This is a challenge where I only eat at home for 7 days, using up as much of the food in kitchen as possible to cut back on food waste and save money. For more details, check out the intro post or days one, two, three, four or five.
Intro thoughts:
So this was Election Day. I thought beforehand it would be hard to not indulge in restaurant food, but the atmosphere was so tense that eating out or ordering in just seemed like a bad idea regardless.
Weirdest things I found in my kitchen on day 6:
So this is almost more about the things I didn’t find. I have a lot of non-wheat flours – oat, two kinds of rice, sunflower – and just one wheat flour – whole wheat pastry. Likewise, I have tons of fake sugar (noted day 2), confectionary sugar and a small amount of turbinado sugar (a very unprocessed version of brown sugar).
In other words, I have either used up previously the ‘normal’ flours and sweeteners or use these items so rarely as to not have purchased them.
Best things I found in my kitchen on day 6:
Frozen pie crust! A great find.
Prep:
Today was a good one, food making wise.
I made delicious chicken pot pie (picture below) with the frozen pie crust I found, the dark meat chicken I found day 3, frozen stock, flour and spices. I didn’t have the carrots, frozen peas or frozen corn the recipe called for, so I substituted radish, cooked cauliflower and corn relish, respectively. It turned out so good. This is really an underrated dish, and definitely one originally designed to use up leftovers.
I really wanted some sort of sweet / baked good to eat. I didn’t have any chocolate, and my baking options were limited, as I almost never bake. But I did have the ingredients for blueberry cake donuts, minus the donut pan. So I made the donuts in a muffin tin with tin foil centers to make the hole. It didn’t work super well, but the result was still yummy.
Food log:
Coffee from my cold brew maker
The half bagel I found yesterday with cream cheese and a fried egg
Matzah ball soup with the balls I made earlier in the week, frozen stock and an egg
Collard greens with Korean hot sauce
Pot pie!!!
Too many donuts
Follow the progress with day 7