Bless, looks great!

The co-op makes the purchasing decisions based on what's freshest and coming in for the large region. It's not as locally-focused as I would like, honestly ('cause we're nowhere near a cantaloupe ranch up here in the Rockies... not til August!), but it is very fresh, and from smaller growers, which is why there's such a price break--no retail middleman. They have a standard "mixed fruit/veg" basket (this week that was right around 30 pounds of produce for $15!!), but also have weekly additional options that vary, such as signing up for five loaves of nine-grain or olive-oil bread for $10 (direct from the bakery!), or getting fresh tortilla packs, or a whole crate of apples, etc.

Once our local farmer's market kicks up in June, we'll go that route, plus our own garden, with a goal of eating cheap and fresh all summer, and putting a good bit by for winter consumption as well. There are several very elderly couples and widows in our neighborhood who are downsizing their canning supplies this year (they're no longer needing to supply a family of ten, now that they're 90!), and I'll be first in line, bribing them with cake, to help relieve their burden and re-stock my jars. (We gave our entire supply away--about 2000 jars---during a move to a much smaller space, so it's this big cycle, I think. I won't be going for a full re-stock of jars, but 500 to 600 quarts and pints mixed would be lovely.)

I am going to give no-knead bread a try either this week or next!

Tonight's supper is baked chicken with either rice or mashed potatoes, gravy, steamed carrots and parsnips, green or spinach salad, and a choice of brownies or orange-cream floats for dessert.

Elizabeth, the co-op sounds like a very good deal! And I am jealous that you are able to acquire large quantities of canning jars, relatively inexpensively! Apparently hardly anybody cans in my area and, of those who do, nobody seems to be parting with their jars! Canning jars sell for $10 per dozen at the grocery store and I've never seen them go on sale! The fancier, "quilted jelly jars" cost even more!

Breakfast today was boiled mung beans. DD ate hers with sugar; I ate mine with "katta sambol", a very spicy mixture of chillies, shallots, a certain type of dried fish pounded until very fine, salt and lemon juice.

Lunch will probably be some of the hot sausage links, baked beans (from a can), salad, and maybe the last 2 ice cream sandwiches.

For dinner - probably some pasta with some of the leftover roast chicken and Brussels sprouts.

Wow, Elizabeth! Even with a family of six, 2000 jars sounds like a lot. Did you really use them all? Five to six hundred is more reasonable - but where will you put them? I'd surely not have room for them in my house, which has more square feet and fewer people than yours. I continue to winnow my supply of storage items, such as for the fridge or freezer. I had a big container for things like chili and spaghetti, but finally gave it away, because it was too big, and got smaller containers that hold one or two servings each: easier to store and more practical in terms of gradually thawing just what we need.

Bless, I sometimes eat rather unorthodox breakfasts. I'll give mung beans some thought. To tell the truth, I'm not sure I've ever eaten them except mixed into other food, such as Chinese. But I would skip the hot stuff on them.

Elizabeth,
The gal that taught us the needlefelting, is starting a coop with the various farmers this summer, and I am checking into joining it. I don't have a garden, other than some herbs, and it would be wonderful to get both fruits/veggies/ and meats, eggs. I am hoping that this will be something I can take part.

With a family of six, if the goal is a rotating year's supply of home canned fruits, vegetables, and meats, the jars add up fast. Consider:

We eat most fruits and vegetables by the quart in order to get full servings for each person; those will last one meal, with perhaps leftovers for the next day. So, to be fully stocked, I need to plan for a minimum of seven to ten quarts of veggies per week, which gives one to two veg options per dinner (times 52 weeks in a year)... that's over 500 quarts right there, and we're not out of the veggie section. Add in another 300 quarts of various fruits, 500 pints of various meats, about 150 pints of jellies and jams (make PB & J for one lunch, and we've gone through a loaf of bread and half a jar of jam... times six days a week, times 52 weeks a year...), 100 pints of pickles, home-canned salsa, 50 pints of pasta sauce, and also other condiments, plus some fun stuff like apple pie filling, cherry pie filling, or peach pie filling (which could also be done by adding to the fruit stock, of course)... getting really close to 1800 jars (mixed pints and quarts) just off the top of my head, and without getting funky with new recipes. Getting to a full, rotating year canning set-up is a BIG process, and one that can take several years to get to. We don't plan to do it all in one year.

Making space for even modest production this year will be done in several stages: first is to clear and sell down things we have but don't want; next, maximizing shelving space in the garage to put things that are currently under the stair out there; third, collecting jars (we'll go for 200 to start... that's the plan!), and that number will easily store under part of the under-stair shelving DH built.

But, really, to consider a whole year? 200, or even 500 jars is not enough for a family of 6 people; it would not offer sufficient quantity or variety. Most people never consider their food in a yearly-consumption manner. Three cups of flour weighs about one pound. That will make about one loaf pan of bread. We go through a minimum of eight loaves of bread a week, year 'round. That's 416 pounds of flour every year, minimum, without inviting friends over for lunch, and not counting any other kind of baked goods.

Food quantities add up when you look at it a year in advance.

Many families in this area have kept up the old tradition of home preservation, so when great-grandma decides, at 80, to downsize, and the younger generations already have their jars (jars are actually a popular wedding gift up here!), many times they're just offered to congregation members. The set we gave away had been given to us by a neighbor.

Cyd: Thanks for the ideas of extending our meals to extended family. They're with us fairly regularly and I have done the usual lasagna, paella, beef/chicken stew, pork chops, etc. I have been giving it some thought and may give a couple of new recipes a try. They're actually from a cable show dealing with food. We've never eaten Moroccan, so I thought that I might try that.

I enjoy cooking for a large crowd, however, my parents don't like to see me work that hard. So I try and find recipes that I can do with minimal work that they see.

I don't do a lot of canning/preserving but I have had over 200 jars of fruit, jellies and jams. I have given some away over the years as gifts and so my number has dwindled as well.

We're looking at "renting" some land for gardening this year. Our back yard is very shady and doesn't produce anything very well. Last year we did dig up the strawberry patch, as the plants had cycled out so we can add a few things in that area as well.

@Elizabeth. We have 300 jars for 2 people and that is not enough some years. We can more some years than others depending on how our garden does. Also some people don't give the jars back when you give them something so we lose sometimes a dozen in a year. 2000 jars for a family of 6 does not sound like a lot to me. I am sure my DM had at least that many for 5 people. I so appreciate the hours we spent canning on the old wood stove in the basement when I was a kid.

Elizabeth, thanks for posting those numbers and calculations. As you know, I am looking into building up a long-term sustainable pantry myself and those numbers are helpful. Of course we are a family of just 2, so our quantities are a bit smaller. So, pints, instead of quarts. The only thing I can in quarts is my tomato chutney. My DD just loves that stuff and a pint will last us less than a week!

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Today's menu:

B'fast: homemade blueberry muffins
A.M. Snacks: banana (for me), Quaker chewy granola bar for DD
Lunch: DD - leftover Pasta Roni Fettucini Alfredo with roast chicken added to it (from yesterday's dinner); me - leftover sausage and baked beans (from yesterday's lunch); grapes for both
P.M. Snacks - potato chips (!) for me ; Japanese cookies and candies for DD
Dinner: I am planning to make a chicken noodle soup from the roast chicken carcass.

Friday night I made pizza with a salad.

Saturday we had leftover pizza with grapes. A favorite at our house is cold pizza. Lunch was soup and sandwiches. DS made our dinner. He made homemade macaroni and cheese, chicken sausages, cut raw peppers and blueberries. He made tapioca pudding for dessert and garnished with strawberries and blueberries.

Sunday we had omelettes with toast and mandarin oranges. We didn't have lunch since we had a very late breakfast. Dinner was pork stir fry over lo mein. My rice took forever to cook. We had enough leftovers for the rice for either lunch or dinner on Monday. We also had berry shortcake using angelfood cake and home made whipped cream.

Tonight when the boys are gone, I'm make chocolate crepes with chocolate mousse and raspberry sauce, as a special dessert. They should be surprised. I made a pepperoni pizza last night. I have that hidden, and DH knows to rewarm it for them for dinner. This is our busy night. They'll hopefully leave the girls some, or we can have leftover macaroni and cheese or stir fry.

This weekend I splurged on some berries. I already had grapes, oranges, apples, bananas. The berries, although shipped in, were priced quite well. I bought strawberries and blueberries. I'm jealous of EC's melons as the ones here are so hard and tasteless.

With the strawberries and blueberries we have garnished pudding, eaten as a snack, especially DD. I made angel food cake and topped with the berries and fresh whipped cream. I still have many left. I just hope the kids remember to eat the "regular" fruit as well.

I'm not eating the melon (I'm *not* a fan of melon in general, and actually detest cantaloupe, but the rest of the family loves it, and they say: "YUM!" so I guess it's a nice one. LOL)... normally, I only pick those up in the summer, when they're in season locally. These come through the co-op from the more Southerly western states, so they're not shipped as far as the Costa Rican ones in the store, at least.

Our baked chicken last night was really good (sprinkled with salt, pepper, garlic, and baked til the skin was crisp. My favorite method!), and the hens were delighted with the plate scrapings (don't worry, we don't promote cannibal hens... they got any veg or rice scraps, and the trimmed bits from the salad. Oh, and the strawberry hulls, which they thought was an awesome dessert.)

Tonight... SIGH. Totally uninspired, and lacking direction. I'm in a terrible, terrible food rut, and that's really hard to break out of. We have eggs and cheese and ham, plus mushrooms, so perhaps we'll use the rest of the melon, and do egg stack and fried potatoes for supper. Egg Stack is my version of omelets. I stink at flipping those, so I do thin discs of egg, with cheese and goodies in between. We all get to sit down at the same time and have a wedge, so it works out really conveniently when serving more than a few people. We could still do orange cream floats after, too. (Orange soda, a rarity around here, with vanilla ice cream floated in. SO tasty!!)