Artists keep stocked with paint, pencils and other supplies so they can craft a masterpiece whenever the creative muse hits. Likewise, as someone passionate about food and cooking, your palette is your kitchen. Keep it stocked with the core ingredients necessary to whip up anything from bag lunches for the kids to an impromptu dinner party.
Stocking the pantry saves time and money – two non-renewable resources and drains on greening our lifestyle. With a little planning and organization, your pantry will never let you down. I recently gushed about my pantry passion in an article for Hobby Farm Home magazine, going into more detail on stocking the kitchen.
Here’s a few starter tips:
1. Buy in Bulk
What single ingredient do you use the most of? Save money and packaging by buying it in bulk. If you don’t have a local food co-op or buying club to purchase a large bag or case, ask you local grocery store if they will do a special order for you. Running a B&B, I buy my key organic baking staples – flour and sugar — in 50-pound bags and Organic Valley butter by the case.
2. Eat Up
There’s a corollary to “buy in bulk”: use it up. We all have items lingering on our kitchen shelves for too long from impulse buys (hey – it was on sale) or over-buying too much of something. Nothing sustainable about throwing out food past expiration date. The easiest way to use things up is to literally go cold turkey on buying groceries other than key essentials and focus on using up what you already have.
3. Get Creative with Substitutes
Think out of your precise recipe box and experiment with substitutions using items you already have. No cake flour? Use 1 c. all-purpose flour, remove 2 T. of the flour and add 2 T. cornstarch. Need buttermilk? Use 1 c. of any kind of milk, remove 1 T. milk and add 1 T. vinegar or lemon juice. Let it stand 5 minutes till it curdles.
Related Posts:
Digging for Fresh Ideas: Save Money, Eat Healthy, Support Local and Sustainable Food Systems
Food Waste Equals Water Waste
Welcome to Thrifty Thursdays!
Photo Credit: Lisa Kivirist
Lisa Kivirist
Lisa Kivirist embodies the growing “ecopreneuring” movement: innovative entrepreneurs who successfully blend business with making the world a better place. Lisa is co-author, with her husband, John Ivanko, of Rural Renaissance: Renewing the Quest for the Good Life, capturing the American dream of farm living for contemporary times. Her latest release, ECOpreneuring: Putting Purpose and the Planet Before Profits is a compact, dynamic tool kit for a fresh approach to entrepreneurial thinking, blending passion for protecting and preserving the planet with small business pragmatics. As a W.K. Kellogg Food & Society Policy Fellow and Director of the Rural Women's Project, Lisa champions a voice for women farmers and rural ecopreneurs through media, speaking and advocacy work. Lisa runs the award-winning Inn Serendipity Bed and Breakfast in southwest Wisconsin, completely powered by renewable energy and considered amongst the “Top Ten Eco-Destinations in North America.” Her culinary focus on local and seasonal cuisine – with most ingredients traveling less than 100 feet from her organic gardens to B&B plates – earned recognition in publications from Vegetarian Times to Country Woman and inspired her cookbook, Edible Earth: Savoring the Good Life with Vegetarian Recipes from Inn Serendipity. In addition to feature writing for publications such as Hobby Farm Home, Mother Earth News and Wisconsin Trails, Lisa is the lead writer for Renewing the Countryside, a non-profit organization showcasing rural entrepreneurial and agricultural success stories. Lisa also penned Kiss Off Corporate America: A Young Professional’s Guide to Independence. Lisa shares her farm with her husband, their young son, a 10kw wind turbine and a colony of honeybees.
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[...] in color, it makes up for in content. The brilliance of this book lies in its reliance on basic pantry staples, allowing even the most simply-stocked kitchen to practice food alchemy. My family lived in [...]