Will Kids Eat It?

With a little effort, anyone can make healthy meals on a budget. But the real success (or downfall) of feeding the family lies in the snacks. What's that you say, "Why do you need snacks if you are feeding the younglings three square meals?" Ah, my fine feathered friend, welcome to the land of the little people. They live on snacks.

If you add up all the food consumed between meals, those little growing bodies really eat about five meals a day. And there's not an ounce of fat on any of them (except JoJo--he's still got that cute baby fat). Between growing like weeds and running all over the neighborhood and the forest behind the house, they consume it all. When the Olympic commentators informed us that gold medalist Michael Phelps consumed 12,000 calories per day without gaining weight, we were not surprised: it happens here every day--no swimming pool needed.

Let's face it: snacks are mostly junk. So this is where the big challenge lies. Step one: (almost) no candy. We ration the candy intake using an arguably sensible rule: candy is a treat, not a food. In its place, the daily staple snack is a piece of fruit. Bananas are a favorite. Apples are popular too. Add raisins, oranges, and the occasional pomegranate, and you've got the basis for sustainable snackdom.


The bread family contributes to the snack party too. Crackers, home-made whole wheat bread, and cookies add to the party. And of course, ice cream. Yes, the real thing--but only upon special occasions.

Chef Kat

For everyday use, we make our own 'ice cream' that is (believe it or not) just as satisfying as the store bought kind,

BX makes dessert

with no sugar added. We wash/peel fruit and put it in the freezer. We then run the frozen fruit through a Champion juicer (with the blank instead of the filter) so that it comes out looking just like frozen yogurt. Everyone loves it. It tastes great, and it passes the 'water test' (you're not thirsty after you eat it). Fruit ice cream is inexpensive and popular year 'round. When we're feeling formal, we buy cones to put it in. Deeeelicious.

Waste not...

We always wonder just how much the children understand when we try some new project. Do they really understand what living on a strict budget means? You can ask them, of course, but they may well say that they get it without really getting it. It's their actions that tell you the real story. So when we witnessed an unscripted scene in the kitchen yesterday we allowed ourselves the luxury of a smile.

Rebekah was making herself a sandwich, slathering on mayonnaise onto a piece of bread. She used so much that the bread became soggy and fell onto the counter in a gloppy mess. She tossed the whole oozing pile into the trash and blithely proceeded to get out another slice of bread to replace it (the sandwich must go on!). That's when the trouble began.

Erik, Elisabeth, and Katharine descended on her.

"Beka, that is so wasteful! After all, we ARE on a budget!" cried Elisabeth

Erik piggy-backed on her sentiment, "Yeah, we should start charging five cents for every piece of food you waste!"

Rebekah's eyes grew bigger as she realized that she'd been caught by the Junior Food Police. Then Kat chimed in,

"Maybe you should not get as much food for dinner because you are being so wasteful."

That did it. The scared look appeared on Rebekah's face. It seemed to say "Were they REALLY going to charge me or take food away from me?!"  Peer pressure had its desired effect.


They get it. Smile.

A Tale of Two Baskets

When you're on a strict budget stretching those dollars to feed the family, you've got to make some tough decisions. But if cost is the main (or only) thing driving food choices, healthy food will likely be the casualty. Consider these two shopping carts:

Shopping Cart #1  (Standard American Diet)
2 2L Soda  $2.00
1 loaf of White bread  $1.50
1 bag of Doritos  $3.00
4 Boxes of macaroni and cheese  $3.00
1 box of Hamburger Helper  $2.00
1 lb Ground beef  $2.00
1 box Cake mix  $1.50
1 can of frosting $1.80
1 pkg. Lunch meat  $2.50
32oz whole milk  $1.50

Shopping Cart #2   (Health on a budget)
4 pounds of oranges  $3
5 bananas  $1
15 lb bag of potatoes  $8.00
1 box of Vegetable broth  $2.80
1 lb of Carrots  $1.00
1 Leek $1.50
1 Garlic head $.50
1 pkg. of Frozen peas  $1.00
1 pint half and half $1.50
1 6oz yogurt $.50

The total price of each cart is the same. But for both quality and quantity, the second basket is the clear winner. What do you do with all those vegetables? Make soup, of course. Here's one that was a hit in our house:

Hearty Vegetable Soup

Autumn dinner

6 to 8 potatoes, cubed
3 cans (14 1/2 oz each ) of vegetable (or chicken) broth
1 to 2 carrots, thinly sliced
1 to 2 leeks (white portion only) chopped
1/4 cup butter, cubed
1 to 2 gloves of garlic, minced
1 tsp. dried thyme
3/4 tsp. salt
1/4 tsp. dried oregano or marjoram
1/4 tsp. pepper
1/4 cup all purpose flour
1 1/2 cups of half and half cream
1 cup of frozen peas or corn or a mix of both, thawed

In a big pot, combine the first 10 ingredients. Cook until vegetables are soft. In a small bowl, combine flour and cream until smooth, add to the pot. Stir in peas or corn. Cover and cook on med to high for about 30 minutes or until slightly thickened.

Eating In

We all know how television has seriously damaged reading. Not as much as email has destroyed letter writing, mind you, but the effects are widespread. The TV is on in the average American household for an average of five hours per day; when was the last time anyone read a book for five hours in one day? In much the same way, going out to eat has had a crushing effect on cooking--especially among young people.

Before we could all afford (or think we can afford) to eat out so frequently, home cooking was the norm. Children (especially girls) learned to cook by working with their mothers in the kitchen. But between going out and nukeable 'wave cuisine, young people today can barely open a can, much less cook a meal from scratch. So it was bound to happen. The natural consequence of our self-imposed home dining had to stir the creativity that had lain dormant during our restaurant-hopping days.

The older children love to cook, and are getting pretty good at it. Elisabeth makes a Caesar Salad that is to die for. She makes her own dressing, and even makes the croûtons from scratch. Erik is getting into the act too:

"What, no cookies?" Erik moaned.
"Make 'em yourself!"
"Ok, I will"

Chef Erik displays his creati

And he did. By himself, Erik baked up a batch of a few dozen chocolate chip cookies. They were pretty good! He was very pleased with the result. Imagine that: you can have cookies any time you want, without driving to the store. One problem: warm cookies go even faster than warm bread. Most of Erik's batch didn't even get to cool.

The little girls are always eager to pitch in with the cooking too. They're good at mixing, stirring, and, with some careful supervision, chopping. Oh yes, and of course eating. They're always enthusiastic about that.

Cheaping Out

We went out to lunch today. Yes, yes, after all that chatter about the budget-busting effect of going out to eat…But today was different. A local sub sandwich place had a one-day special and was offering their overpriced $4.75 eight inch subs for $1.00. Since we were already in town, we availed ourselves of this wildly in-budget opportunity. Eight subs for eight bucks. Not bad.

We got there at 11:00 a.m. just as they were opening for lunch. There was already a line out the door, and the queue snaked out into the parking lot in just the few minutes we were there. It seems that this obscure new sandwich shop was immediately well known and popular as soon as they cut their prices by almost 80%. Are people that cheap that they would show up in droves on dollar day to a place they had never been and would never go to the rest of the year? In a word, Yes.

Charlottesville has a frozen custard place named Kohr Brothers that celebrates its mid-April founding date each year by rolling back their cone price from the current $2.75 to the original price for a cone back in 1905: a nickel. You should see the mob scene that ensues: a line of people two or three wide that stretches around the building and into the parking lot, all day long. A substantial number of our fellow citizens are in fact that cheap. It’s hard to beat indulging a family of seven having two rounds of custard cones for less than a buck. Vive le Budget!

Eating Out

We eat out too much. Most Americans do. And through the power of denial, we don't worry about it because we don't recognize it as a problem. According to the U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics, the average household expenditure for a family of four for food away from home was $4,000. When we finally checked the real figures, our family had been spending at least that much eating out. A meal or two out every week; add it up and pretty soon it starts to be real money.

Let's face it, it's easier to have someone else prepare the food for you. We found that most of our 'going out' meals were in the evening, after a particularly hard day. We looked at each other with that 'I really don't feel like cooking' look, made the easy decision, and listened to the bad-habit-reinforcing cheers of the children as they piled into the car with alacrity that you never see on they are told to wash the dishes or fold laundry.

We marched into our favorite Mexican or Chinese restaurant where the staff knew us well ("Norm!"). Hmmm, perhaps that itself should have been a budget-busting warning sign--like when we took Erik to the hospital Emergency Room and the doctor on call greeted him by name as soon as he walked in. Of course after the meal, the children (professional wheedlers!) would angle for some expensive and unnecessary (but the fried ice cream really is good) dessert. Fat, dumb, and happy after another over-indulgent meal, we'd acquiesce--and make sure we got a few spoonfuls ('spoonsful' if you are a grammar Nazi) before the childabeasts devoured every crumb.

43% of American families spend more than they earn each year. Ask anyone to name one of their top cost-savings measures and they’ll likely tell you they eat out less and enjoy more meals at home. That's precisely what we're doing now. We're clean. Laying off the stuff. Abstinent. Riding safely on the domestic culinary wagon. Eatin' the good home cookin'. Everyone seems to be ok with that. We'll see how long that lasts.

Son of Food Stamps

Most of the six out of seven Americans who are not part of the Food Stamps (SNAP) program don't know how it works. As stated in the opening of the Food & Nutrition Act of 2008, the plan has a laudable goal:

"To alleviate such hunger and malnutrition, a supplemental nutrition assistance program is herein authorized which will permit low-income households to obtain a more nutritious diet through normal channels of trade by increasing food purchasing power for all eligible households who apply for participation."

The following items cannot be purchased using food stamps funds:
- Beer, wine, liquor, cigarettes or tobacco
- Non-food items, such as: pet foods, soaps, paper products and household supplies

The following items can be purchased using food stamps funds:i. Foods for the household to eat, such as:
- breads and cereals
- fruits and vegetables
- meats, fish and poultry; and
- dairy products
ii. Seeds and plants which produce food for the household to eat.

No one can by force determine what you eat. But through restrictions on how the funds are used, the SNAP program discourages 'vices' and promotes shopping the edges of the grocery store where you will find more nutrition and fewer heavily processed foods. Having gotten in line with both the budget and most of the intent of the program, our family needs to implement the last item that was intended in the plan: growing some of your own food.

That last clause in the 'can be purchased' list is (we suspect) ignored by nearly everyone. Other than boutique or hobby gardeners, who grows their own food? In our post-agrarian society, who grows their own food even as a supplement their diet because they need to? With this in mind, we're going to mirror the plan by planting a winter garden and starting to grow a portion of what we eat.