Use what you buy

There's this phrase "buy what you use, use what you buy". And I think that's one of my main "rules" when it comes to cooking and grocery shopping. Many people have a somewhat weird way to do groceries- they supplement their supermarket hauls by a few ingredients that they found in the cupboard, when it should be the other way around, in my opinion. This makes people just so dependent on grocery stores and takes away all the creativity. Creativity is one of the most undervalued yet important skills any home cook should have, and frugal cooks in particular. Frugal cooking is inherently important, as we're all faced with fluctuating prices, off season produce, or just very expensive items in general. Or even food shortages (which we're having to deal with for the past few years). Even though we have a corner shop right in front of our house, I still try not to go there for every single item. I must admit that I have quite a large stockpile of various foods, but if I want to use something that isn't at the house, I try to find a solution before I run across the street. 

Using what you buy usually means coming up with certain alternatives, or simply making do without. It might seem a bit intimidating at first, but using replacement is easier than one thinks. Since I've been doing this for so long, it doesn't really feel like I'm using "an alternative" anymore (I did a post on cheaper ingredient/alternatives, in which I offer a few suggestions, but ofcourse it's not limited to that list if you use your creativity.) Doing without is also something I'm big on - some ingredients I just refuse to buy as they're outrageously expensive. I refuse to buy mushrooms, for example: they cost about 4 euros a kg, which is very expensive here, and they're only sold in small packets of 250 grams. Add to that that I've also heard that they aren't tasty at all when you're used to western European mushrooms. So I just do without. It's quite funny how you're getting used to not using certain ingredients anymore- in the past, I used them a lot, whereas now I can't really think of a recipe in which mushrooms are irreplaceable (except for mushroom soup, maybe?). A year ago or so a relative brought some tinned mushrooms, and to be honest, apart from one tin, they're still sitting in the cupboard... Now honestly, tinned mushrooms are less tasty than fresh ones, but it's more because of the fact that we're just used to doing without. Another example is minced beef: that's just so expensive here and while we sometimes do buy red meat (lamb or goat), mince I just found too expensive and not quite worth it. If I'm making meatballs or mixing in some mince in the pasta, it's not noticeable at all if you replace it by a cheaper kind of meat. This eid ul fitr, however, my kids requested me to make lasagna, specifically with minced beef. So it was the first time in 5 years (!) that we bought half a kg of mince. Was it good? Absolutely! But I still don't find it worth it to buy that often, for that price. Very recently, I've heard that apparently they want to raise the price of lamb and beef to 20 euro per kg, which is just very ridiculously high. It probably all comes down to what's important for you. For us, meat isn't on top of our list, but I can see that for other people it is. If we'd eat meat every day, we'd probably be in debt, and I'd rather spend my money on more important things. So far the "buy what you use" part. 

As for "use what you buy", this can be a bit tricky, and this is the very reason that I'm not very fond of recipe books by most famous chefs. People want to try out specific recipes (not even knowing whether they're going to like them or not), that require specific ingredients that they otherwise would never use. Of course, from that bought ingredient only a small amount is being used. What I don't understand is how those famous chefs, with all their culinary knowledge, don't even consider mentioning decent replacements of those recipes. That would surely avoid so much wasted money and wasted food. This is something I refuse to do. I won't buy specific ingredients that otherwise wouldn't be used. Instead, I'll look for replacements, or reconsider making that specific dish altogether. This is how I make sure to "use what I buy". I can't recall how often others gave me half used packages of spices, grains etc "because that's what the recipe called for and I don't know what else to use them for". Yes, I'm well known as someone who can use up little bits of this and that because she hates wasting foods. 😉I even got a big bag of soy flour from a friend once, which I made lovely pakoras with, among other things. I think being able to think in solutions when it comes to ingredients is not something everyone can do easily, so I won't judge people who can't do this, but I guess that's also why my blog is here. It's not impossible to learn these skills. 

I know people will say, 'it's just one bag of thrown away food', or just a few cents/euros being wasted... While I think it's very important to avoid waste altogether, I think it's not always about the waste in and of itself. It's also about knowing what you do when a calamity occurs: when you don't have as much resources (which can happen all of a sudden), what to do when prices skyrocket/when there are shortages. There can be all sorts of crises in which you need your creativity. As I mentioned, we do have to deal with shortages, which honestly is much more difficult than one would expect. In such a situation, I feel so privileged to be able to come up with solutions to problems which shouldn't be problems if the food system wouldn't be so corrupt.