A ridiculous amount of food in my cupboards

xcarlyx

I live with my parents. My mum always has a stock rotation of the cupboards e.g if she uses peas when she next goes shopping she goes out and buys another.

Long_tall_sally

Thank you all so much for your replies. I don't know why but I was a bit hesitant to do the post because I thought I might get some criticism for failing at what is already a really high monthly target for food and having so much in the cupboards!
I shall have a look at the thread that bossymoo that you mentioned and thankyou Chris25 for the info about the fish. Apart from the obvious things like the yellow split peas & broth mix, I have no idea how to use some of the things for soups but I will google.
Oh and Kittycat204 - Thankyou - its nice to know there are others as bad as me!

Butterfly_Brain

You could donate some to a local food bank

valk_scot

I go through the freezer and storecupboard once every couple of months or so and bring the "must use up soon" items to the front of both. Then I have a week where I try to buy as little as possible and write my meal plan round these items. Sometimes I have to be a bit creative with recipes but it works for me when it comes to using things up, also it gives me a bit of slack in the food budget these weeks so I keep that money aside for taking advantage of good offers when I see them.

Meadows

Long_tall_sally wrote: »

Apart from the obvious things like the yellow split peas & broth mix, I have no idea how to use some of the things for soups but I will google.

Chestnut Soup
A knob of butter
• 2 onions, chopped
• 1 garlic clove, finely sliced
• 2 celery sticks, chopped
• 1 large potato, diced
• 400g vac-packed chestnuts
• 1–1.2 litres vegetable stock
• 1 bay leaf
• 150–200ml single cream
In a saucepan, melt the butter and fry the onion, garlic and celery till soft but not coloured. Add the potato, all but 4 of the chestnuts, stock and bay, with salt and pepper to taste. Boil, then simmer for 30 minutes. Once the potato is soft, remove the bay leaf and blitz with a hand blender till smooth. Stir in the cream and check the seasoning. Crumble remaining chestnuts on top, then serve with croutons or crispbread.

Coconut & Bean Soup
1 tbsp sunflower oil
½ bunch spring onions , whites and greens separated and sliced
1 red pepper , diced
1 Scotch bonnet chilli , deseeded and pounded to a paste
1 garlic clove , chopped
1 tsp dried thyme
1 tsp medium curry powder
1 tsp allspice
3 plum tomatoes , chopped
1 vegetable stock cube
410g can kidney beans , rinsed and drained
410g can pinto beans , rinsed and drained
410g can black-eyed beans , rinsed and drained
2 x 400g cans coconut milk
juice 2 limes
(Add any beans you like to this)

Heat the oil in a large saucepan. Sizzle the spring onion whites, pepper, chilli paste and garlic for 5-8 mins until soft and fragrant. Add the thyme, curry powder and spices, then cook for 1 min more, Stir in the tomatoes, then cook for 2 mins to soften slightly.
Crumble in the stock cube, then tip in all the beans and the coconut milk. Simmer for 10 mins. Turn off the heat and stir in most of the spring onion greens, the lime juice and some seasoning. Ladle into bowls and scatter with remaining spring onions just before serving.

Creamed Coconut Block

Creamed Coconut block can be added, in small pieces, straight into curries towards the end of cooking to thicken them and add creaminess or can be used to make coconut milk. For Coconut Milk: Pour 400ml boiling water into a jug and add 100g Creamed Coconut. Stir until dissolved.

Hmm71

My husband was searching through our kitchen cupboards for something the other day and he found we had five packets of pizza base mix. We haven't had home-made pizza for ages so we may well be having them soon .
I did also suggest that maybe he could now take pizza mix off the shopping list. Once something has gone on the list he does tend to leave it there, whether we actually need it or not. Drives me mad as I prefer to look through what we have in already, then write a menu for the week, then write the shopping list based on what we actually need to buy.

OP, eating dried, tinned or food in unopened jars after the best before date is absolutely fine. It's only fresh food you have to be careful with after the use by date.
I do quite a lot of my shopping at a shop in town called The Cheap Shop. They sell stuff that's past the best before date and it's always fine. Been shopping there for nearly twenty years now and I'm still here.
BTW if you are thinking of chucking out any stuff then don't. Parcel it up and send it to me

Popperwell

I am amazed that more of the kind of shop mentioned "The Cheap Shop" don't exist around the UK...nothing like that around here and yet I know how popular it would be and sadly are needed.

Meadows

Popperwell wrote: »

I am amazed that more of the kind of shop mentioned "The Cheap Shop" don't exist around the UK...nothing like that around here and yet I know how popular it would be and sadly are needed.

http://www.approvedfood.co.uk/

http://www.rosspa.co.uk/

valk_scot

Popperwell wrote: »

I am amazed that more of the kind of shop mentioned "The Cheap Shop" don't exist around the UK...nothing like that around here and yet I know how popular it would be and sadly are needed.

B&M and all the usual ££ shops round here sell foodstuff that's too close to the BB or Use By dates for the supermarket warehouses to accept. It's the same sort of range that Approved Foods get too. My local shops also sell some foods that have gone past their BB dates at really rock bottom prices, I got a great deal on Hovis bread machine mixes one year at 10p a pack and bought enough for 3 months of bread, lol. And very good it was too. Currently we're eating Sugar Puffs, chinese noodles and marzipan (my kids love marzipan) that all go out of date at the end of October and which are about 90% cheaper than the supermarket.

Stuff like that isn't so good for long term storecupboards I would say but you can pick up some great bargains if you know you're going to use it fairly soon, and no worries with postage either. Most town centres have at least one ££ shop too. We've got three in our High Street, I get cat food, toiletries and gardening stuff from them too.

Long_tall_sally

Thank you everyone, particularly Meadows for those lovely recipes. Actually having an idea what to do with some of it is the first step to being able to use it all up!