Happy Easter!

There’s rejoicing today. It’s Easter, a time of hope and renewal. Families and friends will gather in celebration. If it’s not too late and if you have no plans, you might want to drive to Clark in Pampanga and be part of Yats Leisure’s events. Needless to say it would be too late for an overnight stay, but you can catch the brunch featuring an Easter Egg hunt for P1,500 for two adults and two children at the Clearwater Country club or do the afternoon English High Tea at 4:30 p.m. at the Amphitheatre. Call Kathy at 0926 -7052329 or Joy at 0917-8268790. After having a grand time, back in your homes, be prepared for your always-hungry tots, as they start their school holiday.

Easter also comes with the gloomy prediction of an inevitable rise in cost of food. At least two daily newspapers came out with the dreadful news that “low prices are a thing of the past.” Fearsome, indeed. A few days ago, when we visited a wet market, we happily noted that the price of mangoes has gone down to P60 a kilo. We thought this was a good sign. But before that put a smile on our face, there was chicken costing P120 a kilo. Then came this ominous warning in the news, and while we did panic, just as other homemakers would have, we thought we should accept the inevitable with calm, be prepared and look for alternatives, if at all available.

What are the alternatives? If you normally use canola or corn oil, try San Miguel’s Nutri-Oil. It is cheaper and just as healthy. Depending on your usage, it comes in three sizes. Prepare more dishes that do not require oil, such as nilaga, paksiw and grills. Serve more vegetables and choose the less expensive sayote, upo, kalabasa and sitao. Instead of butter, substitute margarine, specially in cooking. Make a kangkong or ampalaya salad instead of the more pricey lettuce. Be more quantity-conscious. If you are a family of three or four, buy the smaller chicken or if you get a big one weighing 1.5 kilos, divide it into two equal parts, each for one specific dish to be served on separate days. Then follow the much quoted slogan that says “buy local,” but only when the price is right and quality is good. Often imported items cost less than the native variety. Onion is one of them, with the native red ones costing more than the imported. Garlic is another item, with the Ilocos variety costing nearly five times higher than the Taiwanese. But, of course, fastidious homemakers will opt for the home-grown because it has more flavor. A Philippine brand of corned beef is normally sold much more than its foreign counterpart.

Then we need to take left-overs seriously. Whenever we visit relatives in the US, we would feel so bad about the amount of unconsumed food that goes into the garburator. We should not do this. There are countless ways to deal with leftovers, giving a dish a different taste and a new look that would belie its former state. Look at your fridge, then check your pantry regularly. Recently we found a few pieces of seemingly unwanted turkey breast and left-over anchovies, plus a half tub of cream and still usable Torani Pesto sauce. We also found a few pieces of green olives, which we cut into small bits. We went to work – sauted garlic and the turkey (cut into small cubes) in olive oil, added the rest of the ingredients and poured it over cooked penne pasta, and voila! The brood hardly noticed this dish came from several left-overs.

One sector that needs help are the farmers. Assistance will have to be provided with regard to increasing their output. Population growth has been labeled the culprit of insufficient supply, specially rice, as local harvest missed meeting the country’s requirement. The stores are full of grains from various neighboring countries – Thailand, Japan, etc. Is there something the farmers can do and/or be assisted with to increase their output?

There has to be a better, more efficient system with regard to farm to market transport, like improved roads and maybe getting rid of middlemen. Wet markets will have to be monitored so they don’t charge higher than the up-scale stores. After all, the so-called ordinary housewife still goes to the markets for their daily needs, more often because they are located near their homes, thus needing no transport money.

But most of all, each and everyone of us MUST stick to our respective budgets. Always bring a list and just enough money. Do not indulge in impulsive buying. That’s where our problem normally begins.

E-mail comments and questions to: [email protected]