[Sca-cooks] 100 tips for Frugal Feasts

[Antonia Calvo]

jenne at fiedlerfamily.net wrote:

>>1) Make your own broth from suitable feast ingredients-appropriate
>>bone/skin/fat/peels.
>>    
>>
>
>Curiously, we use paste 'base' at home and for feasts. At $5.99-$7.99 a
>pint, and only a few spoonfuls needed to make the difference between
>veggies in water and soup, we find it saves us significant cost in making
>soups and stews for lunches. A pint lasts us about a half year! We get
>Minor's Chicken and Beef base from B.J.'s; I need to find a source for
>Minor's ham flavor.
>  
>

Confietor.  I hate making stock.  I don't have the equipment to make 
more than about 6 litres at a time, and a feast can use 20-40l easily.  
I buy it from a place that makes high-quality stock mainly for 
restaurant supply. It comes in 5l packs at around $2.30 per litre.

Feast budget tips.
1. Choose meats with care.  A good butcher can help you with 
availability, suitable cuts, minimising waste, etc.  When roasting, 
remember that one large cut has less waste than several small ones. 
2. Shop around, but not too much.  Look for lower prices at different 
suppliers, but also plan your shopping carefully so that your savings on 
food isn't cancelled out by your expenditure on petrol.
3. Avoid convenience foods that aren't. Pre-rolled pastry is my number 
one bugbear for being expensive and not all that good, but there are 
others.
4. Use seasonable foods. 
5. Avoid false economy.  Two examples:
--I've seen a cook buy the absolute cheapest minced meat available for 
meatballs.  It seemed like a good idea, until the meatballs were 
cooked-- they were a lot smaller after all that fat melted away.
--Also, I've seen more than one cook make so many changes to a dish that 
it just wasn't tasty anymore-- and no-one ate it, so it all went to waste. 
6. Investigate catering/restaurant suppliers.  I used to imagine that 
they wouldn't be terribly interested in small single orders-- then I 
started getting touch with them and found out that they're usually very 
friendly to small customers who take the time to seek them out.
7. Portion carefully to avoid waste. 
8. Say no to bad kitchens.  

-- 
Antonia di Benedetto Calvo

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Habeo metrum - musicamque,
hominem meam. Expectat alium quid?
-Georgeus Gershwinus
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