While, I would love to invite you all to share a meal at our house, I know that really isn't possible. I did want to tell you more about how we eat. It might help when trying to understand our Meal Plans or why I
have a tough time staying in budget the way I do.
We have a kosher home. This means that we do not eat pork, bacon, sausage, shellfish or any other fish that don't have scales. In fact we just learned that catfish isn't kosher because it doesn't have scales. It also means that we do not mix milk and meat. Yup, that's right no cheeseburgers for us. We buy special meat from one of our local Kosher markets. It's actually less to get it there than the supermarket. Winn Dixie doesn't carry any Kosher meat, Publix is 8.99/lb for chicken breast and I don't remember Whole Foods' price, but you can just imagine... This does limit the amount of meat eaten in our home.
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The other limit to the amount of meat eaten here is that the main cook, me, doesn't eat meat. I'm a vegetarian. Well, I guess, I'm technically a pescitarian. I eat fish, but nothing with legs. It used to be that my husband would eat meat when we went out. He believes in keeping "Americanized Kosher." The meat at the restaurants doesn't have to be Kosher, but he won't eat anything that is outright not Kosher (ie pork or a cheeseburger). Since we are trying to limit how often we go out, I am trying to serve more meat to appease Jolly Green Daddy's inner carnivore. It also helps that our local Kosher Market had a living social deal. We got 2 certificates each for $20 worth of food for $10. That means $80 of food (mostly meat) for $40, and being that we bought the certificates a couple months ago, it's not coming out of my current budget. Anyway, I digress...
I am trying to break my meat and potato husband of this desire and broaden his horizons. The
organic buying club we belong to has helped a lot. This has helped us to eat more fresh fruits and vegetables than ever before. Which works well because Jolly Green Daddy is not a fan of frozen veggies. He grew up on canned and if it's not fresh that is what he prefers. Being that the salt content is through the roof on these and, oh yeah, the green beans are brown, I won't buy them, serve them, go near them. I volunteer to coordinate my local group every other week, which means that I get my food for my time. This is a great help to our budget!
I am trying to serve my family as much whole food as possible and get rid of the processed foods. I have finally been able to make a tuna casserole without the cream of mushroom soup that my
family Jolly Green Daddy will eat. This was the hardest for me to master. We do still have some Annie's Organic Macaroni and Cheese in the pantry, though I'm not sure if I'm buying any more after we finish what we have. And there is some Stouffer's Macaroni and Cheese in the freezer for JGD. I am also trying to lessen my processed soy. I know that there is a lot of debate over soy and its benefits or harm. I'm not going to get into that here. I'm just going to say that I am trying to lessen the amount of meat substitutes I eat. I am eating Tofu and we do have Soy Milk in the house (mostly for use with meat meals or making bread).
We are also wondering if we might want to try some other diet changes to see that can improve our general health (Sorry, Mom!). But for now (at least through Small Fry's birthday) we will stick with our regular diet and decide what we want to do come March. I'm also leery to change my children's diets without talking with their pediatrician or a nutritionist to make sure that I really am doing what is best for them.
I bake most of the bread we eat, and am trying to make whatever I can. I have made some strawberry preserves and tomato sauce for fruit that we picked at a
local farm.
I think that about sums things up. I hope that helps you to understand why we do what we do around here.
Anyone else have a house like this, either Kosher or mixed diets? I'd love to hear what you do.
