Making healthy meals on the cheap

Kimberly Maloomian (center) teaches a class in Marlborough how to prepare low-cost ingredients such as roasted vegetables. (Mark Wilson/Globe staff)

MARLBOROUGH - For just a moment, the rhythmic chop of knives slicing through vegetables in near perfect unison is the only sound in the otherwise noisy kitchen. Eager to use the skills they learned the week before, the 11 women make quick work of the bell peppers, onions, winter squash, and rutabaga before them.

This is the second week of Share Our Strength's Operation Frontline class at SMOC Marlboro Child Care and Head Start. The six-week national nutrition education program teaches low-income families nutrition basics, cooking skills, meal planning, and food safety. Each Operation Frontline recipe takes price and health into consideration, and costs no more than $1.40 per serving. With household budgets shrinking, eating well with limited funds is a lesson many need right now. On today's menu is a dish of whole-wheat bow-tie pasta with roasted vegetables and apple crisp.

"These things are not just for people who are on a low budget; these are life tips," says Gill Davidson, program coordinator for Share Our Strength's Operation Frontline in Massachusetts. The organization is running 45 classes now and though demand is always high, Davidson anticipates the need will grow. New data from Project Bread shows a 22 percent increase in calls to its emergency food assistance hotline from July to September this year compared to last year. Classes are designed to help with shopping too.

The idea is to make the best of fresh foods, fresh and frozen vegetables, dried legumes, and whole grains. Without the convenience of packaged foods, planning ahead is essential. Davidson suggests making several meals at once and freezing some for emergencies, stocking up on frozen or low-sodium canned vegetables when they are on sale, and substituting dried peas and beans for more expensive animal-based protein. Behavior changes like these may seem elementary, but they're often overlooked by people not used to watching every penny. In fact, they can result in big savings.

"Consumers are hit hard with product marketing and advertising," says Operation Front-line volunteer chef Kimberly Maloomian. Healthful ingredients don't stand out on the shelves. There are no flashy ads for a bag of dried beans or lentils. But before they begin, Davidson and the volunteer chefs and nutritionists must undo a common misconception: that healthy food is expensive and doesn't always taste good. When volunteer Sara Farnan Colleary, a graduate student in nutrition, talks to the women about seasonal produce as they chop winter squash, they tell her in Spanish and English that they know it's cheaper than something out of season.

The key to economizing but eating well is customizing meals. Maloomian passes around sprigs of fresh rosemary and sage, encouraging the women to sniff and taste the leaves. With a translator at her side, she explains that quality dried spices and herbs are available at Ocean State Job Lot and the Dollar Store. She wants to teach them to improvise. "I just try to give them suggestions, like how they can substitute vegetables in recipes with what they already have," says Maloomian. "There's no need to spend more money."

Later, Farnan Colleary and the mothers compare labels of popular cereals and whole-wheat pasta to learn the health benefits of a high-fiber diet. Marlborough resident Ana Romo perks up when they compare fresh, frozen, and canned vegetables. She always wants to use vegetables but doesn't know inexpensive ways to incorporate them. For Romo, who enrolled in the class for the sake of her 3-year-old daughter, the hardest part of cooking healthy food is the shopping. "You really need to look more at labels," she says, happy to get some practice doing that.

At the end of the two-hour class, the women tuck into colorful bowls of the bow-ties with vegetables and plates of aromatic apple crisp. Maloomian says that these women, like many pressed for time and money, obviously love to cook but were never taught how to be creative about meal planning.

"We're there to empower people with knowledge," says Davidson.

Each participant receives a bag of groceries to replicate the dishes at home. Then the women can really customize. Practice makes perfect.