bareessentialscooking

[bareessentialscooking]

Imma post this here because it might help someone else.

I’ve been spending a ludicrous amount of money on dog shampoos. Grim’s got what I’m calling trouble skin and nothing has worked. He’s also got seasonal allergies that make it all worse.

It’s been a nightmare. So I figured “well, the expensive stuff isn’t working so let’s see if the most basic shampoo will”.

I used this recipe (I doubled it honestly and stored it in a garden mister that works really well) and added 1/2 a tsp of silk amino acids ($30 a bag, so this was kinda extreme, but I’ve been dealing with this for so long. That said, if you’re trying to find skin soothing ingredients, I’d start with oatmeal water. Just soak the oatmeal in the water, then blend it really good if you can, and strain the solids and then follow the recipe above using this to replace the regular water).

I used this today and he usually digs at himself and cries for hours before being able to actually sleep. Initially he seemed to itch a bit more than usual while he was drying. Its 10 hours later, hes been asleep for 3 of those hours, his skin still has some splotches and I think he scratched a for the first minute he was in the bed before falling asleep, so its already working way better than everything else I’ve tried and its only been one day. I’d recommend rinsing in lukewarm water but I watched him outside with the hose, so it was cold. His fur felt a little funny when he first dried but now it’s super soft. I was worried about how he’d smell with the vinegar but now that he’s dry he actually smells normal, like dog. I’m gonna document how this goes over the next couple weeks so I’ll keep ya’ll updated. All that to say:

Sweet dreams, baby. I’m so glad you can finally rest properly 😭😭😭😭😭😭

[bareessentialscooking]

HI! I’m Ash.

I turned 30 last year and have been living below the poverty line as an adult for two years now. I’m using this blog + a small journal to document my journey to making my new life work as much as I can.

I have 3 goals:

1. Take care of myself

2. Take care of my two diabetics

3. Take care of my dog

To do this I’m going back to the basics and experimenting with different things to live the healthiest and cheapest life possible.

It’s important to understand the context of how you live:

Currently I’m housed in a shitty trailer with no central heat or air. I have two window units, one in the main part of the house and one in my dad’s room. In winter we have a wood stove. That said I’m incredibly lucky to live where I am. The land I’m on is family land, I have a well for water, so my bills are phone, the worlds shittiest internet, car insurance, and electric. When my mom died my dad and I paid our vehicles off, him because it was in my moms name and he didn’t want to fight a legal battle with a car payment, and mine because it’s 3 years old and not having a car payment means more money monthly. He was concerned about building credit but we’re in such a financial state that credit isn’t even something to entertain.

I also live on 80 acres of nothing but trees. I’m going to post structures and things I build on this blog as well and it’s important that you know what I’m paying for and what I’m not so you can adjust as you need to. Things in this blog will not be applicable for me everyone, but hopefully there will be something here you can find useful or possibly life altering in a good way no matter where or how you live.

Current Hygiene Experiments:

-Dog Shampoo

-Human Shampoo

Cosmetic Experiments:

-Rosemary + Lavender water for hair

Current Construction Projects:

-Chicken Pen

-Raised Garden Beds

[bareessentialscooking]

My dad eats two types of meat so that makes choosing what proteins to get to save money pretty easy. He likes hamburger (90% of his diet) and chicken strips/nuggets.

So a big part of grocery shopping is looking where to spend your money so it counts the most and what’s most versatile. Hamburger is a pretty versatile meat so I make sure to have some portioned and frozen at all times. Now this does mean that occasionally I’m spending $40 on a tube of ground beef, i do ground chuck cause it’s what my Walmart usually has, but when I say “occasionally” I mean I haven’t bought hamburger in about 3 months because my dad eats once a day and usually eats at work, so 2 days a week we have hamburger dishes. If I run into a problem where I can buy a protein that grocery run, I always have a portion of ground beef to defrost so we can eat through the week.

Chicken strips and nuggets are a little more complicated because that requires breast meat (he won’t eat chicken thighs), so I have to watch for sales on breast meat or even whole chickens cause I can break that down.

If you’re really hurting for money, rotisserie chickens are usually dirt cheap, it’s a whole baked chicken so you can break it down into lots of meat, store that in the fridge and freezer for quick meals. They’re usually over cooked and not great on their own but if you have no way to cook something at the time, they’ll get you through to the next day at least. I’ve used them multiple times myself, just come home, break it all down, and then toss the carcass into some water and make stock and then toss the carcass into the woods. Feeds us for about a week.

Now all that said and done, I usually buy a big bag of leg quarters. Lots of meat on them, bones to make broth for later. To meal prep it, I throw it in a big tub to brine overnight. A simple brine is salt and water, but if you have other liquids or herbs or spices you can toss those right in with it and you have a flavored chicken to make in the morning.

I had more than water and salt available so I used some leftover pickle juice, juice of a lemon I had, some dill, and paprika. Dumped the salt and water in and then submerged the chicken in it over night. Now I’m trying to make food with as little effort as possible cause I have lupus and I’m recovering from my bout of covid. So I’m just taking a baking dish (right now it’s a small baking dish) loading it with a layer of chicken, and baking it at 350. Every 30 minutes I flip them. I’m not cooking it for any specific time, every 30 minutes I check it, and leave it in longer if I want it cooked more. Use your eyes and a thermometer if you must, but if you poke the thickest part of the meat and the juice runs clear, it’s done. My rule is if I can’t smell it cooking it’s not anywhere near done. Once it starts looking like it’s getting golden I start basting the chicken in its own juices and reduce flip/check time to 15 minute intervals.

Now today I did drumsticks cause they were on sale. I don’t using plastic containers for marinades or brines but this is what I have available at the moment. I’d honestly prefer glass or metal or even commercial kitchen tubs, but this is what I have.

I’m baking in batches because my dish is tiny, but this is what they look like cooked.

I’m going to let them cool and then break the meat off of them and store it.

[bareessentialscooking]

So to store pasta and try to keep it from sticking I drizzle it in a liquid fat. You can use anything from vegetable oil or I bet you could use some heated lard even and pour it over this and just mix it really well. Then when you go to portion this in the fridge for yourself, things won’t stick, AND you have a healthy fat already present to keep you going.

Lard isn’t the healthiest thing in the world BUT it’s still healthier than no fats at all. Our ancestors used lard in their foods and it let them live long enough to assure that you exist. If you find yourself lost ask: What would my ancestors do?

(Disclaimer: this question only works for survival scenarios not conflicts. 9/10 the answer to “how would Gruk solve this conflict?” Is “Gruk would kill them so there was no more conflict)

So this is a budget friendly thing. I’m definitely living below the poverty line, not for the first time in my life but for the first time in my adult life, which means I now have to make decisions. Luckily I don’t have a bunch of diet restricts so I asked myself at the beginning of this week: What are the bare essentials to keeping a human alive to the next day? And the answer to that, food wise, is grain, veggies and fruits, protein, and fats.

Sugar is in there too, but we can get those from carbs and fruits so this is what a semi balanced meal should look like. The portions are gonna vary person to person due to allergies or intolerances or vitamin deficiencies, but if you’re stranded and need to survive as long as possible having at least one of the bare essentials (grains, vegetation, protein, fat) can get you to the next day in a pinch. And most of us have access to multiple of these things, we just don’t have the knowledge to put it all together and make it stretch.

That’s what this blog is documenting, me and my family trying to survive to tomorrow while still eating as healthy as possible while spending as little as we can. This isn’t a foraging blog but I’m lucky to live in the woods so I can hunt, fish, and forage, but this should help you even if you live in a shitty apartment, basement or a shack. I do plan on trying some of these recipes in a camp setting, seeing how portable it is, stuff like that.

I make tips so my pay varies day to day so sometimes I might end up with some extra cash and I’ll show you how I invest that into tools I can use to make this life easier.

Ahuhu, ahaha, look at me I’m meal prepping

[bareessentialscooking]

Didn’t mean to reblog to my main but who cares.

Bow tie is finished

Time to start the penne. I like to prep two different types of noodles because of the texture difference. I don’t bother prepping rice ahead, I have a rice cooker and making rice isn’t labor intensive. Not that boiling pasta is super labor intensive but you have to pay more attention to it

Ahuhu, ahaha, look at me I’m meal prepping

[bareessentialscooking]

Ahuhu, ahaha, look at me I’m meal prepping

[bareessentialscooking]

I’m a broke ass dominos delivery driver and I need a way to fucking eat. Let’s fucking see if I can make this shit work