During my maternity leave we had only one income and I looked for ways to cut back on food bills. I kept cut-off tops/bottoms of carrots, asparagus, potato peels, cabbage cores, and any other veggie I used and placed them in the freezer. I served chicken on the bone and before serving the chicken, I de-boned it and saved the bones in a bag in the freezer as well.
When I had enough veggie tops and bones, I made soup with them. I simply added rice and an egg and we had two meals from it. We loved soup and had it for a meal once or twice a week with a salad and crusty bread.
By Marie from Toronto, Canada
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Hi Marie,
What you accomplished while "cutting back" by making a good hearty soup was not only good for your budget, but most likely a far better way for all of us to be eating all the time. I've heard so often that we eat far too many large and expensive meals anyway. Food costs can be cut way down and we end up eating better at the same time.
Back during WWll, my Mother kept what she called a "Stock Pot" going on the back burner of our 4-burner kerosene stove almost all the time. Every vegetable was thoroughly washed prior to paring, and even potato peelings went into that stock pot. Every bit of meat leftovers, bones, chicken skin, etc along with trimmings of some fruits ended up in her stock pot.
Anytime we were to have soup, she had all ready a wonderful base for any kind of soup except her bean soups which were unadulterated bean soup with white salty bacon and a pinch of sugar. All dried beans will make their own soup.
I can remember my father sawing beef bones for her so that the marrow would cook out of them adding additional nutrition and richness of flavor to the stock pot.
These days, we toss away all that free goodness and then buy it in a jar of beef or chicken flavor which doesn't even have the nutritional value to it. If anyone got sick in our neighborhood, they were taken a big glass jar of Mother's clear broth. That came straight from her stock pot, and I have no doubts about its having cured as many colds as
the antibiotics do today. But they never killed all the "good bugs that's in us while killing the bad ones".
I really enjoy reading the postings of how many folks are going back to some of the older and better ways of dealing with feeding their families. You are getting a big "Thumbs Up" from me. Thanks for sharing your smart tip too.
Julia in Boca Raton, FL
I also save my water from steaming veggies for dinner or blanching veggies to be put in the freezer. It is essentially vegetable stock, and makes a great basis for homemade soups.
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