I’m glad you were able to get food when you needed it. Now that you have “too many things in your pantry, fridge and freezer “ you can stop going so someone else that needs it can utilize it. That’s what the food pantry is for and I’m glad you had one available to you in your time of need. That’s awesome. 😊
You did a good job finding ways to use up your pantry items! If you need a good idea for canned spinach(I am not a fan but love this) Drain well pushing it down with your hands or a bowl into a strainer,mix in diced red onion and a generous amount of shredded cheese, then you can use crescent rolls,pizza crust or even canned biscuits, roll the dough thin and add a layer of spinach mixture the depending on which dough you use fold the rolls or roll the pizza crust into a large roll then cut into circles, then bake according to dough directions.
I utilize my pantry as well and we get so many canned foods, making multiple soups and stews I make to use up cans. Peanut butter of course sandwiches, cookies, and peanut butter bread. So many things I just make up meals with to try and use everything up
I'm a food pantry volunteer. We give out a flyer with ideas on how to use the free ingredients. Food pantries can only supplement. It's up to the recipients to make the most of it if they have the facilities to do so. Personally, I buy food and never spend more than $1 a day per person to eat well. I eat food like what the food pantry gives away only I cook it from scratch.
@Laura C I produce a newsletter for our local food bank, and I teach classes. I follow Lisa Dawn and Ardent Michelle here. They routinely do very low-cost budget challenges. Atomic Shrimp is an eclectic channel. He does great "less than a pound" UK budget challenges. If you challenge yourself to introduce low-cost meals into your menus, it can yield huge savings. Swap boxed cereal out for regular cooking oatmeal. Swap out bottle drinks completely. Take a peanut butter sandwich to work for lunch. Make soup from scraps, those ingredients many toss but some freeze to use for soups. We call it mystery stew and serve it with homemade bread and real butter, and the soup is free! So many ways to eliminate waste and cook from scratch.
In Cincinnati we put chili over spaghetti noodles and put shredded cheese on top. We have diff styles so 3-way would be spaghetti noodles chili cheese, 4-way all of the prior plus diced onions, 5-way all of the above plus beans. Lol look up skyline or gold star and you’ll see what I mean :)
Those all sounded so good! I've hit the same situation at the food bank when we needed to use our local one. The company that makes that chili also makes a stew that is more of a stew base, IMO. It doesn't have much in the way of solids in it, but it tastes pretty good, and it has more of a sauce-like body to it. I think we still have one or two packs around. I should get it out and try loading it up with veggies for soup.
Some good ideas for sure! We've gotten a couple of cans of the fruit cocktail and have actually turned them into smoothies. It makes it pretty sweet, so we usually skip the bananas, add water and frozen strawberries, Chia or flaxseed and blend it up. Good way to use it up because we're not the biggest fans of eating it as is. I have everything right now on hand to make the tuna noodle casserole, so I'll put that on next week's rotation. I bought a huge container of the red lentil pasta probably a year and a half ago from Costco, and still have tons of it left. Also not my favorite. The best thing I have found to cook with it is: put it in a pot raw with some raw diced onion, garlic and peppers, a can of diced tomatoes, water, Italian seasoning, onion and garlic powder, salt and pepper and cook till the pasta is mostly tender. Try not to stir it too much as it's cooking because the pasta breaks up really easily. But the starch in the pasta ends up making a really nice creamy sauce.
Many of your canned ingredients can make a very nice soup. Some pasta can be thrown in to give the soup some substance. Baked pasta casserole would be very satisfying and substantial. Canned fruit salad can be delicious added to a bread pudding. You can save your bread loaf ends in your freezer and use it toward the bread pudding. A few eggs , brown or white sugar cinnamon and any kind of milk you have in your fridge will help you have a yummy dessert.
Trial by error. But I appreciate you took that bullet for all of us. Jello casserole looks great….how can that ever be a bad thing? And ugly doesn’t necessarily mean it tastes bad! Thanks for Frankensteining your pantry!
I'm in Kentucky and we do peanut butter sandwiches with chili to dip in it lol I have watched alot of videos where people do noodles with chili but ALOT of them use rice! Which chili on top of rice doesn't sound appealing to me lol to each there own just my opinion lmao I love your videos alot of people I see found RU-vid and doing budget meals have huge houses and flaunt there nice cars and other things and I'm happy for them. But it's nice to have and see someone REAL for a change this is hard times for alot of people and I've done the good pantry alot and I get it about the mixed fruit lol that a peanut butter!!! Lol again keep it up I love all u do!!
Due to rising food costs and supply chain issues, I too stock and use shelf stable ingredients in the meals that I share. I order from Walmart flats of canned meats and vegetables, and do 90% of my in person shopping at Aldi. Really enjoy your content and am a NEW SUBSCRIBER here...
When I have too many canned fruit when I make a smoothie I add like a half of can of fruit mix as the liquid it helps get rid of it and it's being put to a good use just an idea
I'm from Ohio and usually when we make like a homemade pot of chili we have just chili the first night with like crackers or cornbread or something and then the next day the Chili's even better and that's when we pour it over noodles
Great job on the use of your pantry....have you tried making a cobbler with the canned fruit? I've seen recipes but I'm diabetic so not something I can try
I have indeed! I keep boxes of cake mix on hand for this very reason. My partner has a sweet tooth so I make one batch of something sweet for him to have with coffee throughout the week.
I grew up with mixing canned mixed fruit with mayo. and a banana or 2 if you have on hand. and put back into fridge to meld together while making the rest of dinner. sounds really gross.... but its yummy
Wonder if maybe canned spinach ‘metallic taste’ cooks off like canned tomato paste does? Tomato paste becomes it’s ‘better self’ after a sauté…? Maybe next can of spinach You’ll try & see? Lemme know
The chili over pasta, the chili wasn't right. You have the pasta, regular chili with toppings of sour cream, cheese, unions, etc. Think of it as a loaded potato but over pasta dish. There was a popular restaurant around where I lived that served this with a toppings bar to add what you wanted. Yes, this is good but the chili you used looked WRONG.
