Beans And Rice... Struggle Meals

Once a week, I try and cook a "Rice and Beans" meal. This week we will have seasoned black beans over brown rice with a homemade flatbread. It's quick and easy. I'm using my Artisan bread recipe for the flatbread. It does not require kneading. My Kitchen Aid is not working right now. It needs a new part ordered and then it needs to be installed, so I am not making breads that require kneading until it's fixed.

 

We also eat rice and beans throughout the week as sides or I use them as ingredients in other recipes. Earlier in the week, I cooked a pot of brown rice in the pressure cooker. I froze three quart sized bags of  rice and I made Egg Fried Rice out of the rest. 

I had about two cups of the fried rice left, so I grilled some Teriyaki chicken that I had marinated. I sliced the chicken and put it on top of the rice. This is a good example of "Gathering Up Your Fragments". 

Similar to oatmeal, rice can be eaten as a breakfast porridge. When I was a kid we ate hot rice with milk, butter and sugar.  It is delicious, much cheaper and healthier than boxed cereal. 

It is more cost effective to purchase dry rice and beans in larger quantities. I purchased the black beans that we are eating tonight on sale for $1.25 for a # 10 can. It weighs 6 Lbs. 12 Oz. That is about the price of a 1 Lb. package of beans at Walmart. However, that was a rare find. A good rule of thumb is to cook your own food. Don't buy ready to eat foods. It is just too expensive and probably unhealthy.

Beans and rice are a nutritious and cost effective addition to our diets and to our budgets. They can stand alone as a meal, be used as side dish or be used as ingredients in recipes. Start slow if you are not use to whole foods. No explanation needed....

Blessings,

Mrs. Smith

 

Impossible Pie -- Crust Less Pie Recipe...

We love this custard like desert. It's origins are unknown, but it was thought to be created out of necessity or by accident. It is a simple recipe, but really tasty. I decided to make it today, since I am starting to get an abundance of eggs from the hens. I also decided to bake it in a cast iron skillet. It was a great choice too, since my larger pie pan was MIA.  

Milk

Eggs

Dry ingredients, except coconut, together in a separate bowl.

Butter(Slice into 6 pieces)

Vanilla

Dry ingredients on top of wet ingredients.(Except coconut)

Pulse until mixed.

Coconut

Pulse a few times until mixed.

It's ready for the pan.

Buttered pan

Pour mixture into your butter pan.

Bake in a pre-heated 350* oven for 50-60 minutes.

Bake until golden.

The sides will pull away from the pan and be a deep golden brown.

Let cool 15 minutes before slicing. If you can wait that long! Serve warm or cold.

Ingredients:

2 C Milk

4 Eggs

2 TSP Vanilla

6 TBS Butter (Cut into 6 pieces)

1 C Sugar

1/2 C Flour

1/4 TSP Salt

1/4 TSP Baking Powder

1 C Shredded Coconut 

Directions: 

In a blender, add all the ingredients, except coconut, in the order they appear in the ingredients list. Make sure the dry ingredients are on top of the liquid in the blender or you could have unincorporated flour in the bottom of your blender. Pulse until mixed. Add coconut. Pulse just enough to mix in the coconut. Pour mixture into a buttered pie pan or buttered cast iron pan. Bake 50 to 60 minutes in a 350* pre-heated oven. The time can vary with size of your pan and your oven. The edges will pull away from the pan and the top will be golden brown. 

Variations:

Make it gluten free by using a GF flour

Try different flavors like chocolate or almond

Use a smaller deeper pan for a deep dish pie 

Enjoy,

Mrs. Smith

Top and bottom.

Edge

Side

Struggle Meals... Gravy

I baked some chicken thighs in the oven yesterday. I had to use the oven in the house, because the wind has not let up for weeks. I used cumin and jalapeños for flavoring and served them with a quinoa rice blend and green beans. It was the first whole meal that I have cooked since the construction began. In the bottom of the pan was a wonderful crust of chicken fat flavored with spices. Chicken fat makes delicious gravy. The pan drippings helped me decide to do a Struggle Meal post based on gravy. 

"Gathering Up The Fragments"
This was the leftovers from the baked chicken meal. The baggie contains the coveted drippings from the bottom of the pan that will be the base for our gravy.

I deboned the chicken thighs.

I cut up the thigh meat. It was a lot of meat as you can see.

This is the leftover rice and quinoa blend that we will use as a base. 

This is a gallon bag of stock that is a by-product of veggie scraps and a chicken carcass.

I broke the frozen stock into pieces.

I returned the broken pieces that I was not going to use back to the freezer.

I used my largest skillet.

I added the bag of drippings to the pan.

I heated up the drippings. 

Added flour.

I browned the flour mixture for a few minutes.

I added the free by-product stock from my freezer.

Stirred the mixture until it was smooth.

Continued to cook it down until it reached a gravy consistency.

Added salt and pepper to taste.

Continued cooking.

Added the chicken.

I cooked it for another 5 minutes or so.

The chicken gravy is complete.

I thought about adding mushrooms, but decided that this was basically a free meal. I will explain...

In a smaller pan I heated up some butter.

Added green beans and spices.

And viola, I had a practically free meal....

Here is how I did it. The neighbors gave us the chicken thighs, green beans, butter and flour before they moved. I bought the rice quinoa blend for .01 cent from Misfits Market. So all that I have invested in this meal is the spices.

Now let's be realistic...

Chicken Thighs                            1/4 LBS      .25

Flour 5 LBS                                  1/4 Cup      .05

Spices                                                              .15

Butter                                                               .25                   These numbers never 

Brown Rice                                                      .36                    align properly!

Green Beans                                                     .54

Water or Homemade stock                              Free

                                                                         $1.60

This makes it .80 cents per meal. I could have made a lot more gravy, since I had a lot of meat and I could have frozen the leftovers or made more meals out of it, but I didn't. This gravy was very flavorful and filling. 

Making gravy makes it easy to stretch meat and is a great way to combat inflation. Making meatless gravy is even cheaper. Breakfast gravy is also easy. We use a little hamburger or turkey sausage to flavor our breakfast gravy. We pour it over toast or homemade biscuits for a hearty meal. 

Gravy makes even the blandest foods, like plain white rice, taste better. It also adds calories and nutrition to your meals. It is easily made from gathered fragments from leftovers or homemade stocks. 

I encourage you to "Gather Up Your Fragments" and make awesome stocks or meals from them. This will save you lots of money at the grocery store...

Blessings,

Mrs. Smith