The art of living quite well on very little

Press, 20 April 1979, Page 11

The art of living quite well on very little

1 Some years ago in a Los Angeles market I was waiting while another cus- * tomer was served. He was probably about 30, in freshly ironed shirt and "slacks. And you could see plenty who look just like him — rising bachelor executives or professionals, perhaps with elegantly casual girlfriends in tow — stocking the p„ntries of their expensive Double Bay ar North Shore flats with expensive edibles on any Saturday morning in Sydney. Al- . though there was one dif- ■ ference; he sounded better. He was buying up too, ’bags of beans, rice, chick peas, lots of chili powder, the classic diet of the 'Z penny watcher, plenty of bulk for not much money. “Do you take relief cou- ; pons?” he asked the stall- > holder. In these dale-ridden days he would be less of an enigma. An out-of-work J’ actor, suggested a friend later — and probably * quite rightly. But apparently he had a v good grasp of the prin- * ciples of eating for survival. - And somewhere around ’ the same time a person " named Rosemary Crossley was learning them, too. She is working now teach-

ing handicapped children in Melbourne. But in 1970 she had a spell on the dole, living on $lO a week. “I spent $5 on food and $5 for rent,” she says. “My cheapest meal was what the Chinese eat when they’re really broke — a bowl of rice with

peanuts and soy sauce . ..” And that is one of the suggestions that she has written — under the heading of “desperate measures” — into her recently published “Dole Cookbook” which is something of a survival manual for people with less money than appetite. About 70c at present Sydney prices would buy what she describes as the cheapest three-course meal — a meat pie, a raw carrot and a pint of milk. But for $2 she tells how to whip up a dinner party for 4 people — two grapefruit (half each) for 25c; split pea soup (half a

packet of onion soup, Split peas, bay leaf), 17c beef casserole (gravy beef, carrots, potatoes, onions) $1.08; vanilla cream with hot jam sauce, 50c.

That is rich living, how--ever, compared with her suggestions for the really broke — like basic, onevegetable soups and what she calls “soup for the gods:” a few cloves of garlic, soy sauce, sesame oil . . . $lO and careful shopping, she says, should buy one person good nutritious meals for a week. But it a’lows for only a kilogram or two of meat so “you have to buy mince, gravy beef, neck chops, sausages, liver and offal — no steaks or roasts. “If you’re short of money stay away from meat that comes in slabs . . .” Salads and vegetables come cheaper in their seasons. But for basic yearround filling up the answer is “stodge” — potatoes, grains, bread, spaghetti, macaroni. rice “They’re all fattening, but you can limit the size of your serving. “All the cuisines of the world are built around stodge is some form or another.” So she suggests the old

fillers of curry and rice, macaroni cheese, Middle Eastern food with the flat pitta bread ,of the area — ail very nourishing as well as being stomach satisfying. Top of a list of essential equipment is "a good sharp knife.” "With a good knife you are merely poverty stricken, Without one you are a slave.” But a milk battle can be used for a rolling pin, plastic ice-cream tubs for mixing bowls and food Storers. A tin with holes punched in it, holding a piece of household soap under the tap while the sink fills, makes a soapsaver for washing dishes. Such expedients she says can give you a stock of essential basic kitchen equipment at present prices for less than $45.