Bornfamous

While the Volvo is sidelined, a friend offered to take me along a few days ago on her weekly trip to the local organic food co-op. I bought almost exclusively bulk items like beans, quinoa, powdered milk, nuts, dried herbs, spices, salt, popcorn [gotta have my treats!] and several cans of diced tomatoes on sale.

I bought triple or quadruple the amounts that I would normally get, and I left the produce section, where I normally spend way too much money, alone except for a few onions and potatoes. The bill was about double my normal weekly bill, but the food will last at least a month. At least I think it will.

I decided to try an experiment and see how long I can live [or stand to live] off of what I bought last week, including a small amount of farmer’s market produce to round out the diet. I want to try to last the entire month of April without buying anything else, other than possibly another trip or two to the farmer’s market.

The verdict so far: I don’t think I’m going to make it.

Over the weekend, I went through my pantry, which I thought already held a couple of weeks’ worth of legumes, corn meal and various kinds of flour, all bought in a fit of Whole Foods ambition back when I decided to go organic for my health. I’d forgotten how old the stuff was. Most of it was bought three or four years ago, and never touched again.

Now, I’ve learned that beans can last for years, but you have to soak and cook them for much longer than you do with fresher beans. You also need to store them properly, which I didn’t. Apparently, I also didn’t cook them long enough for dinner Saturday night, and regretted it Sunday. Then I read that cornmeal goes rancid very quickly, and flour doesn’t last either. I had some split peas and other beans that were also quite old, so I just decided to chuck them all and start fresh.

So I’ll probably have to make one more trip to the co-op to make it to the end of April, but we’ll see first how long I can [stand to] last on what I have.