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 4 of the Pantry Challenge, a work day for me, my husband and the college boys, a vacation day for our three homeschooled kids.
One of my Pantry Challenge morning routines is to check the fridge. When I do that on a regular basis, I’m more mindful of what I need to use up or freeze.
Today was no exception. I put the Soupercubes of Mulligatawny into the freezer first thing. Then I was able to verify breakfast, lunch, and dinner plans for the fam. I pulled a few things from the freezer or garage fridge and made mental notes for the day.
It made for a remarkably easy day in the kitchen. I know that I’m due for some more prep today, but I was okay with working in other spaces today instead, namely my desk.
What We Ate
Breakfast – I had a fried egg on avocado toast on Sourdough Rye Bread. I also pulled a bag of Lemon Poppy Seed Muffins from the freezer and they were amazing reheated in the air fryer. Kids had muffins and fried eggs.
Air Fryer Experiment: Our toaster oven (purchased fall 2020) died in fall 2021. The manufacturer replaced the unit, but while we were waiting, I moved our air fryer to its spot on the counter. It has a smaller footprint and does a lot of what I used the toaster oven for: reheats pizza like a champ, bakes rolls and biscuits, and makes great toast. I will see how long before we think we really need the toaster oven, else I will give it away as a gift or donation.
Lunch – The CBs had packed their lunches; Bryan has a bag of Bean and Beef Burritos in the work freezer. The home kids had sandwiches: salami, BLT, and egg salad. I had the last portion of Mulligatawny.
Dinner – Tuesdays are date night, so Bryan and I went out for pizza. The five kids made ramen with fancy toppings.
What I Prepped
I didn’t do much prep work today, but I am due for some time in the kitchen tomorrow. Things I need to do:
- inventory the freezers
- prep veggie dippers
- cook quinoa
- make Easy Quinoa Egg Bites
- adjust the week’s meal plan based on what needs using
How did Day 4 go for you?
Cindy
Day 4
Breakfast: DH had his usual of oj and cereal, I had a protein shake at work
Lunch: hubby had a root canal 🙁 came home and made a smoothie, for me it was a crazy day at work, hardly left my desk so it’s a good thing I take a lunch everyday – snacked on veges & dip, cheese / crackers + a yogurt and Mandarin orange
Dinner: hubby scored a whole pork loin @ Costco right after Thanksgiving – cut up and portioned out we got 14 meals for $6.00!
Baked marmalade pork loin chop, added green pepper and onion chunks the last 15 minutes served over jasmine rice – so tasty and everthing from the freezer/fridge or pantry.
Heather M
January 4:
Quiet, cold, covered in snow day here, so we stayed in. I saw on social media that Jan 4 was National Spaghetti Day (lol), so that made dinner plans easy. There’s always stuff for some kind of pasta in the cupboards and freezer. We desperately need fresh produce, so I’ll head out to grab a few things after I type this up. And will stick to only fresh produce (based on need and what’s on sale) and the few other things we need.
B: the guys slept in, again-enjoying those last days of it; I had another orange roll from the neighbors
L: Son finished off the leftover pizza we brought back from NY; L finished off the leftover donuts we brought back from NY and had peanuts; I had a leftover GF bagel we had here for our daughter while she was in town, with cream cheese and everything bagel seasoning, and a pear
D: found a 10 oz package of ground beef in the freezer, chopped up an onion & the yellow bell pepper and shredded a few carrots to cook up and added half a jar of Rao’s marinara, along with some extra seasoning. We had it over spaghetti from the cupboard. I used the last head of artisan romaine and we had the most basic caesar salad- just the lettuce and caesar dressing. We don’t even have parmesan (highly unusual and I will be buying some since it’s so useful).
Laurie in TX
January 5
B- I had peanut butter on toast , hubs had cereal
L – I ate the last slice of New Year day pizza, carrots and a banana
D – we made tacos. We had bought everything for New Year eve but we’re too sick to have company. I cooked the 3+ lbs of ground beef and will freeze some for taco soup later in the month. I’ll make a chicken enchilada casserole with the extra package of corn tortillas we have.
Lara
B – I had a (previously) hard-boiled egg and slice of rye toast. Hub had some oatmeal bake he’d made a couple of days ago.
L – Plate of sliced carrots, celery, English cuke dipped in the tail-end of a bottle of blue cheese dressing (yum)
D – Finished up the NY ham w/ham sammies & chips. Last 2 choc chip cookies, we split for dessert.
Kelly
I made shredded beef in the IP for BBQ sandwiches yesterday and used hoagie rolls we already had instead of buying hamburger buns.
Today I used up leftover cranberry sauce to make my cranberry orange bread recipe that calls for fresh cranberries and it worked wonderfully!
Sarah B.
Yesterday, we had pumpkin-spice flavored pancakes I found in the freezer from an impulse buy of my husband’s. 😉 I’m not a huge pumpkin spice fan, but they weren’t bad and my daughter and husband loved them. We had some grapes to eat with them for breakfast. Lunch was turkey and cheese sandwiches with Miracle Whip that is nearing its expiration date with potato chips and peach fruit cups from my pantry.
Marci
oh gosh…. im a few days behind! I did my inventory, cleaned out expired food (arg! it was quite a bit). I went overboard with covid and purchased too much food. This year my goal is to balance our monthly budget with convenience, the cost of 4 new puppies and major personal development (for my own well-being)- while yep working more than a full-time job. I have 2 teens and a college student- good news- they all like to cook, bad news- they all like to cook! We compete for the kitchen and ingredients. COVID further skyrocketed our prices here in Hawaii- beef ($6-$16/lb), Chicken/Pork ($3-$8/lb), don?t get me started on seafood, dairy and produce.
Yesterday we ate leftovers for breakfast and lunch. We did a BBQ of random meats we had in the freezer- pork, burgers, sausage and veggie patties.
Laurie in TX
I have very low brain bandwidth right now with this crud clogging it. Breakfast was cereal for both. Lunch? Don’t remember. Dinner, I had l/o white chicken chili and hubs had ham and eggs. Since we’ve both been sick there are days where we only eat twice a day depending on what time we got up. One advantage of being sick is we give ourselves lots of grace to just relax and concentrate on getting well. We binge watched Yellowstone. Now that we’re done, we need to find something else. Suggestions anyone?
Danielle L Zecher
Breakfast: I had a granola bar from my stash at work. I’m not sure what hubby had. He was off, so may have just slept in.
Lunch: I had leftover vegetable/paneer curry. Hubby had leftover cheddar vegetable soup.
Dinner: Leftover cheddar vegetable soup and mini cheesecakes with fresh strawberries.
Maureen
My son went out for lunch, the girls packed for school, and hubby and I had leftovers. My dinner meal plan got shelved when hubby made a loaf of homemade bread late in the afternoon and everyone dug in. 3 of us had evening activities/meetings, so everyone just figured out their own dinner when they were ready…leftovers, eggs and toast, and mac-n-cheese were had, not sure what else. I also ran to the store for milk and produce. I stuck to my list, so we’re in good shape. The leftovers are dwindling, so I’ll be thoroughly cleaning out the fridge by the end of the week. It’s due to be completely wiped down. I’ll need to dig around in the freezer and do a bit more planning in the next day or two, too.
Stephanie M.
Tuesday, January 4, 2022
B – Paul had apple/cinnamon coffee cake and yogurt. I had a yogurt parfait.
L – we both had turkey meat loaf sandwiches and apples.
D – leftover hamburger tortellini soup.
I’m already seeing progress in my freezer and this time I took pictures of it at the start of the challenge so I can compare it at the end.
Maureen
Taking a picture was a great idea! I think I’ll need to take a picture once I get my fridge/freezers cleaned out to remind me not to let them get so out of hand again.
Stephanie M.
I thought it would encourage me to keep this up after the challenge is over and get me into better habits. I live within 5 minutes of my grocery store and ten minutes of another so I don’t know why my freezers are always so full. I just know they shouldn’t be.
CarolSue from Virginia
I am participating in the challenge this month, just a little differently. My husband has been off work since early November (planned time off) and has been hunting and filling our freezers with deer and bear. We will be butchering a hog this weekend and will add that to our freezer. We have been eating out of our pantry for several months and cutting back on grocery shopping, and I will definitely continue that. My main goal for this year is to really crack down on food waste and needless trips to the store so I am using items in the pantry, fridge, and freezer before they spoil. That said, I used leftover roasted chicken and various veggies for chicken noodle soup on Monday for lunch and dinner and used frozen homemade chicken broth in that.
Day 4:
B: Scrambled eggs and toasted homemade whole wheat bread that is getting pretty dry.
L: My daughter packed leftover soup, my hubby ate the last leftover burger from Saturday night, and I had cucumbers and hummus from the fridge.
D: Pulled catfish from the freezer that we fixed for a meal in December and froze the leftovers to avoid wasting them. I just thawed it and crisped it up in the oven and served it with baked potatoes and tossed salad.
Food Prep: started beef broth in the slow cooker for vegetable beef soup this weekend to serve while we are processing our hog.
Tasty
Not a very exciting eating day here.
B – cereal for hubby, rhubarb, yogurt and a muffin for me.
L – fruit, cheese and crackers
S – the last of the tourtiere with a salad. Christmas cake with coffee.
There’s still quite a lot of Christmas goodies around and we will go through them all, but not as quickly as we used to:.
Heather M
We also have piles of christmas treats hanging around. All the candy/chocolate will last, so hopefully we don’t overdo it this month, and slowly eat it up. 🙂
Jennifer
Quick and easy day for us.
B – finished up the homemade quick bread with fruit
L – I took randomness from the fridge – diced sweet potatoes, 1/2 grapefruit, yogurt, and almonds, Dh was back to work and he usually takes leftovers or soup – I’m not sure which. Daughter – ??
D – Dh and I split a frozen pizza and I made salad. I needed to leave early for my daughter’s gymnastics meet so I needed an easy button meal.
Plus the pizza was taking up a lot of space and I am expecting 3 hogs from the boys hog hunt tonight. I will play rearrange the freezers after work today.
Kathy in Denmark
Day 4
B: Oats and milk for DH, rolls and milk or coffee for the girls and me
L: DH eats at work, rye bread with hardboiled egg or mackerel in a tomato sauce plus cut up cucumber and bell pepper for the girls and me
S: An ice cream from the freezer for the girls after testing (hey, I am using things up in my freezer lol)
D: Vegetarian lasagna with mixed salad and rolls
Today was much better than yesterday regarding distance learning, so that was a big plus! The girls go back to school tomorrow, hence the tests. My youngest asked if they could have some ice cream and I said yes, but after we get home 🙂
They had already eaten an entire cucumber and a bell pepper between them, so they definitely got their veggies!
I had pulled some fresh lasagna sheets from the freezer which I wanted to use up, so I made a quick lentil bolognaise and a béchamel sauce with vegetable stock and milk. Topped with grated mozzarella and in the oven. It made two lasagnas, so one is in the fridge for later in the week.
I didn’t have any baguette or ciabata, but I did have some rolls, so I just heated them up. The mixed salad isn’t actually mixed when I serve it. I place the lettuce, tomato etc. in little piles on a platter and everyone can take what they want. I find my kids will try different things if they are presented like this and they always have something from the platter. I got the tip from a mum on youtube and it really works.