Sunday, January 10, 2016

Pantry Challenge Week 1 Jan 2-9

okay - so... good intentions & marginal success!!

I say marginal success because I ended up putting more INTO the freezer but that is common in week 1 of a pantry challenge.  Also - the goal IF I put something IN the freezer is for it to be ready to eat (not a preserved ingredient like BROTH )... and I did pretty well there.  I really try to watch the freezer because I want to use it properly - there is no sense putting things IN there if you don't take them OUT!

***some new years leftovers finished up .... rice, black-eyed peas, kale, ham
   actually about a cup each of sauteed kale and chopped ham went INTO the freezer (these will be ingredients in something else - like... an omelet or a slow cooker bean soup).

***an Asian stir fry I mentioned in my last post using tofu & a couple of bags of frozen veggies and some brown rice.

and I had a brilliant idea to use up the REALLY dry cornbread recipe I tried for New Years .... [the taste was fine but it was BONE DRY.  After dinner, I put all the wedges into the freezer until I figured out how we were going to eat it]

***I pulled 1 container of mexi-chicken, 1 container of diced tomatoes and green peppers, and one of black bean broth out of the freezer, thawed and mixed together .... so THREE out of the freezer....

....greased a baking pan and added 4 wedges of the DRY cornbread I knew we wouldn't eat....  tossed the above on it....   added seasonings and a cup or two of black beans out of the fridge (and a half jar of salsa) to where it looked moist.  Topped with foil and baked for 30 min at the usual 350 degrees.....

When I pulled it out, I topped it with cheese - and it was heavenly!

I do have quite a bit more cornbread in the freezer but at least I now have a plan...

I did create ONE container for the freezer BUT it is a ready to eat dinner & NOT an ingredient so that is a BONUS.

***I made a lovely crockpot of a pasta fagioli type soup [in MY terms, a hamburger bean soup thing with pasta that has Italian type seasonings]

SO.... hamburger and black beans and broth OUT of the freezer and a box of pasta from the pantry

TWO new container IN the freezer - 1 of cooked pasta and 1 of the soup.... 


***Did up a pot of red beans with 2 freezer containers of veggie broth and diced tomatoes / peppers......   

****Also made up some dough from the Artisan Bread in Five Minutes book and am ready to make bread.... or stromboli... or something...  I noticed that I have a lot of the random flours used in this book so I am going to have to use some of them up this month!

I ended up purchasing fresh fruit, celery, salad, almond milk and wine....  this was the easy week.  I will be digging deeper into the recesses next week and exercising a lot more creativity!  I think I will be grateful for the pre-cooked beans and ready to eat meals before the month is out!


Freezer:
-2 mexi-chicken & diced tomatoes / peppers
-2 pound hamburger, veggie broth & black bean broth
-2 bags stir fry veggies
+1 chopped ham
+1 black bean, chicken, cornbread
+1 pasta fagioli
+ one very small container of sauteed kale

Fridge:
- half jar salsa
- half jar marinara
- block tofu

Pantry
- box pasta
- can tomato paste
- bag brown rice
- bag red beans
- bag black beans

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