HelpfulGardener.com

I am trying to do better at not buying too many perishable items and using what I have. I am better, but not totally successful. I still get more than I can use when I go to Costco or Sam's

Strawberries went bad. I salvaged a few, but most of them went to the worm bin.

I bought a cabbage. Cabbage is supposed to be a good carb, but I really don't have a lot of recipes I like using cabbage. Even a small head is hard to finish. I like cole slaw, but I don't make a good one and it doesn't use up all of the cabbage
I have made cabbage soup with it. It works and I can throw in some extra peppers from the yard.
On Monday, I went to Costco. I got some kalua pork to make kalua pork and cabbage ( it used up the whole cabbage). They did not have any rotisserie chickens and won't for a couple of weeks and the food court is also closed, probably because their container of chickens and hot dogs did not come in. The only other thing I got was a pumpkin pie for my orchid club meeting. $27 for both. One of my smallest Costco shopping trips. I did pass up the salad because I have lettuce in the garden.

I also got some asparagus the last time I went to Sam's club and had half a bag left, so I steamed it up and ate the last of it with my breakfast bacon and eggs.

The lemons are piling up in the frig and its hard because, apparently there are a lot of lemons around so I can only use it for my tea.

Next to use up is the tofu. ( I would need to get some watercress), ma po tofu ( I have everything for that), or tofu steak ( I haven't had tofu steak in a long time), is tofu salad (need water cress, bean spouts) but it makes more than I can eat and it gets soggy when it sits. There is just plain tofu with ginger, soy sauce, and green onions. Simple, and I have green onions and chives in the yard.

I am trying to avoid forgetting stuff in the frig because I did not finish the left overs, bought more than I could use, or "lost" stuff in the back of the frig.

I was still bad. After Arbor day tree distribution on Nov 2. I had chili and hot dog at the garden for lunch. I was too tired for dinner so I stopped at McDonalds and got a soda, ice cream cone, chicken nuggets and fries. The next day, I was out most of the day so I got a mini teri beef plate ( it was not very good), I ended up eating the nuggets the next day and throwing the fries away ( I don't really like fries anyway), It took a couple of meals to finish the teri beef, I also had some leftover bananas and grapes from the garden club lunch. Hint: Don't do this 3 days before you do blood tests. Usually, I am good about keeping the carbs down, but I wasn't on these days.

After, I make the tofu, I have to check out what I have in the freezer to plan my next meal. Old rules apply, whatever falls out first is what I will plan my meal around.

I can almost always make soup with leftovers.

Today’s leftovers were someone’s lamb curry and basmati rice. I had chicken thighs, onions, carrots, and potatoes.

Added the curry to deglaze after stir-frying the chicken, onions, carrots. Added herbs and spices, then a quart of chicken broth and a bit of rice milk. Diced potatoes and basmati rice. And finally some fully ripe Jersey Devil and Opalka tomatoes.

— I learned I can put rice in the soup and not have it burn or stick to the bottom if I put it on top of the layered food so the carton of leftover cooked Basmati rice was upended on top of the potatoes.

And for good measure, I added a couple of super ripe Jersey Devil and Opalka tomatoes cut in half. Then skimmed the fat and foam, closed lid and cooked on Soup setting at LOW pressure.

Normally I would have added some kind of left over greens here (cabbage would have been good), but I was in a hurry and forgot.

It has been a while since I cooked a dish with rice. Even when I get a plate lunch I ask for all toss or don't eat the rice to keep the carbs down. When I do make rice and have leftovers, then the best way to store it is frozen, I have even made musubi and frozen that. It works well reheated.

I don't make soup often. But when I do make chicken soup with the leftover rotisserie chicken, and I want to add rice to it to bulk it up. I usually don't add it to the soup, unless I am making jook. You can put the hot soup over leftover rice when you eat it. Otherwise if you put rice in the soup when you cook it, the rice will absorb all the soup when it is stored. It also gives me more options with the soup and makes reheating easier. It usually does not burn because I reheat in the microwave, but it can still stick.

Yesterday, I wanted a snack in the afternoon. I made some celery sticks and I had 2 oz of cream cheese left from the cracked chicken recipe I made last week. So I made celery sticks with cream cheese. I added a little stevia to the cream cheese so it would not be so sour.