Tomato soup, and changes to our eating habits

I've been reading Animal, Vegetable, Miracle (Which is today's recommended reading, by the way) and the more I read the more I want to change the way we eat. Not only because I don't want to financially support the terrible food industry in America any more than I have to, but also because I think eating local, in-season produce comes only second to actually growing all your own food as far as making you truly appreciate what's on your plate come mealtime. For example, you really start to appreciate summer's bounty when you're on a strict local-only diet and you've been eating potatoes, carrots, turnips, meat, and whatever you managed to preserve for 6 or 8 weeks and winter's only half-over. It's going to be a slow process, but I'm trying to reduce how much meat we eat while expanding our horizons as far as vegetables go. So far, I've eaten mushrooms (meaning I got over my aversion to consuming any sort of fungus whatsoever simply because it's fungus), asparagus, turnips, and acorn squash. Those are all things I either never liked before or simply hadn't had. I don't necessarily love them yet, but I have a feeling I will eventually. Still, this little project isn't without it's obstacles, the biggest one being my stupidly high metabolism and hypoglycemic tendencies. I need a lot of calories and protein and I cannot get through an 8 hour shift at work on nothing but salad and fruit. On top of that, I have lazy days where I don't feel like cooking and opening a can of Chef Boyardee ravioli sounds really good. I also have days where I get distracted and forget that I need to eat until it's too late to cook something before I have to leave for work, and due to the aforementioned hypoglycemia issues not eating before work is not an option for me. But I'm working on it. I'd like to eventually get to the point where we can just stock our freezer with free-range meat from local farmers once a year and get by on that. The only way that will be affordable is to reduce how much we eat. Same with milk. I drink way too much milk and if I want to buy all organic pastured stuff I'm going to have to cut my consumption. Getting Trevor on board with that idea is also something I'm working on.

To change topics for a minute, I pulled up the garden several weeks ago, but due to the rather mild summer I had more green tomatoes than red on the vine when I went to compost the plant. I couldn't bear to just toss them, so I decided to put them in one of my cloth shopping bags and see what happened. Then I forgot about them.

Well, a day or so ago I suddenly remembered they were in there while I was at work, and a pang of guilt hit me. Surely they'd be rotten by now, and they'd all go to waste. Owing to my wonderful ADD, I again forgot about them until today. I'd skipped breakfast (coffee doesn't count) and for lunch I had a salad, some cheese and crackers, and a handful of apple wedges. Seemed I'd hit a vegetarian streak, and I decided to continue it. We went to Half-Price books, and then Target, and the whole while my stomach growled and I tried to figure out what I could have for dinner that'd still be vegetarian. Then I remembered the tomatoes.

I looked into the bag when we got home and wouldn't you know it, they were just about all perfectly ripe. I inspected them and found one that was going bad, and while chopping them up I had to toss maybe two more smaller ones that were too bruised and mushy. The rest of them went into a pot with some minced garlic sauteed in butter and are now gently simmering along with some spices, salt, and pepper. I'm going to add some rice, lentils, and barley too and it'll make a hearty meal. I only wish I had some dough I could pull out of the freezer like I did earlier in the week with my roast. Perhaps tomorrow I'll do some batches of bread and dinner roll dough so I can have hot crusty bread anytime I want.

Oh yeah, speaking of that wonderful roast: I put it on the table and sat down to eat and it hit me... this meal was entirely homemade. There wasn't a single pre-packaged thing in it save for the milk and block of cheese I served with it, and I told Trevor that if we had a cow those would have been homemade too. I was proud of myself then and I'm proud of myself now. Maybe this whole "Eat more vegetables, less meat, and try to stay in-season" thing won't be so hard after all.

Here's how I made my soup, by the way: (EDIT: So as not to surprise anyone who decides to make this, this is not traditional smooth tomato soup. It's chock full of the barley, lentils and rice with a little bit of broth left over. Rich, hearty, and delicious.)

1 large clove of garlic (or 2 smaller ones)
2 tablespoons of butter (what I had on hand, you could probably use less)
2-3 lbs of fresh tomatoes
onion powder, salt, pepper, oregano, basil, cloves, bay leaf, sugar
half-cup or so each of rice, lentils, and barley and some frozen corn if you want

Heat the butter in your pot, mince the garlic. Sautee the garlic in the butter and take off the heat while you chop your tomatoes. Now, I had a food mill so I just chopped them, added 2 cups of water to the pot with the garlic, and threw in the pieces. Without a food mill you're going to have to blanch the tomatoes and remove the skins and seeds. (Hint: Get a food mill.) Added the herbs and spices and let it all simmer 20-25 minutes. Ran the lot through the food mill, added sugar to taste, and then put it back on the heat to bring it to a boil. I put in the rice and lentils and waited a couple of minutes before adding the barley and corn since it cooks quicker. After that, I let it simmer for 12-15 minutes and stand uncovered. It went from thin and watery to thick and rich. I served it with garlic bread. :)

No more leaves

The news is saying that the Fall colors are just about at their peak, and when we get away from the apartment, they are. Right outside, though, the trees are already bare. We're getting a lot of sunlight in the apartment and on the balcony now, which is good for my mood and great for the little rubbermaid full of leafy greens. Those are probably going to be history by next week, because now that they've been exposed to a couple of frosts they should taste really good. It's a shame I never managed to get any spinach or peas planted.

Now that we're settling into the cold part of the year, I'm going to have to find other things to do with my time. I'm currently crocheting a blanket which will probably end up being a baby blanket for our first kid whenever he comes (surely I'll have it done by then. Right? ... Right?) I'll probably bake a lot more now that the extra heat is a good thing, and I certainly need to work on my pie crusts. I'm also trying to cut down on buying food at work because there are other things I want that I can spend all that money on. I've been taking a lunchbox full of stuff to munch on throughout the day, though it's hard to find time when you work in a busy deli to take off your gloves, go in back where the customers can't see you, grab a handful of trail mix, come back, put more gloves on, and then keep going. Repeat that process enough times in one shift and you can't get your routine done. I'll be glad when I don't have to worry about finding time to manage my blood sugar while working.

I'm also trying to be more dedicated to cooking good food and eliminating some of the processed stuff we eat because we're too lazy to slap something together for lunch or dinner. Trying to cut down on our meat consumption has been a huge challenge, and it's going to have to be a long term goal because we need to broaden our vegetarian horizons and find out what we like before we can start cooking more vegetarian meals.

This is just a quick update, I actually need to hurry up and eat so I can finish the dishes and get ready for work. For now, I'm out.