-
Alt Text for Image
Waste Not Want Not
As most hens do, mine dropped off their egg production to nothing or next to nothing right around the winter solstice. Imagine my shock when I bought a flat of eggs in preparation for Christmas cooking and guests and found it to be about three times the price it had been a year ago! The egg production here is picking back up—from three to six eggs most days—but they are still being treated like the treasures they are.
This morning, I rummaged around in the refrigerator and found a package of corn tortillas that were past their prime so I used those, some leftover bacon, some salsa, and those precious eggs to make migas. I stood there stirring our breakfast as it cooked and started thinking about other ways to use up things in the fridge and in the pantry—partly to keep food from going to waste and partly to put off a huge grocery shopping trip as long as possible. I thought about all the delicious dishes that have come about to use up food that might otherwise go to waste—French toast, panzanella (Italian bread salad), trifle, stocks and broths, bread pudding, a vast variety of soups and stews, and just as many casseroles and savory pies. That led to me thinking about how spoiled we Americans have been with cheap and readily available food. I know the egg situation has been a reality check for lots of people just as the shortages at the beginning of the pandemic lockdowns were.
I realize I am very different from most people my age, and especially those younger than I. I was raised by parents who had each grown up very rural and very poor. Their families raised most of what they ate, slaughtered hogs and chickens they raised, kept gardens, caught fish out of local creeks and rivers, harvested wild fruit such as dewberries and mayhaws, and bought what they could not raise themselves with money from selling crops like tobacco or cotton. You can bet they never threw away a scrap of food that could be salvaged. I know what was thrown away went to feed hogs and chickens, not put in a plastic bag by the road to be taken to a landfill. It never crossed either of my parents’ minds, I am sure, to be picky eaters of any sort, and it has never crossed my mind either.
We all hear a lot these days about taking care of the environment, being “green,” and reducing waste. It has become a real political and societal football with us being encouraged and sometimes forced into adopting “green” policies. Personally, I am not a fan of many of the “solutions” that are proposed, like trading in for electric vehicles, getting rid of my gas stove, or trading in those gassy beef cattle for lab produced meat-like substance. What I am into is adopting the ways of my grandparents— treating food like I had to grow it myself and treating water like I had to pump it by hand or dip it up out of the pond. Individual actions like that will do a lot more to save the planet than any government program or mandate.