The Culinary Adventures of a Gas Point Whore

I’ll be the first person to admit that I am a gas point whore (GPW). For those of you living in places where your local grocery chains vie for your loyalty, you probably know what I’m talking about. If you don’t, here’s a primer: Grocery stores offer ‘points’ according to what you buy and how much you spend. Then, a gas station partnered with the store offers you 10 cents/gallon off your gas purchase for every interval of points you earn. For example, at my local Safeway, 5 gas points is 50 cents/gallon off. But the points expire after a month. And since gas is ridiculous in DC, this becomes a game for me. Wait, it’s more than a game; it’s a calling. My husband is the person who (jokingly and lovingly, lest you comment with a verbal abuse hotline number for me) first teased me about being a gas point whore. He reminds me that we’re not destitute and that I needn’t be so zealous.

Sugar, it’s not about the money, it’s the thrill of sticking it to someone, somewhere. The chase and then the triumph at the pump.  It’s getting away with something. My own economic Olympics. The Hunger Games for OPEC. Whatever.

Now, the crown jewel of gas point whore yahtzee is 10 gas points, which is $1/gallon off.  In a household of two people and one dog, this is hard to do unless you game the system. Throw in the fact that we buy most of our produce and eggs at the farmer’s market and you’ve upped the ante.

Poor Safeway, they didn’t even see me coming. See, you get anywhere from double to quadruple points on gift cards. Hello. Why pay cash at Starbucks, Amazon, iTunes, Nordstrom…you get the picture…when you can use a gift card instead? It also pays to read the circular in the Food section of Wednesday’s WaPo; you can add extra points and in-store coupons that you see there to your online Safeway Club Card account. Then you can go shopping and be THAT WOMAN at the checkout counter who watches the register monitor, “Whoa, Tierra, the circular said that those were two for five and bonus points on top of that.” I’m shameless.

I drive so little that I fill up once a month, usually. So I have roughly 30 days to earn and use points, which requires careful calibration of the stock in the cupboard and the needle on the dash. However, the dark side of  this Faustian bargain is the email correspondence. Scads of it. I’ve tried to opt out of every Safeway email to no avail. Their ‘Manage Email Preferences’ part of the website is probably run by a Sisyphean troll who signs you right back up for the email you just said you didn’t want to get.

Once in a while, though, all the dedication it takes to be a certified gas point whore (CGPW), and not a poseur, is worth it. Case in point: this recipe that landed in my inbox along with this week’s Just for U specials. Why not? I needed to get my grocery shop on since I was still stinging from my last date at the pump, when I had only 7 gas points (70 cents/gallon off) and hung my head in defeated shame as the receipt whirred out.

I have a hard time following a recipe when some of the ratios look wrong to me, so apologies to Christine L. (who originally submitted the recipe) and Safeway. If I weren’t so busy scamming gas points, they could certainly use my help in their test kitchen.

Nutty Wild Rice Salad with Kiwifruit and Red Grapes-The Gas Point Whore Way

2.25 cups vegetable stock (no need to hurt a chicken for its juice)

1 cup wild rice (the good stuff-tell Uncle Ben to take a hike)

2 tablespoons lemon juice (from a real lemon, not a plastic one)

2 tablespoons honey (use the raw stuff and not the goo that pretends to be honey)

a smidge of olive oil, just enough to help emulsify the dressing (for shits and giggles, the original recipe said 2 teaspoons, which is too damn much, I thought, what?, is Bertoli sponsoring this recipe?)

3 kiwis, peeled and diced

1.5 cups seedless red grapes, halved

.50 cup (that’s 1/2) toasted chopped pecans, eh,  I probably used more ‘cos I’m from GA and we like our pecans

• Put broth in medium saucepan, bring to a boil, put in rice and cover, simmer for 45 mins. Drain any extra liquid from rice, uncover, let cool a bit, then stick in fridge
• Whisk together lemon juice, honey and olive oil until the honey has dissolved. Season with salt and pepper to taste, but go easy on the salt as the rice and pecans have enough umami that you don’t need much (according to my tastebuds)
• Place chilled rice in medium bowl, fold in fruit and nuts and drizzle/mix in a little dressing at a time until you like it. Season to taste. Feel good about self because only bees were affected in the making of this dish.
• BOOM!

Yummy