One step closer to being off the grid!

When we moved to our little cabin in the mountains we had dreams of one day living off-grid. Being in a rural area, we were already on a well and septic system, but very dependent on our rural electric "co-op"...and I use that term loosely. While most of our neighbors have gas (er, no pun intended), our house was never equipped with it. Instead, we've depended on electric baseboard heaters to keep our house "warm" in the winter. I use that term loosely too since it takes all we have to get it up to 60 degrees on the colder days. Our highest electric bill last winter was $650. Forget environmental sustainability, that's not anywhere in the neighborhood of financially sustainable for us.

But today, my friends, today the chains that shackled us to those electric baseboard heaters have been broken by this little beaut' ~

 

Okay, so the massive black metal kind of takes away from the beauty that was the huge, open stone fireplace but man does this baby put out some heat!

I'm not 100% over-the-moon about this option, since it does mean burning trees, but I think it's better than gas or electric since we can use wood found on our land from fallen or dead trees. Now if I could just match a couple of those PowerBall numbers we could finally get solar panels. Baby steps.

Meatless Monday: Kasha Pilaf

This Meatless Monday recipe for Kasha Pilaf is my way of being lazy multitasking and combining two of Midnight Maniac's challenges: Meatless Monday and Clean Out The Cupboards. I've had a box of Kasha in my cupboards for longer than I care to admit. I'm not sure how it got there...I think it was in a box of stuff given to us by a friend when she moved back east. Kasha is 100% pure buckwheat, which I've never cooked with or eaten, so I've been a little hesitant to make it. But I promised myself I'd get the box cleaned out of my cupboard this month, so today was the day to do it!

Kasha Pilaf

Ingredients: 

1 cup Kasha

2 cups vegetable broth

Any vegetables you'd like to add. I used a handful of mushrooms, sliced carrots and corn, plus two handfuls (handsful?) of sliced zucchini.

Begin by sauteing your vegetables in butter or olive oil. Add a dash of salt and pepper, to taste. When done, add your 2 cups of vegetable broth and bring to a boil. Add Kasha and return to boil. Cover and turn heat down to low. Let simmer 10 minutes or until the Kasha has softened and the water is absorbed.

I found the smell of the Kasha (while cooking) to be extremely woody, but was pleased with the taste. I'm planning to reheat the leftovers in a wok with a dash of soy sauce and an egg tonight. I think I can sell it to the kids as a veggie stir fry.

This post has been shared at My Sweet & Savory, Hey What's For Dinner Mom? and Midnight Maniac.

Not buying it? Check in here.

Fortunately for me, but unexciting for my readers, I don't have much to report for the I'm Not Buying It challenge other than: I haven't bought anything. Yay me! I mean, it's not a big feat considering I wasn't a sport shopper to begin with and we're only 21 days into the challenge, but it does bring a nice feeling of satisfaction.

Our weekends thus far have been filled with lazy mornings and fun filled afternoons instead of harried trips to big box stores. And with the money we've saved, Fletcher gets to enroll in an after school program called Mad Science that he was dying to go to last semester. Hmmmm...mind-numbing trips to Sprawlmart or mind-expanding education for my child. It's funny how $150 can be blown so quickly during a day's worth of stops at our favorite stores, yet it seems like too much to spend on an after school program. {must get priorities straight}

How are you doing with this challenge? Have you made any purchases or revelations?

Setting goals & cleaning cupboards...

Here we are halfway through the month of January (!?) and I'm completely slacking on the Clean Out the Cupboards challenge. Unless I put something down on paper, I fear I'll crash and burn on this one. So my goal for this weekend is to take an inventory of my cupboards and freezer and make some meal plans for the next two weeks...not all at once though...I'm not that crazy, er, ambitious. I'd like for 50% of each meal for the rest of the month to come from the cupboard or freezer(s).

So...who has a recipe that includes coconut milk and a can of pork & beans? And who put pork & beans in my cupboard anyway? Seriously, not something I would buy.

I did make two meals this week that should score me a few COTC points: chicken enchiladas (chicken from the freezer, enchilada sauce from the cupboard) and chili. The chili was perfect for the cold weather and included ground beef from the freezer, a can of tomato sauce and dried kidney beans from the cupboard and a random onion that somehow managed to survive in our garden. Okay, and half a jar of spaghetti sauce from the fridge. I never said I was a purist.

Meatless Monday: Asian Cucumber Salad

PF Changs used to serve an incredible cucumber salad that is, sadly, no longer on their menu. I guess not everyone found it as incredible as I did? At any rate, you can make this at home very easily. I can eat this and nothing else for lunch, especially on a hot summer day (of course we have six inches of snow right now, but a girl can dream!).

Asian Cucumber Salad

1 large or 2 smaller cucumbers

1 Tbsp rice vinegar

1 Tbsp sesame oil

1/2 tsp salt

3/4 tsp sugar

1/4 tsp chili garlic sauce (or more to taste)

1/2 tsp white sesame seeds

1/2 tsp black sesame seeds

Slice cucumber and set aside. Mix vinegar, oil, salt, sugar and chili sauce well in a sealable container. Add cucumber, seal and toss so that all of the cucumber slices are well coated. Refrigerate for 15 minutes. Remove from fridge, drain the extra dressing, toss in the sesame seeds and serve immediately.

If you're making this dish just for one, you might want to halve the recipe as it doesn't keep very well...the cucumber starts to get soggy.

It also makes a fabulous accompaniment to an Asian dinner. You can mix the dressing beforehand, but don't toss it with the cucumber until the last minute.

Be sure to visit Midnight Maniac for other great Meatless Monday ideas!

Buying it, for a cause.

We've broken the Compact just a week into the new year, but for a great cause! Saturday was Gena, or the Ethiopian celebration of Christmas. One of the local Ethiopian churches threw a huge celebration for the adoptive families in the area. Upon announcing the party several weeks ago, Pastor Ermias imagined that maybe 20 people would show up. What he got was almost 300 parents and children!

The church members who helped with the party were incredibly gracious, feeding everyone, teaching the children traditional Ethiopian games, braiding hair, hosting a traditional coffee ceremony, singing songs, telling stories and giving a gift to each family in attendance.

The families had conspired in advance to make donations to help cover the cost of the party, however, we were told quite firmly that no donations would be accepted. We did learn that one of the books read that evening, Makeda, the Queen of Sheba, had been written by one of the church members in order to help Ethiopian-American children learn about their heritage. Knowing that the proceeds from the book benefit the church and the Ethiopian community, we purchased a copy without giving the Compact a thought.

This morning I had one of those slap-your-forehead moments: "D'oh! We bought something! How did we buy something without even realizing we were buying something?" But I can say with confidence that I don't feel the least bit bad about it. We bought something meaningful, that benefits someone local who is doing good things in the community. It was published and printed locally. What more can I ask for?

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Have you stopped your junk mail lately?

I'm republishing this old post today because junk mail seems to be something I think about every January. I receive far less junk mail than the average person (even my mail man thanks me for that!) but some junk seems to creep into my box each year and I resolve to stop it, yet again. Using the links below you can eliminate tons (probably literally and figuratively) of the magazines, catalogs, credit card offers, etc. that you get in your mailbox each day...

One of the websites you'll be visiting is the Direct Marketing Association who is responsible for a large portion of the crap in your mailbox. The DMA (somewhat humorously) claims that "Direct mail is a green way to shop. If Americans replaced two trips to the mall each year with shopping by catalog, we'd reduce our number of miles driven by 3.3 billion—a 3 billion pound reduction in carbon dioxide and a savings of $650 million on gas alone."

Forget the energy and resources that go into growing the trees, then cutting them down and making them into paper, printing the advertisements or catalogs, shipping them to us, then the packaging for the products we've ordered, and the oil used in shipping it to us. Yes, that sounds very green. Let's say we just cut out two trips to the mall each year and go for a walk or bake cookies or work in the garden instead?

{climbs down from soapbox}

So here are some resources to help you stop the flow of junk mail, credit card offers, catalogs, et al. It's easy. You can even do it while you're pretending to work today!

• Catalog Choice: www.catalogchoice.org - This site lets you search by catalog name, then opt out of receiving it. I've managed to stop all of my catalogs except for that darn Pottery Barn. I've found that, if you do order something from a catalog or online store, you may start receiving that catalog again, so you'll have to re-opt-out.
• www.OptOutPrescreen.com is the official website that allows you to opt out of credit card offers (for 5 years or permanently)
• Direct Marketing Association: www.dmachoice.org - Allows you to manage credit offers (redirects you to the optoutprescreen.com site), catalogs and magazine offers, and other random mail marketing offers. I think last time I did this I had to pay $1 by credit card (you also have the option to print the form and mail it with a dollar if you prefer). It's worth the buck.
• Val-Pak (that blue envelope filled with coupons for carpet cleaning and new windows) has an online form. You need to enter the info exactly as it's printed on the Val-Pak you receive, so you may have to wait until you receive the next one. You can also email valerie@valpak.com with "Remove From Mailing" in the subject line. Again, you need to include your information exactly as it appears on the envelope.

While you're out there saving the world, visit www.donotmail.org and sign their petition to create a national Do Not Mail registry similar to the Do Not Call registry.

DNM claims that "...more than 100,000,000,000 pieces of junk mail are delivered each year—that’s more than 800 pieces per household. In fact, junk mail in the United States accounts for one-third of all the mail delivered in the world. Even though 44% of that mail goes to the landfill unopened (source: EPA), we still spend 8 months of our lives dealing with it all."

Now go forth and save a tree today!

Spicy Roasted Chickpeas

I spotted this recipe on Salon.com last week and have renewed my love of chickpeas because of it!

Spicy Crisp-Roasted Chickpeas

Ingredients

    * 1 can garbanzo beans, drained, rinsed and thoroughly dried
    * ¼ teaspoon Chinese five-spice powder
    * ¼ teaspoon cayenne pepper (more to taste)
    * ¼ teaspoon salt
    * ¼ teaspoon black pepper
    * 2 teaspoons olive oil

Directions ~ Toss everything together and spread on a baking sheet. Roast at 400 degrees for 40 minutes or until completely crunchy.

My next batch will be a bit spicier, but these really had good flavor. They'd be good in a trail mix...or just in my belly.

Compact: Day 1

January 1st always sends me into a mad state of cleaning, organizing and purging. I'm not sure what it is about the new year, but I hear I'm not the only one who feels like getting a fresh start.

In the spirit of the Compact, we thought we'd take the opportunity to return a few Christmas gifts we'd gotten each other that just didn't quite work out.

After hitting Walmart, Target, Kohls and Old Navy I felt a bit like a recovering alcoholic who'd been dragged on a pub crawl. I didn't fall into that zombie-esque "MUST_BUY_SOMETHING" consumer trance though - always a good thing.  And we now owe $85 less to our credit card and have a $60 credit at Walmart (where we can do grocery shopping).

How is everyone else doing? Have you purchased anything? Been tempted to?

If you'd like to chat with me and some other Compactors, visit us on the Living Simple & Green message board at iVillage.

Eating From the Cupboard on Meatless Monday

It's been over two weeks now that I've been at home with three kids, while trying to work and maintain my sanity. I gave up trying to clean, do laundry or wash dishes sometime early in the first week. My house looks like a zhu zhu pet factory exploded and, well, I didn't even take a shower today.

Needless to say, at 4:39 when I realized that a) it was Meatless Monday and b) the creatures would eventually demand food, I didn't have anything interesting to whip up and resorted to kitchen sink pasta - pasta, sauce from a can, and all the veggies left in our fridge.

The bad news is that I haven't made any progress with my New Year's resolution to try new recipes. The good news is that I killed two challenges with one can of sauce: a (somewhat lame) Meatless Monday dish and I Cleaned Out the Cupboards by using sauce and pasta that we already had in stock.

Are you trying to save money and recover from the Month of Spending? Then join Midnight Maniac and a host of other bloggers who are eating their way through their pantries in January. (Of course you can join me in Not Buying It too!)

Drat! I knew I should have given that random can of pork and beans to a charity at Christmas time.