Yesterday I ground grain and made a loaf of whole wheat bread. I also made my own soy milk from Laura Soybeans (the absolute best for making soy milk). It felt good. As if I were coming back to my strength.

I’ve always been something of a food hoarder. It wasn’t that I was a prepper, but I liked knowing that I could do for myself. For a long time we lived frugally. So I made my own gourmet products so that we could live richly without being rich.

I taught myself to make my own staple vegan foods. I can make vegan yogurt, tempeh, tofu, soy milk, and bread from bean or grain to finished product, as well as other foods. (I keep the beans and grains on hand in large 40 pound food storage buckets in the garage.) I can make pickles, sauerkraut, kombucha, and a variety of other ferments. I can make faux meats from gluten and okara (the soybean waste from making soy milk). I can make a variety of amazing gourmet vegan foods cheaply.

Note the “I can make” instead of “I make” phrasing.

My skills at food prep and buying the raw ingredients in bulk helped us save money for years while living the gourmet life. But two years ago, feeling overwhelmed by all I needed to learn to become a good writer and indie publisher, I stopped making the fancy time-intensive foods that require paying attention (like tempeh which requires a long incubation period at the perfect temperature).

Then I abandoned the daily staples. I slowly replaced homemade soy milk with storebought, homemade pickles with fancy gourmet garlic pickles, and finally my own bread with storebought bread.

Steve was disappointed. Our grocery bills soared.

Now with the need to stay at home, I’m opening up my grain and bean food storage buckets again. We’ve taken a vow to not go to the store more often than once every two weeks. To live on what we have. To be generous in this time of anxiety. Part of that means allowing other people to get what they need while we live for a while from our stockpiles.

Thankfully there is no need to abandon the gourmet vegan life. I have the power to return to the habits that made us financially stable and then successful enough for me to quit my job and write. I embraced my food-making superpower this week.

It feels good. Making excellent food from scratch feels like love. Once the panic subsides and the supply chain is once again functioning as it should, we’ll be able to replenish our buckets of beans and grains. But for now we have plenty.

If you are looking for a good source of beans, grains, flours, and other food to have available, as well as the food storage buckets to store them in, I recommend Honeyville. (They even have ready-to-eat meals you can rehydrate.) I’ve bought from them for more than a decade and been satisfied. In the midst of this panic, they’ve been cleaned out of a lot of their products. But that’s temporary.

I hope you are also enjoying yummy food. If you need any recipes or encouragement, hit me up! Food is love.

Be well, friends! And stay well.