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Category: economics

My kitchen needs more storage space

I have a small apartment, and in some ways it has been a good idea to limit my available storage space. I will fill anything… and that will just make it harder to move in the future. But I love my apartment, and I’m likely to stay here for a while.

So I am trying to figure out what to do with my available floorspace.

Option 1: Nothing.
Bonus: It keeps me from accumulating a whole lot of extra crap.

Option 2: Shelves
Can hold my cookbooks and extra pantry stuff… and, if the shelves end up sturdy enough, I could finally bring my mixer from my parents’ home.
Minus – omg, I already have enough food staples stored to hold out against a seige for a fortnight… but they could be in more visible locations so that I’d use them up… *cough* yeah, right, like I wouldn’t just fill the space because it was there… but I would move it all to a level where I didn’t need a stepstool to get to the ketchup.

Option 3: Chest freezer
I can steal all the 8 year old beef that is filling the bottom of my mother’s chest freezer and I can have more room to store my own stuff without having to keep 40 lunches at work.
Minus – I will hoarde food and possibly not get around to eating it, either. And what’s the point of having room to get free meat, if I’m going to spend $150 to get it? Also, it doesn’t solve the book storage problem. Do they make hutches to go over chest freezers, like an etagere?

Figuring out how food works with my finances

I made macaroni and cheese for the first time tonight.

Yes, I do have weird holes in my cooking experience.

So I need to talk about money –
What would you do right after realising your financial management is way out of line? Right – go shopping.

I spent today in the Italian Market.

I bought $27.92 worth of meat for [redacted] (which is excellent because I got almost everything she wanted despite having instructions to stay below $40 – I am a great food shopper)

For myself, I bought miscellaneous chicken bits (backs and necks and stuff) for stock – a 5lb bag for $1.85. I also bought 3 chicken leg quarters ($1.38) and butter ($2.49).

Then I made a strategic error, I think, in going to Fante’s. I bought some paper tea infusers because my teaball was too small to make my tea strong enough ($5.99) — but it cost the same as the teaball I use at work, but they were out of that one. I made tea when I got home – at least the bags work well. I also bought a magnetic hook ($6.49) so I can hang my measuring cups from the range hood instead of having them just hang out on the back of the stove because they don’t fit in any of my drawers.

Trip back and forth took two tokens ($3.30?).

And then I went to the produce truck and bought a bag of potatoes and some celery ($2).

Feeling bizarrely virtuous (aside from the Fante’s part) I went to the thrift shop to see if they had a bigger stock pot so I wouldn’t have to make stock in small batches. No pot, but I ended up with a $2 sweater.

That’s all the money I spent today.
Food: $7.72
Travel: $3.30?
Miscellany: $14.48

I mean, that’s not much and kind of awesome… but on the other hand I am so not good at keeping track at all.

Menu planning

Possible meals for tonight –

Meal #1 – Quesadillas
Ingredients I’d need to purchase
cheese $2-5
tortillas $3ish (I don’t buy them often, so I’m not sure)
Avocado <$1 salsa $3 mushrooms $1 Meal #2 - Eggplant curry Ingredients needed - Eggplant $1 onions $1 yogurt (optional) $2 nan (optional) $2 Meal #3 - Mushroom Risotto flavored with truffle juice Ingredients needed - mushrooms $1 heavy cream $4 (Can you make risotto without finishing cream? Cause then it'd be the cheapest by far) (ETA: yes, I know you can - but it's a question of whether it is morally right.)