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Coupons

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So I make a run on the Safeway on the way home from work, neatly combining a shopping trip with the commute. As I’m forking over $68 and thinking the prices have gone through the roof since my last visit, several weeks ago, the cashier hands me a coupon book.

Excellent, I think. This will be my introduction to couponing, a feature of my month of (not-quite-)extreme frugality.

Other bloggers sing the praises of coupons and swear you can get out of CVS with free products by combining cents-off coupons with sales. The purse-stuffing little pieces of paper evidently save costs in many stores, such as Safeway. I’ve never made a habit of using them, mostly because I think they’re a nuisance-I have enough paper to keep track of, thanks-and also because I rarely find a coupon for anything I want. To get the cents off, you either have to buy a product you ordinarily would not buy or switch brands. And when I select a brand, it’s usually for a reason.

Home at last, the groceries put away, and a glass of orange juice poured. Let’s take a look at what we have in the coupon book:

  • Spend fifty bucks at Safeway and you get a free reusable, environmentally friendly shopping bag, advertising Safeway. Unclear whether it’s canvas or just heavy-duty paper. If the former, sure; I’d buy $50 worth of groceries at Safeway for the privilege of carrying around its billboard. If the latter: I have enough paper to keep track of, thanks.
  • Two bucks off O Organics salad mix. Okay, I use that stuff and would be happy to…you have to buy a pound of it? Who do they think they are, Costco? If I buy a pound of cut-up lettuce, half of it will spoil before I can eat it. Penny-wise, pound-foolish.
  • Three bucks off a foliage plant. That’s nice. But my house is full of plants. They’re the only part of the clutter I didn’t get rid of during the Late Great Decluttering Campaign, because I can’t bring myself to do in a living thing. So I have enough houseplants to water, thanks.
  • One dollah off two Contessa Green Cuisine Meals. I don’t eat processed, prepackaged food. So this one doesn’t count. Two of them don’t count times two.
  • A dollar off two 12-packs of Diet Pepsi. Ick!!! Wonder if they have a coupon for orange juice?
  • A dollar off a bag of cheddar-flavored or vinegar-flavored potato chips. Uhm…I don’t suppose I could just have the cheddar cheese (real cheddar cheese, OK? not a “flavor”) or a nice bottle of vinegar? I don’t eat potato chips, unless forced to it by famine.
  • Two bucks off Yuban canned coffee. I don’t care for preground canned coffee. They put the cheapest, ickiest, most muddy-tasting coffee beans they can find in that stuff. Moving on…
  • A buck off two SunChips snacks. “Snacks”? No clue what the stuff is, but apparently it’s made at a factory where they use solar energy. There’s a good reason to buy it. Whatever it is, it doesn’t appear to be food.
  • A dollar off Miracle Whip. Ecchhh! What is the appeal of that stuff? I’ve never been able to figure it out.
  • A dollar off Back to Nature Granola. Why? Why would anybody buy granola? I make my own for a tiny fraction of the cost. It tastes better (a lot better), I control the ingredients, and it’s way, way lower in fat.
  • A dollar off four Campbell’s condensed salt licks…oh, sorry, condensed canned soup. Here’s a Warholesque image of a can of tomato soup. Campbell’s soup is another of those processed products that palely imitate real food. And the stuff is absurdly expensive, especially considering that many varieties are little more than “flavored” flour paste. Swanson’s is significantly better and that company offers low-salt chicken and beef broth. It’s mighty easy to make your own tomato soup with a can of tomatoes and half an onion. The stuff tastes ten times better and doesn’t leave your mouth puckered up.
  • Speaking of thirst, you get a buck off two six-packs of Nestle’s bottled water, in The Eco-Shape Bottle. Thirty percent less plastic than the average half-liter. “A little natural does a lot of good.” Haw haw haw haw haw! Funniest darn thing I’ve read in weeks. A plastic bottle is a plastic bottle, dear Nestle’s. Water is water. Most bottled water is tap water. Bottling it in plastic does nothing to improve it. Water sold in any plastic bottles still dumps zillions of unnecessary plastic bottles into the land fills, there to stay for all eternity, until the earth is a frigid cinder circling a burnt-out dwarf star. “A little natural does a lot of good,” eh? A little natural what?
  • Speaking of salt, as we were a moment ago, you can get another dollah off Annie Chun’s Soup Bowl or Noodle Bowl. Yum. To assuage the resulting thirst, pick up a 24-pack of Coca-Cola, rotting your teeth and fattening your belly for a buck off.
  • If you like your sugar intake organic, get yourself two 12-ounce jars of organic fruit “spreads” (and what would that be? we’re not allowed to call it jam or jelly?) or 16 ounces of natural (as opposed to “unnatural”) or organic (as opposed, one figures, to “inorganic”) peanut butter. Could be worse, I suppose. Could be the salted soup or noodle bowls.
  • Buy some “pure goodness”TM for a buck off two packages of Cascadian Farm products. Several strange-looking boxes are pictured, labeled “strawberry,” “oats and honey,” and “organic” somethingorother. Whatever it is, I don’t think I want to put it in my mouth.
  • Fifty-five cents off 64 or more ounces of Silk soymilk. Well, OK, if you think it helps your menopausal symptoms, more power to you. Me, I’ll take a glass of nice, cold water. Tap water. Hold the plastic, please.
  • Fifty cents off Clif, Luna, or Builder’s Bar. “Moving toward Sustainability” is this manufacturer’s motto: we’re told this outfit uses 70% organic ingredients (as opposed to inorganic ingredients), 30% to 50% less fossil fuels than conventional farming (but where does it say here that the company is a farm? it makes candy bars!), 450,000 pounds of shrink-wrap eliminated through redesign of packaging (good, good), 20,000 miles of shipping using bio-diesel fuel (oh, please, please, please smarten up, dear corporate executives!). Bars. It’s bars. Bars of what, we don’t know, but whatever it is, 30% of it ain’t organic. One of them has chocolate chips. Your kids can wash them down with some of that Coke and Pepsi you saved on above.
  • Make your soy Westsoy!” A dollar off four Westsoy, soy, or rice drinks. Urp!

Soylent Green is people!

  • Well, here we have the opiate of the masses: yes, yes, yes!!!!!! FREE (with coupon) BEN & JERRY’S MINI CUP. Yes. Three-point-six ounces of Ben & Jerry’s! I knew these coupons were good for something. We will be dropping by the Safeway on th’way home from work tomorrow.
  • “Organic Herbal Teas for Self Care”” a buck off a couple of ersatz nutraceuticals, teas that allege to sooth your sore throat and stimulate your bowels. For a buck off, you, too, can start a practice as your own snake-oil quack! No nuisancey medical school required!
  • A dollar off two packages of “Nature’s Balance Bath Tissue.” Ah! I used “nature’s balance bath tissue” during that time SDXB and I spent three months sleeping on the ground in the outback of Alaska and Canada. It was called “leaves.” Didn’t cost anything, so we didn’t need to ask for cents off.
  • Fifty cents off a bottle of astronomically expensive Tide high-efficiency detergent. Every penny counts, I guess.
  • A buck off Planet 2x Ultra Laundry Detergent. Take that, Tide!
  • A buck off any Green Works item. Hm. I’ve heard this stuff actually functions. I might try that. Now we have two reasons to go back to Safeway, the Ben & Jerry’s and…waitminit. The stuff is made by Clorox? Clorox is making “natural” cleaners (as though any household cleansers were not unnatural)? Well. No wonder it works. “Made from plant- and mineral-based ingredients.” That explains why it “contains no harsh chemical fumes or residue.” Heaven only knows mineral-based ingredients like petroleum products are gentle, and so are plant-based ingredients like, oh…cocaine.
  • A buck off Purex Natural Elements Liquid Detergent. To their credit, Purex’s ad designers refrain from ridiculous sloganeering, double-talk, and empty phrases.
  • A dollar off All Small & Mighty Laundry Detergent. It’s concentrated. According to the ad copy in the front of the coupon book, concentrated is good. Very good. But I have a lifetime supply of Kirkland out by the washer.
  • Suave has also cooked up a design alleged to use less plastic: 13,863,828 fewer plastic bottles each year! Dang! Could we see the math on that, please? And how do the stockholders feel about your selling that much less shampoo?
  • Method handwash chemical-gel, creamy, or foaming: 75 cents off. Personally, I prefer bar soap. It has less wetting agent, so when you wash your face with ordinary soap, it doesn’t flow right straight into your eyes. Is there a reason we need different products to wash our faces and our hands? What is it?
  • Free box of o.b. tampons. Thank God I’ll never have to use those little gems again.
  • Oh, jeez! FIVE DOLLAH OFF A BRITA PITCHER OR THREE-PACK FILTER! Sold!
  • And finally, two bucks off a package of Duracell rechrgeable batteries, or a charger. Duracell has figured out that “rechargeable” justifies printing the word on the batteries in a green label. Green, rechargeable. Rechargeble, green. What’s inside one of those things, anyway?

Now we have three objects to get on the next shopping trip:

  • 1. 1 free 3.6-ounce container of Ben & Jerry’s (which I would never have thought about without this fine offer)
  • 2. 1 Clorox product, alleged to be, uhm, not unnatural
  • 3. 3 Brita filters. Or maybe a pitcher for the office.

Notice what’s happening here. Though we’ve rejected most of the blandishments, a few of which are come-ons for some truly noxious-sounding (and two or three proven noxious) products, we still propose a trip to the store for three new products, two of which we do not need. One is free. But after the free sample, how many of us will get out of the store without buying a pint (at least!) of Ben & Jerry’s Cookie Dough Ice Cream? Or maybe that double-whammy chocolate stuff? I need the Brita filters, the better to make our tap water potable. But free calories? Another Clorox chemical? In any event, the coupons save six dollars, but I spend whatever the Clorox product costs and whatever the Brita filters cost (plenty, as I recall).

Because you have to buy the Clorox product before May 26 and I already own two gallon bottles of Simple Green, I’m required to buy a product that I don’t need and won’t need for many months…possibly not for a year or two. Come to think of it, three Brita filters are sitting in the kitchen cabinet.

With the exception of a few household products, most of this stuff is junk food or highly processed food “products” that are full of salt, sugar, and weird chemicals. Exactly one item of fresh food appears: prewashed, precut lettuce that a) costs more than a head of lettuce and b) is likely to spoil before one person (moi) can consume it all.

We’ve spent a quarter of an hour leafing through and contemplating this pack of coupons, only one of which really is worth anything. That is, at $30/hour, we’ve spent about $7.50 of my time to save $6 on products that I already have. And…why are these coupons are good for us again?

Monday Household Hint: Hide cords with no special gadgets

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Dunno about you, but I loathe seeing wads of computer cords, lamp cords, and telephone cords laying around the floor. Besides making a ugly-looking mess, they get in the way of Roomba-she chokes on them-and they’re a nuisance when I’m vacuuming with a more serious machine.

You can buy various gadgets to bundle cordage together. But in the first place I’m too lazy and cheap to track the things down and order them, and in the second, people who use them tell me they’re nuisances in their own way.

There’s an easier way, involving hardware you’re likely to have around the house: cup hooks. Got some heavy-duty stick-on Velcro around the house? That’ll work, too.

For a desk with an “apron” around it, get a few cuphooks. Climb under the desk, bringing your handy-dandy electric drill with you. Drill small guide holes, not very deep, about every six or eight inches along the inside of the “apron” or, if your desk top is thick enough, on the bottom side of the tabletop. Screw in the cup hooks, using the guide holes as starters. Then untangle the cords, bundle them neatly, and tuck them into the cup hooks, so that they are held up off the floor and prevented from wadding themselves together.

Here’s how that works:
apr21cords1

These are computer and printer cables, phone lines, and a lamp cord running under my desk.

And here’s how the desk looks to a viewer in the room:
apr21cords2

With the chair in place, the power strips are barely visible. Some of the other cords extend to the right and plug directly into a wall outlet, which is completely out of view. It would be even less cord-cluttered if I would bestir myself to get AirPort. But that might be work. And it certainly would cost me something. Horrors!

A table in the family room has a lamp that has to be plugged in way across the room. Check this out:

apr21cords4

The view from above. Before I secured it under the tabletop, the lamp cord dropped off the table on the right side and ran across the floor under the chair-messy and a hazardous nuisance.

For cords sitting on a table whose backside always will be turned to a wall (that is, it’s not the kind of furniture designed so that someday you might place it in a room where it can be seen from all sides), cut a strip of Velcro three or four inches long. It should be long enough to go over the cords with plenty to spare on either side. Stick one side of the Velcro to the back of the table. Place the cord where you want it, and then place the other side of the Velcro over it, pressing firmly to secure the strips of Velcro together. Do not remove the plastic backing on the top piece of Velcro.

Well…you get the general idea. My PC has had it with uploading graphics and refuses to import these either in Flash or by web browser, & I am tired, having copied & pasted wayyyy tooooo many old posts from accursed iWeb into WordPress. If you want to use Velcro, do the obvious: Stick a strip of glue-on Velcro to the back of a piece of furniture. Press the cords into place and stick the other half of the Velcro, with its gooey backing protected by the plastic backing, over the cords. This will hold the wires where you want them.

Weekend Roundup: New neighbors edition

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This morning as I drove past my old house, I spotted some people moving in! Stopping to say hello, I met a friend of the new owners who was helping the young family to move and was wrestling with the watering system, which (welcome to our neighborhood!) had sprung a leak. He asked if I knew how to get into the system’s control box–someone had shut it and lost the key. Well, Richard the Landscaper Extraordinaire had installed the same make of system over here, so I had an extra little plastic widget, which I lent to them.

I have yet to learn whether it helped, but in the meantime got to see a bunch of my old neighbors, who I miss a lot. It’s good to be further away from the war zone at the corner of Nineteenth and Dunlap and almost out of reach of the unholy construction that’s already started on Nineteenth, but friendly neighbors are worth a lot.

The young family moving in has three kids. The house has four bedrooms, so I suppose it’s doable…but unless two kids bunk together, it means Mom and Dad have no private space other than their bedroom, which in these houses is not large. But then, when we were growing up nobody ever heard of home offices and “den” was a word that meant “family room.” They have all three kids in the mid-town Catholic school, so that’s good, since the public school that serves this neighborhood is notorious as a “problem school.” People move here, put their kids in that school, and forthwith their house goes right back on the market. So if the kids stay at St. Francis, maybe the family will stay in our neighborhood. ?

It’s a quiet week in Lake Wobegon. To the extent that interesting stuff is going on, it’s happening on the Web. Check out J.D.’s startling post at Blueprint for Financial Prosperity asking what the heck you’d do it if was your mom and your sister who stole your identity and racked up 17 grand of debt in your name.

Five-Cent Nickel explains what is meant by “mutual fund correlations” and points to a tool that reveals correlations among Vanguard funds. The Micahs have figured out how to spend their tax rebate: Mr. M. needs a new computer.

Across the Pond, Plonkee has a very interesting post on “the credit card shuffle,” a maneuver calculated to leave you with the smallest interest on your largest debt and the largest interest on your smallest debt. This allows you to follow the Dave Ramsey version of snowballing, wherein you work on the smallest debt (regardless of interest) first to charge yourself up psychologically, but to get rid of the stiffest interest rate first.

At Wisebread, Jabulani Leffal offers up ten ways to go on a date for $20 or less, plus some lively prose.

Jim at Blueprint for Financial Prosperity pokes a hole in the myth that a 15-year mortgage necessarily saves you more than a 30-year mortgage.

RacerX is back after a short hiatus. Glad to see he’s returned.

SVB offers ten practical tips for new entrepreneurs at The Digerati Life.

Be This Way highlights the brilliance of a Florida state elected representative. We have geniuses like that here in Arizona, too. Just now ours have set aside their prudery in favor of displaying their bigotry.

Trent at The Simple has another one of those posts that make me feel glad I’m past child-bearing age, this one about the infuriating ubiquity of commercials in school curricula. If I had a kid today, you couldn’t get me to put her or him in the public schools, and probably not even in private schools. It’s beginning to look to me like if you can’t afford to have one parent knock off work and home-school a child, you can’t afford a child.

Well, Granma is tiring out, so it’s time to roll up the sidewalk and dodder off to bed. Hope all you young pups are having a wild and wonderful Saturday

Handy li’l Quicken hack

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By accident, I discovered that if you right-click on an entry in Quicken for Mac, you bring up a menu with several options. One is “report on [name of payee]” and one is “report on [category].” So you can create an instant report on a single category.

If you’re curious about how much you’ve spent in one category or how much you’ve been forking over to a single payee, this is very convenient. You can customize the dates to give you a view over a specific period, allowing you to see what’s been going on over a few weeks, months, or years.

Trees and the frugalist

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The orange harvest is about consumed. I think two more oranges are left, out of my reach-tomorrow morning I’ll have to drag the step stool into the back yard and retrieve those. Arizona sweets, the two trees each bore at least a couple hundred fruits this winter, ripe in February and sweet as candy. For the past three months, I’ve been eating a half-dozen a day.

What a wonderful bounty!
apr19olives

I can’t imagine ever having a house without at least one fruit tree. My last shack had two Arizona sweets, a grapefruit, and a fig tree. This one, in addition to the two orange trees, has an amazing Mexican lime (pictured at right) that just now is covered in fruit and two young Meyer lemons, both of which blossomed in gay profusion this spring.

Manny, the current owner of SDXB’s former abode, has added plums and peaches to the existing grapefruit, orange, and tangerine trees. He insists he can get these to thrive here, and indeed, one of my colleagues has managed to grow edible peaches, apricots and plums in our scorching Valley of the Sun.

How frugal is a backyard fruit tree? I don’t know. The fig certainly was frugal enough: nothing much had to be done to it to make it bear. Citrus, though it’s fairly drought-hardy, needs plenty of deep watering and three doses of fertilizer each year to produce juicy, sweet fruit. If the tree bears a lot of fruit in a season, probably it’s a savings over buying that many oranges or grapefruit. And at 99 cents apiece, a lemon tree doesn’t have to make many lemons to be pay for itself. Lemon trees are notoriously fecund. At the grocery store, 99 cents a Meyer lemon does not purchase!

My water bill last month was $102. The lowest bill of the year, when hardly any water runs on the landscaping, is $70. The base rate is around $60. So all of the landscaping, including flowers and the pool, is costing around $32. Let’s guess the trees cost about $20 of that. Say the oranges bore 200 fruits this year. That’s a conservative guess; in fact, 6 oranges consumed per day x 3 months = 540 oranges, and I gave a bunch of them to friends in addition to the half-dozen I ate every day. But for the sake of easy math, let’s figure $20 ÷ 200 oranges = 10 cents apiece, roughly, per month, over about six months: 60 cents apiece.

That doesn’t figure in the fact that the water also goes on the lemons, the lime, the tomatoes, and the herbs. Still, the savings is probably not great…unless you figure that each orange tree actually bore about 270 oranges…. I was too busy picking and eating to count.

Tree-ripened fruit is so wonderful and so much better than grocery store produce, I’m actually dreading having to fall back on cardboard strawberries and barely ripe watermelons. Clearly, though, if the fruit falls on the ground and spoils or gets eaten by birds, it’s no bargain, neither water nor fertilizer being free. You have to have a way to preserve them.

Some people preserve citrus juice by freezing it in ice cube trays and storing the solid cubes in plastic freezer bags. You can make marmalade out of just about any citrus, and lemons lend themselves to lemon butter. Soft-skinned fruit can be canned or turned into jam, jelly, or butters. It’s a lot of work and I’m not sure I’d want to do it. That’s why I’m glad I live where citrus grows.

SDXB discovered that if you have a certain number of fruit trees on your lot-say, your house was built in an old grapefruit orchard, as many now centrally located 1950s Phoenix tract houses were-and you sell some of the produce, your lot qualifies as a farm and you qualify for an agricultural subsidy. You not only get a bunch of not-quite-free fruit, but you get a break on your taxes. Now that’s frugal!

Figs in Brandy

Wash a bunch of fresh, ripe figs. Prick them in a few places with a fork. Place them in a French canning jar with its rubber gasket in place. Cover with inexpensive brandy. If desired, add a little cinnamon or nutmeg. Store in the refrigerator.

Serve over ice cream.

Lemon Cream

Grate the zest of three lemons and then squeeze and collect the lemon juice. Next, beat five eggs plus five egg yolks until they are light and fluffy; then slowly beat in a cup of sugar, beating until the mixture is thick and pale yellow. In a large mixing bowl, whip four cups of heavy cream. In the top of a double boiler, pour the lemon juice over one tablespoon of gelatin. Allow the gelatin to soften and then stir over hot water until the gelatin dissolves. Stir the lemon-gelatin into the eggs, and then fold in the heavy cream. Chill in individual glasses or dishes and serve with whipped cream.

Lemon Curd

  • 2 yolks of extra large eggs
  • 2 extra large whole eggs
  • 1/3 cup sugar
  • 1 ½ Tablespoons minced lemon zest
  • 1/3 cup lemon juice
  • 2 ½ Tablespoons unsalted butter, softened

In a saucepan (about a quart size), whisk the ingredients together. Stir over medium low heat until the mixture coats a metal spoon, about 8 minutes. Pour the lemon curd into a bowl or French canning jar, cover, and store in the refrigerator. This can be spread on good bread or coffee cake, or served over ice cream.

This recipe can be doubled, tripled, or even quadrupled. Larger amounts require somewhat longer cooking, up to about 20 minutes. Of course, it can be made (to excellent effect) with Meyer lemons.

Meyer Lemon Marmalade

Thinly slice about six Meyer lemons, discarding the seeds and ends. You should have about three cups of sliced lemon. Place these in a bowl and cover with water. Let stand overnight.

Then bring the lemons and water to a boil and boil them uncovered for 10 minutes. Again allow to stand overnight.

Measure the lemon-water mixture and add an equal amount of sugar. Bring this mixture to a boil, stirring until the sugar dissolves. Then lower the heat but cook rapidly for about 45 minutes, until the marmalade sheets off a spoon. Pour the hot marmalade into hot, sterilized canning jars and seal the lids. This makes about six cups.

Drunken Orange Slices

Peel one or more ripe, fine oranges. Slice horizontally into quarter-inch-thick slices. Layer in a wide stoneware serving bowl or enameled pan, and cover the fruit slices with Grand Marnier or brandy. Chill for several hours, or let stand at room temperature for an hour or so and serve. Makes a great dessert as it is or served over ice cream.

Amber Marmalade

Take three oranges, three lemons, and one grapefruit. Halve these and seed them; then slice them very thinly. Measure the amount of fruit this produces, and place the fruit in a large nonreactive bowl or pan. Add three cups of water for each cup of fruit, and let soak for 12 hours.

Then place the fruit and its water into an enameled pot. Boil it for 20 minutes, and again let it set for 12 hours.

Sterilize some canning jars and lids.

Again measure what you have. For each cup of fruit and juice, add three-quarters cup sugar. Cook this combination in small batches, no more than five cupfuls at a time, until the fruit is clear and the syrup falls off a spoon in a sheet. Remove it from the pot, let it cool a few minutes, stirring. Pack the marmalade in the sterilized canning jars, seal them, and store them in a cool place.

Lime Marmalade

Thinly slice limes to make about one quart. Add 1 ½ quarts water and let stand overnight. In a nonreactive pot, cook the limes slowly for 2 or 2 ½ hours, until they are tender.

Measure the lime and juice. Add 2/3 as much sugar. Bring the mixture to a boil; turn down the heat and cook rapidly until the marmalade sheets off a spoon, 30 to 60 minutes. Pack the marmalade in hot sterilized jars, seal them, and store in a cool place.

Ceviche

Cut about five pounds of white-fleshed fish filets, such as halibut or sole, into small pieces. Place in a glass or stoneware bowl. Add three minced onions, 2 cups lime juice, and 1 Tablespoon olive oil. Stir together; be sure the fish is covered with lime juice at all times. Add some minced hot peppers. Cover tightly and marinate in the refrigerator for one to three days.

Jicama con limas

Chill a jicama in the refrigerator. Wash it, peel it, quarter it, and cut it into quarter- or eighth-inch-thick slices, or into slender sticks. Squeeze fresh lime juice all over it. Sprinkle with salt and eat as a snack.

Quite Possibly the Highest and Best Use of Limes

Quarter a Mexican or key lime. Open a bottle of pale beer, preferably Triple-X or Corona. Squeeze the lime into the open bottle and then push the lime quarter down the neck into the beer. Consume. Repeat.

Cheap Eats: Polenta

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I’ve decided to rename the Friday Frugal Crafts department “Cheap Eats,” since it’s more likely to include recipes and cooking crafts than paint-and-fabric projects.

Here’s a kind of comfort food that’s fast, easy, and cheap. You can top it with sauces, tomatoes, or cheeses (or all of the above) and have it for lunch or dinner, or you can pour some cream over it (hey!!) and eat it like hot breakfast cereal.

Polenta is really nothing but cornmeal. Instead of buying the pricier boxes labeled polenta, just get yourself a box of plain yellow cornmeal. Keep it in the refrigerator to discourage any little six-legged critters from moving in.

Memorize this: the proportion is one to five. One part cornmeal to five parts liquid, give or take. The classic recipe is just cornmeal and water, but you get a lovely creamy effect-and add nutrients-if you combine some milk with the water, in any proportion you like.
apr18polenta

Pour about five cups of water into a large pan. Bring the water to a boil over fairly fast heat. Sprinkle one cup of cornmeal into the boiling water, a little at a time, stirring constantly with a wooden spoon, large kitchen spoon, or wire whip. When the cornmeal is fully mixed in to the liquid, turn the heat down and allow the polenta to simmer over low heat for about 20 minutes. Cover with the lid slightly ajar, so steam can escape but bubbling cornmeal doesn’t splatter on the stove. Stir several times during the simmering process.

When the polenta is cooked, you can do any of several things with it. I serve up enough for the meal at hand, and then pour the leftover onto a plate so that it spreads out like a flat pancake. Allow this to cool, then cover it and put it in the refrigerator for later use (see below).

To serve hot polenta, try one of these:

  • Top a serving of polenta with a generous pat of butter and shredded or grated parmesan cheese. Sprinkle a little chopped parsley over the top. Season with salt and pepper.
  • Top polenta with hot spaghetti sauce.
  • Chop up a tomato. Add a little minced garlic, some fresh or dried herbs, and a bit of salt. Mix well and use this to top the polenta; then drizzle a few drops of olive oil over the top and add a generous sprinkle of parmesan.
  • Stir-fry some fresh chard with a little chopped garlic in olive oil. Serve over the top of a mound of polenta with plenty of parmesan cheese.
  • (This is very bad for you!) Place a serving of hot polenta in a small bowl. Pour heavy cream over it and sprinkle on some fresh or dried tarragon. Oh, what the heck-add a little butter, too! Season with salt and pepper.

Now, what to do with the polenta pancake?

Slice the refrigerated pancake, which should set up very much like a cooked pancake, into quarters or eighths or even into strips, depending on your purposes.

Melt some butter in a frying pan (you can use olive oil if you feel virtuous). When the butter or oil is hot, gently slide a piece or two of the polenta into the pan. Don’t overcrowd the pan. Cook the polenta over medium-high heat until it’s browned and starting to get kind of crisp on the outside; turn and brown the other side.

You can top this with any of the above (or anything else you feel like putting on it). Or you can cut it into 1/2-inch-square pieces and add it to a Caesar-type salad in place of croutons.

Clean-up:

Some of the cooked polenta will stick to the bottom of the pan, especially if you added milk. Fill the pan with cold water and let it soak for a couple of hours; the stuck-on stuff will lift right off.