The Hillbilly Experiment: What I Learned

(kneading 2 loaves of HbHw's 'overnight bread' /flex)

This was my normal food-day before the experiment: wake up 30 minutes before class, drink a glass of milk, go to class, possibly make a sandwich for lunch, or eat chips and hummus, make a 4-serving dinner, eat half, eat dessert (probably oreos). Not all pizza and ramen, to be sure, but not great either. This has been my typical food-day during the experiment: wake up 1 hour before class, make and eat breakfast with juice or milk, make a sandwich or something more substantial for lunch, make a 2-serving dinner and eat half, make fresh bread, muffins, or iced tea as needed. At first I didn't think I'd be able to eat all the food that was slated for each day, but boy was I wrong. Other things I've learned:

1) Dishes speak louder than words, especially if that word is "vegetarian." I'd discussed trying a mostly vegetarian diet with S before, but he wasn't big on the idea. I think a lot of people think of skimpy, unfilling food, or tons of salads when they think "vegetarian." If you want to cook vegetarian food and you're feeding other people, don't start out by saying "vegetarian;" believe me, you'll have them at "lentil and vegetable soup with dumplings."

2) On the note of vegetarian food: legumes, whole grains, dairy, and greens are your friend. I really already knew this, but I'd never put it in practice. If you're not going to be eating much meat, you can use the proteins found in legumes (beans, peanuts and lentils), whole grains, and dairy to create proteins that are just as complete as those found in meat. Especially if you're a woman, eat your greens to get the iron you won't be getting from meat (believe me, anemia is no fun).

3) Baking is not as complicated as I thought it was. This menu has pretty much been a baking boot camp for me; for some reason I always thought baking as more complex and tricky than cooking in general. Turns out, making everyday baked good like bread, muffins, and biscuits is not that tough. Making your own iced tea's not so bad, either.

4) Homemade bread products taste MUCH better than store-bought. The bread, muffin, dumpling, etc recipes on this menu are pretty much as basic as you can get, but they knocked the socks off anything I've ever bought in the taste department. Never before have I had the thought "hmm, maybe I'll just have some bread as a snack."

5) Lastly, caloric drinks should be consumed like foods, and not like water. In this case I'm just talking about juice and milk, but it really goes for soda and other things as well. Even though orange juice and skim milk are good for you, it's cheaper, and really better for you, to treat them like foods. You might eat bread and ice cream, but you wouldn't just spend all day eating them. Water is free, and great for you, and tea is pretty close to free, and just fine for you if you don't sweeten it with sugar.

Oh, and collard greens are actually really tasty. Who knew?