In December, I attended a holiday dinner where one guest—a heady, lively mathematician—brought up the topic of the meaning of life. His notion of it has stuck with me:
I think the question of meaning of life comes into focus when you are born and then you answer this question by how you live.
Looking at this answer through a money-saving, grocery budget lens, it’s easy for me to get carried away. As you well know, I live and die by the pantry. And as I cross the threshold of year four of running STOCKED, I stand by this premise: pantry saves.
And yet, there are only so many cans of chickpeas and boxes of bucatini you can eat in a month. We must fill in with vegetables and proteins and, yes, even our guilty, sugary pleasures.
So, in preparation for February, I have created a month of recipes that reflect my budget of $350 a month. I’ll share them with you in advance so you can follow along. I’ll list the items I think should be in your pantry and I’ll total the average price of the groceries I buy each week. I promise the recipes will not be spartan or boring and while they may follow a bit of a vertical pattern, they won’t bore your palate.
Here goes…
Pantry:
EVOO
Capers
Canned tomatoes or jar marinara sauce
Miso
Salt
Pepper
Black sesame seeds
Dijon mustard
Breadcrumbs
Worcestershire
Anchovy paste
Flour
Nutmeg
Shopping List:
Whole chicken $12
Bag of Potatoes $4
Soft tofu $3
Scallions $2
Eggs $5
Ground Pork $8
Cream $4
Milk $3
Hoagie buns $5
Lemon $2
Kale $5
Dried white beans: $4
Green olives: $5
Butter $5
Garlic $1
Parsley $3
Thyme: $3
Crumbly parmesan: $5
TOTAL: $79
Menu:
Day 1: Roast chicken with smashed piccata potatoes. (make and freeze chicken stock/save chicken legs)
Day 2: Miso, soft tofu, burnt scallions, and toasted black sesame seed soup
Day 3: Breakfast for dinner: Dutch Baby + condiments and *Deborah Madison scrambled eggs (jam, Nutella, herb butter etc.)
Day 4: Pork meatball sandwiches with kale caesar salad
Day 5: Bucatini with green olives and toasted breadcrumbs
Day 6: Frittata with frizzled kale, scallions, and mandolin potatoes
Day 7: Poor man’s cassoulet with confit of chicken legs and thyme white beans (reuse Monday’s frozen stock here.)
Please keep in touch and tell me how it goes. I want to see your creations and, more importantly, I want to know you are sliding some of your savings into your investments.
*Her brother-in-law taught me this recipe. You slowly whisk a big knob of melted butter, scrambled eggs, and heavy cream in a pot until it has the consistency of polenta. remove from heat while soft. Top with high-quality EVOO, Maldon, and torn herbs in you have them.
What I’ve been up to this month:
Eating: air fryer bagels; Catalan beef stew; take out
Reading: The New Puritans by Andrew Doyle; The Secret History by Donna Tartt (again); I Dream of Dinner by Ali Slagle
Watching: Your Honor; Wednesday;
Thinking about: Integrative complexity; Spring Break in PSP