Thursday 30 June 2011

Things that I miss - The C's

Okay, here is my next installment of things that I miss from home. 

Campbell's - Yup, the soup.  I used to do a lot with Campbell's broths and condensed soups.  Especially in the winter.  Here, in PE at least, they have condensed soups made by Heinz.  Cream of Mushroom and Chicken, Tomato too.  They don't taste quite the same, but I can manage and don't miss those so much.  What I really miss is the tetra pack broth.  They use stock cubes or powders here.  I always found stock cubes too salty at home and the same goes here.  So I miss Campbell's broth/stocks.  I don't have the space to make my own and keep it in the freezer, and I'm not organized enough yet to make a stock one day and use it a few days later, so cubes and powders it shall be.  Now, I am searching for the one with the lowest sodium content.

Cereal, cold - We used to go through a lot of cold cereals.  It was our breakfast of choice back home. It frequently served as a healthy bedtime or after school snack too.   Unfortunately, they don't quite have the selection here that we did in Canada.  The kids loved Vectors, Honey Nut Cheerios, and Miniwheats back home.  Here they have Cornflakes and Special K.  They have Multigrain Cheerios (which are way sweeter than back home) and that's about it for at least partially health cereals.  They have lots of muesli type cereals too. The rest of their cereals are either high fibre (which my kids wouldn't touch at home either) or have sugar as their first or second ingredient.  The kids love them, but I don't.  So I find I am making a lot of eggs McUncle L for breakfast, thank heavens they have english muffins here.

Composting - Our region back in Ontario had a curb side composting program.  Once a week they would come and collect our compostables.  Food scraps, coffee filters, used tissues and paper towels all went into the green bin and were turned into usable compost for gardens.  We don't have a composting program here and a yard composter is a recipe for disaster with the wild life that roam in our area of the city.  I miss my green bin and hate to add more to the landfills here than necessary, so we have made some adjustments.  Mashed potatoes now include the skin.  I cook in smaller amounts so there aren't so many leftovers.  The family member that appreciates the changes the most is the dog.  Where he used to be a straight kibble eater, he is now benefiting from my desire to not throw things out by getting any re-heated leftovers that I can't put back in the refrigerator or freezer.  He's a happy boy our pup.  I'm also finding it handy that the grocery store is on the way to or from school, so I shop more frequently, which means that things aren't as likely to go bad before I use them.  And, because it's on the way to school I'm not contributing more car exhaust to the atmosphere than necessary either. 

Next Post - Random Observations

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