The New Year comes at a most difficult time for most of us. The burden of making an honest living, of providing shelter and of staying healthy weighs heavily on most families. But the most valuable partners are the homemakers who are tasked with making both ends meet with regard to house expenses. New Year’s resolutions, like promises, are often made to be broken, but there are some that we must resolve to follow through.
There are a few things we need to do to be able to face what are predicted to be harder times. They’re not quite resolutions, but here are pointers to guide us.
Food wastage – how many times do housewives find left-overs that have been forgotten in the fridge for days? Before planning a meal, check yesterday’s bits and pieces of cooked food. Recycle them. Adobo can be flaked and added to fried rice for breakfast. Tinola chicken can be used for chicken soup, either with asparagus or noodles. Beef steak can be re-done by adding oyster sauce and slivers of leeks.
Cook only the right quantity. If you are a small family, a whole chicken weighing more than a kilo is good for two dishes. If only one or two in your family are meat eaters, two pieces of steak, about 400 gms, should be enough.
Some items are better bought by the piece, such as pork chops or fish.Vegetables – do not buy more than what will be used in two or three days. This will avoid greens turning yellow and eggplants becoming wrinkled or tomatoes getting watery.
Rice – calculate your family’s consumption very well so you don’t have fried rice morning, noon and night. When serving pasta dishes, less rice is required. Ask your rice dealer what is ma-alsa.
Go through your daily newspapers for announcements of special promos like buy-one-take-one offers, slashed prices, special items on sale, coupons for freebies, opening goodies, etc. Your neighborhood stores would certainly have them.
Here’s a New Year wish list: That wet market vendors be more conscientious and use proper weights and measures, as well as refrain from mixing spoiled pieces of fish, meat and vegetables with the good ones. On many occasions we have found rotten onions in packs that are supposed to contain fresh ones.
Close monitoring of consumer practices. It is to the credit of Alfonso Valenzuela of the Department of Trade and Industry that we now have the names and contact numbers of those who can assist buyers with their concerns. We will publish details of how to go about this in next week’s column.
More customer service training for staff (front liners and otherwise) on product knowledge and human relations. One of the biggest turn-offs is a sales attendant who does not know anything about his/her products and where they are located. The most irritating person is one who is ever reluctant to assist, never wanting to go and search in their bodega for a specific product and would simply say “yan na lang po.” An exception to this are the boys and girls of the Rustan’s/Shopwise chain as well as the Makati branch.
Here’s wishing that the price of oil will no longer escalate, as well with liquified petroleum or cooking gas. Control is required. Some dealers jack up the price more than allowed. Our particular dealer would always be a few pesos more than published. Content should also be of the right weight.
May the price of bakery products remain steady, barring any hike in the cost of flour, etc. Note that there are good buys among the loaves.
We would also want all products to be printed with expiry dates.
Whatever we wish for, let’s first wish for A Happy New Year!
E-mail comments and questions to: lydia_d_castillo@yahoo.com.