What a long time it's been between posts...apologies to my understanding readers! Work has consumed my life these last 2 weeks or so, but I'm determined to catch up once again. I had previously tried to post every single weekday so I wouldn't forget what we'd done the night/day before. Since I obviously haven't done that, I'm going to give you some general ideas on what we've done to continue "eating down the pantry and freezer."
We continue to eat down our on-hand carbs. As friend Emilie pointed out the other day, "You must have LOTS of pasta on hand!" Actually, thin spaghetti is something we HAVE bought since this started, but at the same time we've concentrated on the other pastas already on the shelves. I now only have 1/2 box of lasagna, an unopened box of carnaroli rice, and a partial bag of curly noodles. I read about carnaroli rice about 8 months ago in a cookbook, "Lydia Cooks from the Heart of Italy", and thought it sounded good. Very shortly afterward, I picked up a box at Big Lots. Haven't touched it since. Typical, isn't it?
We have really enjoyed several creative dishes during this time. I made a delicious soup from cans of chicken broth and tomatoes with chilies, chickpeas, carrots, onions, and a sprinkling of cumin. One night Ken served pork chops, potatoes, salad, and a veg I can't remember - that was Ken getting his meat fix. Another night I intended to roast veggies and put them over couscous. My sweet husband chopped the veg, but they were too small for roasting...so I sauteed them in olive oil, a sprinkling of salt, chicken broth and a good splash of white wine. When the mixture had cooked down a bit, there was a nice sauce that we ate over either couscous or quinoa - I can't remember. It was wonderful!
There's been the ubiquitous scrambled eggs with bits of leftover things added - we do love that. One night I discovered pizza sauce in the freezer, so enlisted our grandchildren in pizza dough-making...they are very good at it! We split the dough and the sauce, and they took it home to cook with Dad. Ours had onion and cheese, I think. Yesterday we worked on some hummus I'd bought for company a few days ago, eating it with celery sticks. A nice beef stew was on the table last night, made with some on-sale chuck, and onions and carrots on hand. I'm trying desperately to use up some balsamic vinegar that's been hanging around so that went in to the stew. There's also a little bit left of the mushroom ketchup we bought in Cornwall a year ago. It adds a flavor that isn't matched by anything else I typically have on hand, so into stews it goes. There are other uses for it - friend Derrick adds it to risottos. Fresh broccoli and spinach salad accompanied the stew.
Breakfast over the weekend was Irish soda bread, one of my favorite things to bake. It's so easy if you plan ahead and have buttermilk in the fridge. I like to keep buttermilk on hand just for this reason.
Well, for the most part that's what I can remember. Sorry it's not more detailed, but that's life these days. With Thanksgiving coming up, and company coming, I did shop for groceries this weekend. It was the strangest feeling, but a good one. I enjoy grocery shopping anyway, but this time I had pictures of the fridge, freezer and pantry in my mind much more clearly than before. Not only did I buy fresh veg and fruit, cheese, oj and salad items as we've been doing over the past couple of months, I bought turkey and a couple of other dinner items that haven't been on my list for a long time. There's a plan for every single thing I bought, either specifically for Thankgiving Day, or other meals during the week. Still, with a trip to Trader Joe's, Aldi (one of my favorites), and Harris Teeter, I still only spent about $100. (Check Aldi for sweet ripe pineapples and red/yellow/orange peppers - two of my favorite things to buy there.)
I hope to keep you better informed about what we're doing, now that a couple of work projects have slowed. Have a nice Thanksgiving, and keep me posted on what you're doing in your pantry. See you tomorrow.
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