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 5 of the Pantry Challenge.
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I was gone most of today in Los Angeles, so I have no idea what Bryan and the kids had for breakfast. Traffic was amazingly light, so I got home with plenty of time to rest and then prep our Sunday dinner.
What We Ate
For dinner we had Grilled Pork Tenderloin, roasted carrots, a Quick and Easy Caesar Salad, and Brazilian cheese buns, recipe from the back of the Bob’s Red Mill Tapioca Flour.
How did your Day 5 go for you?
Kathy in Denmark
Day 5:
Brunch: Soft boiled eggs, bread, juice, hot cocoa for the kids, coffee for the adults. Wiener pecan Danish (baked from frozen) as a “last day off” treat.
L: everyone skipped, but the kids might have had some fruit without me noticing….
D: Pasta bake made with tomato sauce and some cottage cheese for extra protein, mixed salad, HM baguette from the freezer. A few sausage rolls for the kids.
Since DH goes back to work and the kids go back to school Monday, I decided to prep some things for the following weeks. I mixed up dough for sourdough bread, made sausage rolls (wieners in a bread dough; great for lunch boxes), boiled black beans and chickpeas.
I used up some LO pasta for the pasta bake, served the last of our lettuce and used up the last baguette from the freezer.
All in all a good day!
Allie from Ontario
A strict “No spend” is not really my goal but I do try to avoid the store. BUT…I did a produce/milk shop on the 31st and somehow as my eye scanned expiry dates on T’s preferred 2% milk (I use skim) I latched onto the best choice. Imagine Tim’s surprise yesterday when he opened it & poured it into his tea…”Uhhh, did you mean to buy me 2% CHOCOLATE milk???” I didn’t notice at the cooler, the checkout or when putting it way 🙂 Oops…and he is going to get himself some white milk today.
What we ate on Jan 5
Brunch – T had his yogurt & then finished off the ribs. I had the last buttermilk biscuit (freezer) 1st thing & then later, a little sandwich using a chunk of the previous night’s chicken, lettuce & tomato relish on an English muffin.
Dinner – I cooked some pork tenderloin medallions with garlic, rosemary & red onions + freezer raid produce (chopped sweet peppers, diced Fresnos, cherry tomatoes & spinach). The sauce was a mix of tomato puree (freezer), red wine & the last of a carton of heavy cream. We ate this over egg noodles & I declared it a big pantry challenge win.
I also made some jam thumbprint cookies in the afternoon using up a bag of walnuts & a jar of raspberry jam.
Heather M
hahaha chocolate milk. love it! Dinner sounds delicious and for sure a win! We definitely have similar styles of cooking. and cookies….. YUM!
Tàsty
What a yummy supper, Allie!
Tasty
Had to chuckle about the chocolate milk!
Lynn grim NC Outer Banks
Definitely a good (and yummy) PC meal! I’ll bet chocolate milk in his tea was quite a surprise for your hubby!
Erin in Ontario
Breakfast yesterday was oatmeal all around, with fruit.
Lunch: Husband and teenager were out for martial arts until about 1. I made egg salad for when they got home (a favourite), and I also made a Greek dish called fasolakia lathera, which is essentially potato, green beans, and tomatoes cooked in olive oil. Delicious and the perfect comfort food for a chilly day. Daughter and I each had a helping for lunch, with hm ciabatta.
Dinner was a fend for yourself kind of thing. Daughter had more of the lunch but fried herself up some halloumi on top. Husband finished it off but with crumbled feta and crusty bread. Teenager haunted the fridge and cupboards, passing through with plates and bowls at regular intervals. Not sure of everything he had, but the leftover potato soup is gone, a large bag of grapes, and so is the rest of the loaf of crusty bread. I wasn’t hungry.
Allie from Ontario
Hi Erin! My town is around 112 km north of the 401 and sits on the intersection of highways 62 & 28…we live north of town on the York River. Another check point is Algonquin Park….we are around 70 km south of the East gate. It was – 17 @ 8 this am so i can imagine you were colder!
Heather M
OK that greek dish sounds amazing. I’m going to look it up. Wwe have all these things and it might be a good option at some point this week, maybe with some fish from the freezer!
Krista Matheson
Haha, good thing you weren’t hungry, cause your son at it all ;). Once when my son was about 15, I went into his room to talk, and to my surprise, he had an ENTIRE large wheel , and I’m talking costco size, wheel of brie on a dinner plate. :O
With rackers on the side, of course. I look back fondly on those memories, as he passed away 6 years ago Jan 12, at just 25 yrs old 🙁
Lynn from NC Outer Banks
Krista, what a heartbreaking loss. I’m so sorry. I hope sweet memories such as this provide you some comfort.
Maureen
It was our last day off for the holidays, so we spent the time prepping for the week in all ways. Food was mostly snacks and some leftovers. My older daughter and I made a pizza with some of the extra dough from the other night, so not exactly what I would deem as leftovers. And then, she really wanted sticky buns even though we still have all kinds of other treats in the house. She baked a pan last night and put another in the fridge for later. We made a big blender of smoothies to go with them with fruit from the freezer.
Danielle Zecher
Breakfast: I had a couple of biscuits from the freezer, with cheese. Nick had instant oatmeal.
Lunch: We finished off the cheese tortellini and garlic bread.
Dinner: Bean/cheese dip with chips and ice cream.
Kathryn M
Breakfast – banana pancakes – because the bananas were sad looking and needed to go away.
Lunch- I had potato chips and dip because I wasn’t very hungry. DH had a bunch of steak nachos left from the restaurant yesterday so he ate those.
Dinner – spaghetti sauce, already cooked noodles, and some mozzarella sticks came out of the freezer. I made some garlic toast to go with that stuff out of some sandwich bread that had been in the house a while.
I am going to work the next two days, so the pancakes and the leftover spaghetti will go to work for my meals. DH will take the leftover pork chops/corn for his meals.
Lynn from NC Outer Banks
1/5/25
B: cottage cheese with walnuts, jam, coffee. DH had English muffin with peanut butter, protein drink
L: hm chicken and rice soup.
D: LO chicken thighs, cabbage, salad of tomatoes, celery, chickpeas, cukes, onion and avocado. DH had potatoes with onions, and apple slices also.
S: Christmas cookie
Tasty
Friday 5th
B: once a week we go out as our treat to ourselves
I had bacon, egg and home fries. Hubby had blueberry pancakes.
L: not hungry
S: A melange of goodies from the freezer – all leftovers!
Kathryn M
Friday was a pizza night for us too. I used up some naan bread from the freezer as the crust. Had to run out to buy sauce though ($1.25), but I had pepperoni, cheese and veggies on hand.
Danielle Zecher
January 5th and 6th
Friday ended up being a horrible day. It started off fine; a work from home day for me, so I had a peanut butter bagel. Nick got drive thru on the way to work.
Our cat, Frankie, collapsed around 1:00 in the afternoon. I called Nick and our vet and we ended up rushing to the emergency vet. Frankie died in my arms on the way there. He was old, and had been sick; we were trying to manage a few major health conditions, but thought we had at least a few more months.
By the time we got home and cleaned up, I didn’t want to eat. Nick ordered Doordash food and I got a milkshake.
Saturday:
Breakfast: fast food on the way to SC for haircuts.
Lunch: We tried a new Greek restaurant that ended up being horribly bland. We won’t be going back.
Dinner: Leftover pasta from earlier in the week.
Jessica Fisher
I’m so sorry to hear about your cat! Sending hugs…
Kathy in Denmark
I am so sorry to hear about your cat! Loosing a pet is so hard.
Hugs from across the pond.
Lynn from NC Outer Banks
Oh I’m so sorry about your cat. It’s hard to lose pets, regardless of age.
Heather M
Oh gosh, Danielle, I am so sorry about your cat. Sending you my sympathies and a big hug.
Erin in Ontario
Danielle, I’m so sorry about your Frankie! Losing a pet is unbelievably hard.
Karen J
I’m so so sorry to hear about Frankie. Pets are so much part of a family. Hugs.
Janet
Breakfast: it was fend for yourself. We have college students home from school. They don’t usually eat before lunch.
Lunch: Beef stew, toast, apple slices
Dinner: We were gifted a 20 lb turkey for New Year’s. We defrosted it and had “Thanksgiving” for dinner. All the fixings came from food we already had on hand including mashed potatoes and gravy, cranberry sauce, crescent rolls, green beans, and assorted berries.
Lynn from NC Outer Banks
We had Thanksgiving for part of our Christmas too. I needed extra mouths to help my husband and I eat all that turkey! Our children hadn’t had traditional foods at Thanksgiving, so it was well received. What’s not to love with turkey and all the sides? Yum.
Kathy in Denmark
Having an orange tree in the back yard is a real treat!
Kids and I are still under the weather, but I am feeling a bit better than they are. As you can tell from the meals, the kids still don’t have much of an appetite, but at least they are eating something.
Day 5:
B: Toast and coffee for me, Coffee for DH, Hot cocoa for the kids.
L: Bread, scrambled eggs, smoked salmon and a few other bibs and bobs from the fridge
D: Hot dogs, because it was all I was up to fixing!
Heather M
Gosh I wish you and your girls could kick this illness already! Sound a lot like a virus that has been going around the US and lingers (most of my family got it in November, except me somehow), and it’s not Covid or the flu or rsv. Cheers to a new week and getting better 🙂
Lynn from NC Outer Banks
Jessica, I’m jealous of your orange tree! What a great yield. We had a great peach tree that ran its course. Now we’ve got 2 blueberry bushes only. I keep wanting to add some kind of fruit tree to our yard.
Jennifer
Hmm, thinking back to Friday… I did go grocery shopping with a short list. I found a clearance bag of salad that was $0.75 after my coupon. I had several store coupons of high value that expired yesterday that I wanted to use. I got some really good deals and completely stayed in my budget for the week.
B – I had a piece of sausage and yogurt drink then met a friend for coffee and got a scone to round out my breakfast. The others had pumpkin chocolate chip muffins
L – I had one of the muffins along with grapes and a wafer bar, dh had taken leftover ravioli
D – loaded baked potato soup with rolls from the freezer and baby carrots
Allie from Ontario
I somehow missed the start of this but had started my own log of what I have been cooking/using up since Jan 1. I mostly cook for 2 (but love to entertain) and I always concentrate on getting through all the fresh produce I buy (I hate food waste!) but my current focus for January is open fridge jars, single & double servings of soups/various leftovers in the freezer and dry goods in the pantry. ALSO, I grow a very large garden and my freezers & canning cupboard are full of the “fruits” of my labour (relishes & chutneys + lots of sweet & hot peppers, tomatillos, tomatoes preserved in multiple ways and tons of herbs/pestos. Step one = grow them. Step two = preserve them AND step 3 = USE THEM 🙂
Heather M
Hi Allie! Your garden sounds beyond awesome—-all that bounty to enjoy year round. Also, we have similar plans for the month, and also I only generally cook for 2 these days as well. Glad you’re here. 🙂
Allie from Ontario
Hi Heather! My retirement gift (30 years at the same high school in a very small town) was a greenhouse. My partner T then started building me raised beds (1st year = 3 beds at 4′ x 8′ and then another 4′ x 12′) and we also plant tons of large containers. I’m hooked! I started canning the summer of 2022 and took it much farther last summer. It makes me happy to use all those jars of our homw grown produce 🙂
Karen J
B-scrambled eggs with ham and cheese
L-can’t remember, must have skipped?
D-Alton Brown’s shrimp and grits recipe with a few subs-white onion insead of green and added sautéed mushrooms that needed to be used. I opened a two pound bag of shrimp from the freezer so more shrimp in the future this month. Like that’s a problem 🙂 green salad
Nancy
Breakfast was LO breakfast pizza that had a crescent roll crust, l pulled this from the freezer
For lunch I had leftover turkey soup made from our Thanksgiving turkey, a slice of leftover French bread from the freezer and the last Sees chocolate Santa.
Supper was homemade pizza on the Ooni because it’s quicker than heating the big pizza oven. I am having great success with my cold fermented, high heat pizza dough.
Lynn from NC Outer Banks
1/5:
B:bagels and coffee for both
L: more taco soup for both
D: we wound up eating leftovers-curried chicken, cauliflower, pork tenderloin, baked sweet potatoes, fruit medley, last chicken burger, slaw. There were just small bits of all, so I was glad to get all of those containers out of the fridge.
Jessica, I didn’t get to respond to your live reel at the time re: Bryan taking his lunch to work and dollars saved. I retired about a year ago after working 45 years (my how that time flew by). I took my lunch through all those years except when lunch was provided (rare) or I ate out (even rarer). I used very conservative numbers for what lunch would cost, like 2.50 for the first 10 years and 3.50/lunch for the last 30+ years. (I think one would be hard pressed to eat for 3.50 these last few years) The amount came out to $38-40,000, even with these conservative figures, tho I believe the total was actually much higher!! I figure that’s the money that helped cash flow 2 weddings, some college tuition etc. Besides saving money, I also know my meals were healthier than many I would have eaten. So just wanted to add my .02 to your points and the huge savings that can result from that one action.
Karen J
Just saying, your leftover dinner sounds yummy with lots to choose from! And I love getting rid of those final bits.
We must be about the same age-I retired in 2017 after 38.5 of teaching, also making my lunch every day and trying hard to make frugal financial choices along the way. It paid off-we are enjoying our retirement!
Lynn at NC Outer Banks
Karen, yes, I think we are close in age. I worked in schools for much of my career as well. (So I factored in working only 10 months, at least where I worked). I agree-those frugal choices and short term sacrifices made over time are enabling us to fully enjoy retirement and our first grandchild-a grand daughter, as well! Life is good 🙂
Heather M
Another day of feeling off but j did get a massage and it was amazing, and also sad because I realized how crazy tight and tense my entire body is and probably has been. And then I went to the dr and have a treatment plan for the now officially confirmed vertigo if it doesn’t clear up within a week. Otherwise I rested, as I’m also not sleeping well.
Jan 5:
B: we both skipped
L: sent L with a turkey spinach sandwich using the last turkey, an apple, and some veggie stick snacks; I had a roll, a scrambled egg, and some leftover bacon from the pancake day
D: Tuscan tuna pasta (pasta, fancy Italian olive oil packed tuna, lemon juice/zest, chopped red onion, capers, salt/pepper) which we both adore and I super easy which I needed, and a side salad. Still have salad stuff that is surviving from shopping before the 1st. Haven’t shopped yet at all and will be keeping a running total of what I do spend.
Lynn from NC Outer Banks
Heather, I’m sorry you have vertigo. My sister had a bout with it years ago and said it was the worst! Hope it will resolve soon.
Heather M
Thanks, Lynn. Doing my best.
Kathy in Denmark
Hope the vertigo clears up quickly, but good that you have a plan if it doesn’t!
Heather M
Thank you, Kathy. Yes, am glad to have a plan in place:)
ZC
Day 5
Today it’s freezer meals and minimal prep.
B: overnight oats with almond milk, nut butter and berries
L: Trader Joe’s butter chicken with rice
D: Trader Joe’s chicken cilantro wontons
S: a banana and an apple