Pantry Challenge Dinner

Pantry Challenge. I've been doing them for YEARS...

Actually, I used to subscribe to a Yahoo Group by that name, where people supported each other through their pantry challenge weeks - the support was great, even if the suggestions didn't always work for a kosher home! I loved the creativity and the resourcefulness of that group!

What's a pantry challenge all about anyway? It's about not shopping. Instead, you focus on using up whatever is already in your house - the purpose being to reduce spending and use up food that typically sits in the pantry or freezer and doesn't get used, becoming a waste of money AND space.

I do them at different times for different reasons.

Most of my pantry challenges have been inspired by the need to clear out the pantry. Whether pre-move or pre-Pesach, or pre-big event - there are times when you just must use up what you already have!

Then there are the times when I've had to do a pantry challenge due to lack of funds to buy more food, and those tend to be rather... interesting, as those are really designed just to "get by" until there's more cash available, and they don't always coincide with times when the fridge or freezer is full! That's when you figure out how to make the most creative meals, in my experience - when you somehow have to make a meal out of whatever odds and ends you have!

Here's the anatomy of a typical pantry challenge meal in my house - at least at the beginning, when we're still relatively well stocked.

Grains ~ Frozen Veggies ~ Beans or Lentils ~ Cheap fresh veggies ~ 

So this time here's what it looks like:

Homemade bread (this time it came out of the freezer, but it was made of whole spelt and rye flour (the whole rye flour was really cheap at Rami Levy one day, I think it was under 5 shekels/kg - so I stocked up)



Rice - this was long brown rice, bought in bulk from a dry goods store - I think it was 7 shekels/kg, and this was about 1/2 a kilo of rice...

 

Veggies - I picked up red peppers at the makolet from the sug bet rack today, so they cost 2 shekels/kilo - I used about half a kilo for this dinner. I simply cut them, tossed with olive oil, and roasted them!

Green beans - these were picked up on sale for 5 shekels a bag (a deal I couldn't pass up - even though we don't eat tons of frozen green beans!), tossed with garlic, black pepper, smoked paprika, and a smidge of olive oil.




Chick-pea Fritters - these were made of chick pea flour, ground flaxseed, and a whole bunch of spices, like salt, pepper, parsley flakes, granulated garlic, and cumin. Pan-fried and a big hit.

I had some spicy sauces around, and some of us mixed up bowls of rice with veggies and spicy sauce. Others prefer to eat everything separately.

I've spent the last decade trying to figure out ways to make meals acceptable to all of my family members - even though there are hardly even 2 things they will all agree to eat at the same time! That's why the majority of our meals are made of of individually cooked foods that can be combined in different ways, including this one. No one has to feel that they weren't thought of, and I don't have to spend all day catering individual meals! It's a recipe for success - even when we're doing a pantry challenge!

Anyone else out there doing a pantry challenge this week? Let me know what you're serving!

Alternatives to Take Out/Prepared foods

So many of us are living the crazy life. We run from one thing to the next - the list of things to do, between work and family obligations is ever so long - it feels like it's never ending!

And that leads all of us to the well known and dreaded "supper problem".

It happens daily - we need to eat and our kids need to eat, and supper is usually crunch time. It makes sense that we don't always have our act together and we end up scrambling for food - and that's when we buy take-out.

I get it. It makes sense. But I'm going to help you find your way out of this, because if you're reading this blog, chances are, you would like to find a way to spend less money (especially on food).

(You can still do take-out if your budget allows - just plan for it to be X # of times per month - I suggest 1-2 at most so that it feels like what it is - a luxurious splurge, and you'll appreciate it!)

Here are some of our very quick ways of dealing with supper when we're in over our heads.

My number one choice would be to take a few minutes to throw a one pot meal into the slow cooker in the morning. This can be all anything at all - black bean and tomato soup, mushroom barley soup, vegetable and chick pea stew... if you prefer meat, make that - almost anything at all made in the crock pot will be less expensive than a takeout meal.

My second option is sandwiches (you can use a sandwich maker to make hot, crispy, melty sandwiches!) and fresh or steamed veggies for supper. These don't take long to prepare. It may not feel like supper to you - sandwiches are often lunch food - but really, the point is to fill hungry tummies, not to be a gourmand.

Other quick meals that will save you from getting take out could include scrambled eggs - eggs are relatively inexpensive and cook up fast. Get the whole family involved making salads and you're good to go.

I like to keep some ready ingredients on hand, because it's easy to throw together food when I have chick peas or beans, rice, baked potatoes, and more already cooked and in the fridge waiting! Having bread and rolls in the freezer helps a LOT too. A bit of prep on Sunday can take us through till Wednesday so we don't have a crisis.

What tricks do you have that help you stay out of the take-out trap? I'd love to hear your ideas!

Menu for the week

This week's menu is going to be variations on the theme "Easy" - I seem to have a lot to do this week besides my regular routine (that already keeps me quite busy).

Lunches will be soups and pasta and sandwiches and whatever veggies we have on hand.

Suppers:

Sunday: Mushroom barley stew, Grilled Cheese Sandwiches, cut veggies

Monday: Shabbat leftovers

Tuesday: Split Pea Soup, Roasted Vegetable Casserole

Wednesday: Scrambled eggs, Salad, Baked Potatoes

Thursday: Anything left from the week

Looks like Thursday I have a whole bunch of cooking and baking to do - we may be hosting a siyum/kiddush this Shabbat (local friends who read my blog, take note!)! If it happens, I will try to post my plan for that too!

Break the fast menu

This is the longest "short fast" on the Jewish calendar! It is also really hot out, so what I'm looking forward to most of all is rehydration.

Here's our break the fast menu - it's really simple because I had no desire to bake or cook today, so bear with me!



Lemonade
Watermelon
Crackers 
Cucumber and Carrot Sticks
Homemade Chumus for dipping
Tomato, Black bean, and Rice Soup (with shredded cheese on top)




Also planning to have some coffee, probably iced coffee.

What will you break your fast on?

Menu for the week!

Now that the Chagim - Holidays - are behind us, it's time to get back to a normal schedule.

So, first things first, I need to plan my menu for the week, because for some reason, we all get cranky when we don't eat. And Thank G-d my house is more-or-less well stocked with the essentials!

So here's the plan for suppers this week, although veggies are mostly still an unknown, since I need to replenish soon:

Sunday night: Garlic bread, Pasta?, and a big salad

Monday night: Grilled Cheese sandwiches and Tomato Soup with rice

Tuesday night: Red Lentil Soup, Scrambled eggs, Stuffed Baked potatoes

Wednesday night: Black Bean "meatballs" with sweet and sour sauce, Brown Rice, veggies (?) 

Thursday night: Homemade Pizza, salad, and french fries (not so healthy, sorry)

What's your menu for the week look like?

Improvised "Pasta with Cheese Sauce"

A couple of months ago, I noticed an interesting post in one of those groups on Facebook where people post their dinner menus.

Among all the fancy "poached salmon with risotto and wilted baby spinach with fresh mushrooms" and other such gourmet (um, read: unrealistic for a busy family) menus was a GEM. It was a "Cheater's Macaroni and Cheese" recipe, that, get this -- had no cheese in it! 

I was intrigued and filed away the idea. Because, after all, we know that the cheese is the expensive part of a pasta meal, and I was wondering if we could find a way to "frugalize" our pasta meals, but still have milk protein in it.

So this week, I took that recipe and tweaked it to work with my family's preferences.

And here's what I came up with:

Improvised Pasta with "Cheese" Sauce

This makes a really large batch. Enough to feed my family of 6, including a teenage boy and a bottomless pit almost teenage boy AND have leftovers for my hubby to take with him to work for lunch the next day. Feel free to cut it in half.

 What You Need:

large pot
5-6 cups water
2 bags whole wheat pasta
1-1.5 liters milk
1/4 tsp turmeric
salt, pepper, granulated garlic, oregano to taste

First, bring the water to a boil in a large pot. Add the pasta. It will' look like there's not enough water in there, but that's because there ISN'T. Bring the pot back to a boil and stir the pasta as it cooks in the small amount of water. Eventually the water will all be absorbed, and the pasta won't be fully cooked yet. Turn off the flame. Add milk and seasonings to the pot. Stir well, and turn the flame back on. Bring it to a boil, and continue stirring as the pasta cooks in the milk. It will absorb some of the milk, and some of the milk will thicken as it absorbs the pasta's starches, so it will become somewhat saucy. It won't be super saucy, because if you don't let the pasta absorb enough of the milk, you'll just have pasta in spiced milk. When it appears to be ready, turn off the flame, cover the pot, and let stand for 5 minutes.
Mix once again before serving.

Note: the pictures in this post are from my attempt with whole wheat linguini, but it worked better with whole wheat fusilli.

Second Note: this is not a perfect imitation of macaroni and cheese, but for us it was "good enough". And just as I strive in life not for perfection, but rather for "good enough", that is what I strive for with my kitchen experiments as well. Especially the money-saving ones when money is tight.

I hope this helps someone out there!

Healthifying my Pasta nights

Pasta has been my go-to solution to the constant "what should we have for supper" that comes up when there's hardly any time to think or prepare food.

Way back when, we bought the cheapest white pasta we could find (think Stop & Shop pasta on sale for the now unheard of 5 boxes for $1!! I still remember lugging that pasta home from the supermarket every time that sale came up, a young wife and mother and full time student just trying to stay afloat and keep everyone fed...) Now, we live in Israel, where even cheap white pasta is not so cheap, and we've long since moved on to whole wheat pastas. We've taste tested a lot of whole wheat pastas, focusing on finding the best one among the affordable options. In America, I tended to buy the Whole Foods brand pastas (stocked up when they were on sale) and one or two shapes from Target, but WF was far better. Now, we've tried lots of kinds here in Israel, the cheapest being the Taaman brand, but it's not so good. So now, I buy mine from Nizat HaDuvdevan for about 6.50 shekels for a 500g bag (roughly 1 lb), which is not bad for a relatively high quality pasta (and it's organic even though I didn't need it be).

In the past, I'd opted to make my own sauce using tomato paste or crushed tomatoes and spices over buying prepared sauce (although in America, I'd buy good sauces on sale and with coupons. I still miss that convenience). Lately I've decided to kick the sauce up a notch. It can be made in advance and stored in the fridge to be heated as necessary. Mine never sits in the fridge more than a few days, so I can't say how long it lasts, but I'd freeze it if I wasn't using in the next 3 days.

Homemade chunky tomato sauce

olive oil
cut vegetables - whatever you have that you have or what you think will work: onions, celery, peppers, eggplant, summer squash (kishuim), tomatoes, mushrooms, etc
tomato paste or crushed tomatoes (packaged or homemade)
water
fresh or dried basil (fresh is best!)
chopped garlic (fresh is best!)
seasonings to taste - salt, black pepper, and any others you want to add like oregano or rosemary or thyme...

Heat olive oil is a large sauce pot. Add vegetables and stir till they are soft and fragrant. Add garlic and continue stirring for a few minutes. Add tomato paste/crushed tomatoes, water, fresh basil and seasonings, and stir well. Continue to stir occasionally while you bring it all to a boil, then lower the flame and simmer for a while. Serve over pasta and garnish with your favorite cheese if you like.

I will admit that this has not come without objections from my family. They prefer when I don't do anything "funny" to their food, but I figured they'd get used to it and eventually come to appreciate it.

This was the first week that only one child objected to all the vegetables in the pasta, so that is major progress, in my opinion!

I serve this supper with a make-your own salad, as well. 

What's your go-to quick, sort of healthy supper?

Wednesday night - Feb. 16, 2011

I'm thinking about a pre-Pesach pantry challenge in a big way. Time to use up some of those things I stocked up on when I found good sales. That said, I am not going to forgo buying fresh produce, eggs, and dairy products, even chicken for Shabbat...

This morning I poked around the fridge and freezer, and I will be making supper using things I have on hand.

On the way to the table:

Yesterday's Tomato Soup - my pot is big enough to stretch it out for 2 meals!

Rice and Lentils - most people make this as one dish, but my crew is so ridiculously picky that I will make rice and I will make lentils... I make lentils very simply: start with sauteed onion, garlic, and any veggies you want to add. Add sorted and rinsed lentils to the pan, along with water and seasonings (or soup stock). cook till liquid is absorbed and the lentils are soft in texture (you may need to add more water as you go along. I don't measure quantities. I just guess.).

Roasted Cauliflower
 
Cottage Cheese Pancakes - I have cottage cheese that is about to go out of date. Mix it up with eggs, flour, salt and pepper and make pancakes!

Make your own salad - diced cucumbers, shredded carrots, purple cabbage, and honey-cinnamon'd oranges


What are you making for supper? Are you doing a pre-Pesach pantry challenge or freezer cleanout? I'd love to hear how you handle it!

Today's Menu

Today seems to be a "Pantry Challenge" Day. If you're not familiar with the idea of a pantry challenge, I'll give you a quick explanation:
A pantry challenge is when you challenge yourself to cook meals only using the food you already have in your house - pantry, fridge, freezer - without running out to the store. (There's a Yahoo group I've been a member of for several years devoted to this practice. People get really creative!) Some people do a Pantry Challenge when their budget is too tight, and they really cannot afford to shop anymore till the next paycheck, some do it because they simply aren't able to get to the store (that's me!), and still others do it as a "test" - to see if they are stocking up on the right things when they shop. This has lots to do with emergency preparedness, and also everything to do with bargain hunting.
I haven't been to the supermarket since 9 days ago (no good reason, really), so the food situation in my house right now is interesting, to say the least.

For now, my menus are going to focus on Supper (or Dinner).
I found a bunch of wilting broccoli at the back of the fridge that must get used - or thrown out, and that would be a shame - so I'm building my supper around that:

Minestrone Soup
Crustless Broccoli Quiche
Baked Potatoes
Cut veggies with dressing (all that's left are tomatoes and orange peppers, so that's what it is!)