What a 64-Year-Old Retired Novelist Eats With $3.5 Million in Savings in Virginia’s Shenandoah Valley
Illustration by Maggie Cowles
Welcome to The Receipt, a series documenting how Bon Appétit readers eat and what they spend doing it. Each food diary follows one anonymous reader’s week of expenses related to groceries, restaurant meals, coffee runs, and every bite in between. In this time of rising food costs, The Receipt reveals how folks—from different cities, with different incomes, on different schedules—are figuring out their food budgets.
In today’s Receipt, a 64-year-old retired novelist makes gluten-free meals in Lexington, Virginia. She earns royalties from previous books and her husband, who is mostly retired, has a pharmaceutical consulting business. Keep reading for her receipts.
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The finances
What are your pronouns? She/her
What is your occupation? Retired novelist
How old are you? 64
What city and state do you live in? Lexington, Virginia
What is your annual salary, if you have one? No annual salary.
How much is one paycheck, after taxes? No regular paychecks.
How often are you paid? I’m retired so I don’t receive advances, only royalties, totaling about $5,000 last year. My husband has his own pharmaceutical consulting business. He’s mostly retired and will earn about $125,000 this year.
How much money do you have in savings? $3.5 million
What are your approximate fixed monthly expenses beyond food?
Health insurance: $987
Property insurance and taxes: $253 (Mortgage: $0)
Auto insurance: $193
Utilities: $383
Subscriptions (Netflix, Audible, Peloton, Apple TV+, Apple News+): $82
Total: $1,898
The diet
Do you follow a certain diet or have dietary restrictions? Gluten-free.
What are the grocery staples you always buy, if any? Ellora Farms olive oil, Kerrygold butter, Fage yogurt, Banza pasta, citrus, celery, ginger, garlic, buckwheat, oats, canned beans, and all the cheese. I buy organic as much as possible.
How often in a week do you dine out versus cook at home? We eat out less than twice a month. The local pickings are slim and we simply prefer to eat at home. When we travel, we almost always choose to eat at the restaurant bar because it’s lively, social, and the service is more dependable.
How often in a week did you dine out while growing up? Hardly ever. My parents were immigrants, we lived in the sticks, and, especially early on, we couldn’t afford it. We always ate well, though, and were regulars at the local soft-serve joint during the summers.
How often in a week did your parents or guardians cook at home? Nearly every day, every meal. Kentucky Fried Chicken came to town when I was eight and we’d occasionally get a bucket. Dinners were strictly for our family but my parents’ friends might come by for afternoon tea and a slice of cake—always homemade. Sometimes a shot of rum would land in the tea. My mother didn’t like “help” in the kitchen, so I didn’t start cooking until I left home. Once I started, I never stopped!
The expenses
Week’s total: $115.49
Restaurants and cafés total: $0
Groceries total: $115.49
Most-expensive meal or purchase: coffee $9.99
Least-expensive meal or purchase: avocado $0.89
Number of restaurant and café meals: 0
Number of grocery trips: 1
The diary
Monday
6:17 a.m. I make coffee, Peet’s Major Dickason’s Blend ($9.99). The Major and I go back 40 years, to my grad school days at Berkeley, and the original store around the corner from Chez Panisse. When the Technivorm Moccamaster (always brings a smile) has done its work, I fill two mugs and add Nutpods creamer ($5.99), which my husband and I prefer to half-and-half. Yeah, makes no sense to us either.
Between sips of coffee, I pack a lunch for my husband. (Let’s call him P.) We’re building a house about 20 minutes away, and lately he’s been there every day all day, doing things involving electricity, venting, and gravel. My strengths lie elsewhere, e.g., lunch.
I also make breakfast for both of us, our usual Greek yogurt (Fage 2%, $6.49), fruit, and granola. Today the fruit is blueberries, from a nearby pick-your-own farm (Blueberry Hill at Still House, $5.00/lb.). It’s a gorgeous spot to spend a morning and, because I’m a compulsive gatherer, we ended up with 50 pounds of berries in the freezer. The granola is homemade, with an oat and buckwheat base, plus pumpkin seeds, walnuts, olive oil, maple syrup, and other ingredients that vary, and leans savory with fennel, cardamom, and ginger as spices. I leave my breakfast on the counter and head out for a run.
8:44 a.m. Breakfast at last. It’s as delicious as it is familiar. I remember to take halibut out of the freezer for dinner tonight and feel proud. The seafood at our local grocery stores (Kroger and Food Lion) is suspect, and our closest premium grocers, like Whole Foods, are a 75-minute drive, so we get a monthly shipment of wild-caught salmon, halibut, and cod from Fulton Fish Market ($161.29 for 12 portions).
12:19 p.m. I’ve been stupidly excited for lunch since I packed P’s earlier. Yesterday I made a soup from leftover roasted butternut squash, plus fennel, onion, homemade chicken broth, and lemon. As I heat that up, I add leftover berbere-spiced chicken and chickpeas from last night’s dinner. I figured the berbere spice would be a match for the lemony, squash-y soup, and, boy oh boy, is it ever. I enjoy every bite, then finish the meal with yogurt with a spoonful of apricot fruit spread (Thrive Market, $3.49). Now that P and I are in our 60s, we don’t utilize protein like we used to (sigh), so we aim for 80 to 90 grams daily. Yogurt is an easy way to help get there.
1:05 p.m. Now that I’ve cleared out the leftovers, I get ahead on lunches for the next couple days with an antipasto pasta salad, a.k.a. oxymoron salad. I rejoin my audiobook (North Woods by Daniel Mason) and put water on for the pasta (Banza chickpea gemelli, $3.99). I chop salami, fresh mozzarella, sun dried tomatoes, artichoke hearts, Castelvetrano olives, scallions (I’m out of red onions), parsley, and oregano from the garden, adding to the bowl as I go. Next goes the pasta, a grated garlic clove, Zinfandel vinegar (Katz, $15.00), olive oil, and seasoning. I mix and taste, knowing I won’t want a bite of this particular dish at 7 a.m. It’s close enough and I’m out of the kitchen until dinner.
5:22 p.m. Tonight we’re having Alison Roman’s halibut with asparagus and brown butter peas, plus mashed potatoes. I put the unpeeled Yukon Golds on to boil, chop chives from the garden, and have an adult beverage with P. His is a gin and tonic, his usual, and mine’s GT’s Synergy Island Bliss Kombucha (Kroger, $3.00) with tequila. Don’t judge. The fish recipe couldn’t be simpler, which Alison and I agree is the right move for halibut. I put the fillets on a baking tray with scallions and asparagus, drizzle with olive oil, and season. When the potatoes are nearly done, the fish goes in. I brown the butter, dump the peas in, and wonder whether P will be out of the shower in time to mash the potatoes. He is! He adds sour cream and butter, seasons, and we’re ready to eat just after 6.
The meal is wonderful: I got the cook on the fish right (not a given), the asparagus is charred but not limp, and there is butter.
7:16 p.m. We each have a slice of Aran Goyoaga’s chocolate banana bread. It’s the best banana bread recipe I’ve ever had, gluten-free or not. I always freeze it, hoping I might forget about it and not devour the whole thing in two days. It’s made with buckwheat and almond flours, sweetened with dates, and has extra zing from fresh ginger and sesame seeds.
(Everything we ate today was previously purchased.)
Monday total: $0
Tuesday
Each spring I become the watercress fairy.
6:23 a.m. I brew coffee, pack P’s lunch, and make breakfast: yogurt with Granny Smith apple, kiwi, and granola. The fruit’s tart, so I add honey. At the house before this one, we kept bees, and have about a gallon of honey left. We took up beekeeping for the garden and orchard, and for the bees themselves, but the honey is a lovely dividend. We’ll have bees again at the new house; we’re planting fruit trees (apple, peach, fig, persimmon, mulberry) next week, with blackberries, raspberries, currants, and gooseberries to follow.
12:06 p.m. I intended to dig in the garden this morning but it’s too cold and windy. I lifted weights instead before remembering the 950-pound tile order arriving today that P and I will have to transfer from his truck to the garage. What doesn’t kill you…makes you grateful for oxymoron salad, which turned out great. I’m glad I didn’t add more salt yesterday because the olives and salami were enough. It wasn’t heavy the way pasta salads can be, but still very satisfying because pasta.
I grab a peach and cloudberry (WTH is that?) Skyr yogurt (Kroger, $1.69) from the fridge and don’t see anything demanding to become dinner other than a dozen eggs. Frittata, maybe? The eggs ($5.00/dozen) are from a nearby farm where we also source whole chickens ($5.00/lb.). The farmers are our friends and delivered this particular dozen to us when they recently toured our new build. I usually get their eggs from a shed in the middle of the field where the tiny farmers market convenes in the warm months (honor-system payment). I eat the yogurt and feel ready for tile hoisting.
2:41 p.m. No tiles yet but I do have a dinner plan. I brave the blustery weather and collect chard and cilantro from the garden. The chard overwintered under row cover (fabric coverings) along with other greens. The cilantro volunteers everywhere and, weirdly, loves the cold. Next I head down to the spring house (the water supply for our circa 1810 brick house), and the watercress bed at the outlet. Watercress grows in every creek around here, but it’s not safe to eat unless you can trust the water. I cut some for tonight and some for a friend. Each spring I become the watercress fairy.
5:27 p.m. Tile job done with no breakage during shipping, a rarity. Tonight’s menu is Nik Sharma’s Bombay frittata (a favorite I haven’t made in a while), potato fritters from leftover mash, and watercress salad. I tell P I’m going to get frisée from the garden instead (frittata, fritters, frisée), but his eye roll stops me. I combine eggs, crème fraîche (Vermont Creamery, $4.99), garlic, scallions, cilantro, garam masala, turmeric, and chard from the garden in a bowl, melt ghee in a pan, and start the frittata on the cooktop. I mix the potatoes with an egg, a handful of shredded mozzarella, and potato starch to bind. I consider more seasoning but the frittata has a lot, so I skip it. Ghee goes into a second pan (it’s butter week, apparently), then whole cumin. Magically, a glass of white appears at my elbow. Happy Tuesday!
The fritters are nearly done. I add feta to the frittata and slide it under the broiler. It’s all ready in a flash. The watercress needs nothing more than olive oil and flaky salt. I add a dollop of Patak’s Major Grey Chutney (Food Lion, $4.99) to our plates and we dig in. Everything’s tasty—the watercress is a peppery counterpoint to the potatoes—and we’re hungry so it disappears too soon.
7:40 p.m. We share a bar of GoodSam dark chocolate ($2.84, Thrive Market). It’s smooth but the bar’s a little too thick. Anyone else dislike thick chocolate bars? Just me?
(Everything was previously purchased.)
Tuesday total: $0
Wednesday
I’ve had gardens next to parking lots in rentals, in community spaces, in planters on a tiny deck, in raised beds on steep hillsides. I cannot imagine my life without one.
6:15 a.m. The usual ritual: Make coffee, pack lunch (for both of us today), make breakfast (yogurt, Cara Cara orange, kiwi, and the last of the granola).
8:42 a.m. Back from a run, I eat breakfast, thinking that if I ran faster I could eat earlier. Oh well. I chase down several orders for the new house via phone and email, then head out to the garden to water before the wind picks up. In addition to the overwintered greens, there are new plantings to coddle: broccoli, cabbage, kale, snap peas, carrots, beets, spinach, arugula, chard, lettuce, broccoli rabe, bok choy, scallions, turnips, radishes, potatoes, and onions. I’ve been growing vegetables as long as I’ve been drinking Peet’s coffee. I’ve had gardens next to parking lots in rentals, in community spaces, in planters on a tiny deck, in raised beds on steep hillsides, and, now, in a spot that most likely held a garden 200 years ago. I cannot imagine my life without one.
12:42 p.m. At the new house, I say goodbye to a visiting friend, handing her a bag of watercress as a parting gift. I find P and we sit on the staircase to eat. Well, I sit and P grabs bites of leftover frittata and pasta salad in between fielding questions. We’re acting as our own general contractors, and tomorrow’s a big inspection. We have Siggi’s mixed berry yogurts to finish the meal, and I trundle off. As soon as the drywall is up, I’m a full-time painter, but now I’m just underfoot.
5:30 p.m. Simple fare tonight: buttermilk-poached salmon salad with leek-and-caper dressing, recipe courtesy of Aran Goyoaga. I put seasoned salmon fillets and leeks in a skillet with buttermilk and lemon juice, bring it to a simmer, then leave it covered off the heat for 15 minutes. I make a dressing with a bit of the poaching liquid, the leeks, olive oil, capers, chives, dill, mustard, and lemon zest. I arrange garden lettuces, green olives, and avocado on our plates, top with the salmon, and sprinkle with toasted pecans. It looks both pretty and virtuous.
The recipe is a keeper. Considering the modest effort, the salad is delicious, and the poaching method worked like a charm.
7:32 p.m. We have a handful of roasted almonds from a bag given by a friend. (Everything else today was previously purchased.)
Wednesday total: $0
Thursday
The filling could’ve been a bit sweeter, but it tastes of summer and that is plenty.
5:54 a.m. Coffeecoffeecoffeecoffee. There’s still some pasta salad for P’s lunch, but he’s not much of a noodle guy and he’s had it twice. I make him a sandwich, pack the rest, and blend up a smoothie. He’s out the door by 7.
8:03 a.m. I make a smoothie for myself with yogurt, almond milk, cantaloupe (frozen from last summer’s garden), vanilla, hemp hearts, and protein powder. I mostly taste vanilla, which is fine. The cantaloupe wasn’t the flavor sensation homegrown melon usually is, which is how it ended up in the freezer.
9:05 a.m. I head into town to shop at Kroger. I buy Applegate ham ($7.49) and turkey ($5.39), Siggi’s yogurts ($1.50 each), broccoli ($2.11), avocados ($0.89 each), brussels sprouts ($2.20), Cara Cara oranges ($1.25 each), a bag of Honeycrisp apples ($5.89), coffee ($9.99), potatoes ($2.89), strawberries ($2.00), red onions ($2.15), shallots ($1.93), mangoes ($1.25 each), asparagus ($2.25) and a few other items for $115.49 total.
12:21 p.m. I dispatch the last of the pasta salad, along with roasted asparagus from Monday—a pleasing combo—and finish with…drum roll…yogurt with apricot spread.
2:40 p.m. P calls to say we passed the inspection! Seems like an excuse to celebrate, so I prep a blueberry galette. I make a pastry dough (almond and tapioca flours, butter, salt, a bit of sugar and rosemary, and an egg) and slip it into the fridge. I mix frozen blueberries with sugar, lemon, and cornstarch for the filling and place it in the freezer until I’m ready to bake.
4:46 p.m. P heats the grill for the chicken I prepped yesterday (spatchcocked and marinated in lemon, olive oil, garlic, rosemary, and lemon thyme), then makes us cocktails. I open a good bottle of Pinot Noir (Buena Vista Winery, $46) to give it some air, then put together a quick salad of fennel, celery, oranges, herbs, and Parmesan. I assemble the galette and stick it back in the freezer. Don’t want those frozen berries to make a juicy mess! It’s festive in our kitchen.
P grills slices of local bread (Seasons Yield Farm, $9) and starts the chicken. We top the toasts with olive oil, goat cheese, lemon thyme, honey, and prosciutto, and devour them. So good.
At 6 the galette goes in. P brings the chicken inside. It smells amazing and tastes even better. The salad is refreshing; I adore fennel.
7:38 p.m. The blueberries did leak. Oh well. We each have a big piece of galette with a dollop of crème fraîche and a little lemon zest. The filling could’ve been a bit sweeter, but it tastes of summer and that is plenty.
Thursday total: $115.49
Friday
It’s such a fun dish, with tons of flavor, but I shouldn’t have covered the bread because it’s like chewing gum.
6:45 a.m. P’s taking the morning off so I get a respite from packing lunch. I drink my coffee and struggle through The New York Times Spelling Bee.
8:49 a.m. Post-run yogurt, strawberries, and granola from a fresh batch.
12:03 p.m. P and I have lunch together at home for the first time in ages: Hetty Lui McKinnon’s banh mi salad with some additions. Yesterday I pickled the vegetables (carrots, cucumber, radish, turnip, and red onion), and the chicken (sub for tofu) and grilled bread are leftovers, so all I do is assemble the salads, dress with sriracha mayo, and throw cilantro on top. It’s such a fun dish, with tons of flavor, but I shouldn’t have covered the bread because it’s like chewing gum. But even gum is delicious covered in sriracha mayo, so we’re happy. Siggi’s yogurts follow.
5:33 p.m. Tempeh stir-fry, no recipe. I steam the tempeh to quell the bitterness and open it up, then prep a ton of vegetables (red onion, cabbage, sugar snap peas, broccoli, carrots). I sauté the tempeh in avocado oil, remove it, then cook the rest in alphabetical order (just kidding). I pour in my tahini sauce (tahini, lime, ginger, garlic, honey, tamari, and chili sauce), add the tempeh back, and give it a minute. Garnish with toasted sesame seeds and cilantro, twice as much for me as for P, who is near his daily cilantro quota. I don’t have one.
The stir-fry hits the spot. The sauce is piquant but I can still taste each of the vegetables.
7:34 p.m. We share a bag of potato chips (Thrive Market, $3.29). The bag’s small, okay? We both love chips and fries with a passion.
Friday total: $0
Saturday
I’ve made this recipe dozens of times. It was a family favorite when I was cooking for four, and it’s a family favorite now.
6:45 a.m. We drink coffee while we watch the qualifying race for the Australian Grand Prix. P is a lifelong fan but I’m a noob. After, we have our usual breakfast, with strawberries and mango today, then head to the new house to clean up construction mess.
12:40 p.m. Home again and ravenous. I mix the last of the grilled chicken with leftover pickled vegetables and mayo (Primal Kitchen avocado oil mayo, $10.99), and toast bread from the freezer. I top the toasts with the chicken salad and Gouda cheese, and put them under the broiler. Sliced avocado on the plate and lunch is served. Yum. Two Siggi’s yogurts and we’re sated.
5:10 p.m. It’s chilly out and I’m thinking meatballs—albondigas, to be precise. I’ve made this recipe dozens of times. It was a family favorite when I was cooking for four, and it’s a family favorite now. This version (from Cooking Light, but it has drifted) starts with a toasted spice mix: Half goes into the meatballs, along with rice, egg, and garlic, and half blooms with an onion-heavy mirepoix, plus cabbage. I start the vegetables, then make the meatballs. The beef is from a quarter cow we buy annually from friends who have a small grass-fed herd (Basinger Beef). It costs $5.00/lb. for about 50 pounds of packaged meat, everything from steaks to ground beef. I weigh the meatball mass and divide by 24, having learned that it’s more efficient to make them equal to start with, instead of adding a bit here and there at the end, or, God forbid, ending up with 23. I add the spices, broth, tomatoes, and chipotle to the pot, plus some roasted poblanos from the garden via the freezer. In go the meatballs. We have a margarita to pass the time.
Delicious, as always.
7:40 p.m. A slice of blueberry galette to end the day.
Saturday total: $0
Sunday
Even better, there are plain crepes left over for breakfast.
6:44 a.m. We drink coffee while watching the Formula 1 race in Australia.
8:06 a.m. Yogurt, mango, strawberries, kiwi, and granola. A Mercedes driver crashes in the last lap but he’s okay.
11:28 a.m. We’re on a nine-mile hike and pause for a slice of chocolate banana bread.
12:40 p.m. At the summit, we’re treated to spectacular views across the Blue Ridge and Alleghenies. We search for our house and spot it—a tiny speck—then eat the rest of our lunch (boiled eggs, prosciutto, apples). It’s cold and we don’t linger. A bald eagle glides by as we leave.
3:20 p.m. We each have a handful of almonds.
5:09 p.m. Another old favorite tonight, a traditional Brittany dish: buckwheat crepes filled with asparagus, Gruyère, and ham. I made the batter yesterday. While I make the crepes, I prep the other ingredients, roll up the crepes, paint them with butter, and put them in to bake for 15 minutes. Standing in the kitchen, we eat a simple salad of fennel, watercress, radish, and green olives. The vinegar is fantastic and makes this salad (Late Harvest Sauvignon Blanc vinegar, $38 per half gallon), which is why I bought a big bottle.
The crepes are delicious. Even better, there are plain crepes left over for breakfast.
7:28 p.m. We split a bag of Thrive Market chips, along with a glass of tart cherry juice (Knudsen, $7.99) and seltzer.
Sunday total: $0
Originally Appeared on Bon Appétit
