About Claire: a Closer Look Part 1

What sparked my interest in self-sufficient living?

The first thing you should know is I’ve always been a go-getter.
Independent.
One who desired to take care of myself & my own.

So the only thing new about self-sufficiency to me was the term. And I don’t mean like I never heard of it before. I had just never thought to apply that term to myself, my actions, my motivations. Or to just use it as a defining characteristic of my life. Independence really just revolved around money for the longest time.

It was when I discovered that my love of optimizing everything could be applied to areas outside of finances that I was really hooked. I started collecting grocery store circulars & tracking sales. Then I began stocking up on canned foods & tinkering with our budget categories trying to chisel dollars & save cents. After all, we (my college-found best friend turned husband & I) were fresh out of school staring adulthood & W2s in the face with $70,000 of student loan debt on our shoulders.

I would play with the numbers ceaselessly like my life depended on it. My husband was in the same boat (though not as number crunchy) & together we ruminated over money management. We were constantly perfecting, tweaking, experimenting & pivoting.

But when it came to holistic self-sufficiency we sort of started down different paths. I gravitated towards the kitchen & household arena while he chose auto mechanics & other fix-it projects. If you know us, you’ll know that’s so us ahahaha

Childhood Influences

Now, here’s the thing. I’ve always loved being in the kitchen. My mom has photos of me making my own PBJ’s when I could barely see over the counter.

Maybe I was born in the kitchen. Sike, I wasn’t ahahhaha but my spirit definitely feels the homiest & happiest there. Yet, despite being in the kitchen so much, cooking from total scratch & certainly food preservation weren’t things I ever learned or saw growing up.

Born & raised in the city, this has been the story for most of my life. I’m a first-generation everything in my family & grew up accustomed to the philosophy that “food comes from a grocery store” & was either “made in the oven or the microwave at home”.

We had a lot of semi-pre-made meals like Hamburger Helper and Bisquick pancakes. Our diet wasn’t entirely selective from what I remember. Although I distinctly remember when my mom cut red meat from the repertoire & we became a chicken & turkey only family of three. 

Early Adulthood

As I matured through living, things changed for me regarding food. I also think building a career in my early twenties kept me from exploring kitchen self-reliance. You get so pressed working for someone else that when you’re “off” you just want to decompress. And when everyday begins to feel that way, nothing seems better than not having to cook or think of what to cook. You feel me?

So there’s like 2 levels of “from-scratch cooking” then. There’s the “we make everything 100% from scratch, all the inputs & outputs”. And there’s the “we use pre-packaged inputs to make something from scratch with minimal effort”. Or simply put there’s “butter & flour with ice water to make pastry” & “girl, if you don’t pop open a can of Grands & keep it movin!”

Growing up we were the later. My favorite childhood meal was meatloaf, mashed potatoes & sweet peas with those Grands homestyle biscuits ahahaha A close second was my mom’s family-famous spaghetti.

The potatoes though were often boxed flakes, the peas store-bought & the spaghetti pasta definitely wasn’t made from scratch. But to this day, those are still in my top 5 favorite meals. And ironically, my husband’s favorite meal is Shepherd’s Pie (the neater, constructed version of meatloaf & mash ahahaha). He also loves mac & cheese & not the Velveeta kind either. 

The very early days – my ideology was…off-track

So stocking up on canned peas, tuna, salsa (so much salsa) & frozen veg was my idea of food preservation. And this is a good start. I don’t want you to get it twisted hello.
But it wasn’t until…

I started looking for the information that led me to where I am now.

This whole part of myself that’s here with you now has spawned from constantly asking
“What else can I do? What else can I make?”

I started tracking prices from grocery store circulars & watching girls on YouTube organize their kitchens into Pinterest-worthy glories. YouTube’s “you might like this video” feature started pushing more homesteady-y videos my way.

I was honestly amazed. I was like “whoa, really?” A “where they do that at” moment if I ever had one. It never occurred to me that I could bypass the industry & preserve my own food at home.

Like what??! What??? Ahahaha

If my parents knew anything about this, we didn’t talk about it. And it was a revelation. So if that’s where you’re meeting me from, I’ll say “hello lovely” again. I’ve been there & you can be here!

I came face to face with the knowledge of women out there who were growing their own food & then preserving it. Mostly by canning. But never in a million years would I have considered gardening because I despise being outdoors in the sun. I may be a spring baby but internally, I’m a winter baby through & through. Give me alllllll the ice, snow & cold anytime hello. I also dislike plants & flowers in general. But as I was watched it all, I saw beautiful displays of glass jars filled with colorful foods & I was sold.

Here’s something I haven’t shared yet. And I suppose it’s because it’s so much of who I am that I just assume everyone who meets me knows this.  

Filled in the gaps with $0.84 silverware from Walmart, a few Pyrex storage dishes & called it a day, ok. 

I was all very much “Yeah, but…”

Canning was interesting to me, but not anything I saw myself doing at 21 that’s for sure. What I know now is I should have.

I started seeing more about gardening & raising livestock. But again, I wasn’t quite convinced it was something I could do. We had a balcony on that first high-rise apartment & another later on in our marriage, but I had already failed before. We built a decorative little feeder & planted some herbs in them but then drowned the poor things!

Continuing to not believe it was for me, I stuck to stocking up at the grocery store.

But that soon began to change.

Then we learned about long-term storage in Mylar bags. And that was easy! Too easy. And so much fun!

We started storing beans, flour, rice & oats – dry goods staples. By this time, we were student loan debt-free, living in a studio apartment. No credit cards, no furniture other than a bed & dresser, no kids but lots of books.

My husband was supportive of my growing obsession with this form of food preservation. And I knew we reached the Big Leagues when he snipped about my first Webstaurant cart. It had 100lbs of oats & an equal amount of rice but he blessed it anyway.

That was several years ago. Now, he’s fully aware of all these sorts of shenanigans (as he calls it). But he still allows the house to fund my productive hobby (as I call it). Ahahahah

Canning, gardening, Mylar bags, cash envelopes – all this snowballed into a passion to keep learning. But no one in either of our personal or professional lives was doing these things so it was slow going & a lot of trial & error.

We were blessed to meet 2 local couples living a homestead lifestyle we could bounce things off of. One through our midwife, the other through my husband’s job. But since our recent move to the Midwest last fall, we’re starting over in that regard. And just like then, we’ve gone hunting for knowledge again.

My educational outlets at the time went from YouTube to podcasts, to books & FB groups where I gleaned soooo much information from people doing the things & talking about it. We discovered conferences like Homesteader’s of America & websites like RealMilk.com.

We started learning more about food, exploring markets in our area & just trying to be a little more self-reliant. And that’s all I encourage you to do too.

The moment the light bulb went off.

The question is: did someone teach me? How did I first learn about food preservation techniques, such as canning, fermenting, or dehydrating? 

I really got fired up about this passion for food preservation & learning to DIY my way around the kitchen when I started watching other women save $$$ a year. Remember, in the early days I was still heavily influenced by how much the bottom line was affected. So, healthy eating wasn’t really a factor. And I won’t lie, I was really not concerned with quality at the time. Mainly just cost.

So I was watching women with large families bust it out in the kitchen because I was like. “If they have 11 kids, I KNOW they know how to stretch a dollar!” Women/families like Jammerill Stewart & Sarah from Our Tribe of Many & Jessica from Three Rivers Homestead. They were showing me how to really stretch that dollar out girl. The dry cleaning lady couldn’t do better. They showed me how to feed a family gooood & even preserve food.

I was especially inspired by Jessica because she was cooking from scratch 3 meals a day for 7-8 people I believe. Meanwhile, I was still struggling to make it happen for just me & my husband. At this point in my life, I was on the verge of thinking about kids so I knew I better have things prepared so to speak. If I was ever going to do it, pre-kids was the time to get to it! 

That’s not to say you can’t make these sort of changes with kids.
It was just how I thought at the time.

These women taught me how to be self-sufficient from my kitchen.

They taught me how to preserve food as a beginner, how to invest that energy into my family’s wellbeing & how to be joyful doing it. I picked up on canning, freezing meals, batch cooking, saavy shopping tips & so much more. I was having a blast, but it would soon be time for me to dip my own feet into the waters. And boy did I ever.

My husband bought me my first pressure canner & I knew then I had to make good on his purchase. I got a copy of Preserving with Pomona’s Pectin & decided to make my own strawberry jam from some berries we had picked at a local orchard.

It was delicious. But more than that, I had put my hands to work producing something my husband loved & I was incredibly proud. Although I loved the jam too, strawberry jam just doesn’t compare to grape jelly for a classic PBJ to me. But it’s good on homemade biscuits though!

I was doing the thing. I was finally on my way to becoming that girl. And I was loving it.

This is when I fully stepped into food preservation.

Twenty twenty-one was the summer that life in my kitchen changed for me. That was the summer I participated in my first Three Rivers Challenge – a month long event where women around the country preserve something everyday. And that August, we put aside sooooooo much food. From beef stew to canned beans, corn, salsa, bone broth. All the things.

There are still other kitchen management systems I need to work through like organization but preserving food is not one of them. I’m nowhere near mastery. I’m simply at a place now where I need to focus on perfecting the craft.

But the education & inspiration from following those channels early on motivated me to do even more, even better.

Present-day approach

Now I actively hunt for information about all kinds of food preservation methods. From reading various books on the subject to drifting away from fiction & into the homemaking/cooking section at any book stores or library. I’ve developed a much stronger interest in food preservation.

Exploring methods like dehydrating & fermenting are newer to me. Besides making homemade yogurt, I never did much fermenting until I came across a tutorial on it from Lisa of Farmhouse On Boone in 2022.

Every year I pick one skill to focus on & practice at length. This year (2024) I’m taking the time to really dig into fermentation. By the end of the year, maybe I’ll have mastered the basics.

And as for dehydrating food I always bypassed that one, choosing to wait until I had a dehydrator or solar dehydrator because my oven was never really that successful. The temp just didn’t get low enough. Since thrifting my very own Nesco FD-50 for less than $9 I can’t get enough of dehydrating!

Do I always cook from scratch?

This is the kicker. So lemme me just say upfront right now,
I do not cook from scratch everyday, all the time, every meal or anything like that.

I’m working my way towards that & doing the best I can, but I haven’t arrived yet! Cooking from scratch 95%+ of the time is one of my long-term kitchen goals.

Personally, I’ll probably never hit 100% because we like the experience of eating out at new restaurants & all that comes with that. So I know there will be times in my life where cooking from scratch isn’t a primary focus.

Because now we have two kids (home birth babies actually)! What a wonderful adventure & just another way living self-sufficiently has impacted our daily life & thought process.

What/who motivates me to do these things?

Alright, so I’m actually motivated by a number of things when it comes to cooking from scratch or swapping out pre-packaged/convenience meals for homemade versions. 

General Motivations

Family first, family always. I cook from-scratch & preserve food out of love & service to my family, their health & well-being. Maybe you know this or have heard this, but cooking at home can be a great way to eat healthier & save money over time. I want the longest, fullest life possible with my person & my people. Food is one of the best chances I have at the moment to influence that. If we eat properly & fuel our bodies responsibly, maybe we’ll get a little bit more mileage out of these bones you know?

Finances. But I can’t act like I’m not motivated by our finances either. After all, I sort of lept into self-sufficiency because of money management. Finances are often the focal point for many people who want to live more independent lives. And maybe that’s how you found me. It’s wise to have a solid grasp on money handling because it’s everywhere hello. You never really escape it. Learning to cook from-scratch & preserve food at home usually works out to be cheaper than eating out for us. So stick around & I’ll teach you how to save at least $200 on your groceries every month.

Creativity, Challenges & Curiosity. The better I understand my family, their appetites & the role our lifestyle has on all that, the better I get at making the right meals. And the right amount of meals. My curiosity drives me to cook from scratch & I like the challenge of cooking by hand. There’s a creativity aspect to it & cooking from scratch allows me to explore all of that. 

I’m happy being in the kitchen. I’m also motivated because I just naturally spend a lot of time in the kitchen. Even when I’m not cooking. I legit will just straight up hang out in the kitchen reading or rearranging the layout. Looking out the window at squirrels. Just being there. So it just makes sense that I would cook things that I’m learning how to DIY. And when it comes to DIY’ing, I started with things we love – like those Grand’s biscuits my mom would make us. (Do you know I STILL haven’t perfected my biscuit game? Tips? Help a girl out, please!) 

Cookbooks Anonymous. Yes, I may have a habit. But I’m motivated to cook from scratch because I have a lot of cookbooks. Scouting old, vintage or classic versions in used bookstores is my second jam ahaahah & over the years my collection has grown. I feel like, if I’m gonna have the cookbooks then I need to use the cookbooks hello. Although on the other hand, I’m always saying don’t be a textbook chef. Hey, it’s double-sided I know, but this is me. And this is how I think.

Just a side note: The thought process of not being a textbook chef is one I really believe in. So I try to make things based on my basic understanding of the components. With authentic versions of ethnic foods though, I really trust the guidance of a good cookbook. Great cookbooks or food novels are beautiful to me because I have a strong desire to level up my cooking skills. Food isn’t going to go away, but I intend to get better & better with it.

If you’re not in the habit of hitting up your local lib (library), do so. Most give you 3 weeks plus 3-5 renewals. That means you could hold a book out for a few months! You’re bound to pick up a few skills & recipes in that time!

I’m motivated by building a legacy.

Because I spend so much time in the kitchen, my son seems to be developing an affinity towards it too. He’s two but he initiates getting into the kitchen, pulling his step stool up to the counter & getting to it by making oatmeal or cracking eggs. And he leads with “We got work to do!” 

SN: When we got married, I asked my husband to wait 7-10 years before we talked about having kids. Long story short, he wanted to try biologically & I knew I just wasn’t there yet. You can’t exactly compromise on that situation ahahahah either you have kids or you don’t – there’s no in-between. So the time frame was my way of meeting in the middle. I wanted kids at some point, but not right then.

So this encourages me & motivates me as a mother to continue cooking from scratch because I really want to develop that love of food in my kids. And I want to help them understand how to operate in the kitchen efficiently.

Passing this down matters to me. I don’t want the kitchen or cooking from scratch to be a foreign concept to them. Or one that they shy away from because food is a big part of life, right!

If you struggle with being in the kitchen with family/littles, I’ve written a few tips to include your family in the kitchen.

I love being in the kitchen with my family now & only imagine that as toddlers turn into teenagers we’ll still be having a blast in the kitchen. Food is such a big part of self-sufficient living & that’s a big part of my & my husband’s vision. And we both want our children to be independent in life.

But when it comes to food, if you’re not able to adequately move about the kitchen & work with food it’ll be a constant uphill struggle. And today’s food culture isn’t the greatest. Too much fast-paced, diminished-nutrient-based, empty-calorie, tray-table, microwaveable TV dinners. And life is just too precious to be spending it like that.

Related Post: The Value of Slow Intentional Food – a guest post I wrote for the blog The Virtuous Home.

I’m becoming the woman my family needs now, but also the one I hope to be later too. A woman who has recipes to pass down. Whose kitchen tools or appliances everyone remembers growing up around. The one who sings songs & always has a baked good or two ready for some good convo. That’s who I want to become.

I’m motivated to cook from scratch because we love diversity in our foods.

We really value the pop of color experiencing different cultures gives us. That includes the different foods. We really love just about anything Asian, Indian or Mexican. But we also really like Caribbean & Italian. Except that these weren’t foods I grew up eating.

In fact, I survived on chicken strips, french fries & quesadillas in my late teens through college. I liked other foods, but it took meeting my best friend (now husband) to really step out of my comfort zone.

So I’m not familiar with how to cook half the foods we love, especially the Asian fare. But besides costing an arm & a leg to eat out, it’s to our benefit that I learn how to cook ’em!

I’m learning through cookbooks – like the two Vietnamese ones I got from the lib earlier this year. But also most of the food novels/books I read now help me understand flavor profiles & how to build dishes.

I also want to learn to cook cultural foods because my husband & I have a travel bucket list longer than the Nile River. While we may never get to visit some of those places, it doesn’t have to stop us from eating there.

That’s a wrap!

I’ve shared a lot but there’s ohhh so much more. I’ll leave you with this. If you’re reading this & thinking that you’re ready to get your finances under control, finally setup your kitchen & start returning back to the good ole’ days then you’re in the right place. I want to help you get there.

This path though is a journey & although there’s things we’ll cover along the way, you need to be in it for the long haul. Your early influences don’t have to be the end-all-be-all for you. Being different than how you grew up will be hard. But it will be worth it to break some bad habits, start some new routines & save more money than you thought possible. All so you can be doing the things you really want to do.

Wherever you are on your journey, you remember that you’ve got this lovely!