A Week of (Healthy) Bare-Bones Meals: Day Two

One of the key ingredients to make it through a food hardship is variety. I've seen many blogs and websites geared toward bare-bones recipes, but they all seem to focus on the same ingredients, with little variation from day to day. A big part of surviving hard times with your sanity intact is having variety and feeling like you have choices. You aren't going to be very happy eating Ramen-style noodles, oat porridge, and beans everyday, are you? You need variety. It will make you feel better, both physically and mentally.

Variety doesn't have to mean buying more ingredients. It can be as simple as changing the way you present them or the way you use them. Take flour, milk, and eggs, for example. You can turn them into egg noodles, muffins, breads, pancakes, or popovers. All different. All the same. See how that works? Take this new trick and make this delicious, pretty, fun to eat breakfast that costs very little to throw together.

Day Two

Breakfast: Popovers with Eggs & Cheese (recipe follows)
Lunch: Leftover Vegetable Fried Rice
Dinner: Roast chicken, rice, and carrots, yeast rolls with butter or margarine


Popovers Stuffed with Eggs & Cheese
serves 8

What You Need:

for the popovers:

• 3 eggs at room temperature
• 1 Tbsp melted butter or margarine (or cooking oil)
• 1 cup all-purpose flour
• 1 1/4 cups milk
• 1 tsp salt
• cooking oil for greasing pan

for the egg filling:

• 8 eggs
• splash of milk
• salt and pepper to taste
• butter, margarine, or cooking oil for the pan
• 1/4 cup cheddar cheese (shredded) & 1 green onion, chopped, for garnish

How it's Done:

1. Preheat your oven to 450 degrees. Stick your muffin tin(s) or popover pan(s) in the oven to warm up.
2. Mix all the ingredients except greasing oil in a blender. Blend until smooth, scraping down the sides of the bowl as needed.
3. Remove pan(s) from the oven and oil them well. Pour batter into the pan(s) to 3/4 full.
4. Bake at 450 for 20 minutes, then reduce heat to 350 and bake an additional 10 to 15 minutes.Popovers will be high, hollow, and golden brown when done.
5. After reducing the heat, beat the eggs with milk and salt and pepper for the filling. Cook in a hot skillet until done. Sprinkle with cheese and green onions.
6. Cut them open as soon as you remove them. This is to allow steam to escape. Cut the tops off almost all the way. Fill with the eggs, cheese, and green onions. You can add some cooked leftover vegetables if you have them for even more nutrition and variety.

Frugal Tip #2: Buy some things in bulk. Namely, cheese, eggs, and baking supplies. Buying cheese in large bricks, then slicing or shredding at home saves money and takes very little time. Always check unit cost, but bulk buying gives your money more power.