Student Survival - Shopping Tips

I am making a sort of personal cookbook for my son in the fervent hope he gets his grades and starts at university next year. The thought struck me while starting on that that shopping tips would be even more useful, given he can do quite a few dishes already, but has never yet done a supermarket (or other) shopping run.

So for what they are worth, and in no particularly logical order, my top tips for student shopping survival:

1. In supermarkets check out the 'ethnic' food shelves. You'll find rice, coconut milk, spices and plenty more that is appreciably cheaper than the same foods (different brands) on the next aisle.
2. Recipe bacon aka cooking bacon is a wonderful deal - the ends, off-cuts and errors not suitable for pretty packets. Same bacon, and often with big chunks perfect for stews. And who cares if their bacon butty is made up of mis-shapes?
3. Tinned tomatoes - buy the cheapest - basic, value, whatever they call them in your store. Some colour variation, maybe a tiny bit of skin, but no difference in taste or standard. Which price sounds better, 31p or £1?
4. Don't be put off by Aldi and Lidl's lack of fancy decor, they do good food and at low prices. Lidl's Parmesan is the best supermarket one I've found, and it is between 35% and 50% cheaper than the stuff from certain other big name places.
5. Markets can be brilliant for fruit and veg, much cheaper than supermarkets and ethically often great as veg tends to be local.
6. Chinese supermarkets are another source of good and cheaper ingredients. When I get the chance I buy noodles in them for about a quarter of the Sainsbury's price, and tins of bamboo shoots and water chestnuts for 60p to 65p compared with 90p.
7. 'Basic' peppers again are a bargain, just more interesting shapes than the dearer ones. They don't come from bad plants. They are not 'off'. 
8. If you buy veg etc in supermarkets, a quick glance at the bagged up price and the loose price per kilo is worthwhile. Mushrooms you pick and put in a paper bag are a good 10% cheaper than the plastic boxes. 
9. For meat if you can find a butcher's shop (or stall on the market) use it. They will do small bags of mince (ragu, chilli con carne, etc) where supermarkets tend to do 250g minimum. Meat as spice in a ragu needs 100g or less.
10. Don't buy the cheapest bread. Bread should be a pleasure, and the crappiest sliced rubbish is not. Same thing with 'mild' cheddar - and with the latter you need twice as much to get the same flavour as you have with strong stuff, so it's a false economy.
11. Buy in season, when gluts mean cheap prices. The other side of this is don't buy stuff flown half-way round the world - food-mile guilt and the freight adds to the price. 
12. Some 'specials' are worth going for, others not. BOGOF fresh foods risks the 'free' one (not free) going off, so you wasted money and resources. Tins, however, are good value as they keep.
13. Own brand works for simple things like rice, pasta and bread. A brand's price includes a hefty proportion of advertising spend and something for sharper packaging. Who cares?
14. Protein isn't just found in meat. Mushrooms, tofu, Quorn, and beans are good alternatives, and a lot cheaper.  

Any other suggestions?

One Flame Super Student Soup

That's a soup for students, not made from, to be clear.

At a university visit with SC on Saturday the guided tour took in accommodation and a shared kitchen. I loved the community of the kitchen at my alma mater, though the very occasional disappearance of food from the fridge was annoying. As with my experience so today as regards the cooker - electric hob, doubtless to avoid yoots blowing themselves and others to bits.

A wonderful and easy shared meal if students band together to share cooking duties is a fish soup, easy, quick, nutritious and more than a bit virtuous. We had a version last week made with proper ham stock, but a chicken or ham stock cube (I avoid the fish and veg ones) is an OK substitute. Again this is really cheapo for four people, and there's just one pan to wash up.

In a large saucepan gently fry two chopped onions in oil. Don't let this brown. Chop the veg finely, they cook quickly and keep their flavour better. Add a selection of veg chopped finely: carrots are cheap and flavorful, so are turnips, maybe a Basics pepper or a courgette if there's a glut and they're cheap, plus two or three garlic cloves sliced thinly, and sweat them for two minutes. Boil 1.25l of water in a kettle and add this with two crumbled cubes (I like Knorr best), to the pan and up the heat until it reaches a bubbling simmer, then turn the heat down to maintain that simmer (easy with gas, a bugger tbh with electric hobs). Add either (or both) a couple of potatoes cut into small dice, or 100g spaghetti broken into very short lengths, and cook until they are just about done - about 10 minutes. At this point add your fish - cheapest in frozen packs of whitefish fillets or those bricks of pollock. When they are defrosted and cooked through, adjust seasoning and break up the fish into smaller chunks, then serve with bread and butter.

The economics: 520g pack of frozen whitefish fillets £1.75; vegetables if using Basics red pepper £1.25; spag 20p;  stock cubes 20p. Bread and butter according to hunger, but you can get excellent bread from Morrison's really cheaply - two small loaves for £1 so you can have white for most of us and brown for the saintly. Even with a ton of butter that's still going to be well below a fiver for four people.

If you want to push the boat out or play tunes with the idea a pack of smoked salmon bits for £1.50 added at the very end of cooking, or frozen prawns £2.25 for a 400g bag bunged in with the fish make this into a feast (that would actually feed six with another turnip, carrot and spud and half a litre more water). Or cube some 'cooking bacon' and add with the veg. Or throw in a few frozen peas or sweetcorn. This is more an idea/method than a recipe.

I wondered about mentioning that a dash of leftover cider would be good, then I remembered that this is meant to be for students, who tend not to leave much cider.

Nearly Vegetarian

As posted previously, I am trying to fit in one fish and two vegetarian main courses into our week's eating. Or nearly vegetarian. Like tonight's offering, which will be mushroom risotto, maybe with some peas to give a contrast of textures and some more vegetable matter (yes, I watch QI too, fungi are closer to animals than vegetables, but for culinary purposes let's forget the DNA analysis). Except I have some ham stock to use in making the dish, and am probably going to use up the last little bit of a packet of 'recipe' bacon too.

So the definition is broadening to mainly vegetarian. True moral veggies would be horrified by this. I am not a vegetarian at all, certainly not by belief. I just know that too much meat is not good for us. And is weight-for-weight far more expensive than mushrooms or vegetables other than those wastefully (and given their loss of freshness pointlessly) flown in from Peru, Egypt etc.

The inclusion of bacon as above reminds me of a couple of incidents long past. In my Sixties and Seventies childhood one of our neighbours was a vegetarian. When she came over for a party my parents gave my mother cooked her a vegetarian dish - a pie - specially. Except she later admitted to having included "A little bacon, for flavour." And holidaying in Brittany with another couple who were vegetarians I carefully explained to a waiter in a little restaurant that our friends didn't eat meat. He suggested a salad, which duly came with lardons. When challenged about this he said: "But it is only a small amount." 

Good Filla for Good Fellas

We are in culinary winter mode, the threat of a chance that there may possibly be the potential for snow ("Britain Doomed to Snowy Hell" - The Daily Wail) meaning we stoked up the multi-fuel stove, lit a rare fire in the living room (in the fireplace rather than just generally somewhere in the room) and have been upping the solidity of our evening meal. Tonight's was particularly robust, a simplified version of pasticcio.

The simplification only came in the layering - instead of the cookbook version that cut through resembles a sedimentary cliff face this was just penne and cheesy bechamel, tomato sauce and meatballs, penne and bechamel and a good layer of cheese on top.

This was another Monday night supper inspired by Sunday's roast, a way of using some of the remaining beef rib in the meatballs, and doing a bit more fridge clearance with three uncooked pork sausages that were disdained on Sunday morning, and about a third of a pack of 'recipe' bacon (another third became the stuffing served at the same Sunday afternoon meal). Hugh F-W was the source of the idea. In matters of meat I tend to refer to his books, which mix sound sense, culinary knowledge, and environmental awareness. It was he too who called pasticcio Mafia food.

How many Monday meals are dictated by the weekend's feasts? The rib of beef was not as extravagant as it sounds, reduced at Waitrose, and I have a feeling the girl behind the butcher's counter made an error, as a hefty 1.7kg two-rib joint only (only) cost £13. Given it did the Sunday roast, today's meatballs, and the rest will make a salad (with the bones destined to become the heart of a stock) or maybe a spicy Chinese soup tomorrow, that is not bad value.

Another spur to making the pasticcio was our new food processor. Toys need playing with. I'm still in mourning for the old one, about to be tipped. It was a present on our engagement, so not far off 30 years old. Fittingly, rather poignantly, it merely seemed to die of old age: no bangs or rattles, no distasteful smell of burning, one minute it was working, the next gone. It would have wanted to go that way. The new one has variable speeds and more attachments than James Bond's cigarette lighter, but I am willing to bet it won't last five years, let alone 30.

The Casserole Queen

Not me - if I were the casserole queen I'd demand to use the line let them eat casserole - but some annoying actress on a TV ad, saying (obviously from her script) she merits that title because she re-heats something bought at Morrison's or Asda (I think). I hate to think what it costs to feed a family on such cook-chill stuff, but I'm willing to bet it is rather higher than the cheapo midweek chicken stew we had two nights ago: £1 for four plump chicken drumsticks, £0.50 for a half-pack (if that) of 'recipe bacon' (as ever I found one with what amount to massive bacon-chop off-cuts, perfect to dice big or small), a giant leek from the allotment, two big carrots, a parsnip, an onion, and three spuds. A single red chilli and a shake or two of smoked paprika pepped it up, celery salt and a fat clove of garlic added depth. Thickened with cornflour (how unfashionable) it was unctuous and comforting, with a bit of bite too. The juices we dipped up with doorstep slices from a cottage loaf.

If the lot - enough for dinner for we two lumberjacks currently at home, and for me to reheat next day for my lunch - came to £2.50 I'd be surprised. The sad thing is that many of those who really need to get by on such sums will be spending more on the supermarket versions, lacking the basic cookery skills to fend properly for themselves.

Umami - Not Uvavu

My recent trip to Parma revived my interest in both Parmesan cheese and the taste for which we use the Japanese term umami. Last night's meal was turkey and mushroom risotto, which was enlivened by the use of a fair sprinkling - more like covering - of Parmesan. I had tasted the risotto before and after the addition, and  can say for sure that it wasn't just an addition. There is a culinary magic at work that, as with the best food and wine pairings, produces a third flavour out of the ether. The dish became far more savoury, the mushrooms and bacon cubes (recipe bacon cut by me, as ever) altered in taste too, and there was a richness well beyond what you'd expect from the weight of the grated cheese included. 

So reaching for the cheese is not uvavu - for those of a very young persuasion check out Shooting Stars with the wonderful Vic and Bob. It is umami. 

Whatever Happened to the Gratin?

The world of the celebrity chef, where everything seemingly has to be either fried before your eyes or include some odd/exotic ingredients, has to my mind seen the relegation of the gratin to the outer regions. Shame. A good potato gratin is a) tasty; b) cheap; c) easy to make. This is a good potato gratin.

Take four or five fist-sized spuds and slice about 3mm thick, then boil for no longer than three minutes and remove from the water. Fry two large onions sliced thinly until transparent. Grate 100g strong hard cheese - cheddar is ideal (and not mild for goodness' sake).

In an oven-proof dish put a layer of spuds, then of onion, and season well. Put on a small sprinkle of cheese, but save most for the top. Repeat until used up, finishing with a layer of spuds. Measure enough milk to cover all bar the very surface of the gratin, beat in an egg, then pour over. Finish with lots of grated cheese on top, and dot with a few dabs of butter. Cook in a hot oven (200C) until the top is browning. 

Served with a salad (and it doesn't have to be something green from a bag - make a salade de racines with matchsticks of carrot, turnip and beetroot dressed with a vinaigrette) and some bread to mop up the juices it makes a filling and enjoyable supper. And the gratin costs less than £2 with enough to fill four. Splash out by adding some strips of smoked bacon (use that thrifty standby 'recipe bacon' or offcuts from the butcher or butchery counter) to satisfy the carnivores. Instead of the milk and egg mixture use stock - chicken, ham or vegetable - from a cube or your own labours and it is even cheaper, though I prefer the milky version.