Sharon November 13th, 2009
Hi Folks - The weekly Friday “what to put in your pantry update” is here! This week, we’re going to focus on the three sisters - corn, squash and beans. It is a useful mnemonic, I find, to choose items that seem to be related to one another in some way.
The beans are particularly important, because they provide much needed protein. You can actually use any dry legume - there’s a lot of them. If you don’t like beans, how about cowpeas, split peas, or lentils. You can also get canned beans, which are convenient, but mostly come in BPA lined cans, and are comparatively more expensive. I don’t find cooking beans to be that onerous - in the summer, it is easy to throw them in the solar oven. In the winter, they can go on the back of the woodstove, or in the crockpot during transitional times. I prefer dry beans, although I do keep a few canned beans (Eden are expensive but no BPA) around for sudden bean-related emergencies 
.
How much to get? Well, generally speaking you want a 1-3 ratio of beans to grains if they are your primary staple. Beans are one of those things that are much cheaper per lb if bought in bulk. Plus there’s less packaging - but if what you can afford is a supermarket package, don’t let that stop you from having enough to eat in a crisis.
What do you do with beans and legumes? Soups, of course - black bean, red bean, lentil, split pea… Obviously chili. Dal. Beans and rice. Bean dips and spreads. What’s not to love? If, btw, you are one of those people who get gas from beans, you might want to throw in a couple of bottles of beano, or start growing epazote, which both help. Also, generally if you haven’t eaten a lot of legumes, you should add them gradually, rather than all at once.
This time of year, a lot of people are selling winter squash very cheaply, and it is an excellent time to stock up. Good keeping varieties of winter squash - Pink Banana, Hubbard, Butternut will keep the whole winter at around 50-60 degrees, so in your house in a cool spot. They do not keep as well at cold temps, so don’t put them in the root cellar. Most pumpkin varieties don’t keep nearly as well, but pumpkin or squash with lesser keeping qualities can be cooked and dried or canned.
This is also a good time to purchase canned pumpkin, if you are not overly concerned about canned goods. It is usually on sale now, and over the next couple of weeks, we’ll be focusing on foods that go on sale between now and New Years due to the holidays. Whether fresh, dried, frozen or canned, the squash or pumpkins provide rich flavor, vitamin A and important nutrition. If you are dealing with whole ones, don’t forget to eat the delicious seeds as well.
What can you do with them? Bake them, add mashed squash and pumpkin to biscuits and baked goods, stuff them, make pies and puddings….yum.
Finally, I’m going to give corn short shrift here, because we already added popcorn to our storage, but if you are just starting now, one form of corn to add would be popcorn. You might also want to add grits, cornmeal or masa - tortillas, tamales, cornbread, johnny cake and cornmeal mush are part of the traditional foods of our culture. It goes without saying that if you can get good local dry corn for grinding or making into hominy, that’s the way to go. If you have to get pre-ground cornmeal, make sure that you rotate it regularly, because it will go rancid - replace every six months.
Also, if you live in a region where sweet corn is still available, now is a great time to cut some off the cob and dehydrate it - mixed with beans it makes a delicious sweet succotash, on its own, a wonderful corn chowder, added to chili or soups it has a great flavor and wonderful texture.
As you are picking up food for your own storage, please don’t forget your local food pantry. They’d appreciate popcorn, canned beans or bean soups and fresh squash as well to give away in thanksgiving baskets.
As for a non-food item - this is a good time to pick up candles and lamp oil in case of a power outage. Or, for a more modern option, consider buying cheap outdoor solar lighting - you can pick the sticks out of the ground and set them in buckets or vases around the house for lighting. Adding even a few sources of light is the difference between safety and comfort and misery and accidents in a power outage.
Cheers,
Sharon