The Downshift: Week Three Recipes and Cooking Disasters

This is part of an ongoing series that chronicles our challenges and (hopefully) successes living on a $4/person daily food budget. For the what and why of this series, please read our first post HERE.

I had a lot of concerns coming into week three, but come shopping time I was feeling a lot better. I had no idea what this week had in store. Here is what we had planned for our week three meals:

(you can find all Good and Cheap recipes HERE)

Mexican Street Corn (Good and Cheap, pg. 60) and Potato Salad (Good and Cheap, pg. 46)

Risotto (See recipe HERE)

Risotto Leftovers

Chana Masala (Good and Cheap, pg. 90 – minus a few spices that we didn’t have)

Crustless Quiche (Good and Cheap, pg 114)

Pizza (Good and Cheap, pg 139 but made with GF flour)

Pizza left overs

Breakfast was meant to be eggs and whatever veggies were laying around, and lunch was flatbreads, hummus, and soup, all made from scratch.

I planned a smaller range of food because I was struggling so much to work in enough items for a more diverse menu. I was really apprehensive about the flatbreads and the pizza.

I say planned, because our week three menu really didn’t work the way I had imagined.

At one point during the week we ran out of eggs and ate potato salad for breakfast. I had never made flatbreads before, let alone gluten free ones. The first few did not turn out and led me on a wild internet search for some way to save the butter and flour and other edible things that had gone into the dough. That’s how I found out about using wax paper to roll gluten free dough thin without having to add more flour to keep it from sticking (which would make the GF product too dry).

Hummus and pita

I made some hummus from scratch, crisped up some of the gluten free flatbread, and made a big pot of tea for guests Tuesday. It wasn’t the most filling snack, but we were both feeling pretty good that we had something to serve.

It worked really, really well. But my new trick failed me when I tried it on pizza. The additional rolling required to get the gluten free dough flat and circular was apparently too much for the waxed paper. Without me knowing, it eroded the bottom and when I went to transfer our two pizzas to the oven the whole thing fell apart. It was a mass of bits and pieces of waxed paper and my precious, precious ingredients, all over the counter and floor.

It was completely un-salvageable, an expensive mistake.

But we were lucky. This weekend was our planned trip home to New Glasgow.  When we were planning to start our $4/day budget, we discussed whether or not we would maintain Sunday dinners with my family and our one-weekend a month trip home to visit Drew’s family. We decided that we weren’t willing to sacrifice our family gatherings for six weeks. We also didn’t feel as though it was an act of charity or pity (something we are not accepting during the six weeks), since it is a regular event. We happily accepted every delicious meal set before us on our trip home. We also took in the Jost Grape Stomp:

We agreed that free events that were open to the public were also fair game. Now, it has become a running joke whenever we discuss attending an event – “If they weren’t serving cheese there, would you still go?”

And while those weekends and dinners and events were never intended as charity, we’re both feeling a definite sense of pity from everyone around us. I find myself feeling embarrassed an awful lot these days when it comes to food. We’ve both had to excuse ourselves from social gatherings because we can’t afford it. I’ve become near paranoid about eating at events and with others, hyper aware of how I am piling my plate and scarfing down food when given the opportunity.

I did cave this week, though. A full out cheat. I  had a coffee. It was a free coffee, it just wasn’t MY free coffee. My parents collect McDonald’s stickers and they had a few full cards. I was on deadline for a freelance assignment and ready to pull my hair out. That coffee was, if not a life saver, a day saver.

I’m already most of the way through week four, so I can tell you that things have finally, FINALLY become more manageable. I’m feeling like the first three weeks may have been the worst of things. I HOPE they were the worst of things.

Look for our week four shopping list up over the weekend.

Read Our Past Posts in This Series Here:
Post 1: The what and why of our $4/day food budget
Post 2: Preparing to eat on $4/day (and our week 1 shopping list)
Post 3: Week 1 meals and recipes and how it went
Post 4: Week 2 Shopping List and Prep
Post 5: The Nacho Debacle
Post 6: Week 2 Results and Week Three Shopping List

About the author

Gillian Wesley

Since getting together six years ago, we have given away our television, begun weekly DIY nights, experimented with urban homesteading, challenged ourselves to drive less (100 days car-free in 2013), and have learned more about food security. We have experimented with a range of budgeting strategies, all of which involve consuming less stuff. We buy food with reducing packaging in mind. We got a dog. We have been doing these things for a variety of reasons: financial, social, environmental, to achieve a better work-life balance. It has resulted in us enjoying an increasingly simple and satisfying lifestyle. We’ve been influenced by a lot of people we’ve encountered and things we’ve read about along the way, notably the Transition Movement, the Antigonish Movement, and, more recently, traditional Acadien living. And we’ve learned that we are by no means alone. There are many, many people who are taking steps to downshift their lives. Sign up for our eNewsletter, and we’ll send you a round-up of our new and upcoming projects once a month.