Roughin’ It

Tough-Times Recipes Made Modern for Anyone Stretching a Budget Today—So You Can Eat Well Even When Your Bank Account Says No

“Kiki’s knowledge of how to pull together a meal with whatever you have in your kitchen and her no-judgment approach are just what hesitant cooks need to learn to feed themselves and their families on any budget.” —Lidia Bastianich

Kiki Rough isn’t a professional chef. If we’re being honest with each other, she doesn’t even find joy in cooking. What she has is a food-stamp-fueled education in stretching a pantry, and zero patience for recipes that assume you have money to burn.

Roughin’ It is built for the way people actually cook when things are tight:

• Easy swaps for the pantry you already have
• No fancy ingredients
• Adaptable recipes

What you’ll get: 

• Homemade bagels
• Soft pretzels
• Comforting stews
• Potatoes in every direction
• Sauces you don’t need to buy in a jar

With 55 recipes inspired by Depression-era, recession-era, and wartime cooking traditions, made flexible enough to work with whatever’s actually in your kitchen—even including easy 1:1 swaps for gluten-free, dairy-free, and vegan cooking. Roughin’ It strips away the intimidation of scratch cooking and replaces it with a road map to eating well on practically nothing.