Eat All The Food In Your House - Take 2

[MaybeBabyMustache]

I'd forgotten about a Costco size box of red pepper & tomato soups, that were on the pantry shelf in the garage. We purchased them during COVID, when shopping was a challenge. I actually really like them, but don't eat soup often. We got home late from soccer practice, & I made soup for myself & one teen, and grilled cheese sandwiches for three diners. Bonus points, used up homemade rolls made earlier in the week, scraps of cheese leftover from taco night, and a slice of cheese leftover from burgers.

As for tonight, I'll likely have a hot dog & soup, I'll sautee the rest of the zucchini for my husband, who will have a burger from the freezer. The teens will have hot dogs on buns, with fruit salad. We're both trying to use up a lot of odds & ends, as well as we are dealing with a variety of food preferences. Sometimes it gets exhausting.

We're making great progress on the fresh fruit, thanks to me cutting it up & having it ready to grab & go in a bowl.

I also pickled the four giant jalapenos that ripened, and made a quick batch for the fridge. That was yesterday, and the jar is almost empty. My husband & one teen are quite a fan. ;-)

[MaybeBabyMustache]

It's funny what makes me happy these days, but I remembered we had a few leftover pita pockets from last summer in the freezer. I made the kids chicken for lunch, and turned the pita pockets into sandwiches for the chicken. A small amount of freezer space, reclaimed! Bonus points, as I used up the last piece of sliced cheese my husband bought a few weeks back.

Other food related things:
-We finished off the bagged salad that was close to being expired on the day we bought it (despite the date on the package). I'm most of the way through with the second bagged salad.
-Jalapenos are gone. I picked a ton of spinach & tomatoes. I'll make salad to use up the spinach, and I'm making caprese salad tonight with the tomatoes. Yum. I defrosted wings that we made before our last trip, but didn't finish. I'm hoping to successfully reheat them.
-A few friends & neighbors would like more zucchini. I'm also looking for interested people for my BFF, the zucchini.
-I still need to polish off the last of the soup.
-We ate all of the barbecued chicken & the burger patty I defrosted for various dinners. No waste or anything added back to the freezer.

I think I'll make a big batch of chicken curry this weekend. We'll get two meals out of it, then I'll freeze the rest for future meals.

[MaybeBabyMustache]

We leave really early tomorrow for a road trip to our vacation house, which we are selling & closing on. There's a lot of "use it up" eating ahead, and also entertaining our family while we're there. It makes for some interesting logistics!

Currently:
-Finished off the last of the bagged salad
-Made a huge curry, and will take enough in the cooler that we can have it when we arrive tomorrow night
-Picked all of the garden produce that was ready, and we will pack it in the cooler
-Whatever doesn't fit into the cooler (cherries, strawberries) will be eaten tonight as dessert
-Leftover egg roll in a bowl + cilantro for dinner tonight

We have a grocery bag full of tomatoes from the garden. I'm sharing them with friends before we leave!

[Linea_Norway]

Yesterday we ate spagetti with spinach from the freezer and sauce from cream and French blue cheese. But all these ingredients are staples that I like to keep in storage. Tonight I will make potatoes with green peas, as recipee from a cookbook. This will make a dent in the 2 bags of green peas that are in the fridge and that I didn't have a plan for. I will serve it a portion of smoked meat from the freezer.

After tomorrow DH will go away for a few days to visit his parent in another country. Then I will try to eat leftover portions from the freezer and make a dent in the weird ingredients.

[MountainGal]

I cannot believe another week has flown by!  We went camping over the weekend and leftovers were used in this manner:

~Celery, tomatoes, and broccoli were part of a snack plate
~The rest of the blueberries went into Sunday's pancakes
~DH ate the steak for lunches
~Shredded cheese topped Sunday's pizza
~We ate the leftover ranch beans, green beans, and sliced zucchini with last night's tacos
~I gave the smores ingredients to friends who are going camping this weekend

[MaybeBabyMustache]

I feel like I'm on Iron Chef, using up the random freezer ingredients at our vacation house, and combining them with the fresh things we bought, or brought with us. Starting today, we will be entertaining (we will have 10 people at the house) for a last hurrah family trip at the Coast. Then, one night with just myself & my husband to pack up, and turn around & drive back to our house. I can already guess that my mom & sister are going to bring a TON of food with them.

I've started going through the alcohol at the house & sorting out who can take what. I've put together mystery wine packs for everyone. ;-)

Rest of the progress:
-I brought chicken curry, rice, & cauliflower rice with us in the cooler, and we ate that when we arrived after a 13 hour road trip
-I brought all of our garden items, and we've been enjoying the tomatoes. I made two quick pasta sauces with the tomatoes, one using up three chicken sausages, one to go over "healthy" noodles that my husband likes.
-I had the leftover, leftover curry for lunch one day
-We've also eaten from the freezer: 5 mini burgers, a container of white chicken chili, bagels, some butter, a bacon wrapped chicken keto entree, & breakfast sausage patties. We will have almost nothing to bring home from the freezer, at least.
-We've eaten all of the fruit we brought in the cooler, and most of the veggies
-We stopped at Costco & bought the items we need for entertaining (my mom & sister will bring the rest). Somehow, the teens have already eaten all of the fruit we purchased on Tuesday. Including the box of nectarines, two boxes of blueberries, and a container of strawberries. My trick of cutting the prepping the fruit in a large bowl in the fridge is working too well, perhaps. Ah, well, at least the fruit makes a great healthy snack!

[MountainGal]

@MaybeBabyMustache, I love the mystery wine pack idea!

Not much to report here.  I've been planning suppers around the locally raised pork and beef we received.  I've also been focusing on utilizing fresh produce in order to avoid food waste.  This includes baby spinach, broccoli slaw, avocados, eggplant, and zucchini.

Happy 4th of July to those in the US!

[Linea_Norway]

DH is visiting his family abroad. I am home alone. I was looking for a recipe with edamame beans. Budget bytes had a salad with the beans and red cabbage. I hade 2 pots for formented red cabbage. So I use one pot with the edamame beans, a fresh red pepper and fresh carrots. That was dinner yesterday and lunch today.

For dinner yesterday I also poached eggs. I read in an article that the secret of a well poached egg is to put the egg(s) individually in a small bowl with vinegar for some time. Then cook the eggs in water, with the vinegar as well. This worked very well. My best poached eggs ever. Only the cooking pot has gotten a weird coating on the bottom. I tried to soak it overnight in water, without succes. Now soaking again in water with dishwasher detergent.

Tonight I will probably eat some leftover portion, maybe with some preserved self-picked mushrooms.

[Linea_Norway]

Tonight I finished a bottle of selfmade dandelion sirup that has been taking up space in one of the fridges.

[StarBright]

Tonight I finished a bottle of selfmade dandelion sirup that has been taking up space in one of the fridges.

What do you use dandelion syrup for?

[Linea_Norway]

Tonight I finished a bottle of selfmade dandelion sirup that has been taking up space in one of the fridges.

What do you use dandelion syrup for?

I just made it for the first time to find out what it was like. I used it for lemonade. Although it is with sugar then, not something I usually drink. I am not so fond if the recipee I used though. For earlier sirups, I used another one which was more concentrated with the taste ingredient. I sometimes use sirup for making icecream as well, or just on top of served icecream.

This morning I made 1 and a half pot of rose harissa. I used all the rose petals from this years and last year. All the red chili peppers from the freezer, but had to buy more chilipeppers and tomatoes.

[MaybeBabyMustache]

We emptied out our vacation house & freezer (last few items passed on to our family, as we were making a 12 hour road trip). We did bring back plenty of alcohol, because it appears to have multiplied there! My parents & sisters cars were filled completely, as was ours.

We are now home, with no fresh food in the fridge. Our kiddos are staying with my parents for a few weeks, so we will plan for a more adult menu, and for date nights out, to take advantage of our temporary kid free status.

We had a neighbor kid watering our plant. I'm about to go see what survived. Fingers crossed.

[MountainGal]

@Linea_Norway, the syrup sounds delicious!

@MaybeBabyMustache, hope your plants survived.

Lately, in no particular order:

~The broccoli slaw has been finished
~Two more avocados have been consumed
~I (finally) made the dark chocolate macadamia clusters, but, alas, still have macadamias remaining
~Leftover berries and cheese from the 4th of July cookout are being consumed as this week's snacks
~The spaghetti squash was cooked yesterday evening and was eaten for supper, and made three leftover servings
~Tonight's fish and shrimp meal will take care of the bag of cauliflower and portobello mushrooms
~The above will leave just 1/3 bag of baby spinach, an avocado, and a lemon in the produce drawer
~We used up the rest of a bottle each of mayo and vinaigrette dressing, both of which are now on the grocery list
~Poured a bit of the homemade hot fudge (aka the Christmas fudge mistake) over ice cream.  Just 1.5 more small jars to go!
~I discreetly sent approximately 8 canned food items home with a friend in need

[MaybeBabyMustache]

@MountainGal - all is well with the plants. He had an aggressive hand with the sprayer (some dirt sprayed out a bit), but saved everything, so I'm thrilled.

-Made coleslaw out of the shredded cabbage/carrots that were in the back of the fridge. This conveniently used up most of the last bit of heavy cream. I think I can get one more dressing batch out of the cream. I also used fresh chives in the dressing. Typically I sub for dried, so this was nice to have on hand, from the garden
-Used up lots of garden items (green peppers, tomatoes, radishes, Greek basil, cucumbers, kale)
-Gave away five zucchini. The neighbors didn't pick any zucchini, so one is an absolutely insane size. My Buy Nothing peeps apparently don't mind, and there were plenty of uses for shredded zucchini shared. We have gallons of shredded zucchini in the freezer, so I'm happy to see it go elsewhere

[Linea_Norway]

Tomorrow we will go on vacation for 10 days. We will finish contents of the fridge. For dinner roasted carrots, half a home made foccasia bread from the freezer and burgers or susages that I had to purchase: 3 for 2, the rest into the freezer. We will use a box of cream that is already opened. The still closed box of youghurt will survive fine until we come back. And we will need to eat the last egg, which I think is only one. The is a little juice left which we will use for breakfast tomorrow.

[MaybeBabyMustache]

We avoided a major grocery shop this week (this is a huge milestone for my husband, who gets anxious when the fridge starts to look cleared out). Instead, we just bought produce to fill in.

-Made zucchini fritters out of garden produce. They were delicious.
-Made caprese out of garden tomatoes & basil, and an inexpensive fresh mozzarella purchase from Costco. We had this numerous times, and have enough cheese for a couple more dinners.
-Finished off the last of the shredded veggies in coleslaw. Still have extra dressing that we can use for future coleslaw, but it will need to be in the next week or so before the cream goes off.
-Continue to eat a bunch of other garden goodies in salads: radishes, peppers, tomatoes
-Froze the handful of strawberries we picked
-Pickled two batches of jalapenos
-Finished off the steak & salmon my husband grilled the other night
-Ate the restaurant leftovers for lunch one day

We're heading out of town for the weekend, so a few other things we'll want to eat up before we go:
-Grilled chicken (eat with caesar salad)
-Last of a bagged salad
-One piece of baked chicken + one chicken sausage
-A bunch of fresh strawberries. Use or freeze

Otherwise, we have everything pretty well in hand

[SunnyDays]

I've been eating down my freezer for a couple of months now, and there's actually some empty space again!  And nothing falls out and smashes my toes (it's an upright).  I plan to continue this until it's mostly empty so I can defrost it and fill it back up for winter, but not to the insane levels it was for the pandemic.  I figure that if I survived that with lots of food left over, it would take a total societal collapse for me to actually run out of food.  That possibility doesn't worry me enough to overwhelm myself again.

[MaybeBabyMustache]

I'm with you @SunnyDays . It would take a lot for me to run out of food, and I don't like having our freezer this packed. Congrats on being able to open it without things falling on you!

I've defrosted a bunch of bananas, and plan to make banana muffins today. They will largely go back in the freezer, but I'd rather have easy to consume/already prepped items in the freezer vs random ingredients.

We had chicken caesar salads last night, and I have a bit of grilled chicken leftover. Tonight will be chicken curry with cauliflower rice. The frozen cauliflower rice comes in enormous bags, so I'll be happy to get one bag out of the freezer. I'll have the remaining grilled chicken over salad for lunch today.

We ate strawberries for dessert last night, but we will need to eat or freeze the rest.

I also gave away a bunch of our Greek basil, along with a bunch of Buy Nothing items. Our plant is the size of a bush, and has absolutely taken over a planter bed, so it was good to trim it back, and get it to others who will use it.

[SquashingDebt]

Anyone have ideas for using cinnamon basil or lemon basil?  I impulse-bought some plants last month and they're giant!  I use the Thai basil for topping stir-fries and the regular genovese basil is easy to use, but I'm not sure what to do with lemon and cinnamon.

I've been having good luck with eating down the freezer lately, post-move.  We transferred a bunch of frozen stuff but haven't had a chance to organize - so I just find the first frozen leftovers on top and eat those for lunch!  Also super useful because we've been too busy to cook much so there are no fresh leftovers to have for lunch, usually.

I'm also scaling back my COVID pantry.  Our new place has far less storage, so I'm embracing the idea of stocking up to nicely fit the available space.  If I want an obscure ingredient for a recipe, I'll just have to go to the store!  (Or more realistically, my SO will volunteer to go.)  I'm highly motivated to eat down our current overstock because then I'll have cupboard space for other things and be able to get them off the floor/counter!

[MaybeBabyMustache]

@SquashingDebt - wow, I've never heard of cinnamon basil. I looked it up & there are some really fun looking recipes. If you're feeling overwhelmed with it right now, perhaps dry some of it, and save it for future baking uses?

We are making good progress on the food in the house, although the garden is really producing, and we need to stay on top of it. I bought an entire box of tomatoes, not realizing that our plants would have a huge week. I think I'll need to freeze those tomatoes for future sauce or something.
-We ate a chicken curry from the fridge, along with a bag of cauliflower rice, which takes up so much space in the freezer. There's one small serving of curry/rice leftover
-We gave away four zucchini
-We are almost done with the mini cucumbers, radishes, & snap peas, and will use the remainder in a salad tonight

[Linea_Norway]

Back home after being on a mountain hiking and camping trip for a week. I ate a leftover portion of chickpea stew from the freezer. It tasted surpricingly well. As I watched the recently new written list of freezer ingredients, it looks like there is only one freezer meal portion left. The rest of the stuff are ingredients, not a whole meal.

[MountainGal]

@SquashingDebt, that basil sounds good!  @Linea_Norway, I bet your trip was lovely.  @MaybeBabyMustache and @SunnyDays, nice progress!

I also have returned from a vacation trip.  I was treated to most meals, but I did buy a few groceries for my hotel room.  I ate most, left some for my father and his wife, and brought non-perishables home with me such as Everything Bagel cashews and cheese crisps.

Our produce drawer is empty except for a few things that really need to be tossed, and I'll pick up our monthly grocery order this evening.  Have a relaxing weekend, everyone.

[Linea_Norway]

@SquashingDebt, that basil sounds good!  @Linea_Norway, I bet your trip was lovely.  @MaybeBabyMustache and @SunnyDays, nice progress!

I also have returned from a vacation trip.  I was treated to most meals, but I did buy a few groceries for my hotel room.  I ate most, left some for my father and his wife, and brought non-perishables home with me such as Everything Bagel cashews and cheese crisps.

Our produce drawer is empty except for a few things that really need to be tossed, and I'll pick up our monthly grocery order this evening.  Have a relaxing weekend, everyone.

@MountainGal

Ahum... lovely is not the word I would use for this trip. Maybe "challenging" would be a better description. The homemade hiking food part worked well. If you want to know more details, you could read my journal posts 313 and 317 to get an impression.

[draco44]

Still working my way through a bit of pandemic-purchased cans of soup. I feel dumb for not doing this much before, but have realized that if I read the soup's ingredients and add more of whatever (non-salt) spices are already in the can, it can significantly perk things up. Adding extra cumin to a can of Amy's brand yellow lentil soup, for example, made a huge difference.

[Linea_Norway]

Still working my way through a bit of pandemic-purchased cans of soup. I feel dumb for not doing this much before, but have realized that if I read the soup's ingredients and add more of whatever (non-salt) spices are already in the can, it can significantly perk things up. Adding extra cumin to a can of Amy's brand yellow lentil soup, for example, made a huge difference.

This is typically the kind of stuff I eat when car camping. Just a pack of commercial soup, but with some extra vegetables and often fish in it.

[MountainGal]

@SquashingDebt, that basil sounds good!  @Linea_Norway, I bet your trip was lovely.  @MaybeBabyMustache and @SunnyDays, nice progress!

I also have returned from a vacation trip.  I was treated to most meals, but I did buy a few groceries for my hotel room.  I ate most, left some for my father and his wife, and brought non-perishables home with me such as Everything Bagel cashews and cheese crisps.

Our produce drawer is empty except for a few things that really need to be tossed, and I'll pick up our monthly grocery order this evening.  Have a relaxing weekend, everyone.

@MountainGal

Ahum... lovely is not the word I would use for this trip. Maybe "challenging" would be a better description. The homemade hiking food part worked well. If you want to know more details, you could read my journal posts 313 and 317 to get an impression.

Oh, gosh, I just skimmed those entries.  You did indeed have quite the experience!

[MaybeBabyMustache]

Wow, @Linea_Norway - that sounds crazy intense! So glad you made it back safely.

We were out of town for the weekend, where I most certainly did not stick to any type of diet. Crumbl cookies, anyone? (It's a bakery, I'm a huge sucker for frosted sugar cookies. They were amazing. It's possible that I had one with champagne for brunch.)

-Lunch & breakfast out of things from the pantry & freezer, as I hadn't yet been to the grocery store. A freebie protein bar for breakfast, and a breakfast sandwich for lunch + a wrinkled nectarine that I spotted in the back of the fridge.
-Ate the last of a bag of parmesan nut crisp mix snacks that someone left at our house over the 4th of July
-I'm having an Italian chicken sausage (freezer) for dinner tonight, over a salad.
-Said salad will have tons of garden goodies: tomatoes, basil, mint, green pepper, radishes, cucumbers

We have a bunch more zucchini, and so many types of peppers. I need to figure out when to pick each type. I also need to deal with the absolute glut of tomatoes we have on hand from the garden.

[MaybeBabyMustache]

We've made good progress this week. It's been tempting to go out, as the kids are with my parents. But, we have plenty of food, and we ate out last weekend (out of town).
-Finished off the radishes & snap peas
-Used the last of a going bad quickly bagged salad
-Ate all of the chicken sausages (over salads, for lunch)
-Continue to use up a ton of garden tomatoes in salads & with fresh mozzarella as a dinner side

Still need to deal with zucchini & peppers!

[Linea_Norway]

After I returned from my mountain trip, I ate several frozen leftover portions. After that, I bought fresh food again. DH is back and we are leaving on another vacation the day after tomorrow. So now we need to finish the lettuce that I bought, and the small potatoes. And we will need to finish the cold yoghurt soup that I made 2 days ago. In that soup I used some of my frozen wild garlic and fresh lovage from the garden. I should have used fresh mint, but had only dried.
DH is currently making dinner and using a red pepper from our own pepper plant. Tomorrow I will cut all the remaining (green) peppers and freeze them.

[MountainGal]

Hope everyone is well.  @MaybeBabyMustache, I looked up those cookies and they look amazing.  Edible perfection!  :)  @Linea_Norway, I hope this trip goes better for you.

For suppers, I've been pairing locally grown and store bought proteins with produce from the grocery store.  DH's garden has produced only a few tomatoes thus far, but it is still early for our planting zone.

~Sunday's bacon wrapped scallops used the remaining bag of each
~Monday I made the boneless ribs bought last month, which freed up some much needed freezer space.  Leftover ribs went with DH for his lunch the next day, and I put them on top of romaine leaves for my lunch yesterday.
~Tuesday's stir fry used a package of chicken breasts and bag of shirataki noodles, both also bought last month
~Mini caprese salads used the remaining mini mozzarella balls and the two Roma tomatoes
~Long story short, we have 4 different types of maple syrup in the fridge.  So, I'll be focusing on things such as a keto Dutch baby and low carb pancakes over the next several weekends, LOL.

Much to my chagrin, I had to toss portobello mushrooms and an avocado when I returned from vacation last week.  I need to watch that.

[MaybeBabyMustache]

@MountainGal - bacon wrapped scallops sound delicious! And yes, the cookies are amazing. I'll be visiting my sister next week, & they have a shop near her. I may need another cookie. ;-)

I made a smoothie today to use up a bruised peach (from a neighbor's tree), a frozen banana, strawberries (garden), peanut butter & protein powder. I don't make protein balls anymore, so need to find another way to use the protein powder. It was delicious & refreshing on a warm day. It was also incredibly filling. This needs to be a go to lunch.

Tonight we'll have salad (tons of garden items), mini samosas (freezer), salmon (my husband will eat this) & bulgogi chicken (me). That will clean out the fridge, so we can move out to barbecued chicken over the next few days. And, maybe grill steaks this weekend.

[Linea_Norway]

@MountainGal

I also made a "dutch baby" a few days ago. I used a camping aluminium jar with rounded edges for the purpose, as I don't have what you call dutch oven. It worked out very well and didn't stick at all. It popped up many places on the inside.

Language thingy: I am originally Dutch and I think it is really weird that you Americans call a dutch oven for dutch. We Dutch people don't call this pot an oven. We just call it the dutch word for cast iron pot. Therefore dutch baby, is also a weird expression for me, but I think it is called that because it is traditionally made in a cast iron pot/dutch oven.

[habanero]

Dude I know got covid (despite being fully vaxxed). He can't smell or taste anything so he is currently raiding all their cupboards for stuff noone in the family really likes but has been left there. Not the most pleasent way to do it, but it works at least.

[Poundwise]

We let 3 gallons of milk go sour by mistake.  I baked all day, accidentally turned a gallon into curds and whey,  and made the following post... still have a gallon left.
What to do with sour milk

[Dutch Comfort]

We will go on holiday in 3 weeks time. 3 weeks left to empty the freezer (fridge is under control at the moment) and some things from the pantry (overflowing..... hopefully better tomorrow when we will go out with friends and we will all bring food and drinks).
Let's start today:
- pasta (from pantry), bag of tomato sauce (pantry), ground beef (freezer)

Tomorrow (to bring to day out):
- meatballs (more ground beef, but from fridge)
- bacon (from fridge)
- loads of drinks (from fridge/pantry)
- fresh melon (from my kitchen-top, so try to empty that as well)
- crisps (from pantry)
- fresh tomato salad (from fridge)
- candy for the kids (from pantry)

Sunday: not a clue, since I will be out and DH has to take care of the kids....... knowing him, he will make a simple pasta dish or put some burgers on the grill (burgers would be good, since they are in the freezer!).

[Linea_Norway]

We will go on vacation tomorrow. Only camping ourselves tomorrownight, thereafter a week fully served.
There were enough small potatoes for 2 meals. I cooked them now and will make them into a potato salad that we can eat now and tomorrow. I found saucages in the freezer for tonight. And we will have the remaining salad. Tomorrow night improvising on a camping stove. Maybe I will bring the bag of frozen leftover vegetable (pepper, squash and mushroom) along. Should be thawed on arrival. I have a wok in the crate with camping kitchen stuff.

[MountainGal]

@Linea_Norway, I'm not sure why, either, LOL.  I looked it up and there are many explanations.  Here is one:  https://www.chowhound.com/food-news/176549/what-is-the-difference-between-a-dutch-oven-and-cast-iron/

As for my Dutch baby, I make ours in a cast iron skillet.  Our Dutch oven, however, makes great dump cakes while camping.  :)

@Dutch Comfort, that's an impressive list!  Have a wonderful holiday.

@MaybeBabyMustache, I love smoothies, especially in this warm weather.

[Catbert]

@MountainGal

I also made a "dutch baby" a few days ago. I used a camping aluminium jar with rounded edges for the purpose, as I don't have what you call dutch oven. It worked out very well and didn't stick at all. It popped up many places on the inside.

Language thingy: I am originally Dutch and I think it is really weird that you Americans call a dutch oven for dutch. We Dutch people don't call this pot an oven. We just call it the dutch word for cast iron pot. Therefore dutch baby, is also a weird expression for me, but I think it is called that because it is traditionally made in a cast iron pot/dutch oven.

The naming of food products for other countries is interesting since the named country rarely also use that name.  The French don't call them french fries.  I doubt the British call them English Muffins.  Do the Swedish call them Swedish meatballs?  Sadly American cheese was named and even worse eaten by Americans.

[MaybeBabyMustache]

Some weekend progress:
-Continued with the smoothies at lunch to use up fresh & frozen fruit. Love making progress with the freezer bananas. There are so many!
-Made a triple batch of pico de gallo with a bunch of tomatoes & jalapenos (garden)
-Made a triple batch of pickled peppers, using up all of the garden variety. As expected the Serranos are too hot, even after pickling. I'll need to figure out something else to do with them, because we have at least 100.
-Ate leftover Greek food for lunch yesterday
-Had a pita (Greek leftover) to go with my smoothie today
-Using up tons of garden items in our salads & any which way we can
-Made coleslaw to use up the last of a head of green cabbage. Also used up some carrots that have been lingering in the fridge for quite a while.

Tonight we will have steak & zucchini (so. much. zucchini.)

[Dutch Comfort]

More progress:
We're still munching on leftovers from our outing of Saturday. Grocery shopping will not happen till Wednesday for some fresh veggies, but otherwise, I still think we're OK to live on the items still in the house.
Yesterday, my DH made the kids a few pizza's from the freezer, while he took the leftover meatballs and some bread/salad
Today I brought my lunch from home (leftover bread, sausage, tomatoes) and dinner will be baked potatoes, some meat from the freezer and some canned veggies from the pantry.
Tomorrow, my son will make a pasta dish and a salad on the side.
So I think I can still manage without any groceries till Wednesday.
Breakfast and lunch items are still OK. We always have some noodles on hand and some bread/cheese/sausage, so this should work.

Only 18 days to go till we go camping and the freezer should be pretty empty by then (I need to work on the icecream inventory.......)

[PMG]

My partner very briefly decided he should try going gluten free to see if it reduced some of his gut issues. Then he decided that he should just cut back on refined wheats and up his fiber.... meanwhile I had tried to be a super supportive partner and bought several kinds of gluten free flours and such... I tend to do a lot of baking and I was suffering from not having short cake with the strawberries this spring and such because I was trying to be supportive of him... so I bought up all the ingredients and was prepping myself to learn a new style of baking... but now he says he's good to go....  haha! I've created my own challenge.

It really isn't a big issue, except I keep shuffling the ingredients around the cupboard. I haven't opened them yet so may just leave them sealed until fall when I naturally do more baking.  I just thought this thread would find it amusing.

[MountainGal]

@MaybeBabyMustache, do you do anything to the bananas prior to freezing them?

@Dutch Comfort, great job!

@PMG, since they are sealed, can you give them away to a local food bank or on an online buy nothing group?  That is, if you don't want to fuss with them come fall.  :)

Last week DH brought home a bag of locally grown peaches, so this weekend:
~Made a slow cooker crumble
~The neighbor kiddo had one
~Sliced some into overnight oats for DH
~Sautéed some and served them over locally raised pork chops
~The rest went into the freezer

We're doing a good job at incorporating the locally raised pork and beef into meals.  And, DH scored a deep freezer, so we'll have more onsite storage for future bulk purchases.

[MaybeBabyMustache]

@MountainGal - I peel them & store them in a freezer bag. For smoothies, I put them in the microwave for 30 seconds, just to make it easier on the blender. For banana bread & the like, I leave in the fridge to defrost overnight. Your peaches sound wonderful! Yum. A neighbor brought us over a few from her tree, and they were fabulous.

[Dutch Comfort]

Today's breakfast was leftovers again (I still had some bread left from Saturday, which needed to go.... French toast anyone????). Lunch will be banana-pancakes, since I discovered two brown bananas between my other fruits.
Our 11yo will make us dinner tonight (pasta dish with a salad) and I just ordered groceries to be delivered on Wednesday after discussing the rest of the week's dinner menu with the kids:

Today: pasta with salad
Wednesday: baked potatoes, steamed broccoli and some meat from the freezer
Thursday: spinach from the freezer with mashed potatoes and eggs as a casserole
Friday: 13yo will make us a stir-fry noodle dish with veggies and chicken (chicken from freezer and noodles from pantry)
Saturday: I think it will be leftovers (I still have some soup in the freezer) and/or burgers from the freezer

Breakfast and lunches will be leftovers and/or bread from freezer/noodles from pantry.
And snacks....... we will need to finish the icecream, the protein bars and some frozen banana bread to empty the freezer...... I do see a nice challenge here!

[MountainGal]

Thank you for the banana info, @MaybeBabyMustache.

Ah, when your DH says to use up the store bought cherry tomatoes because many are ready to harvest from his garden.  Such a problem to have!  :D  So, we had cherry tomatoes on our Wednesday night salads, I have more for my lunch salad today, and there are just a few remaining.  Also:

~Ate the rest of the kalamata and green olives as snacks and in salads.
~Ate the rest of the baby spinach in salads and sautéed for suppers.  Bought more yesterday morning.
~Odds and ends from the office mini fridge have been finished including blueberries, mozzarella balls, boiled eggs, and the aforementioned green olives.
~I'm using up the rest of the bottled dressings before buying more.  The last to go is a spicy ranch, which I'll dilute with mayo if necessary.
~For ideas, I researched maple syrup recipes to use the abundance of syrup I mentioned in a prior post.  In the next few days I'll make:  Candied bacon, maple bacon biscuits, maple balsamic vinaigrette, and salmon with a maple glaze.  Yum!

[Catbert]

MaybeBaby - With regard to the too hot peppers could you:  dehydrate and then grind to create your own crushed red pepper substitute? Slit open and add one (or two) to a pot of beans and remove before serving?  Use a blender with a bit of oil or vinegar to create a paste to keep in a jar in the refrigerator for future use?   

Can you tell I like growing really hot peppers bc they are pretty but, well, really hot.

[SAfAmBrit]

I am really bad at finishing everything in the house but I have bright ideas and do not follow up and make them - I am vegan and I look at recipes - get fired up at the shop - come home - Yup in the cupboard -  trust me my pantry is not empty! I may allow myself to buy balsamic vinager, bell peppers, onions and olive oil - but that is it - other than that I am forcing myself to figure it out. I always start making excuses and only make quick meals - eg macaroni with jar sauce during the week - so I am making something I can freeze to get me through the busy week days. I am on my own so the challenge is 0 waste / 0 food purchase until next Sunday.

So today - lentil lasagne with Zucchini - should cover 4 days
Tomorrow - Spanish chickpea rice stew should be 4 days and freezes.

This will complete:

Dried Chickpeas
Lasagne sheets

For snack I have made fruit scones.

[MaybeBabyMustache]

@MountainGal - I can be right over to help with that candied bacon & maple bacon biscuits!

@Catbert - thanks for the suggestions. I find that pickling is typically a great solution, but I definitely need to separate the serranos from the other peppers/chiles. They are in a league of their own. ;-)

Things we've done lately:
-Continued to eat a ton out of our garden (tomatoes, green peppers, orange peppers, kale, mint, chives, basil - Greek & sweet, cucumbers, zucchini).
-Got our first handful of blueberries, that the birds left for us
-Drinking smoothies for lunch, using up frozen bananas, berries & protein powder. I stopped making protein balls for awhile (the raw oatmeal hurts my stomach), so it's nice to have another use for the protein powder. But, the big winner by far is making my way through a ton of bananas in the freezer. They go to the freezer when overly ripe, and I always have great intentions, but they really tend to linger.
-Used up 4 grilled hot dogs from the freezer for dinner last night. Made one into a hot dog "sandwich", using leftover hamburger bun. One teen was a big fan. The other was unimpressed. Also used a spicy mayo that my husband had made for burger night on Sunday.
-Made a peach, basil, mozzarella salad to go with dinner last night. We are inundated with basil, and my husband bought three Costco sized containers of fresh mozzarella when they were on sale a few weeks ago. They were crazy cheap, but one expires soon, so needs to be used up. I think tonight we'll have the other half of the container with garden tomatoes.
-Made coleslaw for dinner last night, using the last of the Keto coleslaw dressing I'd made. I do still have some shredded cabbage & carrots, so I'll plan to add that to the salad tonight.

As for the rest of the week (and, I'm going with largely no meal planning, due to being out of town this weekend):
-Burgers & caprese tonight
-Tomorrow will be baked chicken for the kids (mine on salad), husband with salmon
-Friday - wings + zucchini fritters. Blissfully, no soccer practice, so I'll have time to make zucchini fritters

[Dutch Comfort]

One week to go before holiday. The fridge is in good shape, not that much of fresh items that need to be finished before we go. But the freezer is still a mess......
The cupboard is getting some clean spaces, so that is definitely a win.

Today:
- pasta (cupboard), jar of pasta sauce (cupboard), ground beef (freezer), cucumber / any leftover salad (fridge)

Tomorrow:
- dinner: veggies (fridge), fries (freezer), some meat (freezer)
- lunch: blinis (fridge)
- breakfast: crackers (cupboard), cheese (fridge), cereal (cupboard)

Saturday:
- frozen pizza (freezer)
- bread rolls (cupboard), cheese (fridge)

Sunday:
- hopefully a BBQ with relatives, which will help me get some meat from the freezer. But the weather is not too good.....

Next week we will all be at home, so I will do no meal planning, but see what needs to be finished before our holiday and grocery shop only the additional items needed.

[MountainGal]

Haha, @MaybeBabyMustache!  I made the bacon, but still do need help with the biscuits.  :)  The maple dressing is delicious!  I made it with strawberry vinaigrette purchased on holiday last month.

Everyone is doing an excellent job at using things up and with meal planning!

Last weekend when I was poking around the bottom freezer drawer looking for something in particular, I noticed there were some funky, random items which need to be addressed:

1. small baggie of breadcrumbs
2. small baggie each of lime and lemon juiced, then frozen and released from silicone molds a few months ago
3. a baggie consisting of 5 homemade pumpkin chocolate chip cookies made when?
4. a baggie consisting of leftover homemade chocolate crinkle cookies from Christmas
5. etc.

I pulled out the pumpkin cookies for DH's lunches this week.  I'll make an effort to figure out what to do with the juice and breadcrumbs, and I nibble on the crinkle cookies every now and then.  :)  Yesterday I ate the remaining 1/3 pint of coconut milk based "ice cream" drizzled with a bit of syrup.  For suppers lately we've cooked up a pound each locally raised ground beef and pork, some locally raised turkey breast, shrimp, pork chops, 3 lbs chicken breasts, and the pork roast mentioned below.

Our produce drawer has been active.  Sunday I served riced cauliflower, zucchini, and yellow squash with pork roast.  Last night I cut up a head of cauliflower and put half in DH's drawer for his lunches, and the other I steamed and mashed for supper.  Yum!  Tonight I'll make riced broccoli slaw for tonight and tomorrow night's salmon and Baja fish taco suppers respectfully.  Tonight I'll sauté the rest of the baby spinach to serve under the salmon and serve it with the remaining 1/2 avocado.

The above leaves just a few sad limes remaining in the drawer.  Off to the store I go!