Baffled

 Hello dear friends!  Keeping warm?  Ha!  I guess April Fool's Day came early for me this year.  I decided to write  the last blog post because I discovered that more people were reading my blog the past few months then when I was posting regularly.  But you know what?  As soon as I posted the last post my readership flat-lined.  Oh dear!  But I don't care, because it was nice to reconnect with you.  So I will continue to blog, although irregularly if for no other reason that this blog acts as my own personal journal and it is fun to look back and see what I was thinking and doing at different stages of this old journey called life.  

I was going to write about what we were eating during our year of eating out of the pantry, but I don't think it would be helpful to others, because we have a rather unusual lifestyle (we only eat two meals a day), and because some of our pantry meals are not inexpensive unless you have someone in your family is an avid fisherman or you have such a well-stocked pantry that I have, which very few people besides some Amish have. Ha!  But here are some tips for stocking your pantry:

HOW TO HAVE  A WELL-STOCKED PANTRY

1.  GO SHOPPING.  So many people use those shopping services today, but you have to go to an actual store to discover the real bargains.  It really doesn't take that much time.  Ran and I go "bargain hunting" twice a month. We only shop the outer boundaries of the store; the dairy, produce and meat sections.  Things like flour, sugar and spices, we buy in bulk a couple of times a year.  We buy our coffee at the Amish scratch and dent store.  Sometimes we find coffee at the "reduced for quick sale" shelf which is usually tucked away  at a corner in the back of the store. We often find milk that is reaching its expiration date and thus the price is reduced, which we make into yogurt, which is then made into cheese.  Often there are unadvertised sales on meat. (We found a nice lamb roast for $4.99/lb. this past week!)  These bargains would have been missed if we weren't in the store to discover them.

2.  WHEN YOU FIND A BARGAIN, BUY A BUNCH  When you find an amazing bargain calculate how much you will need for a year.  We always reserve between $20-$30 a month for these sorts of purchases.  Most people can afford $20.  It might mean giving up some little luxury, like eating a PBJ instead of stopping at the fast food place because you are too tired to cook, or not buying that bag of chips and pop, or consolidating some errands and saving on a tank of gas, or doing your own nails instead of getting a manicure.  There's all sorts of ways to save $20 a month!

3.  BE OPEN-MINDED  The other day I was standing in the grocery store contemplating whether or not to buy some bags of frozen chicken leg quarters that were 39 cents a pound, when I overheard a woman say "oh gross!".  Now just why frozen leg quarters are gross and fresh aren't, is just not a concept I can grasp.  I guarantee that if I had bought 20 pounds for $7.98 and canned them up and made something and served it to her, she would have been none the wiser to whether they had started out with frozen or fresh meat to begin with.  And I would have had eight lovely pints of canned chicken and several pints of chicken broth in my pantry for a remarkable price.  BTW, if I would have bought forty pounds and canned it, that would have been enough chicken for an entire year and for less than twenty dollars.  A local thrift store gives out fruits and vegetables left over from their food pantry.  I like to leave those things for the truly needy, but the worker implored me to take them because they would just get thrown out at the end of the day otherwise.  You see, people are so privileged in this country that even those that are begging for free food, turn up their noses if it isn't exactly perfect.  So I gladly accepted the free oranges and made some lovely marmalade from it and the brown bananas were made into bread for breakfast, etc.  When eggs were so expensive, our friend Tyler started raising chickens and giving them out to friends and neighbors.  But being busy and a bachelor, he didn't wash them.  I was astounded at how many people complained and rejected his  free eggs just because they didn't look like they came from the grocery store, especially when eggs were were selling for over four dollars a dozen then.

4. LEARN TO COOK  So many of the recipes I see nowadays are not exactly cooking, it's more like assembling ingredients.  A can of this, a package of that. By just knowing a few basic cooking skills, you can eliminate the entire middle and frozen  sections (and most expensive) of the grocery store. Eliminating all those items, you'll have more money to stock up on the basics.  Learn to make a basic white sauce, which herbs and spice to use, with what,  what temperatures to roast, boil and bake at. (all posts I have written about in the past).  Learn how to make your own pasta, bread, baked goods from scratch by learning the ratio of fats, sugars and flours.  As I try to use up every last bit of things in the fridge that have been hanging around since the holidays, I have been baking with some unusual items.  I made oatmeal cookies last week using the last of the maple fudge for some of the sugar, pear sauce and a dab of sour cream  substituted for some of the fats, and diced up dried apricots instead of raisins.  Knowing that fat is fat and sugar is a sugar (except honey which you should use less and bake at lower temperatures), you can use every last drip and dab of food.  We come as close to zero waste as possible. BTW, the cookies were delicious.

5. USE IT ALL UP  Ran caught a lovely walleye last week so we had a our usual fish dinner with coleslaw and tartar sauce.  When  we were clearing the table there was about a tablespoon of tartar sauce and a quarter cup of coleslaw left over.  Now most people would probably have just tossed them, but then most people are not as parsimonious as me. Ha! I combined them with a the quarter cup of turkey I had leftover from the previous meal (turkey Reubens  made from canned turkey) and made enough sandwich filling for one sandwich, which I prepared, wrapped in waxed in paper and put in the refrigerator for someone to discover. BTW, aren't sandwiches tastier if they are cut corner to corner and wrapped in waxed paper? Mrs. Rachel Lynde, a character in Anne of Green Gables, always claimed you can tell a good homemaker by her bread management and would always check others breadbox to see if there was any stale bread in there.  Waste not, want not! 

So anyway, that is but a few ways I manage the grocery budget so I can stock my pantries.  Hope it helps!

BAFFLED

Well, we are going through a cold spell lately.  As many of you dear readers know, we live in a very old house, at least one-hundred and fifty years old and probably older than that.  Although we did our best to insulate it, it is still a cold drafty little place.  The upstairs is unheated and the only heat is via little vents in the ceiling  from the room below, basically it works on the theory that hot air rises.  This morning the inside temperature was 52 degrees (Fahrenheit)! But we stay toasty while we sleep because we dress our bed warmly.  I made quilts from scraps of wool, with old down comforters for the batting and flannel sheets for the backing.  I then hand-tied the top to the bottom.  The reason these quilts keep us extra warm as opposed to a regular quilt is because of the baffling.  The layers of top, bottom and batting are not compacted like in a pretty quilted quilt.  This allows air to be trapped between layers or to be more precise, baffled. Here's a link on how to make your own woolen quilt:

 https://hopeandthrift.blogspot.com/2015/03/sweet-briar-journal-lessons-from-my.html

I was too lazy to make all those little squares for the quilt on the bed so I just cut big squares and rectangles for the top and sewed and cut to fit the unusual sized bed.  It's a two-hundred year old rope bed and is shorter and narrower than standard beds.  Anyway, I find that woolen scarves from the thrift store (I wait until they have their winter clearance and buy them for less than ten cents) make quick work of this sort of quilt.  I was going to pretty the quilt up with some lace and hand-embroidery, but never got around to it. It works and gives me that primmy vibe I like.

I also use baffling to dress warmly.  As most of you know, I only wear skirts and people often ask me if I'm cold in winter.  Actually, quite the opposite.  I've tried wearing fleeced-lined pants when walking and frankly they don't work.  What does is wearing tights, a flannel petticoat and a skirt made from a natural material like wool or a heavy cotton. On top I wear a silk undershirt, a flannel or wool blouse and a wool cardigan.  The warmth from my body heat gets trapped within the layers. I'm warm.  Besides baffling, the other key is to use all natural materials.  Those blankets and clothes made from acrylics, won't keep you warm, so if you need to buy blankets, look for woolen ones and fortunately the thrift stores still have affordable ones.  BTW, don't waste your money getting used ones dry-cleaned, just wash as usual, if they shrink, you will have boiled wool, which is even warmer.

SPEAKING OF WOOL

This is my first project I finished for 2024:

A wool work sewing roll. I dislike having clutter about the house and craft projects always create so much clutter, so I made this sewing roll so at the end of the day, I can just roll up my project and tuck it away. And it keeps everything together.

BARGAINS

Besides the lamb I bought at a remarkable price ( I have another roast in the freezer so I might can them both up, we'll see) I spotted the store still had Christmas items for 90% off.  So I bought two packages of Hershey's kisses for 59 cents each, that I will chop up and use in chocolate chunk cookies sometimes in the future (cheaper than a bag of chocolate chips)  and one of those boxed  panetones  for a dollar.  Which I made into Skiers French Toast.

Skiers French Toast

2 tbsp. corn syrup

1/2 C. butter

1 C. brown sugar 

1 loaf of white bread (or in my case, 1 loaf of panentone)

5 eggs

1 1/2 C. milk

1 tsp. vanilla 1/4 tsp. salt

In a small saucepan, combine corn syrup, butter and brown sugar and simmer until syrupy.  Pour mixture over the bottom of a 9" X 13" pan.

Slice the bread in 12-16 slices and place over the sugar-butter mixture.

In a bowl, beat the remaining ingredients together.  Pour over bread. Cover and refrigerate overnight.

Preheat the oven to 350 degrees.  Uncover and bake for 45 minutes.  Serve hot.

Makes a nice family breakfast for the weekend.

THINKING OUTSIDE OF THE BOX

Rarely do I use objects for their intended purpose.  Linen tablecloths become skirts and pretty blouse become napkins.  Wool skirts become blankets and rugs and woolen blankets become woolen applique pieces.  So the other day I was perusing the thrift store on our "bargain hunt" excursion when I spotted the prettiest linen blouse (made in Italy. Oh-la-la).  I was asking Ran what I could make with it.  I didn't need any more pillows, and it was too nice to stain up for napkins and I am through with making quilts.  'What can I make with this pretty fabric Ran?'  "Well, you could just wear it as a blouse.' Duh!  Sometimes I'm so busy looking outside of the box, I forget to look at the box. Ha!

EATING OUT OF THE PANTRY

Well, this has not been a hardship for us at all and I now have room in my pantry for some of my jars of home canned goods that have been sitting under the tea table in the living room.  Hurray!  Just to settle your curiosity,  today for lunch we had grilled baked  bean and cheese sandwiches and canned asparagus.  The beans were made from our own dried Hopi Indian beans, home-canned bacon,  homemade cranberry catsup and I used some home-canned apple syrup to sweeten them.  The cheese was purchased earlier this year when our Amish bulk store was selling the ends and pieces of deli cheese for $1.89 a pound.  We bought about twenty pounds, made them into packages and vacuum  sealed the packages and froze them.  I have also canned cheese, but it's an awfully fiddly process and it's a chore to clean the jars.  I wouldn't recommend it to you canners. So that is that for this week's life at the old Zempel boarding house.  Hope you all have a lovely week and stay warm!

Hugs

Jane

Colorful

Hello dear friends!  Hope you all are doing well.  We're still spending a good portion of our days watering, trying to keep our garden alive.  My! It's been hot!  But the today we finally had a break from the heat and are having the Picture-perfect summer day.  So many flowers are blooming right now.

This is a garden on the south side of our home.  It's a true cottage garden, in that every plant is either something that someone has given us, or a volunteer plant growing elsewhere in the yard.  It's been thrown together with no forethought on what "goes" but just planted by sticking whatever we found,  wherever there was an empty space.  And you no what?  It's one of the prettiest gardens  that ever existed.  (Sometimes I wish I were a better photographer so I could capture the true beauty of this place, but it is what it is, and if people desire an "artful" blog, I'm afraid they will have to go elsewhere.)  Oh!  And the birds do their part also. Many of the flowers have been reseeded courtesy of the birds. I'm a firm believer in not coddling  plants and letting them live where they want to, no hybrid roses for me!

Here's an area of the yard we will be working on this fall:

This is the back quarter of our property where our apple trees grow.  We plan to plant "something" to make this area completely secluded and have a little sitting area. Even on the hottest days, this shady area is cool.  We've already earmarked some ferns and hostas to go back here.  Any ideas?   I'd love your input. This year we decided not to mow the grass back here and there's all sorts of wildflowers  and herbs growing;   Fleabane, Self-heal, Queen Anne's Lace, Wild Lettuce, Mullein  and Red Clover to name a few.  It's so enjoyable to learn of all the herbs and their many uses. You are never too old to learn something new!

IN THE KITCHEN

This recipe is something new I learned  last year.  For years I've looked at this recipe in one of Mary Mason Campbell's recipe books and ignored it because it seemed too "ordinary".  But last year I had such a glut of summer squashes that I was willing to try anything to use some up. Hence, this recipe, which has become a staple summer meal for us:

 Casserole of Summer Squash

2 tbs. olive oil
2 lbs. summer squash washed and cut into cubes (I use a mixture of summer squash, zucchini and eggplant)
1 white onion, chopped
3 large tomatoes, chopped
2 tsp. pepper
1 tbsp. salt (scant)
2 tbsp. sugar
1 tsp. dry mustard
1 tbsp. oregano
1 C. breadcrumbs
1 C. cheddar cheese
2 tbsp. butter

Preheat the oven to 350 degrees. Parboil the squash for 5 minutes, Drain.
Put the oil in a 3quart casserole. Put in vegetables.
Mix together dry ingredients and half the cheese. Spread over top of the vegetables.
Dot with butter.
Cover and bake 50 minutes. Uncover and scatter the remaining cheese over top.  Return to oven until the cheese is melted.

Isn't it colorful?  We substituted some cheese crackers for the breadcrumbs, just because we had some and they needed using up.  Makes it even more colorful.  Happy days when the garden starts producing!

And look! Canning season has begun! One commenter expressed skepticism that I truly canned as much as what I said I did, but this is just the result of one day's canning session, and my true canning season doesn't really begin until the beans and the tomatoes ripen.  Then it's not unusual for me to can 30 jars a day.  Anyway, I know I should let these comments pass, but it does get tiresome some times. 

And speaking of gardens, with all this dry hot weather, now is the time to be drying your herbs in your car. Something I wrote about way  back in 2012.  Good advice never goes out of style.

This was a dandy year for cherries.  Usually the birds have them eaten before they are ready to be picked, but this year there were even  too many  for them!  I ended up with a dozen jars of cherry preserves.  We will treasure those!  And we had enough cucumbers for a dozen jars of relish. We go through a lot of relish. There'll be more on the way, not to mention pickles.  And I got an amazing deal at WalMart.  They must be getting rid of a brand because they had cans and cans of corn and beans on the sale rack. The expiration date on the cans was 2023 so it wasn't because they were expiring.  Anyway, I bought two  six pound cans of corn for $1.50 each (that's 25 cents/lb!). So I recanned the corn into smaller pint jars.  We never have any luck with corn, between the deer and the raccoons, it just isn't worth our while to grow.  And what they don't eat, the crows will finish off.  Oh! speaking of deer, we spotted twin fawns standing in the street in front of our house.  Gosh, they're cute, but such pests! They know they have it made, with a stream and grazing land behind our house, and apple orchards and our garden, plus the fact that there's no hunting in the village, I'd say they are the smartest little deer!

SEWING

During  the "big lockdown" I took up sewing again.  I haven't done any for years, and it was fun to rediscover the craft.  But not being able to avail myself to any stores, I had to "make-do" with what I had.  Using an old linen tablecloth and substituting some woolen goods for the interfacing I fashioned this old-timey vest.  It has a cute peplum in the back.

Sorry about how awful these pictures are.  I am not a model and the one thing I hate most in the world is having my picture taken.  The photographer gets one chance with me and that's what I go with. ANd I wouldn't know where to begin with photoshopping.  It must be tiresome to be a model, or one of those influencers you see on Instagram.  And I hadn't given any thought about how stupid this vest would look with a t-shirt, (I just put it on to take the picture). Or how I had the back all twisted about. Or that maybe the back would look smoother if I hadn't had a big bulky belt on underneath it.  Oh well!  You get the picture.  

Currently I'm knitting a shawl from some yarn that I picked up at the local thrift shop for 50 cents a skein.  It's just a simple shawl, but the variegated yarn intrigued me. It 's not the best yarn, but I'm not a yarn snob and the entire project will cost me $1.  Not like I'm giving it as a gift or anything, just something to do. Truly a mindless project for the times I'm monitoring the pressure canner.  

Well, the world keeps getting crazier, but life is as good as you care to make it.  I hope you all have a glorious week ahead of you. And that's this week at the old Zempel boarding house.

Hugs

Jane

Foraging and Weekly Happenings

Hello dear friends!  How are you this lovely Spring day?  We had a few days of warm(er) weather so I've been enjoying some outdoor activities.  It was so nice to go outside without having to put on my big bulky, my name for my down-filled winter coat.  Rejoice in the little things! It was warm enough for the dandelions to pop out.

FORAGING

Dandelions must be the easiest to recognize and most abundant food to forage that ever existed.  When foraging, make sure to pick only in areas you know that haven't been sprayed with herbicides or fertilizers or where pets like to do their business.  This year we tried something different, dandelion fritters:

They were quite good, although a little piddley to make"

Dandelion Fritters

1/2 C, flour
1/2 C. cornmeal
1 tsp. your favorite seasoning (we used Cajun)
1 egg
2 tbsp. milk
the heads of clean dandelions


Combine the dry ingredients in one bowl.  Whip together the egg and milk. dip the heads in the egg mixture then into the flour/cornmeal mixture.  Fry in hot oil until the coating is browned.  Salt and pepper to taste.

We also had dandelion salad with this using some of the dandelion leaves and some of our lettuce that we are growing in our cold frames:

This recipe is just your basic wilted lettuce salad but with dandelion leaves in lieu of lettuce, you can use spinach too.

Wilted Lettuce

a few rashers of bacon
2 tbsp. cider vinegar
2 tsp. sugar
lettuce

Fry the bacon until crisp. Drain off all but a tablespoon of the bacon grease.  Add the vinegar and sugar to the frying pan along with the bacon grease.  Stir until  the sugar is dissolved.  Put the lettuce into the hot frying pan and spoon the grease over the top, until the lettuce begins to wilt,  Sprinkle the bacon over top.  Serve immediately.

This was a doubly foraged meal for us as the vinegar I used was made from some foraged crab  apples.  Spring is a wonderful time to forage.  We went out morel mushroom hunting Sunday afternoon, or as we call it "a nice stroll in the woods". We rarely find any.  And when I think of the grocery bags full that we used to pick as children. Ah! The good old days!

There's also lambs quarters and purslane to be found at this time of the year. And our friend Jason told us his young son made dandelion chips (like kale chips).  Pretty clever!  Caleb is parsimonious person in training. You're never going to hear me complain about free food.  It's like money  in the bank!

WHAT'S  GOING ON

Ran and Jamie swept our chimney.  That saves us about $150 and a lot of frustration, because dealing with independent small business people around here, particularly in anything that is home-related is like banging your head against the wall a lot of  the time.  Anyway,  somehow, the chimney brush came off  midway up the chimney.  Thoughts of how embarrassing it was going to be to call the chimney sweep  to have him retrieve the brush quickly popped into my head.  So I was standing there fretting , when Ran turned to me and said "You standing there worrying isn't helping anything." Ha!  So true!  How many times have I stayed up all night worrying about things, only to have nothing come of the problem?  How many times has what I worried about came to fruition only to discover that I could handle it and it wasn't nearly as bad as I had imagined?  And yes, it is true, worrying never helped anything. So whatever situation you are going through right now, don't worry, instead put on your thinking cap and come up with a solution.

I've had many discussion with family and friends over the past few weeks about what may or may not happen to the economy.  Some experts say we'll be in the next depression soon, others say we'll bounce back. Some say there will be food shortages, some say not.  I don't know and I'm through trying to make any predictions.  But I do know that putting aside some things has never hurt anyone.  Remember when everyone was predicting a major catastrophe for Y2K?  I didn't really believe the hype, but I bought a big bag of pinto beans, just in case.  Nothing ever happened, but we used the beans anyway.  It certainly didn't hurt.  And that's the beauty of prepping, if nothing comes of whatever the headlines of the day are, you still can use the food.  So to that end, when I went grocery shopping this week, I took notice that there was very little meat on stock at Aldis and what they had they were limiting to two packages a person., so I went to a smaller independent grocer and purchased some pork and canned it up.  I also noticed that  our Mennonite butcher's (he raises, butchers, and sell his own meat) parking lot was full.  Usually, we are the only people in his store. Let's just say he doesn't normally do such high volume business. All this to say in my long-winded way, "what would it hurt?" to stock up a little?

We order our firewood this past week.  Our local supplier is a very nice  man and always quickly fills our order and is very generous.  We order 10 cords but he always brings between 13-15 cords.  And never charges extra! As a matter of fact, he gave us a discount because we are loyal customers.  Makes a person happy to support a small businessman like that.  If only they all could be so dependable!   So Ran and Jamie spent the week splitting and stacking wood.  Ran splits wood, with an axe ( no log splitter for him), like he was thirty years old.  All this fresh garden produce must be doing his body good, because he'll turn 63 in a couple of weeks.  My thirty-something year old son, says Ran can run circles around him. Just goes to show you, that yes, good organic produce and plenty of it, plus regular exercise keeps you young.  We never think about our age, occasionally we will overhear someone state theirs and we'll look at each other and say, "That old person over there, is younger than us!" Ha!  We never realized that we had gotten old, been too busy I guess.  So anyway, we are ready for winter, although spring has barely arrived.  Up here we only have two seasons, winter and getting ready for winter.  Tonight it is supposed to snow. Ugh! But I guess it just makes the warm days sweeter. And I hope that you have a sweet days ahead of you!

Hugs
Jane

CHOOSE YOUR OWN ADVENTURE

Hello dear friends!  I hope that you are all doing well on this fine Sunday afternoon.  Yesterday my son and daughter-in-law brought the grands for a visit.  Such fun!  And I'm glad to announce that they took our little frozen foundling kitten back with them.  She was intended to be a barn cat, but something tells me that she'll never get there, as she is so adorable and playful.  They're already  spoiling her with toys and special bowls.  Erin, my daughter-in-law, even slept in the guest room with her last night so she wouldn't be scared being left alone in a strange house.  Barn cat? I think not!

Choose Your Own Adventure

As everyone knows that has read this blog for any amount of time, I am a bit of a frugal fanatic.  I have a very good reason to be one, you might say, it is a matter of life or death for someone very dear to me. But that is a tale for another day.  What I've noticed is that people tend to apologize to me whenever they spend money!  I guess they think I'm making a judgement on them.  I am not!  I'm glad there are people out there spending money on expensive clothes, or else I wouldn't have any to buy when I go thrifting.  I'm happy for those that take expensive vacations, my son worked in the hospitality industry for several years, there's people counting on them.   If you have the money and no reason to save, I say go for it!  I happen to have a very important reason for saving money.    Everyone has to choose their own adventure in life, wouldn't it be boring if we were all on the same path?   Trust me when I say, I really am not envious of your big houses, new clothes or cable TV, I love my life just as it is, and my heart is glad for those of you that have those sort of things if they make you happy.   

I love living within the constraints  of a strict budget.  I find it fun and challenging to figure out meals for a month on $150.  Sort of like doing real-life Sudoku.  I find it rewarding to take an old wreck of a house and making it into a home that people stop and take pictures of because it's so cute.  I enjoy designing  a flower garden from others cast off  plants.  I find it adventuresome to create my own unique style from thrift store clothes. I guess what I really love about my thrifty lifestyle is the creativity of it.  I never feel deprived by it.  In short, I love my life and would say it is pretty darn perfect, for me.

Conversely, there's always the thrifty ones that seem to need to apologize for their lifestyle. This past month,I've been watching a lot of YouTubers on their thrifty lives.  And it seems like they are forever feeling the need to explain  themselves.  There's one very sweet gal, that always starts her videos with "this is what works for me and my family".  And isn't that really what matters in life?  For me and my family it's more important to save the money than it is to be concerned with how ethically the chicken I eat was raised.  To my family, buying from Goodwill and saving money is more important than being concerned with how much the CEO earns, or that they don't pay their employees a good wage.  Isn't it just supposed to be a starting position anyhow,  so that you can gain experience to move on to other jobs?   They can always find a different job if they don't think they are being treated fairly.  I can't be concerned with WalMart's policies either, if it's the only store for miles around and it would mean traveling 140 miles to do my weekly grocery shopping otherwise.  We all have to make decisions in life in how we choose to spend our money and time. what we value and don't.  In other words, we have to choose our own adventures in life, what works for one person, might not be a fit  for another.  So don't let anyone make you feel guilty for the choices you make!

MAKE DO

Last week. I wrote about Ran  fixing our refrigerator's crisper drawers that were beginning to crack.  The manufacture stopped making this model, so there weren't any replacements so Ran made some pulls out of wood

 He glued the crack with crazy glue, then attached the pulls to the top of the drawers, thus stabilizing them and keeping them from wracking, so the cracks won't get any bigger.

THRIFTY MEAL

We've been eating a lot of cabbage this week.  It stores well and is one of the cheapest things you can buy, 29 cents/lb., here.  Plus it's good for you.  This week we had it in eggrolls, coleslaw, another batch of the cabbage rolls I wrote about in last week's post,and these Korean street sandwiches, that Ran discovered on YouTube.  Sorry I lost the link to the video, but here's how they're made.

Korean Street Sandwiches

 Toast 6 pieces of bread.  Butter them. Sprinkle with a bit of sugar. Set aside. Shred about 3-4 cups of cabbage to make 3 large sandwiches.  Shred some carrots. Just like a making coleslaw, or use that coleslaw mix you can buy in the store. Chop 1 small onion finely.  Salt and pepper to taste.  Combine  all with 2 eggs.
Heat a skillet with enough oil to coat the bottom of pan over medium heat.  Spread mixture into skillet.  Cook, compressing mixture with a spatula, while cooking.  Once one side is brown, flip mixture over and brown the other side.  Remove from heat and cut into sandwich-sized pieces. Place onto the toast and sprinkle with a bit more sugar. Spread with a mixture of mayo and ketchup.  Add a slice of cheese, top with the other piece of toast and enjoy!

Nothing cheaper than cabbage, carrots and bread!  And it was surprisingly tasty!

AN UNUSUAL PLACE TO FIND BARGAINS

As a washed my little green and cream enamel pan that I use on almost a daily basis, I was reminded to write about the one spot most people don't think about when shopping on the cheap - the antique stores!  A lot of today's antique stores are just glorified thrift stores, most of the stuff sold in them are not true antiques,  They are a great place to buy inexpensive reading material, magazines usual sell for a dollar or two and I find the older issues of Victoria and Country Living much nicer than the newer ones,  the current issues are almost all advertising and pretty lightweight on the content, in my opinion.  Books are also priced pretty inexpensively, and the bindings on some of the older ones are works of art. I always try to replace paperback editions of books I love with prettily bound editions when I can find them for a few dollars.  Things like enameled pans usually are cheaper than those you can find in the stores, and they seem sturdier.  I bought a wonderful cast-iron griddle for a few dollars at one, that is a mainstay in my kitchen.  If you enjoy sewing things like vintage aprons, you can find yardage there for a lot less than the fabric store prices.  Jewelry is another thing you buy inexpensively at antique stores.  I've purchased turquoise earrings for as little as five dollars.  And I'll never understand why anyone would buy new imitations of vintage china, when you can buy the real McCoy for the same price or less. Oh well!  To each, their own, I guess!

THRIFTY THING WE DID THIS WEEK

Most of our thrift has been passive this week, as we haven't gone anywhere, thus not spending money.

I did spend around $20 on groceries; buying milk, bread, bananas, coffee creamer, yogurt, a head of cabbage and lettuce, and some decaf K-cups that were on the reduced-for-quick-sale at $3/12. And a few other items I can't recall off hand (and were probably unnecessary).

Started another wool quilt, like the one I made here.  My dear friend Mary, brings me the woolen fabric sample from an upholstery shop.  They are all Ralph Lauren and Brunschweig and Fils. Should be pretty la-dee-da!

Last week I happened upon some great deals at the thrift store.  They had skeins of handspun and hand-dyed wool for a few dollars each.  The original price on them  was over $20.  However I spent several hours one day just untangling and rolling up one skein.  After that, I lost interest in knitting for a while!

We've been eating a lot out of our freezer, as we try to clean it out.  Makes for some interesting meals.
In the evening we like to use our kerosene lamps and the many candles we purchase at garage sales, it  creates a cozy ambience and saves on electricity. 

We collected fallen branches in our neighborhood for firewood.

Picked up several free pallets for firewood.

I discovered a new-to-me classic movie on YouTube.  It's called Seventh Heaven and it stars Jimmy Stewart and Simone  Simon.  I love discovering these old gems, reminds me of when I was a kid and they had a Sunday afternoon matinee on the the television.  You never knew when you'd find an golden oldie.

 Well that's it for another week at the old Zempel boarding house!  I hope that you all have fun on your own adventures this week. Until next!

Hugs
Jane
 

WHY DID WE SAVE THAT?

Hello dear friends!  I hope that all of you living in the northern hemisphere are keeping warm.  It's amusing to read that many living in the southern states have more snow than we do up here in the "winter wonderland".  It's been a strange winter so far, such swings in temperature!  Right now, it's in the single digits, but we're used to that, it wouldn't be so bad, except for the wind, which blows directly off of Lake Huron straight down our street.  Oh well! In the summer we appreciate it.  Can't have everything in life, nor would we want to.

DOWNSIZING AND ORGANIZING

The cold keeps us inside, so it's the perfect time for organizing and just getting rid of stuff.  Lori wanted to know how we downsized  from a 4000 square foot home to our current less than 1000 square foot one.  I always quote William Morris on this;

"Have nothing in your house that you do not find to be useful or beautiful."

The useful part is pretty easy, I don't think too many people hang on to non-working TVs or broken appliances, if you do, well, then you have more work to do before getting to decluttering and organizing! We always leave anything that has scrap metal potential out in front on garbage day for the man that collects such things to sell for scrap.  Don't know if he makes much money from it, but perhaps it is enough to keep the wolves from the door for him.  I like the scrap metal man, he's a pull-yourself-up-by-the-bootstraps sort of fella. 

A note on appliances: reassess what you really need.  I've never had a standing mixer, and I dare say, I've baked more than the average bear in my lifetime.  They take up a lot of counterspace.  A hand-held mixer works just as well, unless you are making pound cakes on a daily basis.  Find appliances that do double duty; our pressure cooker, which is necessary because we use so many dried beans, also has a setting for slow cooking, thus eliminating a crock pot.  I don't own a slow cooker, just use my Dutch oven on a low setting (300 degrees) in the oven to get the same results, although I'm sure they are nice for those of you that are away from home all day. A cast iron skillet does just as good job as one of those gadgets for deep frying.  My kitchen is tiny 13 1/2 feet by 6 1/2 feet, yet I manage to can enough food for a year, feed large  gatherings holiday meals, and cook everything from scratch, so if I can do it, anyone can do it.  As a matter of fact, a small kitchen makes life easier; less steps to make and everything must be organized. We have an old family friend that has what many would consider a dream kitchen; huge and so many cupboards and drawers, but every time she wants to cook something or find a gadget, she has to rummage through drawers and cupboards for the item.  It takes forever.  Plus a lot of times she just gives up and buys another, which is not thrifty. Which is another reason to be organized.  If you are replacing things because you can't find them, it's time to get organized.  Organization and thrift go hand-in-hand.

LOSE THE SENTIMENTALITY 

A lot of times we hold on to items for sentimental reasons. Trust me, having cleaned out my parent's home and helped clean out several other homes after the people have passed, no one appreciates those old birthday cards and photos of your new car circa 1967.  How often do you look at those things?  Probably never.  Even old family photos.   This past year, Ran and I went through all the family photos and chucked a bunch of them.  The kids are never going to look at old photos of scenery from trips, and pictures of people we don't remember, so how would they? We just kept a few photos of each child at each age, and tried to choose the ones that were the cutest.  Now all our family photographs fit in one shoe box. We never saved our children's art work either.  We displayed it on the refrigerator for a while then had no qualms about tossing it.  They were always making more. And I've never heard any of them say they regretted  that I didn't save any of these things. 

Many times we get "stuck" with furniture and such that family member pass down to us.  First, if it isn't to your taste, say "no thanks", and eliminate the problem to begin with.  Unless the treasure is a valuable antique, I have no regrets with donating it to a charity, and even then, if it's just going to be stuck in the attic, it is better to pass it on to a family member that would enjoy it, give it to a charity that could use it, or sell it to buy something that you need (or raise funds to buy down your mortgage).   After all, a 1970 Mediterranean dresser made from press board will never be valuable. In other words, you don't need to keep things to keep the memories. 

One of the reason I have no  misgivings about getting rid of furniture is that I never pay a lot for it to begin with, having purchased most at estate and garage sales and auctions.  When my tastes change it is of little consequence to get rid of things or to paint or re-purpose them.  Get rid of things that you don't like, it will just make you miserable looking at them day to day.

BE HONEST WITH YOURSELF

This past few months I got rid of all my DMC embroidery floss.  It was driving me crazy, thinking about organizing it, and I had to be honest with myself that I probably never would make a sampler anymore, and if I did, it doesn't cost that much to buy new floss, a small price to pay, to be rid of the anxiety and clutter.  I also had to be honest with myself and admit defeat when it comes to quilting; I'm never going to make one that I'd be satisfied with, so out went all those cotton scraps I've been saving and the quilting hoops. It was actually quite liberating to be done with those things.

I've gotten rid of lots of books over the years also.  I know I'm not going to re-read a lot of them, so out they went to the library book sale.  Many times we hold onto cookbooks for one recipe. Who buys cookbooks now days, with zillions of recipes available on the internet?  I just copy the recipe and donate the book.  My friend, Laurie, was appalled when  I told here this, but I cut up old decorating and craft books and just keep the pages I want.  The craft patterns go into sleeves that are in a three-leaf binder.  The decorating pages are glued into a notebook on decorating ideas. Bibliophiles may find this sacrilege, but nothing is sadder than old craft and decorating books, tastes are continually changing and after while they become so dated, that you can't even give them away.  At the end of each month I gather up all my magazines and catalogs and cut out what I want from them; fashion  and crafting ideas from the catalogs, articles from the magazines, etc. and glue them into notebooks.

Old DVDs are another thing to get rid of, are you really going to watch that movie a second time?  The movies that I love and want to hold onto, I remove from their cases, and put into those DVD/CD organizers.  Saves a lot of space.  I always enjoyed watching old movies and I thought it would be nice to have a large selections, since we don't have TV, but I find that I watch the same few shows over and over again, and rarely watch any of the movies.  I rarely watch any of the shows either, except for when it really is cold out and have the time.  I've discovered that there's quite a few old movies on YouTube, sometimes I discover a real treasure.  Veterans Hospitals and senior centers are often looking for donations of movies, so there's a good home for the unwanted ones.  Or you could donate them to the thrift stores.  BTW,  the series I watch in the winter are: Christy, Road to Avonlea, Newhart, and All Creatures Great and Small. There are plenty enough episodes to keep me busy.

ORGANIZING MY WARDROBE 

We only have one closet in this old house and that is used to store our winter coats, my little black dress  (that I use for funerals and formal occasions) and Ran's suit, so maintaining a small and practical wardrobe is a necessity.  I have two wardrobes; one for warm weather and one for cold, when one is not in use, I pack it away in the attic for storage. The first thing I do when I get them out of storage is to lay everything out on the bed.  This way I can see the "clinkers" as I call it; you know the sweater that doesn't go with anything, the really dated looking skirt, etc. Into the charity box they go.  Next I get rid of everything that is uncomfortable, whether it's because it's too large, small or too immodest, or made of a material that I don't like.  Then out goes all the impracticals; the skirts that don't allow me to move freely,  i.e. pencil skirts, the ones made from fabric that take too much care, such as linen and the ones that just don't mesh with my lifestyle.  I try to keep everything in a color scheme, for me it's cream, beige, gray and grayed down blue and green.  Then it comes to personal style.  For years I tried to "fit"  in with others.  I tried wearing the velour jogging suits of the mommy crowd in the 80s and the yoga pants and hoodies that seem to be the current style, even jeans and t-shirts, but I never felt comfortable in them. I'd wear those things for a while and then revert back to my old self.  I had to realize that although my personal style sometimes makes me stand out like a sore thumb, it is who I am.  After a while people get used to your eccentricities, and you just become part of the atmosphere, so go for it. 

To thine own self, be true.
~William Shakespeare~

 By the time you've narrowed your wardrobe down, to comfortable, well-fitting clothes that convey your personal style, you should have a much smaller wardrobe, but if you still have too much, go through  it a second time and keep just the very best; i.e., the very best example of a gray cardigan, the most flattering denim skirt, etc.  I usually end up with too many gray sweaters, I must confess.  As you well-know, I love to shop thrift stores, so I have a rule, every time I bring something new into the house I must get rid of something plus one.  

GETTING STARTED

I hope by now, we all can agree that getting organized is a thrifty thing to do, but how do you get started at it?  People often get overwhelmed by a huge project, but as the saying goes, "How do you eat an elephant? One bite at a time." the same is true with organizing.  Pick one room per week or month and go through one drawer  or closet at a time and be ruthless about getting through with the things you don't need or want.  As soon as you have a box filled with things for charity, drop it off. Don't keep them around to second-guess it.  

RECIPE OF THE WEEK

I'm trying to make more meatless meals this year and try some of the many recipes that I've clipped throughout my thirty-eight years of being married.  This recipe met both criteria.  I'll give it to you the way it was written, then I'll illustrate how I will make it the next time to utilize pantry staples and my time.

Tropical Stuffed Cabbage Rolls

8 large cabbage leaves
1 can reduced-fat unsweetened coconut milk
1/2 C. pineapple preserves
1 C. cooked orzo
1 can black beans drained
1 onion chopped
1/3 C. raisins
1/3 C. cashew pieces
2 tsp. curry powder
1/2 tsp. garlic salt
salt and pepper to taste



In a bowl, cover cabbage leaves with boiling water.  Cover; let sit 10 minutes or until limp.

Meanwhile coat 3-4 qt. slow cooker with cooking spray.  In a small bowl, mix coconut milk and preserves. Spread 1/2 mixture in bottom of slow cooker; set aside remaining mixture.

Combine remaining ingredients, except cabbage.  Place 1/3 C. mixture at stem end of each leaf and form into cabbage rolls.Place as many cabbage rolls, seam side down as will fit in slow cooker. Cover with 1/3 C. of remaining  coconut mixture.Repeat with remaining rolls and pour the remaining mixture over the rolls.

Cover; cook on low heat setting 7-9 hours, or on high setting 3 1/2 - 4 hours.


Now for the thriftier version, I'd use plain white rice in place of the orzo, since that is not a pantry staple in our house.  I usually have a carton of coconut milk for making oatmeal, which I would replace with the canned stuff, or I'd use plain old milk and add some coconut from my baking pantry.  I happened to have some cashews left over from Christmas, but if I didn't I would just leave them out.  Instead of pineapple preserves, I would thicken a small can of crushed pineapple by combining the syrup and some cornstarch and simmering it with the pineapple until it thickens.  And of course, I would use reconstituted dried beans for the canned ones.  I also wouldn't bother with all the fuss of making the rolls, I'd just shred  the cabbage, stir everything in a pot and throw it into the oven to simmer at 350 degrees for an hour and a half.  I'd also add more beans and rice to make the meal stretch further.  Jamie said this would be excellent on our homemade flat bread.

There was one more thing that I wanted to write about; several people had suggested a certain book that I might like, so I went to Amazon to check it out.  Right off the bat, I could tell it wasn't a book for me, because in the description it had an entire chapter on boiling.  Boiling? Really?  There's not too many things I hate in this world, but those phony lifestyle books where people presume we are all so stupid that we didn't know it was cost-effective to re-use your leftovers, is one of them.  I'm always offended for all those that have come before and things like thrift are just a natural part of life, these writers always act as though they're the first to discover it.  It also makes me bristle when I see authors that write about "the simple life" in their new LL Bean clothes and their fancy chicken coops that cost more than our new car.  Or the pretentious ones that are always having sit-down dinners for an unusually attractive family in their million dollar decorated-to-the hilt homes.  No sir, give me a blog any day, where the people look like real people and aren't afraid to say, that today we ate at Taco Bell because I was just too tired to cook.  Just wanted to get that off my chest.

THRIFTY THING WE DID THIS WEEK

Our crisper drawers in the refrigerator were starting to crack and the manufacturer has discontinued our model, so Ran made wooden handles to keep them from cracking any further.  Funny story:  On another refrigerator the plastic parts that hold in the milk, etc. on the door cracked so Ran made some wooden ones.  Everyone thought they were so neat that we matched our cabinets, thinking that we had done it on purpose.

Started knitting a pair of mittens for next year's Christmas presents.

Spent a grand total of $7 and some change on groceries this week, for 2 heads of lettuce, a fresh pineapple and a small jug of milk.

Made banana pudding with some of the bananas that needed using up.  Saw a recipe for peanut butter banana pudding, but the ingredients were so ridiculous,  that I ended up making my regular banana pudding and stirred in a good dollop of peanut butter.  BTW, I hope that's the last time I need to type "banana" for a while, it's a challenge  for someone mildly dyslexic.

Painted a piece of furniture to fit in better with the decor.

Made bread crumbs from some leftover hamburger buns.

Roasted up the remaining pumpkins, pureed them and put them in the freezer.

Well that's it for the old Zempel boarding house this week!  Hallelujah! My computer has been acting up since I started writing this and it's been a real challenge to my patience, which isn't the greatest under the best of times!  Hope you all have a wonderful week!

Hugs
Jane