do. It also prevent seasonal bottlenecks in food preservation, where you rush and work against the clock to get everything preserved before it goes bad.
Canned desserts like lemon curd, pie fillings and homemade candy are also stables in my pantries. Homemade granola bars and hot cereal mixes are also a stable.
In a way, our food production is centered around eating fresh and what’s in season, while minimizing the amount of work needed. I keep my root vegetables fresh by leaving them in the ground until I need them, and just adding more seeds so we don’t run out.
We did do a lot more preservation while the kids lived at home, but we don’t need that as much anymore.
I am running low on broth right now, so this weekend I am starting a large batch of that. We are also in the main egg production season, so I have pickled eggs in the fridge and egg muffins in the freezer. I freeze dry whole eggs, yolks and whites, and I salt cure egg yolks to use as a cheese substitute. Egg heavy breakfast dishes freezes very well, so those I am also making a lot of.
IMG_3530.jpeg
Soup cubes, Nomato sauce powder
IMG_3529.jpeg
Examples of some of my baking mixes. Only fat and water needed
20
