Don't Waste the Mustard (or anything else)

I love mustard. Love it. Especially the sweet-hot kind. My youngest child is also a mustard lover and feasts on the plain yellow kind with a fistful of pretzels most days after school. Being a male of the species, when the mustard becomes difficult to get out of the jars he simply puts it back in the fridge and opens a new one. Thanks to this habit, at any given time there could be 2-3 almost empty open mustard containers in our fridge.


Yes, of course I rant about this. But it falls on def, hungry ears. A better mother would stop buying mustard. But then that would just be punishing myself, right? So we carried on, until I read this GREAT idea for almost empty mustard containers, especially the squeezeable kind. I found this brilliant idea in a free copy of a home cooking magazine, which has long since landed in the recycling, so I can’t give credit where credit is due. It was one of those abbreviated versions of a bigger magazine sent with stickers and a subscription offer you can’t resist. Since I’ve got stacks of magazines on my desk to be read, I could resist. But before recycling it, I did skim through it while waiting for the mustard-eating child to locate his cleats.

Here’s the great idea: when your mustard jar is almost empty, add oil and vinegar and whatever other things you like in your salad dressing and shake. Brilliant! I added garlic grapeseed oil, elderflower-lime-apple vinegar, salt, and pepper. Yum! Simple, easy, gourmet dressing and no more wasted mustard. And when I’m finished with the dressing, the jar is easy to rinse and recycle.

I’m thinking this idea might also work on BBQ sauce bottles too. You could make a quick marinade by adding oil and vinegar and worchestershire sauce or soy sauce and water, plus whatever spices float your boat.

So there you go, my healthy-eating-good-for-the-planet-don’t-waste-anything tip for the day!

One of the biggest excuses I hear time and again for not eating organically is - "I can't afford it." The first step in affording to eat organically (or affording to eat at all) is to not waste the food you do buy. I've blogged about this in the past, but now I'm focusing on this and other ideas for an upcoming workshop I’ll be giving on Eating Organically and Affording It. I’m still a bit stuck searching for a catchier title for the series of workshops I’ve been developing on all the aspects of kid-friendly organic life. I’ve started with Healthy, Happy, Homemade Life, but that’ a mouthful. If you’ve got a better idea – I’d desperately love to hear it.

And if you’re local, mark your calendar for Wednesday October 26 at 7pm. I’ll be presenting at the Paul Smith Library in Shrewsbury and I’d love to see you there. It’s free, of course. Bring your own ideas for eating organically and saving money, or send them to me and I’ll share them. We’re all in this together and we need all the help we can get.