Ingredient Insanity

 

 $8.00. 1.75 oz

$6.66  1 oz

$1.53   4 oz

$2.18  18 oz

$2.10  2.5 oz

$20.47  total

I've experienced this over and over.  I look at a recipe.  What in the world was I thinking? I wonder.  

In this case I was considering making BBQ sauce.  Not that I wanted to.  It would last about a week, maybe.  Would I like it? I don't know.  

But what really outrages me about so many of these recipes is the list of ingredients.  How much is BBQ sauce that is already made?  About $5.00.  But just the ingredients I don't have on hand are $20.47.  And the ingredients I do have weren't free:  tomato paste, apple cider vinegar, erythritol, dry mustard, onion powder, and garlic powder.  This is not to mention that I'm leaving some of the ingredients out - kosher salt (? why?), unsalted butter (? why?) and crushed red pepper flakes.  Should I really follow the recipe, those would cost about $15 more.  BBQ sauce for around $40? Who makes these recipes up?  

Then, what would I have?  OK, maybe I'd like it and I would be set for a week and then set aside 45 minutes each week to gather and prepare all this again.  This is not a good solution to a BBQ sauce shortage. 

What ingredients does it probably take to make BBQ sauce?  I am guessing tomato sauce or paste, sweetener, vinegar, salt, and maybe onion and garlic powder.  But no no!  This has to be made into an expensive extravaganza.  Why???!!!  

I looked at another recipe for an almond flour bread.  For starters, almond flour bread is OK.  Just OK, not great.  At the end of the day it's a substitute for wheat bread, which some people are avoiding for lots of reasons.  Still, it will never be wheat bread.  It will be a distant second.  

"Oh," whoever made up this recipe said,  "You have absolutely got to do it this way.  I have made almond bread over and over and painstakingly tried ever imaginable combination of ingredients.  You will love this!  But I will not in any way say that if you substitute  other brands for the ones I recommend it will be any good."  

Really?? I checked the prices on her ingredients.  Over $100.  I commented on this on her post.  Everyone was just raving about how this was the best almond bread in the world.  But to find out if this was good I had to gather the ingredients, prepare it, and spend a hundred dollars?  What if I didn't like it?  And I don't make it that often anyway, even if it is a good enough recipe.  Why?  I just don't see the point of almond bread. It doesn't work very well for sandwiches, if at all.  So what would I do with it?  

When one decides to stay away from processed foods, it is going to mean making most of what you eat from scratch.  This is probably the biggest obstacle to staying away from processed foods.  Lack of convenience.  You are hungry and maybe you don't have all the ingredients.  Or time to spare in the kitchen.  I would estimate that you need at least 6 hours a week to prepare food if you don't go the convenience food route.  Well, OK.  Deal with it.  But to add to this all kinds of expensive, silly ingredients and time consuming, unnecessary steps to get what?  A sauce?  It reminds me of the wisdom of sewing one's own clothes.  

I suppose I should make a recipe book that shows people how to actually survive on homemade food and not spend thousands of dollars and unlimited amounts of time doing it.  Clearly, most people have no idea how to prepare food or to budget what they spend at the grocery.  Maybe this explains all the recipes that are so wasteful of time and money.  

In fact, I even know how to survive on about $75 a month on food.    Not because I was so much trying to save money.  I lived on recipes based on sprouts that I grew myself.  This I did for six months.  I was well fed and happened to have blood tests after that. The doctor said, "I haven't seen lab tests like that in a long time," and asked me what I was eating.  Someone asked me if the doctor was saying that in a positive or negative way.  Well, what do you think?  

I came away with the knowledge that the easiest way to store food in the event of some food shortage is to have around 200 lbs of sprouting seeds, and maybe some form of cooking oil.  I found tomato powder to be handy in place of tomato juice or sauce.  And beans and other legumes are nice to eat as soup.  Onions and eggs were my biggest expenses.  And a good thing about sprouts is that, should some food shortage happen, it would only be about five days before one had a crop ready to harvest, not three months.   Not to mention, sprouting seeds last easily for years and don't take up a lot of space.   This was not a starvation diet.  There was plenty of food.  

I'm not against storing other things, like canned goods.  I just think the sprouts are the best plan for inexpensive, easy to store food.  

I checked my spices today to see what I have.  No paprika, cayenne pepper, or chili powder.  Well, maybe those would be good to have.  No dried parsley.  I'm low on bay leaves.  I have lots of turmeric, sage, thyme, rosemary, cream of tartar, onion powder, garlic powder, black pepper, hot sauce, vinegar and cinnamon.

I wish people wouldn't be so ridiculous in their recipe recommendations.   It's a waste of time and money that could be better spend on preparing nourishing food.