Saturday, October 7, 2017

Pantry Challenge Update & Saturday Happenings

I got up this morning, and whipped up some cashew butter, and then went for a two hour hike with a friend. When I got home, I took Nick to soccer, and then went to Costco, the produce stand, and the grocery store. We are all sorted for supplies for the week, as well as for our trip to Hawaii.

I wanted to give an update on where I stand with my pantry challenge. Some definite progress, although more work to do! My dad will be visiting next week (while we're in Hawaii!), so hopefully he'll eat some of the cashews. ;-)

  • An enormous (25 oz) jar of green olives. Side note: what was I thinking?
  • 1/3 or so of a package of chocolate breakfast cereal. This is nothing we would allow the boys for breakfast, but I'm open to using it in something a little more snack like. One of our house guests brought this. - used, in a batch of granola bars!
  • The end of a bag of pretzel chips. Used these for these delicious granola bars. 
  • Two 1/2 used boxes of lasagna noodles - Used one 1/2 box, so down to the other half
  • A 1/2 bag of pine nuts. -  Used some for homemade pesto, but only had enough basil to use a bit. 
  • Most of a container of almonds - used about half for almond butter, when I ran out of peanut butter
  • Most of a container of cashews . . . ditto the almond butter. Used about half for cashew butter, to replace peanut butter. 
  • A few bits & bobs of trail mix - used, in a batch of granola bars!
  • Most of a large bag of sourdough stuffing. 
  • The last of a bottle of green chile sauce (from the fridge) - used up in chicken fiesta rice!
  • An unopened jar of Nutella - turns out this was expired (& had a funky taste), so unfortunately, it was tossed. I have no idea why M bought this way back in the day, but it will never make it on another grocery list, so I feel like we can avoid this type of waste moving forward. 

Other than that, I need to do the laundry (Nick's uniform - as he has a game tomorrow), finish packing, wrap up my granola bars, and potentially sit by the pool with a book & a glass of wine. I'm making this yummy pilaf for dinner. I'll sub almonds for the hazelnuts, and add chicken.

What about you? What are you up to this Saturday? Any lingering pantry items you want to use up? :-) 

2 comments:

  1. I have my pantry items now in the order I want/need to use them. Like you, am tired of waste so we might be having some odd flavor pairings over the next few weeks. Oh well!

    ReplyDelete
  2. You may already know this, but pine nuts freeze beautifully, being way to pricey to let go to waste. They are gorgeous in pretty much any pasta dish, particularly if toasted first. I also enjoy them in spinach salads. They also top a wonderful Italian cookie, Pignoles.

    I'm pretty good at maintaining control over my pantry, having learned the hard way that there is no point to saving anything, even 'special' items. Throwing away one to many pricey bottles of specialty oils and sauces that had gone bad waiting to be used finally cured me.

    And same with regard to wine. Nothing like having to toss a once-lovely white that has subsequently turned to vinegar to learn to, yes, drink the good stuff now, not later. Oof!

    The only items I seem to toss nowadays is cilantro which we use frequently, but never seen able to finish before it gets slimey. It's so cheap though, at somewhere between $0.33 - $0.50 a bunch I don't give it to much thought.

    ReplyDelete