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

wumph

Lump of chicken out of freezer which turned out to be with bone in and too much skin, but made chicken with pineapple chunks and rice.  Pineapple with ice cream for pud and some for brekkie on porridge this a.m.,  more tomorrow so they all used. Took some of the YS sliced tongue which I had frozen out for lunch for today and tomorrow. Managing to make some space in freezer,  not much, and used some of my windowsill grown lettuce for salad tonight.

Cherryfudge

We have a guest coming for a few days so I've bought a large chicken and potatoes. We already have carrots, peas, sweetcorn, tomatoes...

I'm afraid I threw the rest of the salad out: it didn't smell right. Too many cut ends left for too long. At least it went in the compost so it isn't entirely wasted, and it was y/s to begin with.

I'm fighting a losing battle with apple and blackberry jam: I've had so much to do today that I've not finished sieving it. I'm also supposed to be doing a cake for tomorrow and a soup for me... somehow I don't think so, at least not yet.

In better news, I remembered my Mum used to let us have a dribble of ribena (undiluted) on ice cream as a sauce. I tried it again tonight with the un-liked ice cream and the rest of the blueberries, and it was so nice! So the ice cream is back in play: with strawberries I think as Sains was discounting them.

And I've finally finished the monkey nuts. Another little victory.

Cherryfudge

The jam is finally made, the chicken roasted and some more of the ice cream has been added to meringue and strawberries for pudding. I've also finished a jar of peanut butter. All satisfactory apart from trying to strain the pips out of the jam. Impossible.

Then I looked out of the window and a lot more blackberries have ripened...

I made a microwave coffee cake and DH looks like eating his way through it, so that was a quick and easy solution to having too many things to cook though the amount of sugar in the topping is scary. I also made swirly patterns with a fork and stuck a few walnuts on it, so it looked a lot more up-market than it really was (and it used up some of the decaff that I don't really like).

Tomorrow I'm the only one at home in the day and am hoping to make soup, thus using some of the backlog of vegetables and provide healthy meals for myself. There's plenty of chicken left so DH will have some for dinner and later in the week I'll do chicken and chorizo pasta.

Cairnpapple

Thanks @Cherryfudge, we have decaf going stale in the cupboard and somehow I hadn't thought of making it into cake!

Cherryfudge

Cairnpapple said:

Thanks @Cherryfudge, we have decaf going stale in the cupboard and somehow I hadn't thought of making it into cake!

There are also coffee creams (the sweets, made like peppermint creams) or coffee ice cream.  

Cherryfudge

I'm obviously not cut out for this using-up lark. There are still three and a half butternut squashes to use so I started to gather ingredients for a favourite soup that I've not made recently, and which would use at least one.

Things were assembled, onion and garlic chopped, spices at hand, oil heating in the big pan when I realised the recipe was the wrong one and actually contains no butternut squash at all. I went ahead and made it anyway and it's lovely - while the butternut one is on another page and I can't work out whether to make that and have it hanging round in the fridge, where there's precious little space... oh okay. Another day.

Cherryfudge

In the end I made the second batch of soup as well, and just about found cold storage for it. There are still two butternut squashes left, but all the sweet potatoes are used. The soup should do several lunches and is very healthy, so that's all positive.

Cherryfudge

Soup for lunch today. (You know when you say a word often enough and it starts to sound odd? Soup).

It occurred to me I have flour going out of date. I try to avoid bread nowadays as it seems to make my reflux worse, but I got out the bread maker and made a loaf using some of the rye flour and an anonymous white that was probably plain, The wholemeal bread flour was dumped because there were signs of life in the container: not many but I don't want any. I think they were flour mites, which either hadn't read the notice that the container is airtight, or had been hibernating and hatched when it got warm enough. The only times I've ever found any have been in the height of summer. The other flours seem unaffected, thankfully.

I had some things to use up, so I diced strong cheese, sun dried tomatoes and black olives to add to the dough and the resulting bread is a jaw breaker, but oh so tasty. Incidentally, while stocks have gone down, nothing is used up.

Our guest treated us to dinner out, so fridge and freezer contents are much as they were.

Rosetta92

Cherryfudge said:

In the end I made the second batch of soup as well, and just about found cold storage for it. There are still two butternut squashes left, but all the sweet potatoes are used. The soup should do several lunches and is very healthy, so that's all positive.

This reminds me I have a squash to use up too. I’m thinking of trying a roast recipe like this https://www.bbc.co.uk/food/recipes/stuffedsquash_92588

but adding cheese to make it a main course. I’m also thinking I could just cook one half to make one portion but wondering how long the other half would keep in the fridge. 

Wraithlady

Used up one of the bags of chicken breasts (which was starting to get freezer burn, so will have to start on the other bag), tub of chicken thighs out for tonight and I cooked the baby-shark-sized trout in the oven last weekend  (OH, on being presented with a very generous portion asked if the trout was finished up - to be told, oh no, there's the other side left!) - now all eaten

Also used up a tin of sardines we'd had for ages in a potato salad and very nice it was too!