The all new using what you have from your Freezer, Cupboard or Shed (Barn)

Cherryfudge

I managed to use a few things up today: lunch was the Mediterranean veg with the rest of the Brie melted over it, and the last of the mincemeat cakes.

Dinner was for me only as DH is meeting friends for a meal. I decided to use the jar of curry, which turned out to be a pasta sauce that was out of date and didn't smell right - so that's gone. I then invented a curry, and curry, however forgiving, isn't one of the things I am confident to invent for myself. I used up some Thai curry sauce, a couple of sweet potatoes, an onion, a couple of slices of swede from the Christmas veg everyone is still eating up, some raisins, a tin of black eyed beans, a tin of tomatoes, spinach, some ginger... I think that's about it. To my surprise, it worked, especially the sweet potatoes. I topped it off with mango chutney and will need to replace that soon.

I went out for clementines so I could make @oceandreamer's Christmas morning muffins, and somehow came home laden with tins of pineapple. L!dl has 6 tins for £3. The emergency cupboard now needs a good sort out.

Frugalistamama

Used some of the veg that needs using in a sort of scrambled egg frittata this morning along with some eggs. Liked it so oven roasted some more veg for breakfast for the next couple of days to make it quicker.  Also made some veg soup for after school snack for the next couple of days.

We had some left over mince from the HFresh meal for dinner tonight along with wedges and more veg.

Cooked up some brown rice from the next bag of rice I want to use up and made some dumplings so dinner will be easy for the next couple of days. 

JIL

Cairnpapple said:

Cherryfudge said:

Cairnpapple said:

 there are 6 different types of rice in there, they're all out of date, where do I start'.

Rice pudding?  

can't stand the stuff! spouse does like it though.

I'm just wondering whether we could do risotto in the slow cooker. I'm usually the one who makes risotto, spouse prefers cooking that you can walk away from. Hmm I think there's one in the slow cooker book that I could adapt, I shall investigate!

Delia has a recipe for oven baked risotto, its easilyadapted. I often do a mushroom one, in the oven and bake salmon steak at the same time. It is a lovely meal served as risotto, salmon and topped with rocket.

RHemmings

Last night I made some pasta which is in the freezer in glass containers ready to be taken to work for lunches. I'll probably use the first one tomorrow because I have half a pack of rice in the fridge at work to be used up, so I'll eat that with packet curry today. 

After arriving back in the country on Sunday, I've done very little to chip away at the remaining excessive food at home. I've eaten one long-time-possessed packet of 'pesto-infused grains' which was quite nice. But, the pasta is definitely 'from the cupboard'. I can see some brown rice that was bought for a reason and not eaten, and also I found that I had just enough red lentils for a batch (3 meals, with rice) of my standard red lentil dish. 

Other things I have in stock include some coconut milk, moong dal (loads), and still some instant-ish noodle packets. There's still the plain flour. Some tins of 'Saudi Recipe' bean dishes to eat, but they are too liquid for taking to work. 

The vegetables, 'cheese', and frozen vegan products (burgers, etc.) that I bought earlier in the week are going. Warburton's rolls for burgers almost gone now. I did buy more sauces as well, and they are going as well. So, the purchases earlier in the week will not just hang around. The only risk for that is the coconut oil (solid) that I bought, may end up hanging around. I plan to start experimenting with that in the weekend. 

I think I'm going to buy some Shan (brand) spice mix for Moong Dal, as it will be a shortcut to using up the dal itself. 

EDIT: I'm going to try making the red lentil 'flatbread' again, but I'm going to try using moong dal instead of red lentils. As I must have about 1kg of (dry) moong dal. 

London_1

Out from the freezer for today is a quarter of a steak pie I saw a large one reduced in M & S before Christmas at £2.00 and snaffled it and brought it home quartered it up and wrapped the quarters in foil and froze them The pie was one of their family sized ones so the quarters are quite large. That with some mash and carrots and broccoli from the freezer will give a bit more wriggle room in there. I have some left over rice pudding to have for pudding which I'll have with a diced banana so dinner is sorted I've costed it out for today 

Breakfast Porridge, made with water & salt as I always do, with a splash of milk round the edge 10p

Lunch Steak pie                                                                                                                                50p
carrots and broccoli                                                                                                                          30p
Rice pud with a diced banana                                                                                                          30p

Snack at tea time. Scrambled eggs on toast, plus a couple of the reduced clementines               50p

Mid morning cuppa with a couple of Christmas biscuits from a gifted tin                                       10p

Afternoon coffee with a slice of my sis-in-laws Christmas cake                                                       10p

                                                                                                                     Total cost for today = £1.80

Everything eaten will have come from existing stock in the cupboards or fridge/ freezer.
 I sometimes like to cost out the stuff I am using,  just to give me an idea of what I perhaps need to buy or replace when next I go shopping

 I used to run a business where costing things was my job, so old habits die hard .Admittedly I live alone so can please myself what I eat, and using up stuff I already have, and working out a menu for the day gives me a good idea of costings.
It seems to be reasonably healthy, and  I'm certainly never hungry, the stuff is spaced out through the day.

Breakfast around 7.30am, mid morning cuppa around 10.30-11.00. Lunch around 1.15, afternoon coffee around 3.30 and snack tea around 6.30.pm.

I  find that in the winter I will have my main meal at lunchtime, then just a small snack type tea in the evening , but when the longer evenings are here in the summer, I swap around and have a snack type lunch and dinner in the evening.  works for me .
  Does anyone else do a costings exercise to see what its costing to feed yourself for one day.?

   Obviously as I'm trying to run down my cupboards as I am hoping to move this year its a bit easier as I won't be buying much to replace stuff, and consequently eating from my food stocks is to me far better than binning stuff

   I sorted the bottom drawer of the freezer out as I had been batch cooking chicken for the past week and I now have 17 ready meals in the bottom of the freezer. I will do the middle and top baskets today, and see what's still   there to be used up. I try to get tomorrows meal out after tea in the evening, so it can defrost in the fridge overnight. 

  JackieO xx

Cairnpapple

JIL said:

Cairnpapple said:

Cherryfudge said:

Cairnpapple said:

 there are 6 different types of rice in there, they're all out of date, where do I start'.

Rice pudding?  

can't stand the stuff! spouse does like it though.

I'm just wondering whether we could do risotto in the slow cooker. I'm usually the one who makes risotto, spouse prefers cooking that you can walk away from. Hmm I think there's one in the slow cooker book that I could adapt, I shall investigate!

Delia has a recipe for oven baked risotto, its easilyadapted. I often do a mushroom one, in the oven and bake salmon steak at the same time. It is a lovely meal served as risotto, salmon and topped with rocket.

that sounds delicious!!

Cherryfudge

@RHemmings, I had solid coconut oil that went out of date but still smelled good. I've discovered it can be used for all sorts of body and hair care: my favourite is to put a tiny amount - about 0.5 tsp - in the bath water as a moisturiser.

@London_1, you are truly organised! I've not itemised costings very much but when you do, it's interesting to see how it all pans out.

Dinner here today will be the remains of yesterday's curry.

Frugalistamama

So today was some of the leftover roast veg and eggs for breakfast,  smoothie for lunch and dinner was cabbage and carrot, some store cupboard potato cakes which I've kept meaning to try. These were not a hit with the kids. I don't know why I keep trying new things with them..... They finished a bag of nuggets and there was one lonely mushroom pie in the freezer which I had and my hubs will have some breaded chicken with it that's in the fridge.

A bit of a mix match, use it up dinner.

oceandreamer

Made a veg curry tonight with red lentils, some diced potato spinach and half a jar of roasted red peppers. Didn't have any sauce so just threw in some tandoori masala - not bad at all.

RHemmings

I thought I was just about to clear out the last red lentils in the house, but I found a large glass container absolutely packed full - I had forgotten about them.

I'm still buying stuff, but am using it to knock of long term kitchen supplies. After success using them when I was in Indonesia, I bought some here. This morning I made them up, and by following directions online, I can make them so that they are not too soft, but chewy. These ones have been rehydrated with Oxo vegetable stock, and I would describe them as just a bit on the boring side to be snackable.



But, that's just to give an impression of their taste. I made them to use in other recipes. This morning I ate some (long term storecupboard) fried hakka noodles, and because the soya chunks were cooked along with vegetables in soy sauce, ginger, garlic, and sesame oil, they took up the flavour and were delicious in context. And, nicely chewy. Not soft like when I've tried to use them in previous decades. (Must be ten years since I last tried.) Previously I've only used whole chunks, but today (and one week ago) I sliced them a bit to get smaller bits of it, which took up flavours better and I think worked better in context. 

A lot of people here are keen on the red lentil tofu. I made some but am not keen on it. I tried making some to the same recipe but with mung beans (split), not red lentils. It turned out quite different. I had trouble cooking it, and what you see here has been microwaved quite a bit after it refused to set after cooking until it thickens. The result here looks terrible, but I think this has a better texture and flavour than the red lentil tofu. I just need to work out how to cook it. 



I would describe this result, as bad as it looks, as snackable. Not the most tasty snack, but not bad. I think I want to go on experimenting with this. The stuff down the bottom went the most 'tofu-like', and it's not bad. Too crumbly on the top and a bit overcooked up there.