It took our government quit sometime to officially announce that the country was in fact not in a recession any longer but rather a depression. It took this realization for the people (some) to think about how they were going to fair in this economy. For us we had to tighten up even more, especially with working for ourselves. It was time to put holidays on hold, buying frivolous things that we really do not need (that new purse I would really like), staying in more often, bringing lunch to work, trying not to spend $5.00 a day on coffee (we got a french press for the office and bring in coffee/cream) and overall, just tightening up and buying only what we really need to survive and/or for work.
I have been reading in all the food magazines for the past couple of months about these budget dinners and decided last week that I would put our grocery shopping and cooking skills to the test this week by creating the Chez Us Recession/Depression Dinners. The criteria in the about mentioned articles was that it would be for 7 nights and would include a dessert that would last a week, as well, the menus would make at least 4 servings.
We knew that we did not want to skimp on quality as well we wanted to continue eating as we have been for the past few years. This meant we would continue shopping at Whole Foods, yes, you can eat well and stay on a budget by shopping there; it is not as expensive as everyone thinks (that will be another post sometime). I originally wanted to include the farmer’s market in this challenge but did not make it there on Saturday so all of the shopping would be done at Whole Foods. I planned out our menu for the entire week, 7 dinners, 5 lunches (leftovers from the night before) and 1 dessert to last the week. I would bring down the weekly shopping from $120 – $200 (usually on the low end unless we have company over for dinner, or it is time to stock up on staples we are out of) to $100 for the recession/depression dinner series. For this first week I would purchase everything I needed for each recipe and not use what is on hand. Included in this list would also be the usual weekly items, a gallon of milk (yes, organic), breakfast (yogurt), fruit (seasonal fruits and bananas (Lenny loves them in yogurt) and fresh ground espresso.
For dinner tonight I used half of the chicken (I had the butcher butterfly it) and I froze the other half. We picked a couple recipes from the Barefoot in Paris cookbook , the Lemon Roasted Chicken with croutons and a celery root salad. We LOVE French food and we really love this chicken recipe. It is so easy! You stuff this chicken with lemons, give it a rub down with olive oil, salt and pepper and then lay it on a bed of onions and roast it! While it is roasting to a golden brown, you make some croutons out of a baguette. When the chicken is done cooking you are left with a golden brown chick and a roast pan full of lemony juices. I like to lift the chicken out of the baking pan and put the croutons ontop of the juices and then lay the bird back on top.
The celery root is very simply tossed with a dressing of mayo, mustard, lemon juice and white wine vinegar. It is so refreshing and light, really complimented the chicken and the lemony croutons.
Dessert will be announced on Tuesday
– it is good!
$ 12.74 for 4 servings. Dinner and lunch for the next day.
What are you doing in your home &/or lives to help ease this economic downfall?
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