One Less: Ornamental Spoon

Someone I once knew did woodwork as a hobby, and as a thank you for something I did for him, he gave me a hand-carved wooden spoon.

It looked beautiful, so I put it on display.

After ten years or so, while I was decluttering ornaments and trinkets, I realised it looked kind of ridiculous and cluttery being on display like that and put it in my utensils draw, and now it's my favourite spoon for cooking.

How not to have less!

This morning, I was flipping through a food magazine that my grandmother had passed on to me.  She buys a lot of them, and they get passed to her daughters and then on to me.  I used to read them all and tear out recipes to try, but after realising I was never going to get through that pile of recipes, I now just flip through a couple of magazines and pass the whole lot on to someone else.

A paragraph struck me in the 'everyday cooks notes' section:

Investment Strategy

Considering a new kitchen appliance?  Before you hand over the credit card, ask three key questions; where will I put it, how often will I use it, and this time next year, will I be finding a new home for it? Then, to keep things interesting, allow yourself one irrational purchase per year.

And that one purchase, does it matter where you'll put it, how often you'll use it or whether you'll still be using it next year?      But, magazines make their money from advertising, and if people were always rational with their purchases, then the magazine industry would probably collapse.  What a shame.  Okay, end sarcasm.

I think the thing that most struck me was that this snippet struck me at all!   How much has my thinking changed.   I'm not going to buy a Cuisinart ice-cream maker ($119) or a Redecker vegetable scrubber ($8.95), both advertised on the same page, because I don't need them.  Okay, I want the ice cream maker, but the three or four times a year I would use it doesn't really warrant the purchase, or the space in my kitchen.

The high chair dilemma

We have a high chair that we used with Big Boy.  Small Boy is almost ready to use a high chair.  The problem is that the high chair has been sitting out in the garage for 3 years and is looking a bit yuck.   A quick Facebook poll yesterday showed most of my friends would bin it and buy a new one.  There is an appropriate one on a good sale this week: simple, easy to clean, $34.

But, waste is still waste, and $34 is still $34.  I'm trying to learn to not buy things just because I want them.

I'm going to use up the last of some generic brand Napisan that doesn't work as well as the real thing and give the chair a scrub, douse it in some vinegar, and leave it in the sun for a couple of hours.  I've got a roll of that sticky book covering plastic that I don't need, and that will make a good cover for the tray - the only bit that food comes into contact before going into bub's mouth.  If I don't think it has come clean enough for my baby to eat from - and let's face it, in a few months he's going to be crawling around on my floor (gasp!) anyway - then I will buy a new one.

My new motto, which I read somewhere on the blogosphere but can't for the life of me remember where, is Use it up, wear it out, make do or do without.   I will only buy new things if I genuinely need it and actually have the money for it!   Even high chairs.

One Less Bowl

I had a bowl in my kitchen that contained a collection of rubber bands and the twist ties that come on our loaves of bread. And some marbles. No idea where the marbles came from!

We buy more bread than we use twist ties.  I know I use them, but I can't think what for, so I kept ten and a few rubber bands.

The rest went in the bin, and I'll check that my husband doesn't have any sentimental attachment the bowl before I give it away.

One less thing on my kitchen bench.

Too many meals!

Not that long ago I made a list of all the different meals my family likes to eat. Given that in our house there are only 2 adults, one small child and a baby, lots of meals I can make one night and we eat leftovers on a second night.   

According the list, and the number of meals from each dish, it would take us 110 nights to get through the list if I only made everything once.  3 1/2 months!  

Every Friday we eat pizza - usually home made - and on Sunday nights we have something simple, like cheese on toast, or baked beans or scrambled eggs on toast.  That leaves us with five nights a week, so it would take us five months to get through the list.

Add into the mix that we spend anything up to a month each year on holidays or visiting relatives, and we eat out 1-3 times a month, so if I cycled through our whole list and never tried anything new, we would only eat the same thing (other than pizza!) twice a year!  

This tells me that I need to do one of two things:

1. cut back on the number of different things we eat, or
2. not keep the ingredients for every possible dish in my pantry

I’m not much of a meal planner.  I tend to go the shops, see what is a good price, then decide what we’ll eat for the next few days.  The thought of deciding on Monday what to eat for the next seven days stresses me a little. Well, a lot.  I sort of freeze up and can’t think what we could possibly even eat.  I don’t like too much structure to follow, but then I don’t like to get to 5pm and wonder what we’re eating tonight.  I guess that explains having so many ingredients stored in my pantry.  

I probably need to strike a happy medium.  I usually do the grocery shopping once a month, then top up with fruit, vegetables, meat and milk once a week.   If I made a rough list once a month of meals we might eat this month, then I could make sure I’ve got the pantry staples for those things when I do my monthly shop rather than buying an item just because I used it up last month.   If I was really organised, I could even assess what is in my pantry and see if something, like a half packet of split peas, needs to be used up that month rather than it sitting in the cupboard for a year (or more!).  I don’t need to keep a packet of split peas in the cupboard for in case I decide to make pea and ham soup. I have to buy the ham bones anyway, so why not buy the peas too? 

I could also cut a few things off my list.  I’ve never been that successful making my own felafel, and as much as we love sushi, the effort it takes for me to make it isn’t really worth it.  If we want to eat those foods maybe we should leave them to when we are on holidays and eat out more.  

My grandparents’ generation, and even my parents’ to a large extent, just ate meat and three veg every night, with the occasional casserole or roast thrown in the mix. I wonder if that is better or worse than the vast amount of choice we have today?