My family is completely obsessed with food

I have a confession to make, one that you have probably already guessed, but here it is all the same. My family is completely obsessed with food. I read cookbooks when I am not reading for my college classes. My husband is getting a degree in Horticulture. My kids wake asking what we are going to eat for all of the days meals. Our food is about more than what we put in our mouth, it is about who raises it, who grows it, how it is grown, where it came from, and what is in it. I know a lot of people who say my kids won’t eat this or that or my favorite they will only eat ______ fill in the blank. My question is this, what have you told your kids about food? Why do you keep giving it to them? When my kids start asking for something and demanding and refusing to eat anything else we stop eating it. Ice cream is a good example we go months without it so that it is a special occasion. Today we wrote our list of meals for the next couple of weeks, Damian pulled out the cookbooks and chose what sounded good to him Spicy sausage tortillas, Chicken pasta salad, Broccoli Orecchietta, and Cassoulet. James wanted Cauliflower Macaroni and cheese and Roasted Root Vegetable Pizza. When I put a meal on the table James asked what it in it so we spend ten to fifteen minutes talking about what the ingredients are and how I cooked them. We talk about gardening, a lot. What we hope to grow, when we need to start seeds, or when to plant the transplants. My kids all ways ask is that edible?

We also talk about composting and recycling. Because of our chose to be as sustainable as possible we only take our trash to the curb once every two weeks, and the same with the recycling bins. It is a nice realization that we have reduced our waste so much. I know that we have a long way to go before we completely sustainable but I know that we will get there one day, year from now. There is no time limit but the fact we are actively making improvements is a success.

Last month I read an article on the use of wood pulp as filler in food. The USDA allows up to 10% of any food to contain this wood pulp. Yeah that extra fiber in your bread or cereal it could be wood, you’ll never know because it is called cellulose in the ingredients. You can read about it here  http://www.thestreet.com/story/11012915/1/cellulose-wood-pulp-never-tasted-so-good.html.  Here is a fun fact about cellulose it is also used insulation, that’s right insulating your house. Wood pulp it is the modern day Soylent Green.  Shortly after reading more about the wood in meat products as well as breads and cereal, we went out to eat for the last time. I ordered nachos and it hit home when that plate was set in front of me. What is in that? I looked up almost in tears and said, “I don’t think we can eat out anymore.” My husband said simply, “Yeah, I think you may be right.” We have taken out almost all processed foods. We still eat frozen vegetables, canned tomatoes, chocolate, coffee, and bread. Yeah I know it probably has wood in it, but it is the hardest thing to switch over to completely homemade bread all of the time. I am hoping to buy flour in bulk this year to make it easier to make bread at home. I want unbleached flour. Turns out it is not readily available at local super stores.  Here is our boards of dinner meals for the next two weeks.  

Now you know I have horrible handwriting.

Why do I have 20 meals listed and there are only 18 days left in the month; you ask. We like to have a couple of extra meals in case nothing else sounds good. I want to share this journey with you. One thing I realized is how much less it is to just eat at home, even with the grass fed meat. A couple of days ago we had Jamie Oliver's Sweet and Sour Pork with brown rice and Roasted purple Cauliflower. The total cost per person was only $3.75. Let me tell you I do not skimp on food either. Don't believe me? Let's take the chicken listed at the top of my list.

Let's say I paid 18 dollars for that lovely bird. First, because I haven't learned to cut up the chicken I will usually roast it in the crockpot with an onion $1, a couple of cloves of garlic 20 cents, sliced lemons $1 and rosemary from our garden. So far for the chicken it is up to $22.00. Wait I use this chicken for two meals and chicken broth. So lets divide the price by 2 which is $11.00. So here is what we might have with the chicken.

Chicken       $11.00

Brown rice  $     .50

frozen veg   $   1.50

Total            $13.00 now we divide that by four and we have $3.25 for our whole meal. A lot of times we will have a green smoothie but we use the greens we are growing in our garden and a handful of frozen fruit at most it might make that individual total go up fifty cents. I want to encourage you to eat at home too. I have tons of cookbooks and I am more then happy to tell you how it is going complete with the total cost of the meals. It is completely reasonable to buy organic food, local food, and grass fed meat.

I want to leave you with a quote from Oprah Winfrey, "When you know better, you do better."

I hope that your week is filled with a revelation that moves you, Love and Laughter. Be well Friends!