Marketing Behind the Scenes #1

#1 > It all starts here?

Extract:

I’d like to be able tie this up into a neat package for you and say: It all started HERE.

You know, I took some great course on how to have a great business, and I followed their secret formula, and I ate a magic pill.

Or I studied “having a great business” at university, or by mail order course, and I did their 10 step program, and voila.

Not quite.

The beginning of One Roast Vegetable is actually Ted’s fault.

Ted and Donna-Joy came to my house for dinner, I served cappuccino shortbread (and my really amazing mashed potatoes, not together, of course, one was for dessert).

>> To read the complete entry, sign up for email series: “Marketing Behind the Scenes: The REAL Story of One Roast Vegetable”

(special) Behind the scenes video

I’ve never done this before.

I’ve just posted a behind-the-scenes video of the Paris test kitchen that was filmed TWO DAYS after we moved into this new apartment.

http://tinyurl.com/nbzr5n

You see, when we arrived in Paris on July 3rd, we had rented the apartment based on pictures on a website.

We had 48 hours to decide if the apartment was going to be suitable for filming my cooking class videos, because if not, we were going to have to turn around and move right away.

The test video is 2 minutes long.

No fancy clothes, completely un-fancy hair in a weird ponytail. Mixture of French and English as I talk to Andre behind the camera.

I’ve posted it for you to check out now.

http://tinyurl.com/nbzr5n

All best,
Shelley

PS/ This is unedited, raw footage of the new Paris test kitchen. We weren’t even unpacked yet. You won’t want to miss it
http://tinyurl.com/nbzr5n

How to Eat Vegetables on a Tight Budget

===
WANTED: How to Eat Vegetables on a Tight Budget.
Quick response requested. My husband won’t let take out a subscription to your site that I can’t ’sell’ him on.
Thanks, Angela
===

My first tip on eating healthy with a tight budget would be to reduce what you’re throwing away.

Especially when it comes to veggies, ONLY buy what you’re going to eat THIS week.

You see, many errors of judgment are made walking around the grocery store.

Cauliflower is on sale, and it looks big and beautiful and creamy and healthy and low calorie and low fat…

So you buy two.

No meal plan, no idea on how to use it up. But they’re on sale and they look great.

Fast-forward one week, and that same cauliflower is now in the back of the fridge, browning around the edges, leaves wilted and slimy.

Blech. Throw it out.

There goes $3 (or $5?) straight into the garbage.

These days, I only buy cauliflower if I know FOR A FACT that I’m going to eat it the next week. In my house, that means one batch of Cauliflower Soup*, and one batch of Sausage Minestrone*. (Note: *recipe links at the bottom of the post.)

When I was a single girl, which was a lot of my adult life, and I wanted to make Vegetable Beef Stew* for dinner, I would literally go the grocery store and buy two carrots and two
potatoes.

My grandmother thought this was hilarious. She used to tease me on the phone: “What did you buy this week? One carrot or two?”

She was also cooking for one, but she bought her carrots by the bag. Because they were cheaper.

I wonder how many she threw out.

Here’s the reality:  If you’re faced with buying a bag of carrots or individual carrots, there are a few things to consider.

How many people are in your house (I was single). How often do you eat raw carrots for snack (then, never). How many meals do you have PLANNED that use carrots this week? (one, stew).  So how many carrots do you need to buy this week? Two.

Of course, if you’re a family of six you’ll go through more.

Now that I’m in a family of two, I DO buy my carrots by the bag, but only because André eats carrots like a rabbit after dinner, instead of dessert. And I cut them up and he takes them in his lunch.

And when do I buy MORE carrots? Next week on grocery day?

No.Not until the ones in my fridge are gone.

But what if they’re on sale?

Then I walk right past the carrots and leave them in the store. Because cheap or not, healthy or not, too much produce becomes garbage in 10 days.

Tip #1 on How to Fix Veggies on a Tight Budget? Don’t buy garbage. Leave it in the store.

All best, Shelley

PS/
Non-members can access this recipe:
> Roast vegetable salad ($1.45/serving)

** Recipe links for Veggie Club members **

> Cauliflower soup ($1.79/serving)
> Sausage minestrone ($1.35/serving)

*** Order my Motivation and Meal Planning CD ***

They’re lying to you AND taking your money

I want to share a story with you.  I received this email from Denise:

“Shelley, your site does sound wonderful, but I have to tell you.. I guess I’m the only one on earth that HATES SOUP.  Seriously, I hate it.  I see you do make other things, but what I’m looking for is fast 30 minute meals for when I get home from work at 5:20 pm and my mom who is 83 and goes to bed at 7 pm. I try to make her as healthy food as possible, but there are nights I’m so tired that I just grab what I can.  If you can help me make fast meals without spending a lot of money (which I don’t have). Thank you for listening to me and hope you can help. Sincerely, Denise”

Now I’ve got good news and bad news for Denise. And I’m writing this because what I’ve got to say is going to help Denise, but it can help you, too.

The GOOD news for Denise: If you don’t like soup, you can make stew.  Take any soup recipe and make it with 1/4 the amount of liquid. The truth is that André eats his soup with a fork and the leaves the broth behind in the bowl. Every time.

The BAD news for Denise (and everyone else):

They’re lying to you and taking your money.

Who am I talking about?

Cookbook publishers.

Inexpensive, great tasting, healthy meals in 30 minutes or less?  They’re all selling the same giant lie.

If you’re a busy mom, a working mom, a homeschooling mom, what do you dream of? A lovely, healthy dinner that comes together easily. Just think about it and voila, it’s done and on the table.  Something healthy that everyone will enjoy. You dream of it all: fast, cheap and good.

Publishers KNOW this is what moms want, so they keep cranking out the cookbooks. And you keep buying them.  Dreaming. Hoping.

Can I suggest ANYTHING that is healthy, inexpensive, and takes 30 minutes?

Eggs. They’re good for protein, inexpensive, pretty quick to cook.  So if Denise’s mom is happy eating a fried egg and toast for dinner, then maybe that can be an emergency dinner.

Of course, if that’s what she had for breakfast she may not be inclined to eat it twice in one day!

Salad. (OK, not always cheap, depends on the time of year and where you live; not always fast by the time you cut up the
ingredients. Yes, you can buy pre-cut veggies, but they’re even  MORE expensive). I do have a recipe for Roast Vegetable Salad* that
is $1.45 per serving and takes 30 minutes. (*Note, recipe links below.)

OK, so what’s the solution?

Unfortunately, I don’t believe that you can do healthy + fast +cheap seven nights a week. Yes, you can have a fried egg + toast meal once in a while, but you can’t live like that.

You can’t live on hamburger helper (fast, not healthy).  You can’t live on take-out (not healthy, no cheap). You can’t live on instant noodles or frozen dinners (salt, chemicals, not healthy).

And you MUST STOP buying cookbooks that keep promising you that you CAN have a healthy, easy, 30-minute meal. (I especially love it when they ramp up the lie that you can have all that AND do it all with 5 ingredients or less. If you believe that, I’ve got beachfront property to sell you. Those meals taste terrible.)

In all seriousness, one of my favourite recipes, easy and lovely, is roast chicken with rosemary*. The preparation time is minimal (3-5 minutes), pop it in the oven, it takes 50-75 minutes to bake.

Now that’s the time that the chicken is actually baking, not the time YOU ARE WORKING IN THE KITCHEN.

Do you see the difference?

You can prep, cut, chop and rinse.  You put sausage minestrone* ingredients together all in one pot (that takes 20 minutes), and you let it cook for 35 minutes.  It’s $1.35/serving.

If you don’t have an hour start to finish to get dinner on the table on weeknights, because it’s just not possible, then you need some meal planning.

I have recorded a one-hour audio called Motivation and Meal Planning and it’s available on a CD (which includes 4 other full-length, expert interviews) for $19.95. You can see it here.

Once you have the idea of meal planning figured out, THEN it all gets much easier.

You prepare your slower dishes on the nights that you DO have time, like Friday, Saturday, Sunday evenings. You schedule easier, faster meals on the other nights. Fish and rice* takes 13 minutes to cook once the fish is in the oven.  Make that on a fast night.

Then you can make chili* on a slow night, and freeze the leftovers. The leftovers can become a fast meal next week.

I know I’m going to make some people angry and I’m going to get some scathing emails saying: “how can you be so stupid, I eat from my garden all summer, and I have a fresh healthy salad every night for dinner, and it’s fast and inexpensive.”

To which I will say, again: salad is NOT always inexpensive. It depends on where you live. We don’t all have gardens. Some of us live in apartment buildings. We don’t all live next to a fresh produce market in southern California, DESPITE what the recipe books might have you believe.

If you’re in Alaska, or rural Texas, or Nova Scotia, or upstate Maine, then getting fresh produce all year round, including in the winter, isn’t easy and isn’t cheap.

Yes of course, you can get away with eating egg + toast for dinner periodically. Some nights you can make a salad.

Not every night, not all year.

For the REST of the year, you need a plan. And you need some fast + slow recipes to slot into your meal plan.

Leave me a comment below and let me know if this has been helpful for you.

If you’re angry, I understand. Now it’s time to do something about the fact that you’ve been lied to.

All best, Shelley

PS/ Non-members can access this recipe:
> Roast vegetable salad ($1.45/serving)

** Recipe links for Veggie Club members **

> Roast chicken with rosemary *$2.38/serving)
> Sausage minestrone ($1.35/serving)
> Trout with fruit salsa ($3.47/serving)
> Almost vegetarian chili ($1.70/serving)

*** Order the Motivation and Meal Planning CD ***

Paris Post: Centre Pompidou (Aug 8)

A trip to the Pompidou art gallery, here’s the neighbourhood leading up to the centre.

 

street performers out front

the front of the building, with the escalator running up the outside of the structure

the rooftop restaurant

view from the restaurant, it’s probably the best view in the city (in my opinion)

kids can play in the water pool while parents eat their $36 appetizers…

isn’t this the best view?

and this one, too  

 

then after the freaky expensive appetizers, we went for Italian ice cream 

 

They scoop the ice cream into a donut, and then they heat it up! (I had tiramisu and biscotti ice cream in mine; André had pistachio and vanilla in his). These 4 euro treats were waaaay better than our appetizers

 

TO COME: Pictures of the ‘beach’ Paris-style and Parc Floral. This weekend we’re going for bagels and cream cheese (!), and then to Chateau Versailles for dinner and fire works. Lots of good pictures coming, for sure!  And next week I’ll have some behind-the-scenes photos taken while filming the NEW Fabulous French Desserts cooking class.

~ All best, Shelley

Paris Post: Signs

Over the past two weeks I’ve been taking photos of signs. Here are some of my favourites:

one store after another, closed for “annual vacation”

 

a metro sign with an ad for the “Museum of Air and Space”

 

 “I  lost my parakeet”

 

An anti-drinking and driving poster: “Your accident is served, Sir!” and then below “(If) driving:  Alcohol, no thanks.”

 

I want to make everything on this recipe board … duck confit with sautéed potatoes, ‘farmer’s’ chicken with thyme, special hamburger with fries and salad, fish with homemade mashed potatoes, penne with tomatoes, chicken kebobs with ‘sour-sweet’ sauce, salmon steak ‘in and out’ or lightly grilled, raw beef tartare (or lightly cooked), steak with onion sauce

 

trip to Parc Floral de Paris

 

COMING SOON:

Photos in the camera waiting to be posted include our trip to Centre Pompidou, including their super expensive rooftop restaurant… and a day spent at the ‘beach’, Paris-style.

All best,
Shelley

you get a lump in your throat …

Get more information about Very Veggie Videos > http://www.OneRoastVegetable.com/vvv.htm

No time.  Life is busy and we’re all short on time.

“For disappearing acts, it’s hard to beat what happens to the eight hours supposedly left after eight of sleep and eight of work.” ~ Doug Larson

Isn’t that the truth?

Cleaning, making grocery lists, finding soccer cleats, driving kids to soccer, standing around while kids play soccer, finding time to
exercise, finding time to eat …

Now into the middle of your very regular and busy life, what happens if you have an interruption.

Your sister-in-law is in town, wants to come for dinner.

But she’s a vegetarian.

Now you literally get a lump in your throat and your heart beats faster.

You think: Not now. What will I make? I can’t do it this month. What does she eat? Yeah, sure, maybe she’s healthy blah-blah, and maybe it’s healthier to eat a vegetarian meal now and then blah-blah. Not this month. I don’t have time to figure this out right now.

This IS going to happen to you.

Your vegetarian friend is coming for dinner. Whether she’s your sister-in-law or your spouse’s college roommate. She’s coming.

And what are you going to serve?

==
Brilliant Idea #1:  Cookbook!
==

You dig out a dusty vegetarian cookbook you bought years ago but never tried, and scan through the random recipes, tofu, dried beans, and some new expensive ingredients you’d have to buy (never to be used again). You imagine yourself following along with this cookbook, no pictures, no one to ask for help.

And then you think: I don’t really have time for this.

==
Brilliant Idea #2: Take a cooking class!
==

You decide you’re going to take a cooking class, surely that’ll be better, someone will show you what to do.

You imagine yourself registering, getting your supplies, driving across town to the class in traffic, being away from the family for an entire evening, then the next week you have a summer cold and you have to miss a lesson but of course there’s no make-up class.

Groan.

==
Brilliant Idea #3: Take Shelley’s ONLINE vegetarian cooking class
===

You hear about Shelley’s vegetarian cooking class that takes place online.  Very Veggie Videos. Every Monday for four weeks you get an email saying “hey, when you’ve got time, your new lesson is ready.”

You log in and watch the videos after work, on the weekends, when the kids are in the tub, with your kids beside you watching too.

If your head cold keeps you in bed a few extra days and you miss a lesson, that’s totally OK, you watch it next week.  Because there’s no fixed schedule. You can work at your own pace.

You post comments on the class blog and you see pictures submitted by your classmates of their successful meals.

Vegetarian pizza, veggie tacos, homemade vegetarian broth you can use instead of chicken broth, and even a veggie breakfast.

Who has extra time these days?

Not me.  Not you.

This class is short! “Very Veggie Videos” is 4 weeks long, 4 lessons, and then you’ll have 4 different meals you can serve your sister-in-law.

Regular grocery store ingredients, and you don’t have to leave home to take the class.

All that for $19.

“The future is something which everyone reaches at the rate of sixty minutes an hour, whatever he does, whoever he is.” ~ C.S. Lewis

Your vegetarian friend IS coming for dinner. They are coming.

Now, what are you going to serve?

Registration for Very Veggie Videos begins Tuesday, August 11th  @ 12 noon Eastern.

http://www.OneRoastVegetable.com/vvv.htm

All best,
Shelley

PS/ There’s a bit of Lesson #2 (Veggie Tacos) on the veggie blog so you can see how the real class looks. http://www.OneRoastVegetable.com/vvvblog/

Paris Post: Pictures – Tour Montparnasse

Paris pictures from July 30th.

City is already in quiet-vacation-mode

 

i like this sandwich window, with choices like “poulet avocat tomate” and “chévre jambon crudités”

 

Now here are pictures from the top of the Tour Montparnasse:

the big green space is Jardin Luxembourg

 

 

 

from the rooftop desk, you can see the Louvre in the foreground (long) and Sacre Coeur in the background (middle)

 

 

 

 

 

 

here’s a picture of the cute man, wearing a t-shirt he hand painted

 

 I got tired of posing while a. tried to take the ‘perfect’ picture’

~ All best, Shelley

Recipe Research: Cup of Summer

In French, my ‘cup of summer’ would be pot d’été (pough debt-tay). Though perhaps it’s really a cup of springtime, since rhubarb isn’t available for long. I buy extra rhubarb when I can find it, even here, and give it a quick rinse, whack it into 1/2 inch pieces, and stick it in the freezer in 1-cup bags so I can pull it out later when required.

This ‘pot of whatever’ dessert was trial #1 for my new French dessert. Here’s the original dessert at 2 Euros per serving (about $3.10 Canadian):

The crumble was dry and had nothing to do with the lemon. The meringue on top was cold, of course, and the whole thing was uninspiring.

 

Here’s my first attempt at improvement:

rhubarb, coconut cookies, whipping cream, butter, strawberries, and vanilla sugar

 cut up and cook some rhubarb

 

add some strawberries in the last minutes of cooking

 

crush cookies in the groovy cool new mini blender/chopper

 

mix with a bit of melted butter and put in small glasses

 

layer with the cooked rhubarb-strawberry compote, and top with whipped cream made with vanilla sugar

Shelley’s note #1: I would have used wine glasses, but alas we’re already broken two this month, and so there aren’t enough left to make up this dessert.

Shelley’s note #2: Katharyn, if you’re allergic to strawberries, you can make this with rhubarb alone, or you could combine other fruits like blueberries and raspberries.

Shelley’s honest opinion of this dessert: It was yummy, but not super-wowie-terrific. The cookies are nearly the best part so if I didn’t have access to great coconut cookies, then it would be crummy – no pun intended. Gingersnaps, a good logical substitute that would marry well with strawberries, are not easily found in Paris, and when found are called “English cookies” (as in from England).

Future Idea #1: Perhaps I’ll try again with a lemon curd filling and a regular shortbread cookie crust.

Future Idea #2: We did have a pot-au-chocolat for dessert that was lovely … good chocolate, whipped cream, egg whites, a tiny bit of instant coffee (or rum).

My search continues for Fabulous French recipes that I can include in my upcoming video cooking class. 

Your ideas? Let me know what you think.

~ All best, Shelley

Care package for Shelley from Canada?

I won’t do this very often, I promise.

But after a month in Paris, I realize that some of the kitchen items that I didn’t bring with me (because I thought I could find them here) are in fact nowhere to be found.

Now I’m looking for a special favour.

I was wondering if someone in Canada could send me a 2-cup glass measuring cup from Canadian Tire that has ounces, cups and millilitres on it. It’s $3.99 Canadian + tax, and looks like this (except this example is the 1-cup version): http://www.canadiantire.ca/AST/browse/8/KitchenBath/Bakeware/BakingAccessories/PRD~0421181P/Oven%2BOriginals%2BMeasuring%2BCup.jsp

Then you’d pop it in a box, and send it in the mail. The postage might run a bit, given the weight, maybe another $5-$10 Canadian – I’m not entirely sure.

IN RETURN, I’ll give YOU a present: anything from my site that has equal value. Membership to The Veggie Club, credit towards a cooking class, whatever you like. CDs from guest experts, a month’s free members in my One Good Idea series. We’ll find something that is equal in value to what you spend on the measuring cup + postage.

This offer open to ONE person (hey, I only need one glass measuring cup) and ideally you’d be able to put it in the mail in the next 48 hrs. I’d really like this particular cup from Canadian Tire, because it has Canadian/US/Metric measurements all on the same unit.

Other things I may request later could be easily found in the US too, but not this one.

OK, I know this is an unusual idea. If you think I’m a bit nutty, you can just ignore me

All best, Shelley

PS/ I’ll have some other bits I’d like sent to me eventually, but this is the first most pressing thing I can think of. Other than toothpaste. But it seems REALLY nutty to have someone mail me my favourite brand of toothpaste, so I’m trying to learn to ‘like’ what’s here. I’ll let you know how well I do. So far I hate it