[nabs-l] Easy but Bad Re: Parishable Food Items

Sun Feb 27 22:13:49 UTC 2011

I don't remember, but are crock pots allowed in dorm rooms?  I think the
variety of things you can make from a single appliance would triple or more
if using a crock pot.

Best,

Joe

"Hard work spotlights the character of people: some turn up their sleeves,
some turn up their noses, and some don't turn up at all."--Sam Ewing
-----Original Message-----
From: nabs-l-bounces at nfbnet.org [mailto:nabs-l-bounces at nfbnet.org] On Behalf
Of Nicole B. Torcolini at Home
Sent: Sunday, February 27, 2011 2:56 PM
To: National Association of Blind Students mailing list
Subject: Re: [nabs-l] Easy but Bad Re: Parishable Food Items

Okay, so you cannot make everything in a microwave, but you can make most 
things. Most things that you boil, such as pasta or carrots, can be made in 
a microwave. You just need a container that is big enough that the water 
will not boil over and can withstand a lot of heat. I have a quart Pyrex 
pitcher that I use for boiling pasta or carrots. You also have to have 
somewhere to strain whatever you have boiled, so this may not be an option 
if you don't have a sink in your room or a dorm kitchen. Vegetables, both 
frozen and fresh, can be cooked in the microwave. The trick to cooking 
anything in the microwave is knowing how long to cook it for. Often, you 
have to rotate and/or stir whatever you are cooking, even if your microwave 
has a turn table and particularly if you are cooking something that is more 
than an inch deep, such as macaroni and cheese. Potatoes cook well in the 
microwave, as long as you do not over cook them. You can make grilled cheese

sandwiches or mini pizzas with regular bread, English muffins, or any other 
type of bread. You can also use a mix of packaged food and fresh food. For 
example, you can make mini tuna casserole by cooking pasta, cooking carrots,

and then mixing then together with cheese and a small can of tuna and then 
heating it again. Something else to note about cooking in the microwave is 
that somethings don't necessarily burn, but they get tough, such as 
bread/pizza or meat. Different microwaves cook things on different powers, 
and most microwaves have an option for controlling the power setting. Make 
sure that you know all of the functions that your microwave has and that you

have it labeled in some way that you can access the ones that you want. 
Don't ever leave the room with the microwave running. If you ever smell 
smoke, stop the microwave, but don't open it. Let me know if you have any 
other questions.

Nicole

----- Original Message ----- 
From: "Katie Wang" <bunnykatie6 at gmail.com>
To: "National Association of Blind Students mailing list" 
<nabs-l at nfbnet.org>
Sent: Sunday, February 27, 2011 10:53 AM
Subject: Re: [nabs-l] Easy but Bad Re: Parishable Food Items

> Hi, nicole,
>  That's a very good point. I'm in the process of learning to cook so
> any suggestions/tips about what to make in a microwave other than
> packaged food would be much appreciated. I'm sure others on the list
> will benefit as well. Thanks!
>   Katie
>
> On 2/27/11, Nicole B. Torcolini at Home <ntorcolini at wavecable.com> wrote:
>> Just a friendly reminder that those easy-to-make microwave meals are 
>> often
>> packed with sodium and other bad things. Not bad if you need something 
>> quick
>> once in a while, but not the best thing to use as a main source of food. 
>> If
>> anyone is interested in knowing how to make things in the microwave that
>> don't just come out of a package, shoot me an email.
>>
>> Nicole
>>
>> ----- Original Message -----
>> From: "Arielle Silverman" <nabs.president at gmail.com>
>> To: "National Association of Blind Students mailing list"
>> <nabs-l at nfbnet.org>
>> Sent: Saturday, February 26, 2011 10:49 PM
>> Subject: Re: [nabs-l] Parishable Food Items
>>
>>
>>> Hi all,
>>>
>>> I don't think you need to worry too much about expiration dates. Dairy
>>> products will give a telltale smell and/or taste signal when it's time
>>> to throw them away. In my experience, if the milk smells and tastes
>>> fine, it won't make you sick. For uncooked meats and perishable foods
>>> like restaurant leftovers, my mother's rule that I've always followed
>>> is to eat it or freeze it within 3-4 days of getting it. I am not sure
>>> if this rule is too strict but I have found it pretty easy to follow
>>> with a little planning. Once food is frozen it can be stored safely
>>> for a long time; just Braille your freezer bag or remember what it
>>> feels like. Generally, I think just using some common sense like
>>> keeping track of approximately when you bought something and paying
>>> attention to the texture and smell of foods will prevent most
>>> problems.
>>>
>>> By the way, I just learned about a website called
>>> www.directionsforme.com
>>> which contains a searchable database of food package labels. So you
>>> can easily look up the preparation instructions for frozen meals, easy
>>> mac, Ramen, etc. or even read ingredient lists and nutritional info if
>>> you are so inclined. They also have package labels for
>>> over-the-counter medications so you can verify how many Advil or cold
>>> pills you need to take, how often you can safely redose and any other
>>> pertinent drug information.
>>>
>>> Arielle
>>>
>>> On 2/26/11, Cindy Bennett <clb5590 at gmail.com> wrote:
>>>> I know exactly what you're going through. Mini fridges don't havev a
>>>> lot of space, and especially the mini freezers in the top of the mini
>>>> fridges don't always keep things frozen. And, being on a meal plan but
>>>> wanting to have food options for when the meal plan is not convenient
>>>> is hard to balance, because the meal plan was expensive, so you don't
>>>> want to spend a lot of money on other food let alone see that money go
>>>> to waste with food going bad. And that combined with the fact that a
>>>> meal plan causes you to eat your own food less often can make things
>>>> complicated. The previous advice is good. One thing that I have found
>>>> that might be unique to where I go to school is that the perishable
>>>> food found in the convenient stores on campus tends to expire sooner.
>>>> I think this is the case because it wouldn't be efficient to keep
>>>> ordering more stock when they don't sell it quickly, but purchasing
>>>> food at the convenience stores is convenient, because you can use
>>>> dollars from your meal plan. Like I said, especially at larger
>>>> niversities with more on campus students, this might be less of a
>>>> case, but if you've been having a problem with on campus stores, try
>>>> some off campus. Also, when you go shopping, you can ask whoever is
>>>> helping you to look for the latest expiration date available.
>>>> Sometimes stores will place food that is closer to expiration towards
>>>> the front of shelves which might hide longer lasting products behind.
>>>>
>>>> This might sound obvious, but if you bring home leftovers from a
>>>> restaurant, take it out of the crappy styrofoam and store it in a
>>>> sealable container. It will last way longer.
>>>>
>>>> And one thing that I have found for nonrefridgerated food such as
>>>> bread is that keeping it in cabinets helps. You can even keep bread in
>>>> the freezer for a while granted your freezer is big enough for a loaf.
>>>>
>>>> But I totally understand what you are going through, and for that
>>>> reason, I found myself not really buying fruit, but grabbing a few
>>>> extra pieces for the next couple of days when leaving the dining hall,
>>>> and mainly consuming nonperishable foods such as soup or easy mac in
>>>> my room.
>>>>
>>>> And you will probably notice that for money and/or convenience reasons
>>>> that you will become less paranoid about food. I'm not saying you
>>>> should do this with dairy products, but if pizza has been left out or
>>>> something, I definitely consider it a second meal before throwing it
>>>> out. I would have absolutely never done this before college. It is all
>>>> about judgment and your comfort level.
>>>>
>>>> Cindy
>>>>
>>>> On 2/26/11, bookwormahb at earthlink.net <bookwormahb at earthlink.net> 
>>>> wrote:
>>>>> Chelsea,
>>>>> That is a little hard to know. If you're in a dorm, why not ask 
>>>>> someone
>>>>> the
>>>>> expiration date?
>>>>> If you go shopping every two weeks, you probably have nothing to worry
>>>>> about.
>>>>> Over time you'll sense when things go bad; as I haven't lived on my 
>>>>> own
>>>>> much, living in the dorm with the new fridge was new to me too.
>>>>> Generally, things have a certain shelf life.
>>>>> Sounds like you mainly buy dairy products: yogurt, milk, etc. Maybe 
>>>>> you
>>>>> buy
>>>>> lunch meat and bread and cheese to have in place of cafeteria food,
>>>>> sometimes.
>>>>>
>>>>> Well for milk, I heard it lasts a few weeks.
>>>>> You can smell or taste when it goes bad.
>>>>> For yogurt, I imagine it would smell bad too.
>>>>> Yogurt should last a couple weeks provided you seal the container 
>>>>> tight
>>>>> after using it.
>>>>>
>>>>> Lunch meat lasts over a week.  Cheese sliced up lasts
>>>>> a week at least.
>>>>>
>>>>> One thing is I cannot tell if bread is moldy; it doesn't smell or feel
>>>>> different, unless its real gotten moldy, but just a little bit I don't
>>>>> know.
>>>>> So I've  just asked someone or relied on how long its been around. 
>>>>> Like
>>>>>
>>>>> I
>>>>> had this bread six days, its still good.
>>>>>
>>>>> Hth,
>>>>> Ashley
>>>>> -----Original Message-----
>>>>> From: Chelsea Cook
>>>>> Sent: Saturday, February 26, 2011 10:58 PM
>>>>> To: nabs-l at nfbnet.org
>>>>> Subject: [nabs-l] Parishable Food Items
>>>>>
>>>>> Hi all,
>>>>>
>>>>> One of the coolest things about college dorm rooms is ... the mini
>>>>> fridge! However, the stuff I put into mine sometimes gives me trouble.
>>>>> How do you guys manage milk and yogurt and stuff like that in terms of
>>>>> expiration dates? Usually, since it's just me, I go shopping about
>>>>> every two weeks and try to get items that will expire in the same
>>>>> window, but it's still tricky and I haven't gotten it down to a
>>>>> science yet. (Play on words, haha!) Anyway, any tips short of writing
>>>>> down everything would be helpful.
>>>>>
>>>>> Thanks,
>>>>> Chelsea
>>>>>
>>>>> --
>>>>> Chelsea Cook
>>>>>
>>>>> Virginia Tech 2015; Physics Major
>>>>> cook2010 at vt.edu
>>>>> "I ask you to look both ways.  For the road to a knowledge of the
>>>>> stars leads through the atom; and important knowledge of the atom has
>>>>> been reached through
>>>>> the stars."
>>>>> Sir Arthur Eddington, British astrophysicist (1882-1944), Stars and
>>>>> Atoms (1928), Lecture 1
>>>>>
>>>>> _______________________________________________
>>>>> nabs-l mailing list
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ink.net
>>>>>
>>>>>
>>>>> _______________________________________________
>>>>> nabs-l mailing list
>>>>> nabs-l at nfbnet.org
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>>>>
>>>>
>>>> --
>>>> Cindy Bennett
>>>> uNC Wilmington Psychology major
>>>>
>>>> clb5590 at gmail.com
>>>> 828.989.5383
>>>>
>>>> _______________________________________________
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>>>
>>>
>>> --
>>> Arielle Silverman
>>> President, National Association of Blind Students
>>> Phone:  602-502-2255
>>> Email:
>>> nabs.president at gmail.com
>>> Website:
>>> www.nabslink.org
>>>
>>> _______________________________________________
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>>
>>
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