Monthly Archives: February 2010

Grass fed beef at a great price!

frugal strategies, nutrition

Back in December, I shared my thoughts about the King Corn documentary, and in the comments section (where lots of good information is shared but most people miss seeing it!), Miriam shared about a source for kosher grass-fed beef (Golden West Glatt – where it says ‘source’ in red letters in the sentence right before this is a link to their site).  When I checked out the prices, they looked pretty good!  Until that point, I had only been aware of one kosher source in the country and at almost $10 a pound for ground beef (the cheapest cut), it was simply out of our budget.

Years ago I spoke with an Amish farmer who agreed to sell me the whole cow, but it was such a complicated and expensive process to arrange for everything (couldn’t use his facilities, would have had to truck the cow somewhere, rent processing space from a kosher butcher and hire a private slaughterer!) so I gave up on the idea.  When I heard about an affordable option that didn’t require me to do anything but pull out a credit card, I was excited that grass-fed beef might finally be on the horizon for us.  🙂

I contacted the company to find out about how the animals were raised, and here’s the response I got:  ”They are grass-fed and then grain finished which means they are given corn and alfalfa. They are also very humanely raised, meaning that the animals are grass-fed and bedded down at night as well as shielded from inclement weather.”  They aren’t organic, which to me is less important than being grass-fed.  (A little peeve of mine are organic chickens that are marketed as exclusively grain fed.sigh.gif)

At that point they didn’t have ground beef in stock (I was looking for the least expensive cut I could get:)), but they soon added it and I placed an order for 40 pounds last week.  The price for ground beef (family packs) is just $3.49 lb!  That price is cheaper than even the the regular kosher ground beef at the supermarket – and after reading Wardeh’s poll on grass-fed beef prices, it seems it’s a pretty good deal for non-kosher buyers, too!  And with shipping at just $9.95 for any size order, it’s an incredible deal – my order of 40 lb was just $150 including shipping – yes, it’s a big chunk of change at one time, but that’s a lot of meat!  (Edited to add – it seems this shipping special just ended. 🙁 )

In case you’re wondering about the family packs, you get a large box of individually wrapped 1 lb packages. Very compact and easy to store.  (Usually at the store I buy family packs, which are about 3 – 4 lb, and I have to separate it and repackage it into 1 lb chunks before freezing.)  I like buying in bulk so this works well for me, though the minimum size is about twenty pounds, so that might be a bit much for smaller families.  (I think you can buy in smaller amounts for about 3.79 lb.)  The order came today in a large box packed on all sides with thick styrofoam, like a makeshift cooler.  It was in transit for three days, but was still frozen solid when we got it.

I’m not a discerning connoisseur of meat – to me everything tastes fine, and I’m buying this because I care more about how it’s raised and having the right balance of Omega 3 fats – but  several of you have told me you’re very happy with the flavor and I’m expecting it to be very good!

(This post is part of Fight Back Fridays.)

Avivah

Disclaimer- in case you’re wondering, I don’t make any money off of my recommendations on this blog; I’m just sharing an affordable source for meat that is often hard to find at a decent price.

Transform your soup chicken!

frugal strategies, nutrition, recipes,

All broth makers share the same experience: they make a fantastic broth, packed with nutrients, and then are left with the meat that has fallen off the bones – tasteless, unappetizing, and uninspiring.  Is there something to do besides choke it down or feed it to your cat? (We don’t feed our cat commercial pet food, so it’s not a waste, but still…)  🙂

Being the frugalest of the frugal, I’m not about to waste any food that comes into the house if I can help it!  But I’m also not about to torture my family and leave them with bad memories of unpleasant food I forced them to eat so it didn’t go to waste.   Bland soup chicken is easily transformed and made into a really tasty dish.  Here’s what I do:

Revamped Soup Chicken

First I shred the chicken.  Then, using chicken or lamb fat that I’ve rendered, I heat the fat and saute the chicken in the fat – this gives it a rich and delicious flavor.  (If you don’t have rendered animal fat, you can use expeller pressed coconut oil, but it’s not going to be nearly as good.)  Then I generously season it with salt, pepper, garlic powder, and anything else that appeals to me that day.  After it’s been sauteed and seasoned, I add it to stir fries, pot pies, tacos/burritos, chimichangas – lots of possibilities!

Because I tend to think of this as a humble thrifty supper, when we recently had a couple for dinner mid week, I wanted to serve something nicer.  I had a different main dish planned, but something happened and I ended up having to serve this.  I was a little embarrassed when the husband asked me how I cooked it (I thought he was thinking it looked wimpy or not up to their standards – they live on a much higher income than we do), so I gave him a brief answer.  Turned out he really wanted to know because he was trying to figure out why it tasted so good and wanted his wife to make it the same way; he’s a good friend of my husband and kept raving about how good it the next couple of times they spoke!

Simple, frugal, and good for you, too – can’t beat that combination!

Do you have tips on how to use your leftover soup chicken?  Share them below in the comments section!

(This post is part of Pennywise Platter Thursdays.)

Avivah

Supercharge your broth for immunity!

nutrition

Rich and delicious, a properly made bone broth is packed with nutrition and  flavor.  This winter I’ve been using a fantastic addition to supercharge the nutritional value of our stock so that it has even more immune boosting power than a regular broth, and I’ve never seen anyone share about this great ingredient!

It’s an ingredient that is so inexpensive, so easy to add – no prepping – and so effective, that you’re going to want to add this to your pantry right away!  What is it?  Astragalus root.  Are you scratching your head?

Astragalus has been used in traditional Chinese medicine for generations and is a real food that builds immunity.  It looks kind of like a small wooden tongue depressor when you buy the slices.  You can find it at your local health food store or buy it online (I got mine here – scroll down page to see it).  In the pound of astragalus root slices that I bought for $10 there are probably a couple hundred slices.

To use it, you simply pop a few slices into your pot along with the onions, garlic, and any other vegetables you’re adding to your stock.  Since it’s a woody root and doesn’t become soft and delicious with cooking, you’ll simply remove it along with the bones before you serve it.  So simple!

Since I use our bone broths as the basis for any stew or soup I make, cook grains with it, and drink it, it’s a foundation of my cooking.  Using astragalus is an easy way to supercharge your broth to help keep you healthy this winter!

(This post is part of Real Food Wednesdays.)

Avivah

More sleep for your baby (and you!)

parenting

When I wrote about sleep issues for young children several months, a number of you requested that I write more specifics about the topic of sleep and infants.  It’s taken me a while to get around to this; as I mentioned then, this is a topic that I tend to avoid because I don’t like to be taken out of context.  In this post I’ll try to give a basic explanation of how I approach this with my young infants, and then respond to several specific questions that were asked.

Firstly I have to explain that I never set out to develop an approach to get my babies to sleep through the night.   There are things that I’m structured about but this wasn’t one of them!  I don’t mind if babies wake up once or even twice a night; my concern was more about helping my infants get the amount of sleep they needed. And it works out quite nicely that in doing the best thing for them, it makes for better rested parents, too!

The easiest thing to do is to establish healthy sleep habits from the beginning.  In order to do this, you need to learn to read your baby’s cues and respond to them in a timely manner.  The problem is that most of us recognize only the most obvious signs of exhaustion, way after the signs of being tired first appear!  Learn to recognize the signs that your baby is winding down; they start to look droopy and less alert.  If you’re holding him, he’ll often put his head on your shoulder and rest it there.  This is the time to put them to sleep – not when they are rubbing their eyes and starting to cry from tiredness.  There’s a window of opportunity when putting your child to sleep is very easy – he is generally relaxed and mellow, ready to sleep and not yet at the point of being overwrought from crying.  Whatever stage you’re at with your baby, start paying attention to these cues and responding – don’t think it’s too late if you haven’t done this since birth!

How does a baby learn to fall asleep?  I like to put a baby down when he is in the tired and in the ready state that I described above, very relaxed but still awake.  (Remember that you’re putting him to sleep when he needs it, not when it’s convenient for you!)  I think a big part of the problem most parents have is that they get their baby to sleep (nursing, rocking, holding) and then he pops right up when he gets put down.  It’s like those few minutes of sleep refreshed him enough to keep him awake for a while longer!  And he suddenly finds himself in bed, very alert and totally not ready for sleep.  It’s much easier on him if he has the chance to gently drift to sleep on his own.

There seems to be the view that either you let your baby ‘cry it out’ and neglect him emotionally, leaving him with psychic scars that will last forever, or you’re a nurturing parent and you hold twenty five hours a day so that he never whimpers.  :) Just exaggerating a little to make a point.  :lol: There’s actually a possibility between those two extremes that is nurturing and loving towards both the baby and parent that many mothers are unaware of.

By putting my babies down when they’re ready to sleep, I’ve found that they don’t cry a lot. They’re not being left in a crib to scream for long periods of time until they fall asleep exhausted.  Occasionally my baby will cry for a few minutes after he’s put in (about 2- 4 minutes), but usually he snuggles right down and falls asleep within a few minutes with no crying at all.  If he cries more than a few minutes, I know that I misread his sleep cues and he’s not really ready to go to sleep and I take him out.

Not only does he not cry a lot when he’s put down for a nap or for the night, but he doesn’t cry a lot when he’s awake.  Part of that is certainly temperament, but a very, very large part of it is that a well rested infant is a happy infant!

What about nursing a baby to sleep?  Remember, every time a baby cries, he isn’t asking to be nursed!  Sometimes he’s crying from exhaustion, and learning to read his cues will help you to respond appropriately to what he’s telling you.  That being said, I think nursing babies to sleep is fine.  My only caution is that when a mother does this all the time, the baby becomes dependent on her to fall asleep instead of developing his ability to fall asleep. I usually nurse my baby until he was almost asleep, and put him in his crib when he was still awake but on the verge of sleep.  At this point I can nurse him to sleep fully and put him to bed afterwards and he hardly stirs.

If you’re past the stage of being able to do this from the beginning, don’t worry, you can fairly quickly get your child used to a new routine.  A friend told me several months ago about this book and was happy to find it was something I’d recommend.  It’s similar in many ways to what we do.  He has a moderate approach and is able to give more specific and structured suggestions than I am, since I’m just not structured in that way regarding bedtimes.  For me, our babies sleeping schedules have naturally evolved from being in tune to them and respecting their needs.

Something I found interesting was the author’s explanation that infants reach the ability to sleep through the night at about age six weeks from the original due date.  This was especially interesting to me since my current baby slept through the night way earlier than any of his siblings.  Many of you may remember way back eight months ago to when he was born, that he was three weeks overdue; all the rest of my kids were born on the earlier side of the due date.  He slept for seven hours at night at the age of three weeks, something the others didn’t do until 7 or 8 weeks. All of them lined up with the six weeks from the due date guideline, though I didn’t learn of it until he was two or three months old.  Interesting, isn’t it?

In case you’re wondering more about my baby’s current sleep schedule, at about age 5 – 6 months he began waking up once or twice a night.  That was when he was teething, and then he went back to sleeping through the night.  He generally goes to sleep around 9 – 10pm and sleeps until about 7 am.  He takes a long nap in the mid morning, and another long nap in the afternoon.  This is his general routine, but it’s not something I schedule and I can’t give you a specific time this happens every day because it goes according to him, not the clock.

As far as bedtimes for both my other littles, ds2 (29 months) and ds3.5 (46 months) go to sleep around 8 pm and wake up around 7 – 7:30am.  They both take a nap mid day, around 1 pm.  Ds2 goes in a little earlier and sleeps longer than ds3.5.   Ds2 sleeps around 2 – 3 hours, and ds3 sleeps around 1 – 1.5 hours.

Now for a few questions:

>> How do you put them down into a pack and play without them waking? I can barely reach down into one, let alone gently deposit a sleeping baby (I’m very short).<<

Since they’re usually not sleeping when I put them down, this isn’t generally a problem!  Sometimes my baby does fall asleep when nursing, and I don’t worry about if he wakes up when I put him in bed since he’s learned how to fall back asleep on his own.  I actually assume they will often wake up somewhat.  But if they are basically ready for sleep, they will settle back down to sleep within a couple of minutes.  If you make it a point to handle your babies very gingerly when you put them down, they become overly sensitized to movement and it gets to be almost impossible not to do something to disturb them.  I don’t take any special pains to keep from making noise or moving and very often transfer my almost asleep baby from me to an older child to take upstairs to bed.

As far as height, I’m guessing my dd9 is probably shorter than anyone reading here!  She routinely puts the baby down (and was eight when she started doing it several months ago), and now ds7 is also starting to put the baby in for the night.  They’re tall for their ages but not that tall!

>>Oh, and I’m curious how you arrange naps around your other kids outings? You have older kids, so maybe they stay home and babysit, or take the younger kids to their activities… <<

When my babies are little up through the age of about 2 or 2.5, I don’t mess around with their napping schedule.  I think it’s very important that they get to sleep when they are tired, just like I think they need to be fed when they’re hungry.  That means that activities are scheduled around their nap times.  Everyone is much happier when the baby and young children in the home are well rested so this isn’t much of a sacrifice!

>>With nightmares, teething, taking to bathroom in the middle of the night, illnesses, etc., with so many kids,  Avivah, I cannot imagine how you get any sleep, since with two I barely seem to.<<

I should get to sleep earlier than I do, but my sleep limitations are because I choose to spend too long online (like writing posts for my blog ;) ) than because of my kids.  As you see from above, the baby/young child part of the equation is fine!  My husband and I unofficially split the nighttime responsibilities years ago; I take care of the nursing baby, he takes care of anyone else that needs it.  He doesn’t have to get up very often, though!  They don’t usually need much once they’re in bed for the night – sometimes someone isn’t feeling well or wakes up suddenly crying, but that’s not common.  And now that they have older siblings they share rooms with, usually a sibling will hear them and help them before we get to them.  He also helps out with the baby in the night if there’s a need, like changing the baby if it’s necessary.

I hope this was helpful!  If I didn’t address a concern that you have or something was unclear, please feel free to share questions in the comments sections below.

(This post is part of Works for Me Wednesdays.)

Avivah

Cheesy Cauliflower Soup

recipes

Here’s the cauliflower soup recipe that was requested yesterday; my family really enjoys having this for a tasty and filling lunch:

Cheesy Cauliflower Soup

  • butter
  • 1 c. onion, chopped
  • 1/ c. celery, chopped
  • 3 cloves garlic, minced
  • 1 c. carrots, sliced
  • 2 c. potatoes, chopped
  • 2 c. cauliflower, chopped
  • 5 c. vegetable stock, milk, or water (I use milk)
  • 1/2 t. dried dill
  • 1/4 t. caraway seeds
  • 1/4 t. dry mustard
  • 1/4 t. black pepper
  • 1 1/2 c. shredded cheese (I prefer cheddar) or sour cream
  • salt to taste

Saute the onion, garlic, celery, and carrot in a generous amount of butter until tender (sorry, I don’t measure, I just throw a big chunk into the pot:)); I like to cover it and leave it on low until the vegetables are soft.  Add the liquid of your choice (stock/milk/water) and cauliflower.  Bring to a boil, then simmer for about twenty minutes until the cauliflower and potatoes are tender.  I like to blend it at this point with an immersion blender, but that’s not necessary.  Add the seasonings, except salt.  Now add the cheese and stir until it’s all melted.  Salt to taste, and enjoy!

You can adapt this to the vegetables you have on hand, keeping the vegetable total to 6.5 cups.  Often I use a lot more cauliflower and leave out the carrots and celery and it still tastes great.  It just depends on what I have on hand.

Avivah

Do you have to be ‘smart’ to homeschool?

homeschooling,

>>i have always been a a poor student myself and am scared therefore to homeschool. would you say that being “smart” is a requisite to homeschooling?<<

Does being a poor student mean that you’re not smart?  Absolutely not – I reject that!  Similarly, I reject the idea that the kind of intelligence needed to do well in school is more valuable than other kinds of intelligence.  There are many kinds of intelligence and every single person is uniquely gifted in some way. Many people did fantastically well in school but weren’t successful in life, career, relationships….  School based success is very limited.

Having said that, I understand that the question is being asked because of the insecurity that as a poor student, you might not be able to meet your child’s academic needs.  Parents who haven’t completed their high school education (sometimes only up to 8th grade education) have successfully homeschooled their children past the point that their education was completed.  If they needed to know what their children needed to learn, there’s no way they could have been successful.   I can say with confidence that you can go beyond your school experience and support your child/ren effectively and watch them thrive while homeschooling.

How so?  There are a number of options.  First of all, there are other resources out there except for you – you don’t have to know everything!  There are books, dvd programs, classes, mentors, and paid resource people.  I love the library; it’s free and has a huge variety of materials for you and your children to access. Many who did do well in high school still don’t remember the information well enough to effectively teach it to their children.  I have two children homeschooling high school now, and their interests and my strengths don’t always line up. But they aren’t limited by me and my knowledge base – I’ve encouraged them to develop  independent learning skills, and they’ve been able to explore their interests and gain skills beyond me.  (They already know not to bother asking me for help with math at this point! :))

Second of all, a fun aspect of homeschooling is that you can learn along with your children!  There’s so much to know out there and it’s ridiculous to think that anyone covered it all in four years as a teenager, no matter how high their report card grades were.  My kids are constantly sharing new things they learn with me, and as I learn new information, I share it with them.  It’s invigorating and exciting to expand your knowledge base, and being a parent doesn’t mean it’s too late to learn more.  It’s never too late!

What’s more important than your academic success in school is your willingness to tune into your child’s needs and find ways to support him.  It’s not really any different than what a parent who was ‘school smart’ needs to do.  Don’t be afraid, and don’t think you’re unusual – we all have areas we feel inadequate about.  You can homeschool and you can do a great job!

(This post is part of the Carnival of Homeschooling.)

Avivah