Rachael,
I had never used microwave before I moved to US.
I cook a lot though we have been going out to eat a lot the last 6 months since I gone back to school.

I normally do all my cooking on weekend and freeze them in pyrex ware and take them out the night before I want to eat.

It can be tiring to cook 5-days food in one morning or afternoon esp if it is summer cos standing near the stove and oven for 2-3 hours can be exhausting.

Now I make use of slow cooking pot a lot. I prepare my husband breakfast and lunch for him to take to work. I cook rice a lot and he loves rice more than sandwich.

My self make easy recipe with slow cooker :
2 pack of ground turkey + 1 can of spaghetti sauce, 1 can of dice tomato, 1 can of kidney bean + 2 cup of wild rice.

Let it cook for 8 hours and that can serve 2 days breakfast/lunch for my hubby.
Cost = $8~$9 for 4 meals for an individual.
(I add one boil egg for the breakfast portion)
Do you think that is a reasonable cost ?

I used to be able to budget for US$20 for a week grocery bill but not anymore now. Most things have increased price. I remembered I used to buy a pack of rice (20lbs) for $3.50 , now it is $8.50. A pack of rice would last us for 2 months. We eat rice practically every meal.

Thank God, the University has adjusted husband pay according to inflation rate (that is what they say but I think the inflation rate is higher than the inflation rate that they included in his salary).

I think we only use microwave for boiling water for coffee, tea or warm milk for hot chocolate , and occasionally we use it to warm up frozen TV dinner (which is not very often), so I definitely can survive without microwave.

Jamy

Thanks for your pointers on how to survive without a microwave oven. I like the way you melted the chocolate in a double boiler.

Although I have a microwave oven, I don’t use it much. I still use the kettle to boil water, thaw the meat in the fridge and heat my food in a pan.

However, it is always great for popping corns.

Hi Jesie, I see you already understand the value of time. I am learning that lesson hard and fast. Because everyone really does have a microwave doesn’t mean they use it. I used mine a lot before it broke. Heating up leftovers, melting butter or shortening for a recipe, warming canned vegetables, cooking prepared chicken nuggets for the kids, and of course popcorn. Having mine break was a reality check for me. I had to do more thinking ahead. I know God had taken my microwave so that I could appreciate time better and be thankful for all the gifts HE has given me. That is only one of the blessings of not having the microwave.

Rachael,
Tofu and dry bean are very expensive in publix store.
But in store such as Ward super market ( a small grocery store near us that sell tofu for 79cents a pack which will cost $2.99 in publix and their dry bean is also very expensive.

The reasons why I wanted to turn vegetarian (at least semi) are for 2 reasons :
a. healthier (esp. after going to health care studies, I realized heart disease is the worst chronic disease here than cancer).
Red meat is really bad for our arteries !

However, package substitute meat (like soy burger, soy meat are extremely expensive here, that is not the way I am going into).

I hope to include more veg, fish, beans, tofu, mushroom, into our diet cos these are much more healthier than red meat.

The 1st 2 years after we got married, we were vegetarian. John was 170lbs kind of guy (yes, he was pretty chubby in our wedding photos) but he lost about 40lbs after 2 years on vegetable diet and has maintain since but have gone up the last few years after I gone back to school and turn into meat eater again.

It is the animal oil and fat that is bad for us. Veg, fish and tofu has lots of roughage and they are good for our artery and heart.

I might even make my own tofu eventually cos making soya bean drink and tofu were very common among Asian families (esp. Japanese and they have the lowest heart attack rate in the world).

I intend to get a soya bean drink maker in Orlando the next time when I visit my friend.

2. The second reason is the cost. That’s one of the reason I spent only $20 / week on grocery bill the first 2 years I lived here.

We were much healthier and spent less.

So, I hope to return to this eating habit after I gotten myself settle after my exam.

You can do a lot of things with tofu. There are soft and firm tofu. Firm tofu’s texture taste like meat and if you put the right seasoning, it is delicious.

I will show you a few recipes that I have created after my exam.

Love
Jamy

Rachael,
Sure, I will show you how to when I find the machine.

I am sure you can find zinc in other food group than meat.

I think one of the reasons why John was very keen to go into vegetarian then was we met a couple in our friend home who was 7days adventist. They were vegetarian because of their religion. This couple look so young though they were in their late 30’s. Their skin was so radiant , they are so fit and when they told us they have never had a cold nor pay any medical bill in their life, we were like ‘wow’ and we did it for 2 years and we were as fit as cow.

When I had my open heart surgery, one of our friends who is a dietician in VA told me to include meat in my diet cos she said protein help me to heal after surgery. I think that is one of the worst advice I had receive. I listened to her and started taking meat. And after that I forget about my vegetarian diet and I am 1/2 as healthy before I had my open heart surgery (then I had a congenital heart defect, now I am tire all the times eventhough they fix my heart).

No, meat is bad for you especially in America where they inject steroid in animals so they grow faster for the farmer to slaughter faster.

I am sure you see the girls here are getting bigger and bigger chest earlier than previous generation. It is all steroid.

No, I definitely will go vegetarian when I get out of school. There are alternative food groups than meat out there. The European (Italians, Greeks eat more whole grain , veg, fruits than us and they sure have less chronic heart disease than us, the big pharm companies want to sustain their business by providing us with blood pressure pills, cholesterol pills than having healthy diet that cost a lot cheaper than pills).

If you ask around people who are more than 60 years old, it will be a miracle if they take less than 5 meds a day.

The health condition here is pathetic, we are putting less afford in preventing but we put a lot more attention in fixing the symptom because this country is getting more and more like 3rd world where they are controlled by the big tycoon but not the middle class, sigh.

Jamy