By Laura Holland
So did you take the eGullet challenge and skip your weekly grocery trip? Did you find it hard to live off the stuff already in your fridge, freezer, and pantry?
If you need some motivation to keep the experiment up or to take it on, take a look at this article from the LA Times about how grocers are battling with name brand food producers over rising food prices. The article reports that supermarket chains are hopping mad that big manufacturers like Unilever and Kellogg are raising prices (and shrinking packages) despite dramatic drops in prices for fuel and commodities such corn and wheat.
While the manufacturers defend themselves by claiming the situation is “complex,” an analyst cited in the article predicted that prices will drop when consumers exert pressure by either going without certain items or by shifting to store brands.
In other words, maybe the eGullet challenge will help bring down your grocery bill in more ways than one.
The eGullet challenge and last week’s snowstorm reminded me of a book by Arthur Schwartz called What to Cook When You Think There’s Nothing in the House to Eat. This book is full of recipes that rely on food most people already have in the house, even if they have not shopped in a while.
He organizes the recipes by ingredients, starting with anchovies and ending with yogurt. The idea is that you see what you have and then you see what you can make from it.
I once made cream of celery soup from this book when I had an overabundance of celery and pretty much nothing else in the house in terms of vegetables. It was pretty good soup, which is saying a lot because I really do not like celery all that much. (Does anyone?)
If you want to try out some recipes from this book, visit Arthur Schwartz’s website The Food Maven. His website has five recipes from the book: chocolate pudding, scones, spaghetti all’Amatriciana, Welsh Rabbit, and spoonbread. The pudding recipe is especially fun.
Schwartz also has ideas for stocking your pantry so that you won’t go hungry if you can’t get to the supermarket for one reason or another. After the great blizzard of 1996, Schwartz also wrote an interesting article on this topic, “Food Staples (Snow)Bound to Please: Keeping a Blizzard of Possibilities in the Pantry.” He provides an A to Z emergency pantry list well worth considering.
In the article, he quotes a nutritionist as complaining that people stocking up for the upcoming storm were fighting over bread and milk. There was also a run on eggs. The nutritionist took this as an indictment of the “public’s food values and attitudes.” “No one complained there weren't any carrots, oranges or lentils,” she observed.
Hmm. I think that people stock up on eggs, bread, and milk before a storm because these items are perishable and people get them on an as needed basis. They probably already had plenty of oranges, carrots, and lentils in the house. I do. Don’t you?
Speaking of which, my experiment with the eGullet challenge is going pretty well. There is still a whole lot of food in my pantry that need cooking. But, I think I am going to need to run out and get some eggs, milk, and bread pretty soon.
I caved and went grocery shopping. We needed milk and bread!
Posted by: Katherine | Wednesday, March 11, 2009 at 05:10 PM