Are you someone whose grandma or great grandma lived through the Great Depression? Those days required a bit of ingenuity to make do with what was available. With the price of food being what it is today, we might take a look at those old-time methods for maximizing nutrition at meal time without going penniless in the process. Here are some ideas from Grandma’s bag of tricks:
Make Use of Plant-based Protein in Meals
Today’s plant eaters likely have health related and morality-based reasons for opting out of meat. But back in the 1920s, 30s and 40s when families were struggling during and after war times, it was quite common to stretch a meal by adding some cooked beans to last night’s leftover meat like chicken, pork or beef.
Today, the mix and match dinner tradition lives on but we don’t think of it as something people do to save money. You probably have rejoiced at the selections and variety offered in the chef’s dinner specials at your favorite restaurant. All of those mingling flavors and textures and different types of food sounds exciting, don’t they! The truth is that necessity often drives us to this type of culinary creativity.
Next time you have a bunch of odds and ends and random leftovers in your refrigerator, try to come up with a different kind of dinner. You can add everything to a big pot and make a soup or stew. You could conjure up a colorful and delicious stir fry. Or you could even offer a sumptuous smorgasbord of different flavors and textured foods.
Make Meatloaf or Meatballs
Did you ever think that Mom’s recipe for meatloaf, a family favorite, was born of a need to stretch meal ingredients and make that meat go farther? Meatloaf is delicious, can be soft and full of flavor. But like many treasured recipes that were passed down, meatloaf likely came into being because someone wanted to make use of different ingredients to create a tasty and nutritious meal for their family.
In the days of the depression, and still in some modern day places, all-meat burger patties were probably not as commonplace as you maybe used to. And with food prices being what they are these days, it’s even becoming more common to see filler ingredients added to meat patties served in commercial restaurants. Consider this the next time you have a choice between running through the drive-thru and going home to reinvent Grandma’s delicious meatloaf using whatever is available.
Adding the Cooking Liquid Back Into the Meal
Bet you never heard of this one before. When we boil or simmer food in water or other liquid, vitamins and minerals from that food leach out into the cooking water.
Think of a pot of broccoli that you quickly simmered up on the stove top. You would would drain and serve the broccoli. There is liquid left behind. Most people toss this. Next time, remember to reuse the broccoli water! Incorporating this cooking liquid into your recipe is a really great way to enhance the nutrition content and make use of every drop of nourishing goodness from the food we eat.
Here’s another example. Let’s say that you have a roast in the oven for dinner. You have also boiled up some potatoes and carrots, or simmered some spinach. As the roast gets closer to being cooked, ladle some of the vegetable water over the meat and give it a good basting of all of that tasty and good nourishment.
Simmer Up a Pot of Eggshells
Add the liquid to soup, mashed potatoes, hot cereal or even sneak some into your smoothie. You’ll be serving up a portion of extra nourishment from calcium, zinc and any other minerals that may be present.
Cook Up a Chai or Pumpkin Spice Mix
– and add it to everything. Fill a pot 3/4 of the way with water. Add a cinnamon stick, 4 whole cloves, 5 peppercorns, a few gratings of whole nutmeg and a chunk of fresh ginger. Smash up the spices a bit before simmering until the water level reaches 1/3 of the way down.
Chai is loaded with nutrition. Magnesium, iron, zinc, selenium, and vitamins are present in this powerful concoction. Chai is healthy for the digestion, boosts immunity, is antifungal, and balances the blood sugar.
Here’s a healthy dessert idea: For Chai or pumpkin spiced apples, peaches or pears, roast up some fresh apples, peaches or pears in the oven with chai mix, a sprinkle of walnuts and a drizzle of honey.
Chai spiced oatmeal – Add a few tablespoons of chai mix tea morning oatmeal along with grated apples, cinnamon and almonds.
Pumpkin spice sweet potatoes – Mix it in with sweet potatoes, butter and maple syrup. There are endless uses for this amazing brew.
Make a Hot Drink Out of Rice Water
In Mexico this is known as horchata. Rice, especially whole grain brown rice, is loaded with B vitamins which is excellent for the nervous system. Why buy rice milk and nut milk at the store when you can get the same nutritional value by reusing the rice water from your cooking?
Cook a pot of rice as you normally would, adding a little extra water. When the rice is done, strain the extra cooking liquid to use in a hot drink. Sweeten with honey to soothe the stomach or add a few shakes of cinnamon, cloves and/or nutmeg, and milk.
Cook Up a Bone Broth
These days people probably make a project of cooking bone broth. If you’ve enjoyed meet on the bone for dinner, just use what you have. Steak bones, pork chop bones, chicken bones, turkey bones, any kind of Meatballs you have can go into a medium sized or large sized saucepan. Cover with water to 3/4 of the way up. Bring to a boil. Let simmer for an hour or more.
Keep lots of Pyrex storage containers on hand so you will be able to transition your broth from stove to fridge or freezer without a lot of fuss and hassle.
Getting into the habit of adding broth to all of your recipes is a really excellent way to deliver nourishment to your family in the form of tasty and healthy meals. It is cost effective too, since you already were eating the meat and now you are stretching its benefits even farther.
If you’re simmering up something tasty for dinner, add a bone directly to the pot. A great example of this is rice or potatoes. You’ll be cooking in some extra nourishment, including calcium and other minerals and collagen. The broth that results will also add yummy hearty flavor to your sides.
Simmer Up a Shellfish Broth
Use it in your favorite recipes. Any time you buy fresh shellfish like clams, mussels, oysters or some other combination, before you toss the shells, let them simmer in a big part of water for half hour to an hour or so. Save the broth to use in recipes.
You can make soup, sauces, pasta dishes and more with all of that good seafood broth that has so many minerals. Iron, calcium, selenium, zinc and magnesium are just a few essential minerals that you can get from seafood.
Add a gelatin packet to your soups and stews. Gelatin is made from animal bones, skin and cartilage which is good for your own bones. Not just for wiggly desserts, gelatin strengthens your bones, hair, and teeth, and improves the condition of your skin. It’s basically collagen marketed in a different way.
Add Nuts
When you go out to eat, you probably think of a particular dish as being fancy and special if nuts have been toasted and added. Favorite Asian dishes that you would enjoy at a restaurant often contain peanuts, cashews and sesame seeds. Not only does this make the food more exciting and appealing for nut and seed lovers, but you certainly are enjoying a balance of nutrition from different sources.
The addition of nuts to your meals at home can be a smart way to cut back on the cost of meat, however, some people are allergic to peanuts or other tree nuts. If you plan to prepare a dish like this for a crowd, definitely ask in advance about allergies.
