Credit crunch cook

My house is small, and doesn't heat easily. I've decided the best way to heat it this winter is to have the stove on, cooking, most of the day, rather than burning gas filling my rubbish heaters. Because the rooms are small, a good stew can heat my whole house for a day, not to mention the hot, steamy joy of actually eating the finished dish. 

The coq au vin I made tonight (see below) has made the house so lovely and warm that I'm going to dig out some old favourite cookbooks, including Lindsay Bareham's A Celebration of Soup, in preparation for my stew and soup heating-eating solution. I am already looking into getting a weekly organic vegetable box delivered (there are links to a couple of box companies who deliver to Glasgow at the bottom of the page), and I hope to be able to top this up with the farmers' market maybe once a month, a deli shop if I happen to be passing and, of course, the butcher and fishmonger. Luckily, my dad's a keen angler and can often surprise me with the odd catch. The wild salmon in my freezer came from his line. Making a conscious decision to stay away from the supermarket as much as possible, ironically in an effort to save money, has changed my eating habits forever for the better. I will occasionally do an online shop at a well known supermarket for bulk items: tins of  coconut milk and plum tomatoes; jars of curry paste; huge bags of rice. But in these times of financial anxiety, cooking big pots of healthy, fresh food will last a couple of days, be cheaper and heat your home (if it's as small as mine). It's a no-brainer for me.

Picture by Gypsy D, Flickr