Last week, I bought a cow share. My cost on that depends on how long I keep it, but ranges from $3.75 per week to $6 per week for 1/2 gallon of milk and cream. This is obviously not cheap, but it’s great stuff, and I haven’t yet trimmed my grocery bill to accommodate that addition. I’m not sure if I will or not, but more changes will be necessary once I start getting my CSA share.
I bought a few staple items that will last at least one month including cooking sherry, white wine vinegar, iodized salt and dried cranberries (I use them for making granola and sometimes just stick a little handful in bento box lunches). Asparagus was $1.49 a lb., so I couldn’t pass that up. I splurged and paid too much for a zucchini and for a red pepper. I’ve wanted ice cream for a couple of weeks, so I bought some, and I also bought two cake mixes. I don’t eat the cake as I can’t digest wheat, but it’s Tino’s birthday, so I made him cupcakes. I certainly can eat ice cream, and I have OF COURSE sampled the frosting.
You’d think I’d make my cake from scratch, but no. I *do* make my own buttercream frosting though, and the Plugra Butter on this list went straight into that. I could have used local butter, but then I would not have enough to last until Friday, which is when I pick up my milk, eggs and local meat. Also, $2.85 for 8 oz. of Plugra is a great price. The grocery store is discontinuing it, so they are blowing it out. IME, this means it’s going to come in a smaller package and cost the same. I currently pay $5.71 per pound for local grass-fed butter, which is also a damn good deal.
Last Friday, also counting towards this grocery budget, I purchased a dozen local free-range eggs ($2) and a bag of Mache from The Plains for $3.75 when I picked up my milk. So, I’m a couple bucks over ($52.36).
I’ve never bought cooking sherry before, but I think it’s become necessary. We do have some sherry in the wine cellar, but I’m just not willing to open of a 375ml of dessert wine just to put it in a recipe, and sometimes, something else just won’t do. For instance, I used the remaining stock from last week to make a vegetarian French Onion Soup, and since I did not have sherry, I used white wine (Missouri Traminette). This was a bigger flavor problem than the fact that it wasn’t made with beef stock, believe it or not. I’ve subbed Mirin in marinades that call for sherry, and I think I got away with it there, but I won’t have to in the future.
I made stock this morning, but as usual, I’m not sure what I’m doing with it. For Easter, I will make the small turkey that’s in the freezer. It’s a Kosher bird that I got for free from the grocery store for being a loyal customer. I didn’t use it at Thanksgiving because I bought a local heritage bird and cooked that instead. The turkey will get brined (see photo of brine below), and I think it’s going to be cornbread stuffing again. I still don’t have a decent gluten-free bread recipe, but I do make an excellent cornbread, better than I’ve ever made with wheat flour, actually.
And a word about sour cream: I could sour my own raw cream, but that means I couldn’t use it for other things, like in coffee. While examining labels, I found out that Breakstone’s is no longer just cultured cream. It’s also got milk, enzymes and something I can’t recall added. Daisy has one ingredient: Cultured Grade A Cream. I will not go through both tubs of sour cream in a week either, so I guess that’s a staple for the future too.
Recent Comments