Simple Cooking

or how to get the last bit of goodness out of the trash and into your meals

Since we posted our "Why we eat the way we do" article, several people have mentioned that they wish they knew how to make the change from processed foods to home cooking. It seems that people who are used to cooking with packaged food aren't sure how to go about cooking without them.

Fair enough. It was a long slow process for us, too!

Our first recommendation is that you take it slow and use an additive approach to changing the way your family eats. That way, you won't get overwhelmed and feel deprived, putting a premature end to your mission to improve the way your family eats.

What do we mean by an "additive approach"? Well, rather than say "we won't use packaged foods anymore", leaving you to figure out "ok, then what will we eat?", we suggest that you learn to make new things that don't start with packages or cans. Maybe rewrite one of your favorite recipes to use all fresh ingredients or learn to make something new. Add more and more things that were made from scratch to the things you usually serve and don't keep score. Just aim to add at least one new from scratch thing every... well, you know your family. You set the schedule.

You might start with roasting a chicken, that staple of Sunday dinner from years gone by. One reason a chicken was so often the first choice for Sunday dinner is that quite aside from being yummy, it also gives you the things you can use to make a couple more meals through the week.

So lets start there.

Roasting a chicken

Start by buying a nice fat broiling hen, ideally fresh, organic, and pastured, but any hen will do in a pinch. If the hen was frozen, thaw it in the refrigerator for a day or so.

1. Preheat the oven to 450 degrees F
   
2. Wash the hen inside and out with cool water and pat it dry.
3. Mix 1 tablespoon of dried rosemary, 1 tablespoon of dried sage and 2 teaspoons of garlic powder (not garlic salt, the salt will dry out the meat).
4. Rub the inside of the hen with the mixed spices.
5. Rub the skin of the bird with a couple of tablespoons of fat (butter, lard, or olive oil) with the rest of the herbs in it, and then place it breast side down in a roasting pan, tucking the legs and wings under the bird as best you can.
6. When the oven is hot, put the bird in and roast for 20 minutes or until the skin is nice and brown and crispy.
7. Turn the oven heat down to 300 and continue roasting for another 25 minutes or so.
8. Remove the bird from the oven and let it sit in its pan juices for at least 30 minutes.

Easy peasy! See, you made a roast chicken!

Making Chicken Gravy

Once the bird has sat in the pan drippings for 30 minutes to reabsorb moisture, you probably still have quite a feast of yummy drippings in the bottom of the pan. You can turn those into a delicious gravy to serve with potatoes or over the meat.

1. Move the bird to a serving platter
2. Deglaze the roasting pan: put 1/2 cup of cool clean water in the roasting pan; heat the pan, scraping the chicken bits and drippings off the bottom of the pan until everything is loose and easily poured off. Pour the dripping into a heatproof Pyrex measuring glass.
3. Put a pat of butter or lard into a large frying or the roasting pan.
4. Heat on medium heat until melted and hot.
5. Add two tablespoons of whole grain flour and stir and mash until the flour smells wheaty and toasted, about 10 minutes on low. (Don't cut this part short -- that's how gravy gets lumpy.)
6. Little by little, maybe a quarter cup at a time, add the drippings to the flour and stir until smooth. (A whisk is great for this!)
7. When you have used up all the drippings, start using milk or water, a splash at a time, until you get the perfect texture.

Not as hard as you thought, was it? You're getting the hang of it!

Now then, you have had chicken and gravy for dinner. (Along with potatoes and vegetables, I hope) You have chicken left on the bones, and of course, the chicken bones. Now what?

I know, lets make a chicken soup!

Chicken broth

1. Pull all of the meat off the chicken bones. Split the meat into two containers, cover it and put it in the fridge.
2. Put the bones, skin, and everything else that's left into a sauce pan.
3. Cover it all with cool, clear water.
4. Add a couple of tablespoons of lemon juice and bring it to a boil.
5. Once the water boils, lower the temperature to just under a boil.
6. Cook for hours, adding water as necessary to keep the bones covered. (We boil the bones for three days or so to get all the goodness out of the bones, but after 4 or 5 hours, you'll have a good rich broth.)
7. Turn off the heat and lets the broth cool.
8. Pour the broth through a colander and put the broth in the refrigerator.
   (You can throw the bones away or bury them in your compost, whichever you prefer. )

As it cools, the broth will thicken. The longer you cooked it, the thicker it will be. That gelatin contains the nutrients from the bones and is extremely nourishing. Broth is what we used in place of vitamins for the several million years before we learned how to put vitamins in tablets -- and it's a lot more tasty than a tablet!

Chicken soup

1. Saute 1 medium onion in a little fat (butter lard, or oil) in a large sauce pan
2. Add one stalk of celery and two cloves of chopped garlic
3. When everything is soft and starting to get brown, put 2 cups of chicken broth, 1/4 cup of brown rice, and three cups of drinking water into the pan.
4. Cook until the rice is soft
5. Add one sliced carrot to the soup
6. Cook until the carrot is soft
7. Add one cup of chopped chicken and 1/2 cup of frozen peas and heat through

Yum.

Now then, what about the other chicken meat?

How about a nice chicken salad?

Cut the leftover chicken into bite-sized chunks. Cut two apples into similar sized cubes and cut 1/2 cup of grapes in half. Toss them all together with a half cup of walnuts (or pecans) and add mayonnaise to taste. Serve it on lettuce leaves for lunch, maybe with a cup of 'almost instant' soup ... ooohhh, fancy. With very little work!

More uses for chicken broth

OK, so now you've had three meals from a single chicken - - and you still have a bunch of bone broth in the fridge. No need to eat chicken soup again, that broth can be used in any number of ways. If you think you might use it pretty quickly, you can leave it in the refrigerator. Otherwise, freeze it into 1 cup and ice cube sized servings to use over the next month or so.

So what else can you do with chicken broth?

• Use a cup of it plus water anywhere you would have used a can of broth
• Use a cup of it to make gravy (use where you used the drippings in the previous recipe)
• Add an ice cube sizes serving as a part of the water when you make rice
• Use an ice cube sized serving to saute vegetables in a stir fry

Oh, and when you don't have time to cook, you can use it to make an 'almost instant' soup

Put one cup of broth in a sauce pan. Add two cups of water, a quarter cup of small pasta or leftover rice, and a cup of frozen or leftover vegetables and whatever meat or beans you have on hand. When everything is heated through, add salt and pepper and serve. You can use anything in 'almost instant soup' so it's a great way to use up leftovers that don't feel like leftovers

Rod is also working on an article about how to make and use beef/pork/mutton broth, which is actually a staple of ours.