the Waste-Not Blog

Oh, my goodness, can it be that time of year again? I'm afraid so, everybody! I've got almost a dozen flats of planted seeds, the very first pepper plants are poking up their shy cotyledons, and pretty soon I'll be planting my flat on onion seeds as well! (I usually end up planting some sets but my goal is to be able to rely on seeds entirely one of these years... given that it's March, this won't be the year either, but a girl can dream!) Seed shopping might be the most fun part of gardening. I know very few people who would put up a determined resistance to that assertion. I mean, sure, eating what you planted is fun too, but that fun is spread across the growing season and interspersed with a ton of hard work; but seed shopping? looking at dozens of pretty pictures, reading dozens of cute and interesting descriptions, drawing garden layout sheets with your favorite pens on your favorite graph paper? That wins. Hands down. Now if you've been blessed with

This is a tough one. On the one hand, my husband and I are living proof that with hard work and frugality it's possible to save money and even start a homestead on an income well below the poverty line. On the other hand, there are days when I stop and think about how much sooner our goals could have been realized, how much more stability our lives could have contained, if we'd chased down a better job for my husband years ago instead of months ago. There are a lot of reasons why people might choose not to pursue a more lucrative position. Maybe you don't currently have any skills and the cost and effort to obtain the skills you need seems prohibitive. Maybe the last time you hunted for a job you found the process to be stressful and unpleasant, and you aren't keen on boing through it all again in the near future. Maybe you have a great relationship with your co-workers or a great enjoyment for your current employment, and feel that seeking more pay would be at the ex

White, all-purpose flour.  It's inexpensive, readily available, and foundational to a whole host of delicious foods. It's far from deeply nourishing, even with the trace amounts of nutrition the factory adds, but can a case be made for using more of it? I believe so, and I intend to make it. Think of the foods that you buy most frequently. Not raw ingredients, mind, but finished foods. What comes to mind? For many, item one on that list would have to be bread. This includes sliced bread, hotdog and hamburger rolls, and Italian bread for spaghetti nights. Speaking of spaghetti nights, pasta is easily a close second to bread as far as regularly purchased staples of Americans. Including macaroni and cheese, egg noodles for soup, and of course spaghetti, pasta is a crucial part of even the most frugal of American diets (not to mention special occasion stuffed pastas like ravioli, pierogies and tortellini). We can't forget biscuits or their close relatives, scones and American

In "The Waste-Not Plan: level 1" I outlined concepts like the grocery snowball and other ways to spend less on food and necessities, in order to be able to build a higher level of financial independence and resilience. Important concepts included budgeting, taking advantage of economy of scale, and reducing debt, in addition to helpful tips about reducing impulse spending. Titled "Spend Less," level 1 is all about reducing how much money you need to spend each week and turning more of your income into disposable income. Level 1 consists almost exclusively of steps that anyone can take, right where they are, even if they live in an apartment without an inch of ground to call their own. Level 2: Depend Less. It's all about finding gaps in your self-reliance and closing them any way you can. While Level 1 works wherever you are, even a studio apartment in the Bronx, level 2 may require a move or at least a creative solution like using a community garden or lan

When I thought of the title for this blog post I had this little thrill, like, "Wow, if I can come up with something like financial fire drill, I must be really cut out for this blogging thing!" I started planning what I would do with the money when sponsors started paying to advertise on my site, and made a note that I really need to at least outline my planned cookbook. And then I googled financial fire drill and found out that literally every financial blogger talks about them, and so do most of the frugality bloggers. Oh well. What most people mean when they talk about a financial fire drill (outside the investment world) is to write down a plan of how to pare back expenses if you lose your job or have a major expense that suddenly arises. Things like having a list of non-essential monthly services that you need to cancel (like Netflix and your YMCA membership), knowing in advance how to apply for student loan deferment, and having some idea of what your minimum gro

"You never want a serious crisis to go to waste."--Rahm Emanuel Don't worry. The above is the first time I have, and the only time I will, open a blog post with a quote from a left wing terrorist! And this post is not a manifesto regarding the use of tragic current events to further one's own political ends. No, the crises that I'm focusing on today are personal and specifically financial in nature. How can a crisis go to waste. you may ask? After all, for most people a crisis is something that happens , and must simply be survived. Your bread winner loses his/her job. The car needs a transmission. The power goes out for 36 hours. These things can and do happen through no fault of your own, and present major challenges that have to be overcome to the best of your ability; it can feel at the time as though anything beyond mere survival is asking too much. Furnace broken? You'll just have to fork over that $450 and live on old Rice-a-Roni and tuna fish for

For us, the Waste-Not Plan is a blueprint to arrive at our ultimate goal of total independence in terms of food (for us and our animals), energy (at least in terms of heat and cooking, and using the grid only for luxuries that can easily be dispensed with) and money (we want to be able to have both me and Ben at home or at least working very minimally, so what land we have needs to at least pay for its own taxes and hopefully a bit extra). For others it might just be a matter of becoming progressively more self reliant: having enough food to know that a couple weeks without buying groceries won't reduce you to eating expired spaghetti-Os from the back of the cupboard, being able to pay down debt and add to a nest egg, reducing your carbon footprint and plugging your particular holes in the waste stream. That's why I call these "levels" instead of "steps," because even if you never get past "level one" or "level two," you're here. You&

15 grams of protein. 6-12 grams of insoluble fiber. 4-5 g of soluble fiber. Plus vitamins and minerals, particularly potassium. These all come from a one cup serving of cooked dry beans. The amounts of different nutrients vary based on the type of beans under discussion: black beans and kidney beans are very rich in iron, while lentils are a very good source of molybdenum and folate. But we all knew this, right? Beans are healthy, beans are cheap, we should all eat more beans. Clearly nobody needs to hear any of this information again. Remind me why I thought this post was a good idea? Oh. This is why. On average, a given American eats less than six pounds of beans in a year . That's about forty cups of beans annually, significantly less than a cup per week. We're all concerned about the burgeoning problems with cardiovascular disease, obesity, living wage, you name it--and we eat maybe a cup of beans in a week? Nonsense, I say! Balderdash, I proclaim! We can all do bet

Eating out. It used to be an obsession of mine, you know. If my husband and I were in the car together, and we drove by a restaurant within an hour or so of meal time, I would be on the verge of praying that he'd decide to stop and treat me. It wasn't that I didn't like cooking, I loved it! And it wasn't that I didn't have perfectly good food at home waiting to be cooked, either. For me, eating out was a novelty I hadn't experienced much growing up; while I was getting better at cooking, I wasn't yet to the point where I could say with confidence, "I could cook that better at home"; and meal prep, while fun, took mental energy that as a pregnant newlywed and then first time mom I didn't have much of to spare. These days, it's safe to say the novelty has worn off, and with it the youthful confidence that we can afford a dinner out has worn off a bit too. I am at a point where, in most cases, I could cook it better at home (at least w

Hey, all! Today I'd like to examine the frugal breakfast enjoyed (tolerated?) by millions of Americans every day: oatmeal.  It's packed with vitamins and minerals, loaded with fiber, and relatively easy to prepare; it's filling and warming; and it's easy to amend with such pleasant additions as walnuts, shredded coconut, or even (my guilty pleasure) chocolate chips, to help keep the boredom at bay. There are dozens of "recipes" online now for overnight oatmeal that you don't have to cook, mix-ins to make your oatmeal resemble your favorite dessert (oatmeal brulee is a thing, y'all, I wish I was kidding), and oatmeal baked in a muffin tin. So with all these recipes to make the morning gruel more interesting, what could possibly possess me to think yet another oatmeal recipe is necessary? The answer lies where, you will find, it usually does: there's a less wasteful way. More specifically, there are three main ways in which oats could be used with