To state the obvious, food prices are insane. And I am enough of a Midwestern/Southern girl, that having a can of cream of fill-in-the-blank soup means I can fix a casserole with anything. But those cream soups get expensive. Looking at Walmart online, they are 72 cents a can today. (I know, I really need to do a cost comparison. I will – maybe – just not today!). For me, the cost is lower because I have all the ingredients already on hand.

Reading the ingredients kind of ooks me out too – vegetable oil, and bioengineered ingredients and wheat gluten. Not sure my body knows exactly what to do with those, but it certainly tries.

A number of years (like 10+ or so) ago, I started making my own cream of soup mix. It’s so easy. I keep it in a mason jar (what else) in the cupboard and can tweak it as needed – adding chicken or celery or mushroom or bacon to it when I prepare it.

The mix is this:

• 2 cups dry milk (in the same aisle as cake mixes in most grocery stores. You can also use Nido in the Mexican food).

• 1 1/4 cups cornstarch OR 2 1/2 cups flour

• 1/4 cup chicken bouillon
• 2 Tblsp. onion flakes
• 1/2 tsp. pepper
• 1 tsp. thyme (optional)
• 1 tsp. basil (optional)

Mix all together with a whisk, then (if you want it to be smoother and dissolve better) run it thru a DRY blender. Store in a mason jar (or whatever – reuse a jar with a lid!) until needed. To use, mix 1/3 cup mix with 1 1/4 cups water. Cook until slightly thickened. At this point, it is like what comes out of the can. If you truly want soup (not just using in a casserole), add twice the amount of water.

It takes about 5 minutes to make this up and will save you a lot of time and money. I put a label with instructions on my jar with scrap paper and packing tape, so I don’t have to look them up every time I use it. Making it with cornstarch also makes it gluten-free (it’s always good to have options!)