Getting started

Yesterday I took a good look at my finances and faced the fact that I'm spending a little more than I make. It's not so much gas prices and the rising price of wheat and rice, I'd say the problem is that my daughter has decided she wants to be a figure skater. Why couldn't she have taken up a less expensive sport, something like running, which doesn't require competition dresses covered in Swarovski crystals? The bottom line is, I can't pay for everything I'm buying. So, I got off Ebay first of all. Then I went shopping at the 99 cent store. I didn't go there with the intention of coming out with the makings of a great dinner, but when I realized that -- well -- I had the makings of a great dinner in my basket, I thought, "here's a great project"!

We could call it the 'let's make penury fun' project, or maybe the 'creativity with fiscal responsibility' project. It boils down to this -- it gives me some structure and something to fool around with while I try to whittle down those credit card bills.

A project like this needs a few rules and guidelines, I'm guessing. One rule is that everything has to be available at the 99 cent store, except for a basic list of pantry items. Lots of the basics are available at the 99 cent store, actually: milk, butter, eggs, olive oil, soy sauce, various hot sauces, all of them on the shelves. I'll allow fresh cuts of meat, too, since that can't be had at the 99 cent store, but since I'm leaning back toward a vegetarian diet, I'm thinking I won't be cooking much meat in any case. Since I do a lot of Chinese cooking, or at least Chinese-inspired cooking I'm putting on my pantry list at least the following:

sesame oil
tabasco
garlic
fresh cilantro
fresh ginger
cider vinegar
tofu

Also some of the very basics:
flour
rice
baking powder

And because I'm not a professional cook and because I'm doing this on the fly, I am giving myself permission to add ingredients to the pantry later. The other principle I'm working with is that the food should be easy to make, not fussy, and very good to eat.

There was a lot of fresh produce at the 99 cent store today and I picked up the following fresh goodies: pasilla chiles, baby yellow squash, big crisp green scallions, artichokes, broccoli, several plantains and a bag of limes. The total I spent was $23, but I'd also gotten a bunch portable flashlights and other random items -- I think in terms of dinner ingredients, I spent $7. I'll feed my boyfriend and myself tonight, and there will be plenty of leftovers for lunch tomorrow. We're not big sweet eaters, so there's no dessert planned.

Basically, I might characterize the theme of the meal as a cross between Mediterranean and Caribbean. If I wrote it out menu-wise I guess it would look like this:

Steamed artichokes with lime mayonnaise (or lime butter)
Grilled vegetables with black bean dip
Pita bread
Fried Plantains

I'm steaming the artichokes which will be sort of appetizer-y, to eat with mayonnaise with lime juice mixed in. Or butter with lime juice mixed in. I say "sort of appetizer-y" because my plan is really just to put all of the food out on the table and we'll eat our way through it in whatever order we feel like. The main course is bunch of grilled vegetables to eat at room temperature, and along with that a black bean dip. We'll scoop up dip with triangles of pita bread, also from the 99 cent store, and also eat some fried plantains, a food that I can never get enough of. I would eat a dinner of fried plantains alone, if left to my own devices.

Grilled Vegetables
These are indoor grilled vegetables, which I do by putting a cast iron skillet on high heat, adding a tad of olive oil, and then throwing stuff into the pan. Turning on the exhaust fan is really important here. I grilled the squash and the scallions. Slice whatever it is if it needs slicing -- in this case the squash -- and then just put it in the pan and leave it there basically waaaaaay longer than you think you really should. I'm the sort of person who likes food kindof burnt black, so I often leave the room for relatively long periods of time while grilling vegetables, do some work, read some newspaper, water the back yard. The scallions just get so good when you really let them get all crinkled up, they start smelling jammy and less oniony.

The pasilla chiles need to be singed right over the flame -- I like to put an oven rack I saved from an old toaster oven on top of the grate on the stove so the chiles aren't always falling into the flames. Nothing could be much easier -- the chiles just need to be on the flame until the skin is black and blistery all over (turning them using chopsticks is a good idea) and then thrown into a paper bag for a while, with the top smooshed down so they'll steam just a little. Then pull the chiles out, rub the skin off, and slice the flesh of the chile into strips. Onto the plate with the squash and the scallions.

For the black bean dip:
A 29 oz can black beans
garlic
olive oil
lime juice
salt
pepper

Drain the liquid off the beans. I chopped up three fat cloves of garlic and threw them in the food processor, added the beans, put in about two tablespoons of olive oil, the juice of three limes, and some salt and pepper. Whooosh around until smooth ish, and done. I probably would have added a bunch of Tabasco but I didn't have any in the house. I made this on the early side, thinking that it will taste best when it's had a little time to 'get to know itself' as a friend of mine says.

Fried plantains are easy -- as much as a person might not want to, the key is to fry them twice. Sometimes you have to cut the peel off a plantain, especially when they are green which is how I like them. It's good to slice them into pieces that are not too thick, maybe 1/2 to 3/4 inch -- diagonal slices work well. Vegetable oil heated in a skillet, not too deep on the oil, fry the pieces a few minutes on each side till they seem cooked through, then take 'em out and put them on a paper bag or paper towel or something else that will soak up grease. Do little batches till they're finished. Next, you squash the fried pieces -- there actually are special instruments for this but I use the bottom of a glass. You're not trying to squash them flat, just put the bottom of the glass on top of the plantain pieces and sort of mash them down till they're flatter than they were before, then put them back in the oil, frying until crispy and brownish. For the two of us, I'll make two plantains. I have another saved for tomorrow.

It's nearly six, the vegetables are all finished, and the bean dip is getting to know itself. I haven't started the plantains yet since those just have to be eaten hot. Adrian and I are supposed to go do a dog walk up in the park and down to the arroyo -- only there's a strange storm that's coming through complete with a thunder and a tornado and a flash flood warning, so I'm wondering what our walk might look like. No arroyo for us today.