HomeCookbooksMexican CookbooksWildly Affordable Organic: Eat Fabulous Food, Get Healthy, and Save the Planet--All on $5 a Day or Less |
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31 of 32 found the following review helpful:
 Great Book! May 21, 2011
By electronic_cat
I live in the same city as the author, and have followed her work ever since she was featured in the local paper. Previously she had e-books which covered much of this same material. However, I was excited to see she was finally publishing. Reading about how the project evolved was fun -- it was not easy at first but she figured it all out and passes it on to us. She lists what brands to buy, and how to organize your cooking to minimize time in the kitchen.
If you are a vegetarian who likes beans, this is a great book. She has adaptations for vegans. If you want to learn to make no knead bread, this is a great book. My husband liked it the first time I made it and he is a meat eating man who has never liked my bread before. Even I did not like my bread before.
The book is hugely practical, and rest assured, you really can do it for $5/per day/per person. The author regularly shops the local stores to see what the current pricing is. You can do it for less if you go non organic.
In posts on her web site, Linda talks about buying all the equipment needed for cooking (basics: pans, knives, etc) for less than $100. I would like to see Amazon package the collection plus the book for persons starting out in their first home. Page 55 lists the essentials.
30 of 32 found the following review helpful:
 Recommended But Not For Everyone Sep 15, 2011
By J. T. McKinney
I had hoped to find this book in a store so I could give it a once over before purchasing it. Alas, every single bookstore I went to did not have it in stock and my library's two copies were checked out!
Now that I've purchased my own copy, I'm a little disappointed in the book. On the whole, the author does accomplish her mission of proving your meals can be almost 100% organic on a very simple budget. However, the scope of her experiment is not entirely adaptable to everyone's lifestyle (though I don't think anyone ever promised it was). My chief complaint about her meal plans is that they are very monotonous overall. If you choose to follow one of her plans, you WILL streamline your kitchen work; you WILL have wholesome, nutritious food on the table; and you WILL be subsisting on beans and pasta for the rest of your natural-born life! Sigh... it's not exactly what I had in mind. [I was also very surprised that one's "breakfast" while following her plans is -- more often that not -- a mere slice of bread smeared with peanut butter. Homemade bread or not, friends, that's not a breakfast, in my book! I'd be hungry well before lunch!!!]
I love to cook and I'm an adventurous eater -- it's why the premise of the book grabbed my attention. I currently make out weekly menus for our household and shop accordingly and we do have a food budget. I already know how to use our freezer to boost that budget and save time, and it's no great revelation to me that processed foods are the enemy of any budget. We do limit our meat consumption and have also a few vegetarian meals each week, but we are not willing to go completely meatless.
I read in the previewed pages on this site of the author's own eating preferences (she doesn't claim to be vegetarian but only eats meat when there's no other option while her husband eats meat only when they eat out), but I had hoped her meal plans would be a bit more flexible in regards to including at least some small portions of meat, poultry, and fish. In spite of the less than imaginative meal plans, I was hoping this book would offer some timely tips to help us cut some corners I was having trouble figuring out on my own. Instead, I found the content to be more useful for someone who was COMPLETELY new to this subject area. It's not that I consider myself an expert, it's simply that there wasn't any new, earth-shattering information in this book for me.
That being said, if you ARE new to the concept of cooking on a budget (or even the concept of cooking in general) and you're trying to incorporate homemade, REAL foods into your diet but you lack some cooking skills and some simple but solid recipes, you could stand to glean a lot of information from this text. All of the information contained in it is solid, trustworthy, and backed up not only by the author's own experiences but also several other reputable sources on the subject. The beginning sections are also an interesting read as you can see how the author's methodology unfolded and really get a sense for the importance of her work.
5 of 5 found the following review helpful:
Helpful guide for challenging times Aug 07, 2011
By andrea
I followed - with fascination - the hoopla in the news a few years back about congressmen attempting to survive on a food stamp budget. I am constantly trying to pare my food budget - one of the few items in my budget that can "budge" at all. Therefore, I was already pretty sure "Wildly Affordable Organic" would be right up my alley. What intrigued me was the idea that you could eat organic, which I don't buy due to the cost, and stay on such a slim budget.
I've enjoyed reading Linda Watson's book, which is obviously well-researched and thought-out. She practices what she preaches. Truthfully, I think the menus are a little monotonous for my family, if that was all we ate. I have a wealth of recipes using the same ingredients as are in the book, such as falafel, or migas, to add variety. However, I got some great new ideas for things that it always bothered me to waste, such as bean broth and those woody ends of asparagus. I also look forward to trying parsley pesto, saving another item that too often goes to waste in spite of my best intentions!
I highly recommend this book for a young person setting up shop for the first time, a spendthrift who wants to learn how to survive on a drastically slashed budget, and anyone who, like me, enjoys reading cookbooks that have more than recipes in them. This is more of a lifestyle -- and even if you are not going to jump in 100%, you'll learn some good ideas and recipes. Watson provides the details anyone needs to copy her success. With this book in hand, I plan to try once more to pare that food budget - and this time, maybe I can try the organic produce, too!
3 of 3 found the following review helpful:
Provides the How-to Oct 30, 2011
By Anne Speck
My Dad once criticized a family friend's food spending by saying that a person in the US should be able to eat on a dollar a meal a day. That was in the 80's and I heard it frequently during my own college career. Thing is; we didn't eat on $3 a day at home and my dad could never really tell me *how* -- this book provides the how.
How #1 -- a go-to core of recipes that are made with basic ingredients. No longer do you need to buy bread and biscuit mix and pancake mix and cake mix plus the baking soda/powder for cookies and quick breads. Instead buy 5-10 lbs of great flour, fresh baking soda/powder, and learn to make all the rest with variations on the basics.
How #2 -- when you cook, make some for later. By doubling stews/bean/breads when you cook them, you have quick meals ready for busy nights or times when you want a fast dinner so you can cook something else.
How #3 -- eat more beans. As another reviewer pointed out, this book has a lot of bean recipes. It also has a lot of nuts, whole grains, and high-protein pasta. The author has a good reason for this: peanut butter and conventional beans cost about 2 cents per gram of protein, half the cost per gram of the cheapest, factory-farmed cuts of meat you can buy. That makes plant-based protein a great place to save money (even if you spend some of that savings on occasional meals of better meat down the line).
How #4 -- have a system. This is where the book truly shines. Starting with investing 30 minutes a day you can accrue quick meals in the freezer for busy nights; healthful breakfasts, lunches, and dinners which are nearly all organic; and save money over the conventional American diet.
This is a great book for anyone who is ready (or needs to) make more of what they eat, eat healthier, or save money on food. It is also a great companion book for food justice books such as the More-with-Less cookbook or Diet for a Small Planet.
3 of 3 found the following review helpful:
Changed the way my family eats Jul 29, 2011
By Melanie Shelton
I've been following Watson's plans for 2 months now, and she's really changed my family's diet. My husband said "I'll save money and lose weight--what's not to like?"
On a limited budget, I never thought I could eat fresh, local food from the Farmer's Market. Now I go to the farmer's market once a week.
I've read a lot of cookbooks, and what makes this stand out is the level of planning and organization. Not only will you eat well, but you WILL gain a lot of skills and save time and money. You will even do significantly fewer dishes--what cookbook has ever offered that?
There is no meat or soy on the plan, but I supplement with local meats--sausage and bacon, etc-- to add to the beans and pizza.
The author is obviously talented and deeply committed to helping people eat better for less money.
The only possible caveat is that one cannot expect to switch to all homemade food without spending more time in the kitchen. Watson's organizational plan minimizes this, but does not eliminate it.
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