A Few Shoestring Pantry Essentials — Part 2: Flour and Sugar
By David & Martha Cox 03/12/2010Last week, we introduced a series on pantry essentials–basic food items you should invest in and keep on hand to make cooking on a shoestring easier and more enjoyable for you. Last week talked about spices and seasonings. This week, we’re looking at those tried and true staples of grandma’s: Flour and sugar.
It doesn’t get much more basic than flour and sugar. Flour is good for more than just baking loaves of bread. You can use it to thicken sauces (like we did with our Paprika Hendl), coat meat for frying, or cook a variety of breakfast recipes (e.g. pancakes, waffles, biscuits, donuts, etc.). A bag of flour doesn’t cost much–about $1.75 after taxes. When you consider how much use you’ll get out of it–and the fact that it will keep almost indefinitely, provided you store it away from moisture–you’re really getting a pretty good deal.
Sugar, like it or not, is used in a tremendous number of recipes–even in small amounts. A spoonful of sugar will do more than help the medicine go down; it will sweeten spaghetti sauce, improve tea and coffee, liven those pancakes and waffles you made with flour, and even help your soups and stews balance out their more bitter ingredients.
Like flour, sugar doesn’t go bad; its main enemy is moisture. Other than that, it’s fairly user-friendly. And–again, like flour–a bag of sugar costs next to nothing when you figure how much use you’ll get out of it. Sure, you’ll stretch the bag farther if you don’t bake dozens of cookies and sweet breads on a regular basis, but even if you do, your bag of sugar should last at least a little while before you have to pick another one up at the grocery store (and baking cookies is much cheaper than buying them at the store, so you’re still saving money).
Obviously, this is an extremely basic primer designed to highlight the value of sugar and flour as basic ingredients–there simply isn’t enough room to discuss every use of these two items in recipes and cooking. But I hope we’ve given you enough to get you pointed in the right direction. So if you haven’t already, pick up a bag of flour and sugar next time you’re at the grocery store, and start using them. You’ll be amazed how many recipes out there call for those two ingredients, and you’ll be able to save money by baking your own food instead of hitting the drive-thru window when you’re feeling hungry.
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