Fine Eatin' from Fridge & Pantry

In an effort to avoid wasting any more food, start clearing out the pantry, reduce our expenditures on take-out and convenience food, and, perhaps, eat just a little bit healthier, I am making more meals from what I have* in the refrigerator and the pantry.

(*That is, what is left after the major clean-out of spoiled food, rusted containers/lids, and stale stuff while moving food from the ill-advised upright freezer-fridge conversion to a smaller refrigerator picked up this past week. All pantry foods with a 2010 expiration date have now been moved to the front lines and are making their way into meals almost every day.)

I have been pleased with how tasty the food has been so far and am excited about some of the dishes I plan to make soon.

Over the weekend, we had a really rich and tasty pasta dish using some whole wheat spaghetti and a mix of fresh vegetables from the CSA and food in jars (purchased on sale, not canned by me). While the spaghetti was cooking, I sauteed an onion and a few cloves of garlic in a little oil from a jar of olives. When they were golden, I added several chopped fresh tomatoes. Once they'd softened up a bit, I dumped in an entire 9 oz jar of "Mediterranean Appetizer" - a tasty mix of roasted red peppers and eggplant. I also pitted and chopped up half a dozen green olives from another jar that I'd found on the clearance rack of one of the natural food stores. The only additional seasoning needed was fresh basil and some salt and pepper.

I wanted to make sure the vegetable mixture coated the pasta well so I dumped in a bit of the pasta cooking water with the noodles, as Lidia often advises on her cooking show. Unfortunately, I put in too much so I had to thicken it with a little whole wheat flour dissolved in water. The end result, however, was wonderful and made me glad I always scour the grocery store racks for the sale items.

This morning, I had a rather odd breakfast, or rather, brunch. I didn't get around to eating until about 10 and by then ordinary food sounded just as good as more breakfasty options. I happened to notice an instant soup cup that has been languishing in the cabinet for some time and decided today would be a good day to eat it. Split pea soup with crackers may not be what most people would choose for brunch but I was happy with my choice and it filled me up really well. I don't remember what I paid for it, but I know this meal was dirt cheap!

While browsing through my cookbooks, trying to cull a few (so hard!), I pulled out the Apocalypse Chow book. I flipped through it, debating if it was one I wanted to keep. I landed on a page with a recipe for pasta salad with chickpeas and artichoke hearts. It sounded good! And I had a 12 oz jar of marinated artichoke hearts that had been sitting in the same cabinet with the split pea soup for a long time.

What I didn't have, however, was any good salad pasta. Spaghetti just doesn't quite cut it for a cold salad, at least for me. I browsed around the kitchen and pantry for a bit and decided to make a big substitution, one that would also be a little lower in calories. The arugula in the produce bin was calling out to be cleaned and eaten so I skipped the pasta altogether and used the greens instead.


I think the pasta salad would have been a bit boring, so I'm glad I used spicy arugula leaves instead. My final version included a can of chickpeas (drained and rinsed), the 12 oz jar of artichoke hearts (partially drained), half a dozen reconstituted dehydrated cherry tomatoes (originally from the CSA), lemon juice (frozen from my friend's neighbor's tree), tarragon, and salt and pepper. I topped the salad with seeds from a CSA pumpkin that were salted and toasted until crunchy.


While I was on a roll in the kitchen, I made something sweet for later. My mother-in-law calls these "Cub Scout Cookies" but most of the recipes you'll find online are called No-Bake Cocoa Cookies or something similar. By making a batch and a half, I was able to use up the open tin of cocoa powder and the last of the quick-cooking oats. I hope the dogs don't mind that I stole a scoop of their peanut butter for the recipe.

You can see by the photo of the cookies that I still have food to use up in the freezer. There are frozen peaches from our trip to the U-Pick orchard this summer, flax seeds (bought in bulk on sale for use as an egg substitute), and that blue bag holds a couple of bones from the organic, grass-fed, local beef sold at the CSA. The bones are for the dogs, not soup.

I'm debating whether I want to go to the effort of making some dog biscuits from scratch this week. I don't have any mesquite flour, but I could use all whole wheat flour and maybe add some carob powder since dogs can eat that (and I can't stand the stuff). However, I don't have any soy flour either, and I'm not sure if it's important for the protein level or binding. I suppose the dogs wouldn't care. And it would let me use up some of the carob and ground egg shells I've been holding onto just for this purpose.

For our dinner tonight, I'm planning to use up some leftover fake chicken in the fridge with a CSA onion and bell pepper in a stir-fry. There's a leftover sweet-n-sour stirfry sauce packet from some frozen veggie eggrolls we had a while back and I've got freeze-dried pineapple chunks that can be reconstituted for it, too.

If I do decide to make the dog treats, I'll bake some berry cobbler while the oven is on. This way, I can use up some of the frozen blueberries in combination with the can of blackberries (on sale!), and top the whole thing with homemade vanilla ice cream. What about the cocoa cookies, you ask? Well, they are in the freezer and can always stay there for a few more days. Or, I suppose I could be nice and send a couple in my sweetie's lunch bag to work with him every day for a while.

With these tasty meals, it makes me wonder why we've been eating so much food lately made by others. Oh yeah, it takes time to cook at home and then I'm stuck with dirty dishes, too. Oh well. At least the food at home tastes a whole lot better!