Author: Isabel Montclaire

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How to use an Un-recipe Recipe, Part Two

Here’s another example of an un-recipe. In case you haven’t read any of the prior posts, an un-recipe gives you enormous freedom in the kitchen. You can break free from having to use exact ingredients and exact measurements, too (baking is an exception, there is some leeway but not much). You learn to switch out and switch up ingredients in recipes and use what you have on hand. This makes the whole topic of food easier and more pleasurable. Over time, you learn which flavors go together and you will discover unique combinations you didn’t even know existed. If you want information about which flavors compliment each other, check out “The Flavor Bible” by Andrew Dornenburg and Karen Page.

The following un-recipe is for my favorite quick bread. I love eating this in the morning, toasted with a lot of butter. Eating something this delicious —and nourishing —makes me happy to be alive. The quality of one’s life can be measured in the number of simple little pleasures that occur throughout the day. You don’t even need a mixer to make this – just a mixing bowl, spoon, and some elbow grease.

The Very Best Quick Bread or Muffins

2 cups unsifted flour (I’ve tried this with gluten-free flour, it works as long as you add some xanthan gum)
1 tsp baking soda
½ tsp baking powder
¾ tsp salt
Sweetener: 1 cup date, coconut or cane sugar. I like to use date sugar. If you use coconut sugar, keep an eye on it because it will brown fast. Cover with foil about 15 minutes into the baking. This recipe may work with honey or agave syrup, but I have not tried it. You might need to add a bit more flour.
Spices: ½ tsp each cloves, nutmeg, cinnamon and ginger or 2 teaspoons pumpkin pie or chai spices or other combination of warm spices.
2 eggs
½ cup vegetable oil (I like to use rice bran oil) OR substitute ¾ cup mayonnaise and ¼ cup water for the oil and eggs
1 ½ teaspoons vanilla or other flavoring (I like maple, almond and hazelnut)
1 cup pumpkin or winter squash, or mashed ripe bananas, applesauce, zucchini, or other pureed fruit.
Chopped nuts and/or dates, candied ginger, chocolate chips, etc.

Combine the dry ingredients. Combine the moist ingredients then thoroughly mix the dry with the moist. Pour into greased loaf or muffin pans. You can vary the size of the loaf or muffin pans– just make sure they are filled about half way. Bake in a 350⁰ oven for 35-40 minutes or until the mixture starts to pull away from the edges of the pan and cracks appear on the surface. Cool in pan. This bread freezes well, too.

Heirloom pumpkins make fantastic pumpkin bread!

I like to make this via the “assembly line” method. You can make multiple batches of the dry ingredients and store each batch in one quart mason jars. Then all you have to do is round up the moist ingredients and whip a loaf together in just a matter of minutes. So there you go – another un-recipe recipe.

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How to Use an Un-recipe recipe, Part One

When you do The Plenty Method, you discover new freedom in the kitchen via “un-recipe recipes”. You’ll have a pantry packed full of scratch ingredients, called Master Ingredients, and a nice assortment of “flavor bursts” – concentrated flavorings that up-level your cooking from good to great. The variety of foods you keep on hand is dialed back – less is more in the case of your pantry – and immense creativity and ease arises out of this simplicity.

Most recipes call for exact ingredients and measurements. This can be quite restrictive and following recipes exactly is time consuming, too. They can also lead to excessive food clutter. Recipes often call for ingredients that you may never use again, so they tend to end up as food clutter then food waste. Using un-recipes avoids this. When you read recipes that call for ingredients you don’t have on hand, you learn to make substitutions with what you do have. If you are using “The Plenty Method”, your well thought out pantry gives you many options.  A simplified yet plentiful pantry takes much of the complication out of putting food on the table.

Here is an example of an “un-recipe recipe” – my favorite salad dressing. Why is this an un-recipe? Because you can mix and match the ingredients and create many versions. Over the years many friends have asked me for this recipe and I am happy to share it with you now.

The Very Best Salad Dressing


½ cup vinegar (l like aged-sherry, champagne, white and red balsamic)
1 tablespoon sugar (I use raw cane and demerara)
I tablespoon mustard (favorites are stone ground, Dijon and spicy brown)
Pinch of salt (any kind but iodized. It tastes terrible!)
1 shallot (if you don’t have one, use about ¼ cup diced any kind of onion)
1 clove garlic
1 ½ cups oil (my favorites are olive, walnut, rice bran)

Puree the first six ingredients in a blender. Then slowly add the oil and blend some more. Store in a glass bottle. Keeps for up to two months, refrigerated.

Lately my favorite version of this is made with sherry vinegar and half olive/half walnut oil and stone ground mustard. In the past I’ve used blood orange champagne vinegar. White wine vinegars are better with neutral oils, like rice bran (please see previous post) and dark vinegars are better with olive oil.

Make your own salad dressing with the best vinegar you can afford and increase your sensory pleasure and enjoyment of life!

So look at what you have on hand and whip up a batch. Once you taste this, pre-made dressings you buy at the grocery store will utterly pale in comparison. I use the money I save by NOT buying pre-made salad dressing to buy high-quality vinegar and oils. It takes just a few minutes to whip this up and the extraordinary sensory pleasure you’ll get makes the time spent so worthwhile. So there you have it – a real “un-recipe recipe”.

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How to Multiply Your Food Dollars 6.5x

One of my favorite retail versus wholesale price comparisons is rice bran oil. You have probably never seen this, as it’s not commonly available at grocery stores. But most restaurant supply wholesalers do sell it because its high smoke point makes it ideal for frying. It’s quite versatile, being especially excellent for salad dressings and baking. Olive oil, coconut or nut oils are healthier choices, but sometimes a neutral vegetable oil is just what you need. I have yet to see this available in an organic version, however.

A one gallon jug sells for $10.47 or 8.5 cents per ounce at the restaurant supply store where anyone can shop. At the grocery store I saw this bottle selling for $6.99 for 12.7 ounces, or .55 per ounce. That means I can multiply my food dollars 6.5 times by buying it from a wholesale source.

The retail versus wholesale price of rice bran oil

I can hear you wondering how you’d store that much oil and then worrying it will go to waste. Here is the solution: divide it into quarts and pour it into sterilized glass bottles (you can do this by running them through the dishwasher or filling them with boiling water then letting them dry). I use recycled juice bottles and those with swing-top-bale tops. Glass is better than plastic for long-term storage of foods. The chemicals in plastic leaches into food, particularly oily foods. You can use recycled bottles as long as the lids are in good condition (I have been known to retrieve glass containers out of my neighbor’s recycling bins).

A one-gallon jug of rice bran oil decanted into recycled glass bottles

Once you’ve divided the oil into manageable portions, then what do you do?  When stored in the refrigerator, oils will stay fresh for about a year. If you estimate you’d use a gallon in a year and you have extra fridge space, you can keep it all for yourself. If you won’t use that much or don’t have extra fridge space, you can trade or exchange the extra with a friend (I intentionally don’t use the words “buy or sell” as it may be illegal in some states to open containers and sell portions of them). Here’s what I usually do:  I keep one quart in my kitchen cupboard, mindful to use it in a couple of months before it goes rancid. Two go in the backup fridge. Then I trade a bottle with my friend who grows fresh catnip. I store the oil I keep for myself in bottles with swing-top-bale caps, and the oil exchanged goes in a recycled bottle. I label and date them.

Over the years I’ve developed a few “un-recipe recipes” that use this oil. Rice bran oil is extraordinary in baking as it makes the crumb of baked goods remarkably moist. I gave my friend Michelle my salad dressing recipe for her fiftieth birthday after she begged me for it for years. Stay tuned for the next two episodes!

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Curry in a Hurry, Part Two

As mentioned in my previous post, The Plenty Method helps you whip up sumptuous meals on a moment’s notice. I call these “quick plates”. The idea is to stock a pantry with a plentiful yet simple collection of scratch ingredients called “Master Ingredients.” Then, develop a repertoire of “un-recipe recipes” that reduce the time it takes to get food on the table. This way, you’ll always have great food on hand and you’ll know what to do with it. Which makes the question “what to eat” much easier to answer and the statement “there’s nothing to eat” non-existent.

Over the years I’ve developed some short cuts to expedite time spent in the kitchen. The curry described in the previous post is more flavorful with a little garlic and ginger added. But peeling and chopping those takes precious time, time you may not want to spend. Plus, you may not always have those ingredients on hand. What to do about this dilemma? Freeze it! Here’s how:

Start by buying a couple of pounds each of garlic and/or ginger. Then, peel and coarsely chop it and drop it in a blender or a food-processor. Blend until it becomes a smooth paste then add a little  vegetable oil so that it binds together and becomes spreadable. Using a spatula,  put the mixture into ice cube trays and freeze for a day or two. Then, thaw until the cubes are loose enough to be scooped out with a small knife (I find a butter knife with a rounded edge works best). Place them on a cookie sheet and re-freeze. Then place in a plastic container with an airtight lid. I cut the cubes in half and put waxed or parchment paper in between the layers. You don’t have to thaw these out before using. Just chop them up a bit and use them as if they were fresh.

You can do this with lemon juice, whipping cream or fresh herbs. Having these “flavor cubes” on hand gives you the ability to up-level your cooking from good to great with minimal effort. Easy “un-recipes” make cooking a lot more pleasurable, too!

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Curry in a Hurry, Part One

Now that you can buy coconut milk for a third or half of retail cost, (please see previous post), you might consider keeping an extra supply in your pantry. A plentifully stocked larder encourages you to get in the kitchen and experiment a little. So, what can you do with all that coconut milk?

Whip up a curry using The Plenty Method! While recipes are useful for ideas and inspiration, their requirements for exact measurements and ingredients can often be quite restrictive and time consuming. The “Y” in Plenty means “Yum: the un-recipe recipe.” Break loose of cooking rules, formulas, shoulds and musts and experience new freedom in the kitchen!

So here is how to make a simple curry sauce using an “un-recipe recipe”. You can mix this sauce with lentils, roasted or sautéed vegetables, pineapple, noodles, rice, tofu, tempeh, beans, shrimp. Or, cooked chicken, beef, pork or lamb (which I purchase from a local farmer). The combinations are endless. And it is surprisingly easy to make this sauce.

To start, find a large skillet, sauce pan or Dutch oven. Dice an onion and sauté it in butter, vegetable, or coconut oil that has started to bubble. Sauté the onion for a few minutes until it’s translucent. Then add about a tablespoon of curry powder or paste and some seasoning salt (my favorite are those made by Maggi). To that, add a can of undiluted, unsweetened coconut milk and stir until it bubbles.

If you have some tamarind paste or concentrate, add slightly less than a tablespoon. In The Plenty Method, tamarind is what we call a “flavor burst”. It’s a concentrated flavoring that kicks the flavor up a notch and makes humble ingredients more interesting. If you don’t happen to have any tamarind on hand, don’t worry. But next time you are at an international food market or Asian grocery store, consider picking some up. It adds a lovely tart and tangy complexity to many dishes. Another flavor burst you might like to add is a splash of aged sherry vinegar. Just a touch adds yet another layer of lovely flavor. Add a touch of hot sauce if you like your food spicy (my go-to is Sriracha). Some people like the flavor of fish sauce. If you do, add that if you have some.

If the sauce seems too thick, add some water. If it’s too thin continue to cook it down or stir in some corn or tapioca starch diluted in a small amount of water. Then voila! There’s your curry sauce, ready to use as suggested above. Along the way, listen to your senses; they will tell you what to do. If it tastes a bit flat, add more curry powder, tamarind or salt. And if you are in a hurry, you can forgo the onion and start with the coconut milk. My favorite way to eat this sauce is over roasted cauliflower served on a bed of brown rice and topped with roasted cashews. Nourishing and delicious fast food!

One of my goals is to help people learn how to whip up something easy and delicious in the time it would take to get take-out or go to a drive through. Having a plentiful supply of food on hand and a few “un-recipe recipes” makes it much easier to cook on the fly. Try it, you’ll like it!

Tamarind makes an excellent flavor burst. I love Maggi seasoning salts.

PS If you’d like to learn a little more about how to use coconut milk, check out this post by Mark Bittman. Written in 1999, it’s still relevant . . . except for the price! https://www.nytimes.com/1999/08/25/dining/the-minimalist-exotic-but-accessible-coconut-milk-earns-its-shelf-space.html?mtrref=www.google.com&gwh=ADF4A52816F9F2E2F31BB2B9140793ED&gwt=pay

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How to Multiply Coconut Milk, Part Two

Let’s say that you multiplied your food dollars three times by buying a 98 ounce can of coconut milk at a wholesale price (please see previous post). But what do you do with all that coconut milk once it’s opened? Naturally, you may worry that it will go to waste. And since grocery store shoppers are conditioned to buying small amounts of food frequently, buying a large amount of food less frequently might feel uncomfortable at first. But don’t worry – The Plenty Method will help you learn how to store the extra. That’s what the “N” in “Plenty” means: “New containers and making space”.

Opened coconut milk keeps in the refrigerator for about a week or two, depending on how cold your fridge is. Store it in the main body of the refrigerator where it is coldest. Since the coconut cream separates from the coconut water, you’ll need to mix it first. The easiest way to do this is to put it in a large pan and gently heat it. That melts the oil and makes it easier to blend. To minimize the number of things to wash, consider whipping up a quick curry (see next post). Then wash the pan!

Estimate the amount you will use before it spoils then freeze the extra. I freeze it in pints. You can freeze the portions in zip-lock bags because they lay flat (wait until the coconut milk is at room temperature before pouring it into the bag). When you finish with the Ziploc bag, you can keep it in the freezer. Then you won’t have to wash or throw the bag away every time you divide coconut milk. If you don’t want to use plastic, try a straight-sided canning jar. These prevent the milk from cracking the glass as the liquid expands.

After the milk thaws out, it curdles a bit. To restore its creamy consistency, blend it for about thirty seconds. If you are interested in the food science around this, check out this Cook’s Illustrated article: https://www.cooksillustrated.com/how_tos/9034-storing-leftover-coconut-milk. To minimize containers to wash, blend it right in the bag with an immersion blender if you have one. Then dilute to desired consistency and pour the mixture into a glass bottle. Always give it a good shake before using as it does separate.

If all this seems too complicated, you can buy the coconut milk in 13 ounce cans at the restaurant supply store. You can still multiply your food dollars by about twice. But once you know how, it’s really not too much trouble to store a big can. Or, freeze just some of it. Children enjoy helping with this project, especially if they get to drink a hot-cocoa or fruit smoothie afterward. I find that children tend to be motivated by good things to eat, most adults, too!

The wholesale versus retail price of coconut milk in a 13.5 ounce can.
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How to Multiply Coconut Milk, Part One

How to Multiply Coconut Milk, Part One

I began working on The Plenty Method in 2008 when I was a planning commissioner for the city of Wilsonville, Oregon. I specialized in food and water because they are so fundamental to life. Slowly, I began to worry that accessing uncontaminated/unadulterated food would become more difficult and more expensive over time. Eating well was a priority, yet a healthful diet consisting solely of organic and humanely food was already cost-prohibitive.

Now, ten years later, I’ve finished articulating The Plenty Method. I’d like to help you learn how to access – and afford – the best food on the planet. Then you can have radiant health and experience more pleasure in life, too. The following is an example of how you can multiply your food dollars when you use The Plenty Method.

Lately, there’s been a lot of mention about how livestock contributes to greenhouse gases. So I’m trying to find non-dairy alternatives for milk. Coconut milk makes a surprisingly good substitute for cow’s milk and cream. The unsweetened concentrate comes in a can and when diluted with water in a one to one ratio, it has the consistency of milk. Use less water and it’s like cream. Coconut milk is creamier and silkier than cow’s milk. When mixed with other foods, the coconut flavor becomes mild or even diminishes. So far, I’ve tried it in my favorite creamy vegetable soup and a béchamel sauce (that I poured over roasted cauliflower). It’s fabulous in hot chocolate!  Use it in curry and smoothies. Feel free to experiment, substituting it in recipes that call for milk or cream.

A 13.5 ounce can of organic coconut milk retails for around $3.59, or just shy of .27 cents per ounce.  At the local wholesale restaurant supply store (where anyone can shop, no license required) a 98 ounce can sells for $9.59, or just shy of ten cents an ounce.  When I buy it wholesale, I multiply my food dollars by almost three times. Multiplying your food dollars will make you feel quite wealthy. Having plentiful amounts of coconut milk on hand feels quite luxurious. Contributing to planetary health by reducing the use of dairy and increasing your purchases of organic food can make you feel happy, too. By the way, the “E” in The “Plenty” Method stands for “Easy-to-find-food-sources”. Our book, “The Joy of Plenty”, will show you how to find non-grocery store food sources so you can easily multiply your food dollars. And if you wonder what to do with that all that coconut milk, stay tuned for the next blog.

The Plenty Method helps you learn how to multiply your food dollars
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Half the Truth is a Lie, Part Two

Let’s continue reading between the lines in the advertisement that Bayer/Monsanto placed in The New York Times on Wednesday, March 27, 2019 (please see previous post). The corporation placed this ad in response to the negative publicity being generated from the 11,200 court cases winding their way through the legal system. The plaintiffs allege that Roundup/glyphosate causes Non-Hodgkin Lymphoma, a type of cancer.

The advertisement states “Independent regulatory agencies continue to assess glyphosate-based products and conclude they can be used safely and that glyphosate is not carcinogenic. These include not only the United States Environmental Protection Agency (EPA), but also the European Food Safety Authority (EFSA), European Chemicals Agency (ECHA), Australian, Canadian and Japanese regulatory authorities, as well as the Joint Food and Agriculture Organization of the United Nations/World Health Organization Meeting on Pesticide Residue (JMPR).

That’s quite a lineup of societal authorities, very convincing. But . . . . let’s read between the lines to reveal what the ad doesn’t say. Remember, a lie can be told by omitting the other half of the story, the contextual framework. Here is what Bayer/Monsanto doesn’t want you to know:

That one of the tactics agribusiness uses is to infiltrate regulatory agencies and other institutions around the world with their own executives. These people then become high-level officials in the regulatory agencies/institutions that oversee the agribusiness industries. Then these executives use their power to influence the agency’s policy and regulations. Other terms for this are “regulatory capture” and “revolving door”.

Keep in mind that governments create regulatory agencies to act in the public’s interest and to protect the public’s health.  When the corporations capture the agencies, the commercial interests of big business (via lobbying groups) become primary and the public’s interest and health, secondary.

Bayer/Monsanto also doesn’t want you to know that they genetically modified food so that it can withstand increasingly strong applications of Roundup/glyphosate. Now the pesticide’s residues are appearing in many foods. Roundup is being detected more and more in our water, air and soil. It’s everywhere.

We need more people to recognize the deception and destructive dynamics these large corporations use to keep us blind and unremittingly under their control. Then we can say a loud and resounding NO to this unethical use of power that represses and disregards the public’s voice. We can say NO to government captured by corporate power. We can do this by refusing to buy the corporation’s products. In the case of Bayer/Monsanto/Roundup, this means avoiding genetically modified food and if possible, buying organic food instead. The truth, the whole truth, and nothing but the truth is that, we, the people, can speak truth to power, one buying decision at a time.

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Half the Truth is a Lie, Part One

A couple of weeks ago when I was thumbing through The New York Times, I couldn’t help but notice the blue and white full-page advertisement placed by Bayer/Monsanto in defense of Roundup/glyphosate. The heading reads “Let’s talk about Roundup® herbicides”. Oh no!

The company is launching a campaign to convince the public that the pesticide won’t harm our health. When big corporations see their profits are threatened, (please see previous two posts for explanation of this) they launch massive campaigns designed to manipulate the public’s opinion. These campaigns will be filled with propaganda and disinformation, including paid ads disguised as news meant to create doubt. An unsuspecting reader might read these ads and be convinced the stuff is safe enough to drink in a martini every night. And the corporation certainly doesn’t want you to know that most GMO food has been modified to withstand increasingly strong applications of the stuff, and that the pesticide is showing up in our food, soil, water and air with increasing frequency.

But here’s the thing: a lie can be told via a “half-truth”. It’s lying by omission. It’s lying by presenting only part of the story and omitting the full context.

So knowing that, let’s read the ad between the lines:

“Glyphosate-based herbicides, which include most Roundup® products, are among the most rigorously studied products of their kind”. What they don’t want you to know:

That the chemical companies hire scientists to do the research necessary to get pesticides approved by regulators,[1] so the scientists are bought and paid for by the chemical companies. This naturally creates a conflict of interest dynamic, because the scientists will feel duty, obligation and loyalty to the authorizing power over them. The scientist might feel pressure to conform to the company’s objectives and standards. Under this pressure, the researchers often skew the findings, fail to question fundamental premises, and suppress awareness of contradictions so that the results favor industry profits over the public’s health. Then when agribusiness companies answer questions about pesticide safety, they can claim with authority that decades of scientific studies have shown the chemicals to be safe for human use and that no credible scientific evidence exists otherwise.

As you can see, it’s all in the family – at least in the feudalistic one, where the corporations are the overlords. So now you’ve read between the lines and you know more of the truth than you did before.

Advertisement in The New York Times, Wednesday, March 27, 2019

[1] Danny Hakim, “Scientists Loved and Loathed by an  Agrochemical Giant,” New York Times, December 31, 2016, accessed at  https://www.nytimes.com/2016/12/31/business/scientists-loved-and-loathed-by-syngenta-an-agrochemical-giant.html

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Goodbye, Corporate Feudalism

I don’t generally consider myself to be a political type, yet I can’t help but feel encouraged about the conversation I see shaping up among the Democratic Party’s presidential candidates.  Many are outlining a plan to revitalize rural America by breaking up agricultural monopolies and restoring competition in that sector.

Finally, someone (Cory Booker, Elizabeth Warren, Amy Klobuchar, and John Delaney) is acknowledging the damage done to rural America from industrialized farming practices and hyper-consolidation in agribusiness. Independent farmers, the backbone of our rural economy, are finding that their profits are rapidly disappearing. This is because big monopolies now control the cost of everything involved in the entire food production process. This process begins when a farmer plants a seed and ends when a shopper plucks an item off the grocery store shelf. Farmers are getting strangled from both the buy and sell sides of transactions. The inputs monopolies control the prices of the products the farmers buy to grow or raise food: seeds, fertilizers, pesticides, machinery, etc. On the sell side, the processor/distribution monopolies control the prices paid to farmers for their crops/livestock. These monopolies make it increasingly difficult for farmers and ranchers to run profitable businesses; they drive up the price of food for shoppers.

Is that too long and complicated? Then how about this, in two simple words: corporate feudalism. A difference between now and centuries ago is that the overlords aren’t the aristocracy; it’s the corporations.

I felt another glimmer of hope that turned to excitement after I read the best summary on corporate feudalism that I have ever read, written recently by the Open Markets Institute.  It’s titled “Food and Power: Addressing Monopolization in America’s Food System”. They propose suggestions about how to solve this problem on pages 12-16, take a look! We can mobilize as a society to support these policy changes and transformation can occur. Check it out here: https://openmarketsinstitute.org/wp-content/uploads/2019/03/190322_MonopolyFoodReport-v7.pdf

It will take a lot more than breaking up agricultural monopolies to restore economic vitality to rural America. It took fifty years for those monopolies to develop and it may take that many years to undo them. Still, dissolving them is a step in the right direction. The coming tsunami of job loss due to automation, robotics, artificial intelligence and software are enormous headwinds. So I approach the subject of breathing life into rural America with cautious enthusiasm. 

This upcoming election season presents a fabulous opportunity for discussion and debate. I hope Republican candidates will also join this conversation to weigh in on the issue of hyper-consolidation in the agricultural sector (and other sectors, too). I look forward to lively dialogue and bright lights shining in dark and dreary corners.