Pantry Challenge Week One Wrap up

One week down, 3 to go.

And in spite of my earlier whining we are actually doing okay. The fridge and cupboards are all still fairly full and we are not in danger of running out of anything quite yet. We don't have as many eggs as I would like but if I can convince the Russian not to eat two a day for breakfast we should be okay. Beverages are still problematic but I'm coping. We've run out of instant coffee but I don't drink it and the Russian has switched to tea without complaint. We have lots of tea and hot chocolate.

Sundries on the other hand are going to be an issue and I forgot to clarify if they were included in the no buy challenge. We are low on dish soap, laundry soap and already ran out of tp which I had to buy at the corner store. This is apparently an area I need to pay attention to and either stock up or find homemade alternatives to (the family cloth however is SO not going to happen).

Here's a brief overview of last week's menu, in no particular order:

steak fajitas with homemade flour tortillas and home canned salsa (red and green)
bacon pancakes
4 cheese macaroni and grated beet salad
homemade chicken noodle soup ( from previously frozen stock and meat)
eggs and homefries x 4 (the Russian)
yogurt and frozen fruit smoothies x 4 (me)
Roast beef and cheddar sandwiches and homemade shiitake mushroom soup
beef and beer stew in the slow cooker (leftover from last sunday's roast)
Oven bbq chicken with potato salad and steamed beans
Canned sardines on toast
Pasta with turkey, shiitakes and roasted red peppers in vodka cream sauce (last of the cream but not last of the frozen turkey)
Gado gado

Gado gado is an Indonesian salad of sorts that is simple to make and easily adapted for what's available at any time of year. I used potatoes, cabbage, frozen beans and cucumber ( thankfully we were able to pick up an Ontario grown hot house cucumber last week) in this version- you could also use fresh tomatoes if you have them.

Gado Gado

2 cups of potatoes, cut in pieces, skins on.
2 eggs
1 cup of cabbage coursely chopped
1 cup of green beans (or carrots, cauliflower, snow peas, etc)
1/3 of an English cucumber, cut in chunks
1/2 cup tofu cut in small pieces and pan fried (or use tvp soaked in a diluted soy sauce)
1/2 cup bean sprouts
2 green onions chopped
1/2 cup shrimp chips, broken in small pieces ( optional- they add a nice texture and flavour but I rarely have them at home)

Put potatoes and eggs in a pot of water and bring to a boil. When potatoes are partially cooked (about 5 minutes) add cabbage (and carrots, cauliflower etc if using) and cook for a minute. Add beans and turn off heat- cover and let sit for another minute or 2 until beans are partially cooked but still crunchy. Strain and run cold water over everything until cool. Peel eggs and cut in quarters, set aside.

Meanwhile pan fry tofu chunks in oil until browned on both sides. Or soak tvp chunks in warm water with a dash of soy sauce until softened. Set aside.


Spicy Peanut sauce

2 tbsp canola or peanut oil
few drops of dark sesame oil
2 cloves garlic chopped
3/4 cup natural peanut butter (chunky is best, can substitute other nut butters)
1 tbsp tahini (sesame paste)
1 tbsp yellow curry powder or red or green curry paste
2 tbsp soy sauce
4 tsp brown sugar
1 tbsp sambal oelek or hot chili sauce (use less if you aren't fond of spicy!)
2-3 tbsp lemon juice or red wine vinegar
1 cup coconut milk or 1 cup water

Heat oils in a frying pan over a medium heat. Add garlic and stir briefly until soft but not browned. Add peanut butter and tahini, stirring constantly until it's all softened. Add the remaining ingredients except coconut milk or water. Reduce the heat and slowly add liquid stirring well. Simmer for 5 minutes, uncovered, stirring regularly until the sauce reaches a creamy consistency. If sauce is too thick add more water.

You can adjust this to your taste by adding more or less of the sweet, sour, salty or spicy. This peanut sauce makes a great dipping sauce if you add even more liquid, or can be added to any number of stir fry or noodle dishes.


To make gado gado - on a plate or bowl layer potatoes, cooked veggies and tofu. Place cucumber chunks and quartered eggs around the edge. Top with bean sprouts and pour peanut sauce over everything. Sprinkle with green onion and shrimp chips if using.

Pancakes and Self Denial

In the Christian faith, this Wednesday marks the beginning of Lent, the period proceeding Easter, which makes Tuesday traditionally the last day to indulge in the luxuries that you'll be abstaining from for the next 40 days (actually 46 but Sundays don't count!). Around the world that day will be noted with festivals and food; Mardi Gras (Fat Tues), Carnival, Shrove Tues, Pancake Tues; in my predominently Polish neighbourhood, it's known as Doughnut Day and there's some delicious treats to be had. All of these celebrations come from the same source; one last blow out before a period of self denial and reflection (hangovers are an excellent incentive for the latter).

In my family growing up it was all about the pancakes and although I no longer follow the faith of my childhood I can't help but crave pancakes when Lent rolls around. We happen to have the all the stuff for making some pancakes from scratch in the house so I dragged out my trusty Five Roses Flour cookbook circa 1960.

Basic Pancake recipe
1 1/2 cups Five Roses enriched flour
3 tsp baking powder
1/2 tsp salt
3 tbsp sugar
1 egg
3 tbsp melted butter
1 1/4 cups milk
1/4 tsp vanilla extract (I omitted this)

Fat (butter, bacon fat etc) for cooking.


The recipe indicates you can substitute 3/4 cup of white flour with graham or whole wheat flour so I used some Red Fife stone ground whole grain flour as well. This made a much stiffer batter than regular white flour so if you like runny batter you may want to add additonal milk. I didn't and my pancakes were a bit dense but still airy.

Mix and sift dry ingredients. In a separate bowl, beat egg thoroughly and add milk (and vanilla if using).
Make a well in the centre of dry ingredients and slowly add milk mixture. Add melted butter and mix only till smooth.

Using a heavy iron frying pan or griddle, heat fat until melted but not smoking. Pour batter in small circles, allow room for each to spread without touching. Cook the pancakes until bubbles appear through out, then turn to cook the other side. Do not turn more than once.

I wanted bacon pancakes so I partially cooked two slices of bacon, cut in small pieces and added to the batter before cooking. I cooked the pancakes in the resulting bacon fat but I had reduced the melted butter to 2 tbsp in the batter and they were still lovely and moist and slid from the pan easily.

Top with real maple syrup or fresh or frozen fruit for breakfast. Or if you prefer, have them for dinner. It was tradition in my family to have them with a side of maple baked beans that my mom would make for Pancake Tues when we were kids and it was our kick off to Lent. In my case it's been many years since I gave up anything for Lent but as we are currently restricting our normal behaviour (for a totally different reason) I feel a resonance with that ancient ritual. In this case it is the purchasing of food that we are denying ourselves rather than the consumption but it sometimes amounts to the same thing. If it isn't in the house now, I won't be enjoying it for about 3 more weeks.

So far it's been rougher than I anticipated. Not because we are lacking in options- the cupboards and fridge are still pretty full. But it's the idea of choice (or lack there of) that's been causing me to question my ability to see this through. I'm fairly organized about shopping and cooking but I'm also prone to whims in our dietary decisions and often will decide to make something because it appeals to me in the moment. Living within walking distance to any number of options for food shopping makes picking up additional ingredients an every day occurrence if I choose. I found not being able to do that felt really restrictive over the last few days. On top of that I realized that food shopping is a form of retail therapy for me. Often my trips elsewhere are coupled with a stop at a food retailer and even when I'm broke I can always justify spending a few dollars on food. Not having that option made a long week seem even longer. Coupled with a bad head cold and the general end of winter blahs, this plan to restrict ourselves added more misery and made me wonder why anyone would choose to do this voluntarily.


Lent occurs at relatively the same time each year; this year is actually later than usual but it's dependant on the lunar calendar. The earliest Lent can begin is Feb 4, the latest is Mar 10. Which means it inevitably falls in the latter half of winter, when we are already feeling a bit deprived. The original purpose of Lent was to promote fasting and prayer, signifiying the time Jesus spent alone in the desert (pondering his fate, no doubt), but I don't suppose the early Christians had northern hemisphere winters in mind when they worked out the dates. Little wonder that the ritual has evolved into choosing only certain things to abstain from rather than complete abstinence of all things pleasurable. Still it's a long way from total fasting to giving up chocolate for 40 days -something I could do with ease (gingerale on the other hand...). Choosing self denial isn't something we are accustomed to these days, yet in a few short days I have been made aware yet again of how little I know of real deprivation. Maybe I was due for some reflection. Maybe I lose some weight or finally ween myself from sugary drinks. Or maybe I'll just be unbearable by the end of this month. Time will tell. In the meantime, there's always pancakes!

March Pantry Challenge- eat what you got!

I've been encouraged to participate in a Pantry Challenge for the month of March arranged by a couple of bloggers I read: Canadian Doomer and Farmgal. They got the idea from a couple who did it for the month of February(sure, pick the short month!) at BrokeProfessionals. The idea is to try to eat entirely from what's already in your food stores, a sort of dry run for TEOTWAWKI (the end of the world as we know it), if you believe in that sort of stuff. I think it's a great idea, both from a practical and idealistic point of view. Being forced to eat only what's in the house means I might actually do something with all the fruit I preserved last year. It will also make me more aware of how often I pick up a few things here and there to supplement what's already in the house. Of course to be totally realistic we probably shouldn't have done a major grocery run yesterday. However, in our normal routine we usually do a big shop about once a month for staples and then pick up other things as we need them (root veggies and the occasional cheese from the Sorauren market on Mondays, eggs from the shop on Roncy that sells local free range, dairy and baking supplies from the natural food store and so on.). Yesterday we spent a bit more than normal but we were out of a lot of staples(butter, sugar, potatoes) and there were a few sales I wanted to take advantage of (olive oil, cheese).

I've been a bit hesitant to commit to this however because I'm not sure we can give it 100%. Not without stock piling certain things and that seems like cheating. Ms Doom decided to make a few exceptions (goat's milk for her children for one) in her plan. So the first thing on my exception list is the farmcats- there are 3 of them and while it wouldn't be impossible to stock enough food and litter for them for a month, it would require a fair amount of space and we don't really have the room. (Plus Shadow likes to rip apart bags of food for her own amusement.) The Russian has suggested that he will make homemade food for them from fish we purchased yesterday- I'll let you know how that turns out. The other thing is alcohol- while I certainly don't equate alcohol as being a necessity like milk for children, and one of us could probably stand to drink less (ahem), there's no way that one's going to stick. I'm already dreading the point when I have tell the Russian there's no more chicken for the month; I won't even consider telling him there's no more beer.

The other exceptions will be due to previous engagements/celebrations- we have concert tickets and dinner plans for Mar 11, the Russian will be on tour for a few dates this month and I'm reserving the option to do something other than cook on my birthday/St Paddy's day. Other than that we will try to eat only at home from what we have on hand.

I'm not going to do a detailed inventory of what we have on hand but I cleaned out the fridge and reorganized the freezer before we shopped yesterday so I have a good idea of what's here. The freezer is packed with meat and veggies, the fridge is full of mostly pickles and condiments and some dairy. The dry goods cupboard is decently occupied and the preserve shelves are pretty well stocked for this time of year. The one area of concern is fresh veggies. We have one squash, some carrots, beets and cabbage as well as 10 lbs of onions and 20 lbs of potatoes but no greens. Which of course is pretty much the norm for this time of year. I will be starting some seeds for the garden this week and will likely plants some salad greens and maybe some sprouts. The other area that is going be problematic, for me anyhow, is non alcoholic beverages. I drink a ton of sugary drinks; pop, juice, even powdered drink mix, and that's all I drink period. I know how bad it is for me, I know I'd probably drop 20 lbs if I switched to plain water but I just don't find anything else quenches my thirst. I've been trying for years to ween myself to no avail. I rationalize it for the most part because it's the only area of my diet that is high in sugar. I don't eat cookies or cake, I rarely eat candy, I don't even really like fruit! I don't know what I'll drink once I run out of the juice we bought yesterday. Probably homemade iced tea. Until I run out of lemons or sugar. And then who knows? If there's one thing that may make me cave it will be this. Suggestions welcome!



So we kick it off today! As the month progresses, I will try to post updates and maybe the occasional recipe to keep it interesting.

Wish us luck!