Homemade sandwich spread

Years ago, I ate a lot of Heinz sandwich spread- it was a good vegetarian option in a time when there was not a lot to choose from besides cheese. Being frugal as I was, I later switched to the generic brands when they developed their own version. Even though I wasn't vegetarian anymore, I still liked it, and still didn't eat meat on bread. Now I make my own, as they don't sell anything like this around these parts. The homemade version is obviously healthier, but I find it way more flavourful as well. As it's quite perishable compared to the store bought version, I don't make large batches at once. Or I only prepare the vegetables so I can mix in the remaining ingredients on the spot. This past week, I made a batch sandwich spread to have on baguette with lentil soup. There was some leftovers for the next day. When it comes to perishable foods, I'm always a bit anxious not to make too much as I'm so cautious about wasting anything. 

I always make it a bit different, depending on what's in season and what I have at home. This is how I made it: 

An onion, cut in half and sliced very thinly    Grated carrots, turnips and courgette              Some homemade sauerkraut                            Seasonings: salt, red pepper flakes, dried parsley, and garlic

Mayonnaise and double concentrated tomato paste 

Sautee the onion and then add the carrots, sautee this with the onion for about a minute, then add the seasonings, turnip, and courgette. Stirr well and cover your pot with a lid. The turnip and courgette will release liquid so don't add any liquid. After about 10 minutes, check the doneness and if it's tender but there's still some liquid, let it evaporate without the lid. Then allow to cool completely and when it's cooled down enough, add the mayonnaise and tomato paste. The tomato paste isn't essential, but it kind of duplicates the store bought version that I liked the most. Then add some well drained sauerkraut. You can add any other fermented or pickled vegetables, this is just what I had on hand. The fermented vegetables not only adds in some extra nutrients, it's also a flavour enhancer- there should be a bit of tangy flavour in this sandwich spread, in my opinion. 

Just use your creativity and remember to use what you have, rather than to run to the store for single items. No mayonnaise? No problem! Make your own, or use yogurt/cream cheese/even leftover bechamel sauce. Use any veggie you like. No fermented/pickled vegetables? Add in some lemon zest and juice, or vinegar etc. 

What did we eat past week

So this is my 2nd menu plan in retrospect, , just like last week in random order as I'm again not sure anymore about what we ate when. I'm planning on posting some recipes of the foods we had. 

• Couscous, 2x - once with baked chicken and once with lamb 

• Makarouna (Tunisian style pasta) 

• Vegetable stew with bread 

• Red lentil soup with bread and homemade sandwich spread 

• Another Tunisian dish: kafteji (grilled peppers and tomatoes with fried potatoes and egg) with homemade flatbread. We had this with takeaway bbq'ed chicken. 

• Bami goreng (Indonesian fried noodles) 

Did a bit less of batch cooking this week, which is quite unusual for us. But we did eat the leftovers for lunch. In fact, there's still leftovers which we'll have tonight to empty the fridge for tomorrow's grocery shopping. 

Package free grocery shopping: pros and cons

As I mentioned before, our groceries are partially purchased at a refill store. Meaning, they're package free. I'll try to elaborate a bit more on this way of shopping in this post. Depending on which store we'll shop at, they have shelf stable goods in huge baskets or more tidy containers. From what I've noticed, the tidier the containers and the shops, the more expensive they are. Usually it's not self service, but an employee will measure/weigh the goods. You could bring your own container,  but usually they put it in a baggie, similar to a sandwich baggie. It's then labelled with the product/price on it. 

What kind of foods do we buy there? Legumes, some grains (such as whole wheat flour, sorghum flour, and oats), spices, nuts and seeds, cocoa powder, cornstarch, as well as some "candy". Traditional healthy treats such as frankincense (this is like natural chewing gum), corn for making popcorn, and carob. This obviously doesn't cover all our needs from the store, and there's certainly items that we don't buy there. If it were me, I'd buy everything there, but unfortunately not everything is available at the refill store. I really hope these stores will expand their assortment one day and that about everything would be available there. 

Its obvious that this kind of shopping does reduce the amount of plastic going into the landfill, which is the foremost reason why we shop like this. Seeing nature sites getting more and more cluttered with rubbish is so heartbreaking. It's frustrating when you realise that the world's plastic pollution is not inevitable, if people would just put a little more effort in how they shop. Other than environmental reasons, which are obvious, what I especially like about these kind of shops is the simplicity! You've probably seen pictures (if not in real life) of colourful markets with heaps of different coloured spices. Well, apart from the fact that it's not just spices there, it still looks quite similar. The more modern refill stores will sell their goods in a bit more neat containers, which has a bit more of the aesthetic look. It's both very simplistic in their own way. I also really appreciate that this way we're cutting back on our plastic use. Living in a country where there's a garbage problem in some areas, it's clear how much plastic is being wasted. I cringe at every disposable plastic item that I can easily avoid using. Yes, they do use sandwich baggies in those shops, but I make sure to simply reuse those. So that's not too big of an issue (to me), and otherwise I can still bring my own containers. Another benefit of these shops is that they're usually just so much cheaper! Just to compare; oats are about double the price here if you'd buy them in the supermarket. And at the refill store, they already are quite expensive. You'll get the exact same product, which means you're paying all that money just for a cardboard box. Not even a firm reusable box with a lid or something. That's just throwing money into the trash, in my opinion. What I also like is that with package free shopping, you're not dependent on the package sizes that you find in the supermarket. When you have a small household or only want to buy a certain (small) amount for whatever reason, this is possible- you can buy just however much you want (this is the case where we buy our goods anyhow). This is a good way to avoid wasting foods. 

Of course, as with everything, there are cons - or others may consider them to be cons, anyhow. I only see benefits in shopping this way but I'd thought of including them anyway. Since it's package free, there's obviously no "use by" date. To me, that's no issue at all - I think that putting dates on shelf stable foods is just a way to encourage wasting foods. If it looks and smells good, I'll just eat it.                                                            With foods not being "properly" packed, you do need suitable containers. Yes, this may cost a bit initially, but it doesn't necessarily mean very trendy and expensive ones with the "zero waste aesthetics", you can just buy the cheapest plastic containers you can find, or simply reuse food containers. With smaller kitchens, this does take up a bit more space at times, but I'm willing to sacrifice that space (I have no idea what else to store in my cupboards anyway). We have a lot of smaller buckets, I think they're 5L buckets, not completely sure - there fits about 3.5 kg of flour in a bucket. I also have smaller containers for the foods that we don't buy in bigger quantities, such as sorghum flour. Yes, this does take up space but I don't think it takes up much more space than stocking the average pantry with packaged items. The reason why we need a lot of space is due to the fact that we're buying in bulk, not so because of the lack of packaging. As long as you're using suitable containers, it's not that much of a space they're occupying. 

All in all I like the way we shop- the way people have been doing this before supermarkets were there. You may find it too costly, which unfortunately is the case in some countries, unfortunately, and I can totally understand that especially in these times, people look at the prices solely. Some may find it too time consuming, which I can understand too. I'm privileged with a refill store in our street, even though we usually go to another one in a different neighbourhood, but it's still very accessible.

Still, despite people's general reluctance of returning to the old ways of shopping, I am very enthusiastic about it. It just may take some planning and making shopping lists and investing in containers. 

How and why we (don't) meal plan

Confession: I must be the most terrible housewife/mum out there, or even the most terrible cook, because I don't meal plan. Yep, there I said it. Well, saying I don't meal plan at all isn't correct technically, but meal planning in the traditional sense doesn't happen at our house. We don't sit down at the table with a piece of paper and pencil (or anything screen, but I'm more into old fashioned ways) and write down what we're going to be eating that week, and then buy every item that's on the list. Here's some whys as to why we don't: 

First of all, we're living with/very close to my in laws. While we don't live in the exact same house, we basically live in my MIL's backyard, which is great as it enables us to take care of her. The thing is, as with most Mediterranean/African/Arabic countries, people are generally so spontaneous and planning in general usually doesn't really work. Even when it comes to appointments, it's better to expect that people won't probably be on time. If they are on time, that's a plus, but should not really be an expectation. Anyway, since my MIL doesn't/can't cook anymore, we usually bring her supper, but the thing is that relatives and neighbours might just pop in unexpectedly and bring food with them for her. Every single time I did try to plan somewhat in advance, that's what happened. Of course, I don't blame them at all, they're sincerely doing something good, but if your plan messes up it's sometimes a bit frustrating. Of course, at times I didn't plan anything at all, no one showed up to unexpectedly bring her food 😉

Secondly, since our way of shopping is a bit different (which I did a post about), we can't plan before we do our shopping. We just buy what's being sold and is most affordable at the market. For example, some weeks parsley is very cheap, whereas the next week it's five times as expensive, so it wouldn't make sense to make a lot of parsley based dishes then. So generally we buy what's available and it's always a bit different. This week, we had a LOT of aubergine, which is defenitely going to be on our plates quite a few times. And so instead of buying what's on the menu, I just make do with whatever's available at the market. We just estimate what we'll be using that particular week. And when there's still veg leftover, that's what will be used first the next week. Etc. I love that it makes me more creative that way. If I'd have to sit down an write a week worth of meals in advance, it's probably going to be a boring menu. When I'm forced to cook with whatever we have in the house and to come up with ideas instantly, my creativity thrives. 

I deal with chronic pain issues, and I never know when I have a good day or a bad day. Usually I have a few bad days in a row followed by a few good days, but it's not quite predictable. When I don't feel well, I do still cook, albeit simpler meals that don't involve a lot of standing. This is also one of the reasons why I batch cook. 

This might be a bit weird, but we never know what we'll crave when. If I, say, am supposed to make a pasta dish on a particular day when we crave rice, I don't see the need to still go for the pasta just because it was written on a list and therefore can't be changed. Others might call it stubborn, but for me it's just common sense. 

It's interesting how meal planning is always mentioned as *the* way to avoid food waste. That you're very wasteful when you don't meal plan as you're essentially heading without any direction and you'll just buy perishable foods recklessly and that way, waste tons of foods. But here I am, practically not wasting any food AND not meal planning. Yes, that is possible. Saying that meal planning avoids wasted food is a bold statement, in my opinion. In fact, I believe it can even be the other way around: if you're sticking to a particular meal planned for that day, you might neglect other produce that's about to go bad. Avoiding food waste is actually a very reason why I cannot really meal plan; I might have to rescue certain items from the fridge on some days or finish leftovers (sometimes there's enough leftovers for all of us). Yes, even if we crave something else- avoiding waste comes first at our house. 

I can't recall my grandmother or even other women from their generation ever had a menu plan. And especially my oldest grandmother, who was born in 1910, would never ever throw away any foods. So it's quite a new phenomenon actually. Which isn't bad in and of itself, although I do value a lot of the old fashioned skills and way of living people had. 

We do kind of vary by rotating dishes that we like. The meals are usually centred around the starch. Not around the meat, as we eat more vegetarian meals than meat based meals. So for example, one day it's pasta, the other day it's bread or couscous. Today, we had a vegetable stew with freshly homemade bread. Since I batch cook, we usually have the same meals every other day. Probably it's a bit less varied than most people would do, but this is what we like and it saves time, cooking fuel and energy. I might do a different side dish with the meals so that it makes it still a bit varied. For example, yesterday we had pasta, with a salad on the side. The next time we'll probably have the pasta with a different side, such as stir fried vegetables. The days that I'm not cooking (or just making a quick side) I can focus on other household tasks a bit more, such as keeping up with folding the laundry, cleaning the bathroom/kitchen/floors, etc. 

Bread pudding

Yesterday, I desperately needed some room in the freezer. There were to large bags of pieces stale bread and I thought it was a good idea to make a bread pudding. I hadn't made one in a while and I know how much my husband and children love it. In addition to having so much stale bread, there were other foods that wanted to use up: some raisins, some leftover sweetened condensed milk that I made a while ago, and a small container of applesauce. This all goes very well in a bread pudding. When I make one, I don't really stick strictly to a recipe but just use what I have on hand. It would be a bit ironic to be sticking to a specific recipe with dishes that were actually invented to get rid of leftovers, wouldn't it? Anyway, this is how I made it: 

Leftover bread - not sure how much exactly, but it was a big bag of pieces stale bread, both baguette and round bread. I cut this in smaller pieces and put them in a large bowl (similar to a washing up bowl). In a smaller bowl, I mixed 3 eggs with about 2 cups of sweetened condensed milk, 3 heaped spoons of melted butter, 2 tablespoons of applesauce, and three more cups of liquid (a mixture of milk and water). I also added about a teaspoon of ground cinnamon. This mixture was then added to the bread chunks and mixed with a wooden spoon. If there's some dry bread, add some extra liquid. Then I greased a big baking dish and spreaded half of the bread mixture on it, some raisins and then added the remaining mixture (flatten it with a spoon). I then sprinkled the bread mixture with cinnamon sugar. 

I baked this for 75 minutes, the first 30 minutes on 220° c (428° f), then the remaining 45 minutes on 200° c (392° f). Then after about 10 minutes, let the bread pudding cool down outside the oven. When it was a bit warm I put it back in the oven and just let it sit there until this morning. You can reheat it a bit, but I didn't really find that necessary so we just had it cold. 

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. 

What did we eat past week

So I'm trying to do this "what we ate past week" every Monday from now on. Meal planning beforehand clearly doesn't work for us, at least in the traditional sense (this is something I'll try to elaborate on in a future post). But I'd still like to share what we ate so sharing our "meal plan" in retrospect would work best for me that way.  I'm not completely sure anymore what we ate when, so it's a bit in a random order. 

• Steamed vermicelli with onion and chicken (among other ingredients), 2x 

• Refried beans with homemade mlawi flatbread and fried aubergine

 • Tunisian fricassé (sandwiches) with french fries 

• Couscous, 2x 

• Leftovers (soup, among others) 

By "2x", I mean I batch cooked and we had the same meal twice. Usually we don't eat the same thing two days in a row, but every other day. And of course, we had more than one meal a day- I'm mainly focusing on the main meal here, not necessarily breakfast and lunch. Breakfast, although I try to vary a bit, is still a bit more repetitive and well..  just a bit "breakfasty" I guess. And for lunch we usually have leftovers or sandwiches, if we eat lunch at all (my husband and youngest aren't very big on eating lunch). 

Our cat

Where we live there are a lot of stray cats. Our cat is a former stray cat too, and there's just something special about giving a strat cat a home. We never looked for a cat, but he was suddenly just here. Initially, he was quite timid, only coming at the door for food, which is what he got. Then he slowly allowed us to pet him, and dared to come inside the house. He's still pretty much an outdoor cat- he always sleeps outside, and during the day most of his time is spent outdoors too. He might come in the morning and spend a good three hours of sleeping on his blanket, then go outside and come back in the afternoon for some sleep again. When it's rainy or stormy, he's inside the house more, but he'll always spend the night outdoors. We have an area in the back yard that's covered and there's some furniture on which he sleeps, during the winter we have a blanket on one of the chairs for him. There's also a heap of straw in the garden (don't ask me how that's gotten there), on which he loves to sleep. 

Unfortunately, he fights a lot and I can't really recall a time when he didn't have a wound of some sort. They always seem to heal quickly. Once he had one of his nails ripped off completely- it really looked scary. His paw was blue ish and he couldn't walk, let alone run. But even that, he recovered from. Probably he will not change when it comes to fighting. It's interesting how stray cats can be so different from cats that have been indoors from the beginning, although I'm wondering if it's just because of being a stray cat. It could also just be his character. Anyway, he's certainly quite wild, that's for sure. 

When it comes to food, it's fun to find out what he likes. Cat can have some really weird preferences! Most of his preferences I found out because of being caught on the counter. Chicken and fish are obvious ones, so I never leave that there (unless it's covered). But to my surprise, he absolutely loves legumes! All sorts, but broad beans are his favourite. And then chickpeas. I also caught him once sipping in a pot with aquafaba (chickpea brine). I do try to teach him not to jump on the counter, which he does when I'm in his sight, but he still tries to. Fortunately our kitchen is not an open-plan kitchen and separated from the living room so I can close the door, when necessary. The thing is that they don't really sell cat food here, so we need to get creative and make our own cat foods. For the most part, he just finishes leftovers- he LOVES pasta for example. This is supplemented with fish and chicken and some harder stuff to chew on, such as dried bread chunks. The other day I found cat food in the supermarket, which apparently was something new there, but it turned out to be a very small bag for a ridiculous price. I'd rather buy 5 KG sardines for him for that same price. We also get free fish heads from the fish vendor. The vendor knows my husband as we usually buy our fish there. As loyal customers, he usually saves the fish heads for us, which we get for free, as well as nearly expired fish that he sells for a small price. I honestly think this way of eating is much healthier for a cat than all that store bought cat "foods". His fur is amazingly soft and usually you can tell how good a cat's diet is by the softness of the fur. 

What I find quite annoying, though, is that he seems to refuse to eat out of a bowl. He always wants to eat directly from the ground. Especially when he has fish, it's such a mess! That's probably another difference between "real" house cats and (former) stray cats. He was used to eating on the streets and not from a bowl/plate. Same with drinking, he exclusively drinks from a bucket, not from a bowl. It's quite funny how cats have a these "weird" traits and you'll be annoyed by them yet at the same time you love them so much. I am annoyed by the fishy kitchen floor and then wipe the floor clean after him with so much love. 

But overall it's just an amazing experience to be cat owners. We feel very blessed that he chose our home and we're so grateful to give him a home he deserves. Even though the stray cat part will always be present in him somewhat, that's ok. He's just so affectionate and sweet overall. Having grown up with cats, it's kind of funny how I sometimes compare it to previous cats my parents had, and how every cat is so unique. I loved being around cats growing up and I love for my children that they have the same experience. 

Some reasons for being frugal

I read a article the other day on why people choose to live a frugal lifestyle and I found the perspective interesting, although I didn't really agree with it- it claimed that being frugal is usually done out of necessity, which is why being frugal is not so sustainable long term, as it might make people feel deprived. 

Feeling deprived is defenitely something that can happen when you're making a lifestyle switch cold turkey, especially when you simply have no other option. So I get that. Where I don't agree is claiming that necessity is the only reason to be frugal. It's almost saying as if being frugal is somewhat pathetic. I am pretty sure that most frugal people are frugal out of choice. It's also interesting that poor people are often the least frugal people out there- despite being frugal would help them a lot to struggle a bit  less. As someone experienced both periods of poverty as well as more comfortable stages financially, I can tell that being frugal absolutely helps when you're in dire need, but it also helps when you don't absolutely need to. It all depends on the reasons why you're being frugal in the first place. 

The environment is not the first reason people think about when it comes to frugality, but for us this is one of the biggest reasons. Not only was I brought up to value green living, but being religious we believe that we need to take good care of the creation. We are not allowed to misuse resources and pollute the earth even more. Especially when we're facing crises like these days, this should be even a bigger argument to be very frugal. Yes, of course money plays a role too. As I mentioned, having experienced relative poverty, I know what's it like to have to pinch pennies. Even though I don't *have* to anymore, I think having gone through a more lean period can change people for good, I'll never take having a good material life for granted anymore. That being said, our income is fluctuating so it's always good to have money to spare for periods when money is more tight. 

Some people will be surprised by this, but I just really, really like being frugal. I probably have the same excitement over having found a way to reuse a certain item or a way to cut down on electricity use that others would have after going on a shopping trip. This is why I never will become "normal" when it comes to spending money, throwing out stuff etc. But what even is normal? 100 years ago, frugality was the norm, whereas unfortunately these days, overconsumption and tossing away perfectly functioning stuff is considered normal. It's sad. I'd rather be the weird one than being wasteful. And I'm convinced that us frugal people will eventually prove the consumerism wrong. It probably has to take a few more crises until that happens. 

I also find it very important to set a good example for the next generation, particularly my own children. It's funny to see them coming with random items they're about to throw away and asking me first if I'd want to keep it. It's also cool to see them making their own decorations for their rooms, rather than buying. Yes, they do have store bought decorations, don't worry- but I guess they just know the value of reusing stuff just too well. Most things they make are real pretty though. My oldest is becoming more into fashion and clothes and she rather buys them second hand. Our second hand market for clothes here is huge and she's always so excited when she found clothes that matches her size and taste perfectly! 

Also, as much as we value frugality, we probably value slow and simple living even more. Even if it might cost a bit more in some cases. Having turned my back to the consumerism culture feels just so liberating. Trying to meet al the standards that most western societies set is like having your mind turned on 24/7, and I'm glad I refuse to take part in that rat race. Slow living and frugality usually go hand in hand though, they seldom contradict each other. You refuse to buy the newest trends just because they're the newest trends, you don't feel the need to buy that "necessary" new kitchen appliances that promise you to make your life even more easy- for busy people, that is. You don't have to upgrade your house a the time. You don't feel like you need to meet all the expectations of keeping up with the Jones's. Here in Tunisia, especially in the more impoverished areas (like where we live), there is no such thing as "keeping up with the Jones's" anyway, because very few people can afford to be like the Jones's. So that's an easy one. That can be one's definition of frugality, but for us, it's not just frugality, but also more simplifying our life.

As I mentioned before, being frugal and "simple" can make you being the weird one often. For a long time that bothered me a bit, because why would people be so judgy? I now know that that's just the way most people are- afraid of the unknown. I now try to do my best to set an example in the hope that I can inspire others to live a (little) bit more sustainable/frugal/simple, because I truly believe that's also in their best interest. Also, when you're trying to set an example, that leads to more accountability. Which is a good thing for my own conscience. 

Saving for a rainy day- without having social security or a pension to look forward to, I think it's defenitely important for us to live frugally right now as we basically have to save up for our own pension (if it's decreed for us to reach that age anyhow). Or just unexpectedly high expenses. This feels different for us than to be frugal out of necessity. Some people might say it's similar, but since we don't actually need it right now to survive, it's still a bit different. 

So- that were our reasons to be frugal. Yours might be different, and that's ok. 

Reheating foods without a microwave

Apparently it's surprising to some people that we don't own a microwave. People have become so accustomed to using appliances for about everything that we kind of forgot how to do things in a more simple/old fashioned way and even think it's impossible unless you have a device doing it for you. We did have a microwave in the past, but haven't owned one in over 14 years. When my sister's oven died, we gave our oven to her, which was a small microwave/oven combo (we had a stove with bigger oven, so never really used the oven part of the microwave). That's when I realized that a microwave wasn't a necessity for us. Apparently, this is quite a controversial topic. Probably because the reason why some people refuse to use a microwave isn't exactly evidence based and people tend to link that to conspiracy theories. I can understand that, which is why I firstly wanted to make clear the reason behind not owning one. And I don't judge people for being into "conspiracy theories" or believe certain things that aren't considered evidence based; I just wanted to make clear our reasons behind this. Which is quite simply just not seeing the need to own one. 

Isn't it interesting that one day you're convinced that you actually need a certain thing, only to find out you can easily do without after it's gone- the opposite way would be a lot easier. What's also interesting is that people here generally don't have microwaves either. They do sell them obviously, although there aren't quite a lot of different types. The combo things like we once had aren't even being sold as far as I know, so it's just individual microwaves. I actually know only one person that owns a microwave and she doesn't really use it a lot. People generally were just brought up reheating foods the old fashioned way and probably don't feel the need to buy something that does it for them. Which also plays a role is that they don't sell foods here that need to be microwaved- there's not a lot of convenience foods, and certainly no "TV dinners" kind of foods. So what do you do with a microwave then, after all. 

Anyway, here are some tips on reheating foods without a microwave. It seems like people would like to live without one, but aren't sure how, so I'll share some practical experience that I've gained throughout the years. 

• Soups, stews and other liquid foods are a no brainer to me, but I'm including them anyway. All you need is a saucepan of some sort. I'll be honest, I sometimes use an old frying pan, to make reheating quicker (the narrower the pan, the longer it takes to heat). 

• Pasta dishes: I reheat this in a frying pan on very low heat, stirring occasionally. I do this too with rice, although with rice I prefer to add a few spoons of liquid. Then just heat until the liquid has evaporated. With mashed potatoes this works as well. 

• Couscous: just the same way as it's being prepared- by steaming. This doesn't necessarily have to be a steaming pan, you can also use a meat sieve or colander. I'm not sure how it will turn out when using instant couscous as I've never used that. This will work for plain rice too. 

• All kids of foods that have been fried up previously, such as baked potatoes, fish, eggs, chicken, vegetables etc. Eggs are probably not the first food you think about when it comes to leftovers but I thought I'd include it anyway, 'cause you never know. These you can all re-fry again, on a low temperature and flipping regularly. 

• Food that's already on a plate is a little bit more complicated to reheat. Just a little bit. I have two methods: either to heat it up with the water bath kind of method, when you have a plate on a hot saucepan and let it simmer for as long as needed, usually not longer than 10 minutes and then letting it sit there for another 10 minutes or so (be careful when you take off the plate!). This works best with soup plates. My other method is to use my cast iron pan which I use to bake bread on the stove. I heat up this pan until it's very hot and then put the plate of food on it. If the plate isn't too big, I put another pan on top of it and cover that with something hot. I nearly always have hot pans on my stove, so when I just made something that needs to rest I'll use that. Sometimes I put a small saucepan on the lid of a bigger pan (they're metal lids, for safety reasons I wouldn't try this with glass lids). Another wat of water Bart heating is to put glass jars in a pot with water and let it reheat slowly. It's important to use cold water and let it heat up slowly as it could break the jars otherwise. This is especially handy when you have multiple small leftovers and you don't want to use so many pans. I use my glass jars a lot to store leftovers anyway, so this way I am saving a lot of extra dishes to wash. 

• Pancakes, breads, waffles etc. can be heated (and thereby, revived) easily in a frying pan, but I use my cast iron pan that is specially designed for making bread. We usually have either homemade flatbreads (north African style, which is kind of similar to pita bread), or baguettes that we buy at the local bakery. Especially the baguettes become stale quite quickly, and by reheating them they taste almost freshly baked again. It's also a way to defrost bread- just make sure the flame is set very low and that the bread is being flipped regularly. 

• Another kind of using residue heat is to use the oven. I have a toaster oven (albeit bigger, but it's an individual oven not attached to the hob), and especially when baking something that has a long baking time it can get quite hot on top. So I might use that every now and then to reheat foods on, by simply putting the plate there. Or just to keep foods warm. I also like to use it to dehydrate certain foods, but that's for another time. Another way to keep foods warm is to put pans on top of each other. This works well when pans can fit on top of each other, which isn't always the case, but when they do it's quite a handy way to keep foods warm until it's time to eat. This was done a lot in the 1950s, and apparently it was even propagated to do by the Dutch government, to encourage people to use less cooking fuel. 

• Steaming can be used not only for couscous but for so many other foods. I know my father in law sometimes steams his bread when it has become stale. And my grandmother reheated poffertjes (tiny Dutch pancakes) this way- she didn't have a "real" steaming pan but just used the metal colander which I mentioned earlier. This, she called "the poor man's microwave". 

• This is where I cheat a bit: I sometimes use my air fryer. I especially do this with small things as ours isn't that big. I reheat my baked oatmeal for example, although it's not limited to that. Other foods I can think about that I use my air fryer for are donuts, muffins (either savory or sweet), etc. To be honest, if it were me I wouldn't have purchased the air fryer, but we were gifted one. I do find them convenient at times though. If I wouldn't have an air fryer, I would probably have reheated the baked oatmeal/donuts by steaming. 

• Of course, you can also use an oven to reheat foods. I don't really do that, as it's very energy inefficient in my opinion. Even though our oven isn't as big as most other ovens, it still takes a lot of energy to heat up. With casseroles, this is probably the best and only solution (although, if using a round oven dish, I'm sure my previously mentioned method of the cast iron pan, will work just as fine). We don't eat a lot of casseroles and if we do, we usually don't have a lot of leftovers. But all in all the oven is the last option for me. This reminds me of when we had blackout of our gas and my mother in law wanted to reheat her tea. She ended up using our oven! She couldn't use hers, as she has a gas oven.i found it a bit weird honestly, but it did work. 

•The sun: since we live in a generally warm country, with plenty of sun, using sun warmth is obviously the most sustainable option of all! I might forget to take out a baguette from the freezer or something and just lay it outside in the sun. This works very good. I can't put everything there because of the cats in our garden, but defrosting bread isn't something that you can't do with the cats. When the heat is very intense during the summer, this should be possible with any food, although I must admit I haven't tried it a lot. 

• Heaters: I grew up in a home with a wood heater. There was a flat surface on top of the heater which was very useful to heat up foods, which my parents sometimes did. It will also work with most radiators. The heater we use right now isn't suitable to put things on, unfortunately, but when we did have radiators we used that to heat up foods. Just make sure you don't put that heater on for the sole purpose of reheating foods- in that case, you can even better use an oven. 😉

• Apparently, you can even use the dishwasher to reheat (or even cook!) foods. Since I don't own a dishwasher (and am not planning on getting one) I'm not sure how, and if, this works. I just read that others do this. If it does work and you're running a load of dishes anyway, why not? Probably most people find it gross, but with all the water inside the machine, I'm assuming that the food is covered properly anyway, so I don't see a problem there. But again, I can't attest to the correctness of this. 

So these were a few of the things I do. Kindly note that I'm not claiming these are the most healthy or safest ways- I'm simply sharing what works for us. What I'm sharing probably goes somewhat against most official guidelines. But then again, I personally don't really care about most rules and I guess I have my own kinds of guidelines. I mean, some things are obviously common sense, but I personally don't agree with the caution against reheating rice, just to give an example. That's going overboard with food safety concerns and I just think it leads to so much wasted foods. But, if it's a concern to you, just know that this is not necessarily meant as an encouragement to go against official guidelines. My intention is simply to share some of the things that works for us. 

Line drying laundry while aiming for a zero waste lifestyle

Ask the average homemaker what his/her least favourite chore is, and the answer is usually somewhat predictable: dishes and laundry. I'm not an exception, when it comes to dishes especially. As for laundry, I don't mind it that much, as far as sorting/"washing"/hanging to dry/taking it off the clothesline (yes, those quotations are there on purpose, as it's the machine that does the washing for me). Folding and putting away, however, is a bit different. I don't know why, but for some reason I just have a hard time with that, and I just keep procrastinating until there's quite a big mountain of laundry waiting on the sofa. Things need to get done anyway, whether it's a small load a time or a very big time consuming one. Rationally thinking, it would be much more easy to put the laundry right away when it comes off the line, but unfortunately for some reason, it doesn't always work like that. It probably also has to do with the fact that it's usually dry by the end of the day, especially during the colder months, and that's when I'm just tired with a hurting back and not willing to do a lot of things around the house. That's probably a big "why" to my procrastinating. I still try to live by the rule "do what's most important first, and do what's most fun last". That mindset really helps a lot honestly, so it already has improved. 

Things get a bit complicated when you try to live zero waste/environmentally conscious and, as a consequence of that, have a lot of reusable items. If you're really struggling to keep up with putting away the laundry, why on earth would you be adding all those extras to that?! I honestly just can't use all those disposables anymore. I cringe by the thought of it alone. My no. 1 reason for the reusables is the environment obviously, although health and money play a big role too. It would be fun to calculate the costs I've saved already by using reusables instead of disposables, I've probably saved already thousands of euros by now (I've been doing this for nearly ten years). Knowing that I'm saving that much money, of course is a big motivation to keep doing this. I mean, as for the environment, you don't quite see a result, except if everyone is doing it, but when it comes to money, you do see results. Still, despite the overconsumption and overly plasticky world we live in, I still keep in doing this for environmental reasons, and perhaps convincing others to do the same. If I look at how the zero waste movement once was non existent and now has a lot of followers/enthusiasts... I think it CAN be possible as individuals to make a difference. 

Ok, back to the laundry now... The annoying thing is that there's different kinds of reusables, so I need to sort them, which can be a tedious task. I do have developed a kind of system to sort them before washing, but after line drying, everything gets piled up in the same basket. I do try a bit to colour coordinate different kind of wipes, to make sorting out easier. I also stopped folding most of the wipes - it's actually ridiculous when I think about how I folded all those wipes! Perhaps it's one of the reasons I actually developed an aversion to this. So now I just dump them into boxes/baskets that I use for storing all these reusable wipes (with the exception of the cloth pads, which are stored a bit more tidy). It probably doesn't look as neat, but it saves me a lot of work- and above all, procastinating. And as I mentioned before: I try to live by the rule to do first what's most necessary and to do the most fun parts last. This means I'll try to put away all the small things first. These things combined really helped me to stay on top of all my reusables somewhat. Yes, somewhat, as there's lot of room for improvement, but still it's better than before.  Fortunately I don't mind hanging all those tiny cloths... It would be an absolute nightmare if I'd have an aversion to having to do that! I've become a pro in hanging them as quickly as possible, but still takes a bit longer than the average load. Oh well, just free exercise! 

I'm the kind of person that wants to do it either perfect or doesn't do it at all. Zero waste living can defenitely be a bit more work, but if you plan and organize it makes a real difference. You just have to give up perfectionism. That can be a challenge in and of itself, but seeing the results can be so rewarding. You're both saving the environment and money AND you're seeing improvement from within yourself.