This month, we’re shopping our kitchen in order to use up what we have so we can save money and clear kitchen clutter.
Here we go with Day 10 of the Pantry Challenge!
Want to save this post?
Enter your email below and get it sent straight to your inbox. Plus, I’ll send you budget recipes and money-saving tips every week!
Even though we’re in a squishy month, not back into routine until spring semester starts at the end of January, it felt good to get back to my Friday ritual, my Rest Day Sabbath Prep.
I got the kitchen and living spaces back to zero and worked on food prep for the weekend. Feels good!
What We Ate
Breakfast – My friend Michele bought me eggs at Fresno prices last week (They are $8 a dozen at my local Ralphs) so we’re still enjoying eggs and toast today.
Lunch – Leftovers needed eating: vegetable soup, mashed potatoes, chicken legs, gravy.
Dinner – Fridays are pizza night and we had a couple of the kids’ friends over. I made six pizzas and a big salad and batch of Homemade Buttermilk Ranch Dip.
How did Day 10 go for you?
JulieT from MN
B-I had a grapefruit, a piece of toast with strawberry jam and coffee. Hubby had cinnamon toast and OJ
L-beef, vegetable barley soup made form a jar of beef, a jar of beef broth, potatoes from the garden, frozen mixed veggies, and barley. There will be L/O for tomorrow. I also pulled 4 rolls from the freezer and heated those up.
D-Hubby had the 2 L/O rolls from lunch and popcorn. I was out with a friend and had pow chicken pasta. So yummy! L/O were brought home.
Tasty
Tuesday January 10th
B – the usual mix of fruit, yogurt and granola with a muffin
L – I was out with friends, hubby had a banana and ?.?
S – pea and ham soup from the freezer with the lo biscuits from yesterday
Stephanie M.
Tuesday, January 9, 2023
B – I had a bagel and a yogurt
L – Paul had a turkey sandwich using the last of his bagels and the last of the turkey
D – whole wheat pancakes and turkey sausage. The pancake recipe pie is Jessica’s and it makes a lot so now we have quite a few in the freezer.
JulieT
B: homemade blueberry muffins from the freezer with coffee and juice
L: leftovers. I had the last of Swedish meat balls/ mashed potatoes. Hubby had the last of wild rice soup
D: popcorn
Pat
I made taquitos for dinner with chips and salsa plus fruit.
Snacks were a couple of cookies and granola bars
Lynn from NC Outer Banks
1/10/22
B: skipped except for coffee, DH: eggs, sausage, grits
L: Brunswick stew, DH: ham sandwich and stew
D: LO bbq cheddar chicken, green beans, LO cauli, Waldorf salad
Laurie in TX
B – I had an English muffin, jam and almonds, hubs had a granola bar
L – lunch out at Whataburger
D- hubs had pizza at his cousins while watching the football game. I had l/o white chicken chili, guacamole and chips
We made our first Costco run since moving. We needed staple items and household/cleaning items. Starting up a household again is expensive!
Deborah
B – French toast
L- Tyson frozen chicken tenders with sides of cooked cabbage and carrot sticks/ranch dressing
D – frezezer egg rolls and fried rice (trying to use up that $5 after Christmas sale ham – any suggestions – only 2 of us and I’m running out of ideas ????)
S – Cherrio(leftover from Christmas Chex mix) peanut butter bars
Lily R.
B: I dug out some frozen pumpkin brioche from Trader Joe’s and made french toast. I made oatmilk lattes to go with.
L: I made chirashi with some super fresh yellowtail and tuna I found at my local Asian market.
D: Lunch today was kind of late so I’m thinking big salads with roasted walnuts, cranberries, avocado and some shrimp I have left from yesterday’s dinner.
I need to find some time to catch up on the older posts! I’m off to dig some more stuff out of the freezer and see what treasures I find…
Kathy in Denmark
Day 10:
B: The usual – Oats and milk for DH, oatmeal for DD1, rye porridge for DD2 and a roll and coffee for me after taking the kids to school and grocery shopping
L: DH ate at work, packed lunch for the girls, rye bread for me
D: Spaghetti and marinara with parmesan cheese
I am still shopping for the groceries we usually need like milk, produce and eggs. I am being very mindful of what I buy and how much, so I am still happy with how things are going.
DD2 had her swimming class tonight, so we always have something easy which DH can whip up while she and I are away. Dinner has to be on the table as soon as we walk in the door, since swimming makes you hungry and no one wants a hangry almost seven year old around lol
Heather M
Wait, is she already 7?? Wow, time is flying.
Kathy in Denmark
Yep, February 4th!
She’s a real little lady 🙂
Jen in Ohio
B: DS had a frozen breakfast sandwich and pomegranate (back to school means real breakfasts for him lol)
L: kids either took lunch or ate at school, we had miscellaneous leftovers
after school – 1st day back / Mom needs extra caffeine: Starbucks frappucinos (w/ coffee for me, w/out for DS)
D: baked chicken w/ mushrooms and mozzarella, barley pilaf, salad
The barley pilaf was new to me, and inspired by an open bag of barley and the pantry challenge. I really liked it! Not sure if the kids loved it, but they ate without complaint so I’m considering it a PC win. (Also diced up the last couple celery stalks and carrot sticks that were getting wilty, and tossed those in too.)
Kimberly
B-the usual cereal
L- kids ate at school, hubby got ChickfilA with a work group, I stuck with the challenge eating soup, salad, and cornbread at home
D-beef enchiladas with avocado; for dessert, we discovered some long lost Halloween candies that should last us a few weeks, lol
Kathryn M
Breakfast: cereal
Lunch I had a frozen meal – marie callender ( a chicken pesto pasta bowl). DH took his street tacos to work.
Dinner: beef soup,. I had 1/2 a package of bear creek vegetable beef mix to use up. I added some of the street taco beef to it and it added a nice little flavor kick to it. I still have 2 servings leftover for later.
Snacks: I finished up some older trail mix that had been lingering and a few brownies.
lisa s
B: coffee and special K cereal
L: Tuna, apple, tomatoes, cucumbers, mini kind bar
D: had mushrooms which were in the now or never stage, so moved up beef stroganoff night, which I tried making a little different, cooking the noodles directly in the sauce, and I like how it turned out. Kroger still out of peas, so we had it with mixed veggies.
Heather M
January 10 was a good day… I finally made this recipe I found in December and have really wanted to try. And it was soooooo good! I also got some things cleaned up and out of the house and got back to my workout routine finally, which hasn’t happened since the kids came home before christmas. It’s also pretty darn cold right now, but makes it easier to stay in and cook.
B: L had some peanuts; I skipped
L: toasted turkey and pepperjack cheese sandwiches (L had a thick whole one, I had one open-faced)l; he also had an apple and I had carrots, celery, and cucumber with some light dip
D: Spicy Salmon Roll Bowls- just delicious! I followed the recipe pretty closely except I opted to swap out the rice for quinoa and it worked beautifully.
https://healthyishfoods.com/spicy-salmon-roll-bowls/
I made extra quinoa and after dinner made up a favorite lunch I created early in the pandemic – it’s quinoa, fancy italian oil packed tuna, not drained (I buy this at Costco and use it not for sandwiches but for main dish meals), chick peas, celery, red onion, red wine vinegar, and Penzeys Ruth Ann’s Muskego Ave Chicken and Fish seasoning (this stuff is amazing, and Idk if I could replicate its balance on my own). It should be good for at least 4 servings. I also chopped the pineapple.
Maureen
After I fed everyone else lunch on Sunday, hubby made a big pot of french onion soup in the middle of the afternoon. So, there’s at least 7 servings in the fridge (some will be moved to the freezer) and he wasn’t very hungry for dinner. I took the opportunity to use up the Brioche loaf and made french toast for dinner.
We’ve eaten so many leftovers in the last week that there are only a few things left. Monday night we were all going in different directions, so I sent 2 kids to Subway as a treat and the rest of us had leftovers and snacks as they fit our schedules.
We’ve finished up a couple of open bags of crackers/chips from the pantry but plenty more of those to go. It drives me crazy that people open up something new before even looking to see what’s already there…we end up with SO many open bags/boxes. I haven’t figured out a way to prevent this yet. I may only buy a couple of snacks each week and not buy more until they are completely gone. I think the family would revolt, but it might get their attention.
I also made mini muffins using up the last of the ricotta from lasagne. I’m happy with our progress, but it’s slow going. College son is home taking classes this semester, though, so it should go a little faster with him home. And it really helps reading everyone else’s comments.
Heather M
Yeah the open snacks thing is not fun and hard to manage. I will say that it’s easier when the kids aren’t home, lol. But it’s also too quiet. One thought I’m having right now is maybe choose a day when everyone is mostly home and pull out all the open packages, put them on the table or counter, and put a sign on the pantry/cupboard stating that they can only eat those open things that day? And maybe make that a once a week kind of thing or something, until the issue improves, if it every does, lol. The onion soup sounds delicious. Freezing some would definitely make for a few easy lunches in the future. 🙂
Maureen
I am definitely going to try this. I do that with fruit and veg when I have things I want gone (prep it and leave it out on the counter for snacking throughout the day), but I haven’t tried it with the chips/crackers. I might try planning a weekend lunch around those things each week, too. AND hopefully, if I significantly reduce the regular stock on hand of new snack items, then they won’t have as many options.
Stephanie M.
Hi Maureen.
When I had kids still living home, I would just hide things. I had crackers, cookies, etc in the back of my closet in my bedroom. They never found them and they never looked because I hid them as soon as I bought them so they didn’t even know we had them. I did that until they moved out because otherwise it never stopped.
Maureen
I tried that once, but didn’t hide my stash very well and they found it. Time to try again…I just went and filled a box with all the “good” unopened stuff and hid it. I’ll ration it out as we go along and see how that works. Maybe they’ll even resort to searching the fridge for healthier options when they can’t always find their favorite chips.
Tasty
B – hubby made himself a bowl of oatmeal, I had an apple, a yogurt and a slice of toast with lemon curd ( that emptied a jar from the fridge!)
l – an old childhood favourite of mine – beans on toast
S – beef stew and sprouts (from the freezer) with buns also from the freezer. The last of a pack of Christmas shortbread with our coffee.
The beef came from the freezer. It was enough for 3 meals for us so altho I took a few things out of the freezer, 2 containers of beef stew went back in.
Kathy in Denmark
I bet those containers of beef stew will come in handy someday!
Tasty
Don’t get me wrong – I love having home made meals in the freezer for days when I don’t want to cook for whatever reason but it will take a long time to get some real empty space in the freezers.
Kathy in Denmark
I get it – I have the same problem especially with meat, since DH is vegetarian.
I love things like beef stew, but my kids aren’t keen and DH obviously doesn’t eat it, so I rarely have it. So I am a little jealous that you have some ready to eat in your freezer 😉
Sandi
It was a carb-laden day!
B – I had a coffee and then unintentionally skipped eating. He had cereal.
L – turkey sliders using turkey thawed from freezer, chips, veggie sticks
D – I cooked the ground beef with the onions, peppers, and garlic. Then I split it to use some for dinner and some saved for the upcoming pot of chili. I boiled the spinach ravioli from the freezer and used that to make a faux lasagna by layering it with sauce. beef mixture, and shredded cheese. I was in the mood for lasagna but did not have any pre-made or ingredients/time to make one so that worked perfectly plus used up the bag of ravioli. I used a baguette from freezer and would have had a salad too but have to buy some first.
S – While the oven was on, I baked some very old cookie dough for dessert. there are still 12 cookie dough pieces left and based on how they cooked up, I need to use them quickly.
Heather M
What a great idea to make the ravioli lasagna!
Lynn from NC Outer Banks
Hi Sandi. I keep a bag of frozen ravioli in the freezer for a quick “lasagna” meal as well. But I make it even quicker by just layering the sauce with/without meat, ravioli and cheeses on top. I don’t cook the frozen ravioli, I just put the dish in the microwave and microwave it until the ravioli is done and the cheese is melted. Before, when I tried boiling the ravioli the filling would sometimes seep into the water. I read where a blogger did it this way (cooking the ravioli from frozen) and I’ve never looked back. You could bake in the oven as well, but the microwave makes it really fast-in minutes! It may not be an exact lasagna, but it works for us with fewer steps, time and energy. You could always bake the dish a few minutes if you wanted to brown the cheese on top. This is one of the fastest meals I can get on the table when time is short or we are getting home late and are hungry! I will eventually be using the bag of ravioli I have in the freezer for one of my pantry challenge meals in just this way!
Danielle L Zecher
Breakfast: I had a white chocolate mocha from Starbucks. I’m not sure what hubby had.
Lunch: We both had leftover pizza from Sunday. We don’t agree at all on pizza toppings, so ordering pizza means we eat it for at least three meals.
Dinner: This recipe: https://www.budgetbytes.com/garlic-noodles-with-beef-and-broccoli/
I substituted spinach for the broccoli b/c I’m not a big broccoli fan and I had two bags of fresh baby spinach in the freezer. I had just tossed the two bags (the fresh ones) in a 2 gallon freezer bag, so that was taking up a decent amount of space in the freezer. It didn’t use that much from the freezer, but it looks like it did, so I’m kind of happy about that.
I REALLY need to do some kind of breakfast prep tonight so we can stop with the drive-thru in the mornings.
Heather M
Good thing leftover pizza is deelish! Love your spinach substitution. It really can go in so many many dishes. And I bet seeing a little space in the freezer is so satisfying. Good luck figuring out some breakfast options. I kind of need to do the same, too, but we aren’t leaving our house much right now(wfh, etc right now), so we just keep scrounging.
Jennifer
My hubby and I were off work yesterday because I had a back injection procedure – it was very tempting to go out to lunch after – or breakfast before, or just anything because it was just the 2 of us. In the end we held strong and just hit Starbucks after my procedure.
B – I had leftover muffins, daughter had cereal, hubby made eggs, son cooked a breakfast burrito left from when I did a grocery pick up of very easy items because 3 in my house had covid over break. He also ate a muffin and a yogurt.
S – I got a hot tea and split a brownie with hubby at Starbucks
L – I made a fried egg sandwich with bacon, cheese and egg on a bagel. Hubby had a leftover stuffed pepper, as did daughter (I found the remants in her room). Ds packed for work.
D – homemade pizza using up some already ground sausage in the fridge, a block of mozzerella and the last of a jar of home canned pizza sauce in the fridge. 1/2 the pizza got topped with chopped onions and olives. Veggies were the last fresh pepper I have and baby carrots with hummus.
Hot tea before bed for all.
Heather M
Great job only springing for Starbucks! Sounds like you ate well anyway. Isn’t a bacon egg and cheese bagel amazing? They’re just so good. Hope the back procedure does what it’s supposed for you. 🙂
Stephanie M.
January 10
B – Paul had cereal. I had a yogurt parfait.
L – Paul had two empanadas and leftover wild rice. (I made 8 empanadas the other day for future lunches and put in the freezer). I had a salad with grilled chicken.
D – leftover pot roast, mashed potatoes and peas.