Chip off the old block

The problem with not eating fast food on a regular basis is that you don’t know how the menus work. Today I ventured into the city centre to buy tickets for a concert and as I hadn’t eaten lunch before hopping on my bike and cycling in, I thought I would catch up with Colonel Saunders and see how things are with his KFC. However, when I got to the KFC concession stand in the city centre mall I couldn’t be bothered to queue (it is, after all, just seasoned chicken remember).

I therefore decided to try some New York Fries. Less damaging than KFC (no meat at least), and probably cheaper (although on reflection I’m not sure it was). I always approach fast food menus with a little trepidation as they’re not quite as simple as they should be. To me, at least, it seems there are endless permutations of items and to simply ask for a burger and chips would just leave everyone confused (if not a little disppointed given the creativity that's gone into producing those menus). Anyway, the menu at NYF didn’t look too complicated (although I did wait until the customer in front had moved off so she wouldn’t actually hear what I was about to order). At the time, the chances of walking away with a simple portion of fries seemed out of reach, so I asked for a portion with sour cream and tomatoes (these were two of the four ingredients under the heading “Veggie Works”). The woman behind the counter – see what I mean? I don’t even know the correct term for someone who dishes this stuff up! – explained that the Veggie Works included all four ingredients. I knew then that I had screwed up, so said that that would be great and yes, please. I walked away feeling very grateful for her patience in dealing with someone who obviously belongs in the first half of the 20th century.

But thrifty NYF ain’t. $4.99 for a bowl of about thirty fries, covered in Cheez Whizz, sour cream, chopped tomatoes and green onions. And half of those fries tasted of little else than the plastic cheese. Next time I’m standing my ground and having just the fries!

On a green note though, I kept the plastic fork the woman advised me to pick up once she’d handed me my fries. I will keep it in my bag with my plastic spoon. I find it difficult to use this stuff and then throw it away. I’ve been carrying the spoon around with me since I found it impossible to throw away one of those plastic stirrers you get in the coffee shops (I think I’ve also got that in my bag too!). The spoon’s great though: just use it to swirl your milk into your coffee, stick it in your mouth to wipe it and then put it back in your bag. Although I sometimes take a little extra care with hygiene and use an old tissue I might have in my bag to wipe it clean...

Soap story

The reason I got into soap-making has nothing to do with thriftyness, or green or DIY living. It’s because I’m a sucker for a pretty package. In fact it doesn’t even have to be pretty. Some products are packaged in such a “natural” way that there’s little room for prettiness – and still these pull me in. The products I get a particular thrill out of seeing cleverly packaged are those that fall into the “lotions and potions” category – shower gel, hand lotion, and especially soap. Soap is such a useful product, too; shower gel and hand lotion I can live without (almost), but soap certainly has its uses. That’s why I bought a book from Amazon and set about making my own. As you can see, I’m still working on the packaging…

Making soap's just like cooking really. You take quantities of basic ingredients, mix them together, and then enjoy the results. You have to wait a little longer when making soap than you do, say, a cheese pie, to sample your endeavours however. But when you see your first bar of soap foaming up as you turn it over and over in your wet hands, it’s well worth it. And making your own soap does of course incorporate thrifty, green, and DIY living. It’s cheap to produce your own bars, no unnecessary chemicals or materials need be used, and you make it completely from scratch.

A very basic recipe for making soap involves just three ingredients: lye, fats, and water. There are lots of other ingredients you can add if you want your soap a little less basic, such as essential oils, bees wax, colorings, but these three ingredients are all that you need to make soap. If you've never used sodium hydroxide (lye) before then you need to know that it should always be handled with care. Wear rubber gloves and protective eye-wear when dealing with lye, and keep it stored away from children and animals - and anyone else who might be curious enough to know what it is! And before you ask, no, it's not possible to make soap without lye; there's no "safer" alternative.

Basic Soap Recipe (suitable for vegetarians)

Ingredients:

2oz (57g) lye

5oz (142g) distilled water or spring water

16oz (454g) vegetable fat (for the last soap I made, I used a 50/50 mix of olive oil and corn oil)

Equipment:

2 enamel or stainless steel pots

2 glass candy thermometers

Weighing scales (kitchen scales are fine)

Eye protection (DIY glasses or similar)

2 plastic spatulas for stirring

Old towel or blanket (to wrap soap once in mould)

Plastic mould (use what you can find!)

Knife for cutting the soap once it's hardened

Melt the fat in a pot. Use a stainless steel or enamel pot; don't use aluminum or iron as these will react with the lye, which you will add later. Once the fat has melted, turn off the heat and leave until the temperature settles at about 130 degrees F (54C).

In another stainless steel or enamel pot, place your water and then carefully pour the lye into the water. Put on your protective eye-gear and rubber gloves for this (and never pour water into lye or you’ll have an explosion on your hands!). Stir until the lye is dissolved. The mixture will give off a small amount of fumes, so be careful not to have your face too near and breathe in; it's best to do this in a well ventilated part of the house. Leave the solution until the temperature settles at about 130 degrees F (54C).

Then add the lye solution to the fats and carefully stir intermittently. After a while the mixture will start to thicken and then "trace" (leave a trace when it falls from the stirrer back onto the mixture in the pot). Once this stage has been reached, pour it into your mould. Don't worry if it takes ages for your soap to trace, sometimes when working with vegetable oils it can. If you've spent the best part of two or three hours stirring your soap every so often and it's thickening but not actually tracing, just pour it into the mould and it'll be OK. Wrap your mould in a towel or blanket for 24 hours, after which time the soap should be hard enough to cut (if your soap took a long time to trace it may not be hard until two or three days after having poured it into your mould). Whenever it is hard enough to cut, take your soap out of the mould and, wearing the rubber gloves (the soap will still be caustic at this stage so may irritate your skin), cut it into bars. Cover the bars and place them somewhere to "cure" (complete the saponification process) for six weeks before use.

Saponification occurs when an acid (fats or oils) is mixed with a caustic alkali (sodium hydroxide in the case of hard soap, also referred to as lye or caustic soda). When these two are mixed at a certain temperature, a process called saponification is triggered, the result of which is soap.

Once you've mastered this basic recipe you can experiment using different fats and oils, and then start incorporating other ingredients into your soap, such as fragrances, colors, and even fruit and vegetables.

Source: Melinda Coss: The Handmade Soap Book

Cheez pleaz

There’s a great scene in the film Infamous (starring Toby James as Truman Capote) where, having recently moved to Kansas, he's invited to a dinner party (of sorts). Being used to spending his days dining in the best restaurants in New York, Capote goes in search of a fine cheese to take as a gift to his hostess. At the local supermarket he's horrified to find that the only cheese on sale is Velveeta. Velveeta is far from fine cheese, or any cheese come to that; it's a "cheese product" – the original Cheez Whizz.

Capote was right: You can tell a lot about the civilization of a place from the cheese its inhabitants consume. I felt a bit like Capote when I first went to buy cheese here in my local Safeway's. On first sighting, I took the orange colored cheese in the supermarket to be slabs of Red Leicester and found it a bit strange that this particular cheese was so popular in Alberta. Until, that was, I discovered that the orange cheese was in fact regular processed "cheddar." In Alberta, the cheddar we get in the UK is referred to as white cheddar (and isn't orange).

But if you're looking for something a little more exotic than orange cheese here in Edmonton, then you may have a problem, especially when it comes to halloumi cheese. Because it seems that this cheese can't be had for love nor money. Well, actually you can find it if you venture out to the bigger supermarkets - but only during the summer months. The assistant in Save on Foods, where I was unable to buy some the other day, advised me that it's only stocked during the summer (it's the middle of August now but seeing as it's winter for six months of the year here, I suppose it's conceivable that autumn's already upon us).

The reason that halloumi is only stocked during the summer here in Edmonton is that, as it doesn’t melt, it’s a great cheese for the barbecue. And it certainly is: no more having to worry about what to feed vegetarians, and no more having to worry about whether what your guests are eating is actually cooked! But halloumi is more than just a gimmicky cheese that holds its shape when heated; it's also a delicious tasting cheese, creamy and salty with a lovely soft and chewy texture. There’s also something else that’s a little gimmicky about it; it squeaks when you eat it.

For great tasting halloumi kebabs (or kabobs as they're called in North America), marinate chunks of the cheese, with cherry tomatoes, squares of red pepper and red onion, and mushrooms in olive oil, crushed garlic, a little lemon juice and some chopped herbs (thyme, parsley, mint, and oregano work well). A few hours in the marinade should be enough. And then thread the cheese and veggies on to skewers and away you go. Use the remains of the marinade to baste the kebabs while they’re cooking. And if it’s raining, just use the grill.

Halloumi shouldn't be a "seasonal" cheese; it tastes just as good cooked indoors as it does out. So if anyone knows where to get it (all year around) in Edmonton, Alberta, Canada, please let me know!

Let's get this party started

Nigella says that her party popcorn is a thrifty recipe. Not many ingredients are needed and of those that are, only very small quantities are called for in this recipe. Popcorn's not expensive and you get lots of it for your money. So, yes, I suppose she's right. Although I find it difficult associating the word thrifty with anything connected to the divine Domestic Goddess...

As much as I like popcorn, there are a few drawbacks to eating it. It gets stuck between your teeth for days after you've eaten it (and yes, I do floss). And if you eat it at the cinema with melted butter poured over the top, then you end up with grease stains on your clothes. That's why I decline the offer of butter whenever I eat it at the cinema - that and the conversation I once overhead in the queue for popcorn during which the young woman in the popcorn kiosk told the guy in front of me that it wasn't really butter but margarine (pronounced mar-ja-rin in Canada) that they used. Urgh. (It's always important to get the balance between thrifty and taste right.) But if you wanted to make Nigella's party popcorn even more thriftily then you could substitute margarine for the butter in the recipe.

If you do decide to try this recipe - and it's well worth it as it's quick to make and tastes very good - then here are a few tips (plus photos)...

On the YouTube clip (the one in which the Domestic Goddess is looking glam in a LBD and natty cardigan), Nigella says that all you need to do once you've melted the butter and mixed in the spices is to pour the mixture over the popcorn and stir. I think she's opted for this method so as not to ruin her party look. It won't really work, as given the ratio of spice mixture to popcorn you will coat only about a fifth of the popcorn. What you need to do is what Nigella suggests in her recipe book, and that's take a big paper bag (although plastic will do if you don't have a paper bag), put the popcorn in it, dribble the spice mixture over, and then close the top of the bag up and shake - and shake, and shake. I think Nigella suggests three shakes, but again, she's taken the leisurely approach to party popcorn here because if you want to ensure that as many of the popped kernels as possible are covered, then you need to shake x about 10. And then get dressed for the party.