The Poor Folks Cookbook Project is for anyone to contribute. We think it will be a book or file that can be distributed to food shelves, work centers, and welfare offices. It needs to be free and it needs to be easily portable. I have solicited your help, and many have already responded.
This project is called a cookbook, but it is much more than that. Lessons on life, how to get health and dental care, how to entertain yourself, your kids, etc, how to get clothes, and grow fruits and vegetables, herbs, are all legitimate things people need help with once they are poor or newly out of work.
Thank you all for the kind encouragement. This is what Daily Kos is all about!
This is not really a discussion diary - please use the first diary for that if you feel you need to have a discussion - I'll monitor it.
For contributions, please use the title of your post for the category you'd like to contribute to - or add one of your own, then provide the link or description of your idea, recipe or resource or skill.
Please see my first diary on this subject for a background before contributing here today.
Here is what you've done so far. We will be asking for more help with resources, and even money, in upcoming diaries. Oh, and before I forget, I probably missed something. If I did, please point it out and I'll add it back here.
Resources/chapters:
Recipes and food buying strategies
1. First, do no harm. Make sure that your precious food dollars go to food sources as close to you as possible, and avoid giving dollars to multinational corporations which will ship those dollars as far away from you as possible.
2. Develop a taste for soup. Soup can be served at any meal, can be made exceedingly cheaply, has infinite variety, and is really really healthy.
Recipe 1:
1 box chicken broth ($1.99)
2 lbs green beans ($1.38)
1 lb tomatoes ($0.69)
2 potatoes ($0.87)
1 onion ($0.39)
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$5.32 - 4 servings
Recipe 2:
1 box chicken broth ($1.99)
2 potatoes ($0.87)
1 onion ($0.39)
3 carrots ($0.49)
2 stalks celery ($0.47)
1 parsnip ($0.42)
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$4.63 - 4 servings
Recipe 3:
1 box chicken broth ($1.99)
2 potatoes ($0.87)
3 zucchini ($0.87)
1 ear corn ($0.47)
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$4.20 - 4 servings
-ultrageek
Shopping
http://groceryguide.com/
http://www.mygrocerydeals.com/
-Catte Nappe
Poor folks pizza dough/sourdough bread
2 cups flour
1 can beer
kneed with fork until combined
work with your hands into a ball or the shape of your baking dish
cover with wet cloth in a warm place
wait 1 hour
bake 20 minutes at 350
It's not the best bread in the world, but its cheap. I substituted beer because yeast is in it, and people (yes even poor people) generally have it on hand.
-Nada Lemming
Lentil Soup
For about .83 cents per serving (talking big serving sizes here - enough to fill a teenaged male):
3/4 c. lentils
1/2 c. brown rice
3 c. chicken broth or stock (homemade is simple and cheap)
2 tsp. granulated garlic
1/2 tsp. thyme
1 tsp. oregano
1 tsp. basil
1/2 tsp chili powder (optional)
Mix all together in a casserole dish, cover tightly and bake at 350 degrees for one hour. If you want to splurge, top it with 1/2 cup grated cheese (gubmint cheese works well!) and bake until cheese is all melty and yummy.
This will feed four hungry people.
-seefleur
http://couponmom.com
-SoCalJayHawk
http://www.mygrocerydeals.com
-TXDemJenn
Settlement Cook Book is a book originally written in the 40's and has had revisions, but the re-published original i ts full of how to do things--to make things from scratch, how to bring them from garden/farmyard to the table. (You know, not necessarily how to kill the chicken, but how to pluck, cut it up, etc). How to preserve foods (canning, freezing of different kinds of foods depending on their chemical base, etc).
It was a valuable teaching tool for me and my husband when we first got married (back in 69 when Mother Earth News and living back on the land was all the rage). Good things to know even if you aren't poor!
-In her own Voice
"More with Less" by Doris Longacre is my absolute favorite cookbook. Every chapter has sections called "gathering up the fragments" which suggests things that can be done with leftovers. It also is loaded with great quotes like:
A full stomach says: "A ripe guava has worms." An empty stomach says: "Let me see..."
It's much more than a cookbook, it's a whole philosophy of life. It helps the cook feel great about living well by simplifying.
The Tasselejara cookbooks are excellent as well. I love sections like, "Something missing muffins" which gives super-simplified recipes that get around what to do if you are out of eggs or whatever.
-Lefty Mama
Buy your packaged goods at an independent store toward the end of the day and ask the shopkeeper if you can have fresh produce that's on the verge of being thrown out.
That probably wouldn't work in a very, very poor area where lots of people have the same idea, but it might work in an area where a request like that is fairly unusual.
-sclminc
We tapped maple trees and made syrup. When that ran out we added maple flavor and color to kaypro corn syrup. Super cheap.
Canning at home is relatively cheap, and many vegetables and fruits can be grown or bought in bulk and frozen.
-Nailbanger
Beans - dried beans of all types are pretty cheap, nutritious, filling, and work in a lot of recipes.
Rice - buy the large bag, it's cheaper per pound - often far cheaper.
Corn meal - useful in many recipes
Flour - you can bake your own bread, rolls, and other things. A good idea is to make your own sourdough, since the cost of yeast is not trivial anymore.
Bulk pasta - One of the things I learned years ago was that there really isn't a whole lot of difference between cheap pasta and expensive pasta once you get the sauces on it.
I also recommend non-fat dried milk. While it doesn't work for drinking, it's a lot cheaper to use than regular milks in cooking, and you're not limited by refrigeration.
-Norbrook
Health & Nutrition Resources
Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program (Formerly known as Food Stamps)
Recipe database
-Catte Nappe
Depression Cooking with Clara
Excellent series of Youtube videos has Grandma Clara sharing recipes her mother cooked during the Great Depression.
-Tracker
How to cook rice in a microwave: http://www.wikihow.com/...
-Norbrook
Free/discounted dental care (need a resource)
Free/discounted hair care (need a resource)
Free/discounted health care (need a resource)
Economics
Common Security Club
I am initiating/facilitating a local group for "dealing with uncertain times" economically and etc. Here's a comment I posted in Ellinoranne's economic frustration diary yesterday or day before which describes more in detail what I'm doing with links.
I think it's a good thing to do in your real-life communities to build solidarity, tho it's great to do it here on DKos too!
Common Security Club project
Places to get taxes done for free or discounted (need a resource)
Entertainment
Most modern libraries have computers with internet connections for public use. In the days when I was extremely broke, my local library was the way I kept in touch with the world.
-Norbrook
Clothing
Goodwill (need a resource)
Vintage clothing (need a resource)
Transportation
General coping/life skills
Book: "The impoverished students' book of cookery, drinkery, & housekeepery."
-hideinplainsight
Hillbilly housewife: http://hillbillyhousewife.com/
-iconoclastic cat
European eating
They depend on the basics. Starches, vegetables, fruits (in season). Treats are occasional. For example, in France we had dessert only once a week at Sunday family dinner. Otherwise, a piece of fruit was 'dessert'.........
The proportions of meat and veg are reversed to how we do it in America. Lots of potatoes and vegetables and just a small portion of meat. And not meat or fish every day!
In a year in France I only saw butter on the lunch/dinner table for two dishes --- either with radishes or with blue cheese. To add butter to a pot of soup was an elegant luxury for special occasions. Margarine or peanut oil were used in cooking otherwise.
Sandwiches!! Cheese sandwiches! Frequently chosen for lunch.
A ham sandwich has one slice of ham.
Bread is filling and delicious.
Soups are filling, too. And economical.
Very little waste. Everything served is eaten up. Children learn from a young age not to waste food. In Holland if a kid takes too much on his plate the parents will make him or her finish it and feel uncomfortable......so next time a lesson has been learned.
What we eat for breakfast, some Europeans would eat for dinner and not feel deprived. Omlettes, for example. In Holland we had pancakes for dinner sometimes!
Soda, beer, junk food? For parties only.
Coffee? Sipped from demi-tasse cups rather than swigged by the mugful.
Lots of foods have great emotional impact...a WOW factor. For example, when strawberries come into season...friends will call to invite you over, saying, "We have STRAWBERRIES".........
-LNK
Special skills (contributors)
"I can't really contribute good recipes, but I can compile them into a nice little book people could print and bind on their own!"
-Elise
I know many recipes for outdoor cooking, many of which only require a Dutch Oven and the ingredients. I also have many traditional recipes that can easily be converted for the microwave. I'd be happy to contribute some of my knowledge, if anyone is interested.
-LynneK
I can help with recipes and buying tips.
I have a stand alone freezer that I think of as a pantry. I watch grocery store ad fliers every week and purchase when things are at the right price.
I buy chicken leg and thigh quarters when they are $.49 a pound or so. They require you to purchase 5# or more. That's a lot of chicken for a couple of dollars. I then break it down into portions for my family for one meal, package it and freeze. I only buy chicken breasts when they are buy on/get one free with the skin and bone. Then I break it down. I remove the bone. Then I remove the chicken tender. (They charge $5 for a package of tenders!) I package the portion I will need of the breast together and package 5 to 6 tenders together and freeze. I keep all the bones packaged together and when I have about 4# I make stock. Very easy. I do the same thing with fruits and many vegetables. When strawberries or blueberries are in season and really cheap I buy lots. I put them in an even layer on a big sheet pan and freeze separately. When frozen solid, I put them in a freezer bag. Then I can take out as much as I need.
-orchid