My Grandma wasn’t a zen master. My memories of her though are of a strong will, a peaceful presence and a cheerful attitude. She was wonderful and totally unique. Like many of her generation she had been thru some hard times and had many sorrows. Yet she remained cheerful and unfailingly considerate and polite. I don’t think she thought much about goals or future plans. She simply enjoyed the day for what it was. Like the popular song, her attitude was que sera sera, whatever will be, will be. She had never heard of the zen proverb of chop wood carry water but that is essentially what she did every day of her life. And she was all the happier for it!
The Pantry Principle – What you’ll need to get started – Part 2
Last week we talked about how to save lots of time cooking for your family by starting and maintaining a pantry. If you haven’t ever approached shopping in this way before you’ll certainly be wondering where to start. A few things are obviously missing from your household setup, most likely.
Getting Started
Let’s say you are starting completely from scratch as I did many, many years ago. I had just a tiny apartment kitchen, a few pans scavenged from my Mom’s rejects, and some old tupperware. I had little to no extra money. My kitchen lacked pantry space, storage containers and freezer space. What to do, what to do? Start small with baby steps. Begin by adding inexpensive additions in small steps. For instance, storage containers. It’s pretty cheap to buy glass canning jars for kitchen storage. Walmart, hardware stores, and often your local grocery store has them at about $7 a case for quart jars. [Read more…]
A Good Enough Cook
Anything worth doing is worth doing badly.
G. K. Chesterton
I wasn’t always a cook. Heck, many would argue that I’m not a cook now ;-). Still I cook pretty much everyday and have for about a decade now. So am I good candidate for the next cooking reality show? Hardly. Instead I find that I have become a “Good Enough Cook”. Like my mother, and her mother before her, and her mother before her. [Read more…]