Frugal Meals: Delicious Nourishing Recipes

Is eating wholesome gluten free food expensive? It doesn't need to be. I was delighted to receive an advance copy of Traditional Meals for the Frugal Family: Delicious, Nourishing Recipes for Less by Shannon Stonger. Like me, Shannon maintains that low budget should never mean low quality.

Shannon Stonger is the blogger at Nourishing Days and has also authored 100% Rye, Traditionally Fermented Foods, and co-authored The Doable Off-Grid Homestead. She, her husband, and their six children live on an off-grid homestead in Texas.

Collage of dairy free chocolate pudding, pizza, tomato soup, gluten free bread for frugal meals — **Pin to save.**

In Traditional Meals for the Frugal Family, Shannon shares how she feeds her family of eight with delicious, nutritious meals for less. Based on the wisdom of traditional food diets, these recipes are focused on unprocessed ingredients, pastured animal products, and frugal foods that people have thrived on for generations. The resulting meals are gluten free, almost entirely dairy free, picky eater certified and, most importantly, deeply nourishing.

The ingredients are commonly available in grocery stores or online, if you don't already have them.

The book includes:

Defining Traditional Foods
Thrifty Mornings
Frugal Broth & Beans
Economical Pastured Proteins
Accompaniments
Prudent Sweets and Treats
Penny-Pinching DIY's

Frugal Cooking from Scratch Recipes

I made four recipes from the book:

Soaked Grain-Free Garbanzo Bean Pizza Crust (page 44)

gluten free pizza crust with tomato sauace, mushrooms, pineapple, and basil — Grain Free Pizza

I topped the crust with our favourite pizza toppings. The crust was delightfully chewy with beautiful crisp edges. We could easily hold a pizza slice in one hand without it falling apart.

slice of thin-crust pizza held in hand — It's nice to be able to hold a slice of homemade gluten free pizza in your hand.

Soaked Gluten-Free Artisan Bread (page 88)

sliced round loaf of gluten free artisan bread, a component of frugal meals — This excellent loaf of rustic bread slices up nicely!

I started Soaked Gluten-Free Artisan Bread a couple days ahead and let it sit in the fridge so it was ready to bake when we were ready for it. It made a couple of nice round artisan-style loaves, crunchy on the outside and moist on the inside somewhat reminiscent of sourdough bread. It was like the homemade bread I used to make before going gluten free!

Shannon soaks bread batters to make the grains more digestible.

Real Food Copycat Tomato Soup (page 60)

tomato soup in white bowl — This soup is amazingly easy to make!

The soup was just like, from what I remember, the canned tomato soup I grew up with, only better - and, it's almost as easy! I'll be coming back to this recipe, for sure!