Having got back home to Essex on Friday afternoon, I was left with the dilemma of whether to brave the supermarket hordes this morning, or whether to try and make do with what was lurking in the fridge and on the pantry shelves. Having recently followed with interest The Shopping Sherpa's Fiscal Fast (www.theshoppingsherpa.blogspot.com) for June, I thought I'd try and make do with what is around.
Luckily, I'd made sure that there was milk that was still in date in the fridge and there was some fresh pasta and pasta sauce also still within date in there too. Other than that I'm making do with mainly tinned foods from the pantry.
Last night for my evening meal I had a pack of noodles with roasted Sosmix (a vegetarian powdered sausage-substitute that you mix with water and then fry or bake) tickled up with some bottled Satay sauce which needed finishing. Dessert was an apple, of which there are two left for today and tomorrow, and which needed eating up. It wasn't haute cuisine but it certainly filled a hole and was pretty tasty for a 'scratch' meal. For lunch today I had a home-made soya pate which uses soya flour, dried herbs and spices, chopped garlic and tamari, all of which I happned to have. The recipe is better when you add fresh lemon juice but as I didn't have a lemon in the house I made do without. The pate went very nicely with some tortilla wraps I had. I've also got a loaf of bread baking in the breadmaker which will mean something on toast or sandwiches are also available for tomorrow's lunch.
Tonight I'm going for a tuna pasta salad which calls for tinned tuna, tinned kidney beans, tinned sweetcorn, and fresh tomatoes - of which there are about half a dozen still in the fridge which definitely need using. The recipe also calls for hard-boiled eggs - no eggs so scrap that - and a chopped red onion which I have omitted as I don't really get on with raw onion in things. The pasta was in the store cupboard and I've got oil, wine vinegar, mustard etc to make the dressing. That should last me for two evening meals which means in theory I've still got the fresh pasta and sauce for another meal later in the week, plus I've got some tinned stewing steak and small salad potatoes knocking about which only need some fresh greens to make yet another meal from the pantry.
Considering I don't have a freezer so am unable to fall back on the usual frozen goods, I'm surprised that, in theory, I could feed myself fairly well for the next week or so purely on tinned or dried goods or food in the fridge. I do have to say that I've got a fairly substantial shopping list for when I do venture to the shops on Monday so I don't think that in the long-run I will save much money by eating from the store-cupboard, but it has opened my eyes to what can make a good meal when push comes to shove. And with the price of food rocketing weekly (or so it seems), it may be a useful tool in the near future.
Oh well done you!
Let me know if you need my fresh tomato soup recipe to use up the rest of the tomatoes...
Posted by: The Shopping Sherpa | 06/28/2008 at 11:21 PM