But my wife doesn't really like vegetables, except for a few selected types, she hardly eats any other vegetables.
BUT... she loves soup. So I've basically taken to cutting everything up and boiling it into a soup until everything is soft and she will be willing to consume it without much complaints.
There's a lot of stuff she doesn't eat by itself... onions, capsicums, cauliflower, carrots, etc...
But what to use as stock base? I tried just boiling the soup with vegetables, but it was just bland, even with salt and some soy sauce. There was just a lack of depth in flavor.
Previously, I would use pork, chicken or beef bones. But those are expensive. And since I want to try to keep my dinners to as vegetarian as possible... "as possible".... I'm not vegetarian, and I will still use oyster sauce, but I'm trying to just keep it to just veges as the main dish.
So the secret ingredient for cheap soups is.... drum roll.... MISO...
A cheap miso paste is around $2.50 for 500gm. And that will last for a long long time.
I usually use one table spoon for around 400ml of water, then cut up veges and dump them all in and boil til everything is pretty much soft...
I'm not proud of it... but it's the only way to get my wife to eat her veges and for me to clear up the large quantities of vegetables which I have.
It's a pretty healthy meal. A simple vegetable soup and easy to prepare.
I don't do this for ALL the veges I collect, just the ones she doesn't like. I still stir fry vegetables with oyster sauce and mushroom sauce and all that. But since I can't choose the stuff I collect at Pasir Panjang, on days that I can get veges that she eats, I take those, otherwise, I will just collect what is available and make a soup out of it.
Another thing I do is, I also use organic stock cubes... ok this is a cheat... I don't use the cubes by Maggi or Knorr. I feel those are just too salty and loaded with all kinds of chemicals.
I use Kallo organic cubes when they are on discount at Cold Storage or one of those premium supermarkets. But those aren't as tasty as the Maggi or Knorr cubes. So I have to use 2 cubes for every 1 liter of water.
On discount, each box of organic cubes is around $3.30 for 6 cubes. Otherwise, they are $6.60.
The strange thing is... in Singapore, Kallo organic cubes have only vegetable varieties. Like mushroom cubes, or garlic and herb cubes. But when I was in the UK earlier last year, I managed to buy and bring back, organic beef and chicken cubes.
Obviously, this method is more expensive than just using miso... but I do it for a change every once in awhile. Else drinking miso soup all the time would just be boring.
For anyone who would like to cook healthily and super cheaply... I highly recommend this method...
To join the freegan group to get free vegetables from Pasir Panjang on Saturdays, (Wed is possible but most readers are working), then bring back a stash of vegetables (enough for a week) to boil with a fairly cheap miso...
Organic miso paste can be bought at NTUC or Cold Storage at around $6 for 250gm. I bought my cheap miso at $2.50 for 500gm at Meidi-ya.
With just $2.50 for the miso, along with an estimated $3 transport cost per collection... assuming you do it every week, a whole months' worth of dinners could potentially cost only $3 x 4 weeks, +$2.50 = $14.50... plus the cost of whatever rice you are using.
Alternatively, unsold vegetables can be collected on some evenings with the freegan group at Little India, when one vendor we are acquainted with gives us his excess inventory.
I'm not advertising for anyone or the Freegan group. Just sharing.
Cos I've been getting loads of vegetables at low cost and I've been drinking soup for quite some time and I'm not getting bored of it, cos I switch the soup base around a bit. And I'm really enjoying my soup with a mixture of vegetables which I usually don't get to consume, cos previously I wouldn't buy them cos my wife wouldn't eat them.
This is a post more to share about reducing grocery cost and how I'm handling the large volumes of vegetables with a simple and cheap recipe, which is healthy and nice enough for both of us to eat regularly without getting bored.
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