Pantry Clean Out Challenge Week 4

I know I have been slacking on my self-inflicted challenge but it has been an insane couple of weeks.  Let's recap on our last episode, I am currently up 4 points.  For this challenge, I actually have extra weeks to work on these ingredients but I did not use all the ingredients.  

Week 3 ingredients:

Dried Figs - I did make fig jam +1
Semolina Flour - I did not use it -1

Whole wheat spaghetti - I made spaghetti with my version of eggplant parm+1
Coconut - Coconut sponge cake with a mango mouse +1
Imitation cream cheese - I cheated and used this for a cream cheese frosting +1

Total: +7

Week 4 Ingredients
Semolina Flour
Can of Cranberries
Vienna Sausage (we always have a stock of this stuff)
Tempura Batter
Chocolate Chips

Spaghetti with meatballs and eggplant parm

Coconut sponge cake with mango mousse

Week 3 Pantry Clean out Challenge and A Misadventure at the same time.

 

 

Another week, another week to attempt to reduce the amount of stuff I stored in my pantry.  This week I actually got a chance to cook everything....I WIN!  I was good and actually planned out what I was going to make instead of just winging it (like normal :D).  Thank you for the kind words from my last failed attempt.  It got me motivated to try to clean out the pantry.  I even was able to use a few other stuff I had stored away :D.  I also used one of the ingredients twice.  Good for me :D 

 

Here is my working ingredients

Dried Apricots - Cookies (Misadventure)

Corn Flour - Cake and Cookies (Misadventure)

Ginger Bread Cookie mix - Cookies for The Daughter

Chickpea - Mexican Stew

White Chocolate Chips - I actually didn't have any in the house so I used semisweet - Cookies (Misadventure)

At the start of the week -4

Dried Apricots, Corn Flour, Chocolate Chips - + 5

Corn Flour - +1 (I added another point since I used it twice)

Ginger Bread - +1

Chickpea - + 1

End of the week +4

 

Week 4 Ingredients

Dried Figs

Semolina Flour

Whole wheat spaghetti (I have 4 packages.....4!)

Coconut (I believe I have a whole tree my pantry.  I have no idea where all of them came from either)

Imitation cream cheese (Let's just say, I was making a lot of cheesecake and for some reason I got the wrong one, OK like 24 boxes of the wrong kind.  Did you know groceries won't let you return them after you bought them 10 minutes prior)

 

These are my ingredients and hopefully I'm sticking to it. 

 

 

Here are some pics and maybe a recipe on what I make :D

The Daughter Making Ginger Bread cookies with The Husband

 

 I actually made homemade Marshmallow Fondant that I got from Cake Journal.  You will never go back to regular fondant! 

 

I made a Victoria Sponge cake created by Nigella Lawson that was shared by Tomayto Tomaaahto.

Could you figure out what I'm trying to make? 

 

It is Rocket from Little Einstein.  I totally have to improve on my free hand work.  The Husband even helped me put it on the cake (That was not a pretty sight).  But it was a great attempt for my first time carving :D.

 

Here is my Misadventure!  Cookies are not my Enemy!  I can't get it right no matter what I do.  I don't get it.  Any suggestions?

 

I just stuck it in here because I thought it was a cute picture :D 

Pantry Clean Out Challenge Week 2 - FAILED

I totally failed for this week.  I was even trying to go to the last minute and use all the ingredients on Monday.  I didn't get to it.  So this is the tally

Week 2 Challenge Items

Dried Apricots - Failed -1

Corn Flour - Failed -1

Ginger Bread Cookie mix - Failed -1

Chickpea - Failed -1

White Chocolate Chips - Failed -1

So right now I'm -4.  So I'm carrying over all the ingredients into week 3.  I already started to work on this weeks ingredients.  Last night I made my version of a Mexican stew.  The only reason I consider it a Mexican stew because of the frozen vegetables I used.  It stated Mexican mix.  It also incorporated Mexican sour cream too. 

Mexican Stew

Ingredients

1 Lb of Beef Stew Meat Cubed

1 Can of Chickpea

1 Package of Mexican Frozen Vegetable

1 Tomato Diced

2 Onions Sliced

2 Cloves of Garlic Minced

4 Cups of Water *you may want more soup. 

* The rest of the ingredients, I just went by taste. 

Salt

Pepper

Cumin

Paprika

Cayenne Pepper 

Nutmeg

Garlic Salt

Garnish

Jasmin Rice

Mexican Sour Cream

Directions

1. 
   
   Heat a large pot,  a dutch oven would be ideal and pour a light coating of oil.
2. 
   
   Add the meat to brown a little bit.  Do not over cook.
3. 
   
   Remove the meat as it browns and than add the onion and garlic.  Stir around the onion and garlic to pick up the flavor of the meat.
4. 
   
   Once the onion is fully cooked, add the meat back in and season with salt and pepper.
5. 
   
   Add the water and bring it to a boil. 
6. 
   
   Add the frozen vegetables.
7. 
   
   Once they are cooked, add the tomatoes and the chickpea.
8. 
   
   Than add your seasonings.  The measurements is up to you.  You may want more heat, less heat, more nutmeg.  I went with even parts of each thing except for the garlic salt.  I doubled that.
9. 
   
   Reduce to a simmer. 
10. 
    
    Once it is to your taste, serve with a side of rice and sour cream. 

Pantry clean out Challenge - update

Pantry clean out Challenge - update

 

This past week has been insane.  I don't even know where to start.  Last Monday, it was confirmed that my car was finally getting out of the shop.  Here is the back story.  The Brother decided to drive to Chicago from California to retrieve all of his instruments (he graduated with a music education and performance degree) from my attic and drive it back.  We figured since he was driving, he would bring back The Mother's industrial mixer.  Yes, it is an industrial mixer.  It is taller than The Daughter and she could sit comfortable in the bowl :D.  I'll take a picture when I have a chance.  Well on the way back, he decided to kill Bambi in Colorado.  So the car was there for about two weeks.  I got the call that the car was ready and we could pick it up.  I was totally looking forward in having a free weekend with just The Daughter and I.  We were going to clean, organize the kitchen, eat out, and go shopping.  The next day I got two calls and a bunch of text messages requesting for some of my Filipino pastries.   Since I'm slowly and I mean slowly starting a catering company, I figured this would be a great opportunity.  Lets just say, I have been cooking straight from Tuesday to Sunday for 3 parties, a showcase, and my monthly book club (which I didn't get a chance to cook for).  My highlight of my insane weekend was to finally meet my new friend Jennifer dela Cruz of Bead ala Has.  She is the person that held the showcase. 

 

 

Here is Jenn, me, and The Daughter

This is only a fraction of the amount of food I brought

 

Here are a few of the stuff she makes.  Beautiful huh? 

 

It was a wonderful week and weekend and I was able to challenge my time management skills.  After this weekend, I'm completely motivated to to continue learning and growing in my cooking skills.  So long story short I didn't get as far into the challenge as I wanted to.  Here is my break down :D

 

Guava Paste - Guava Bundt Cake +1

Dried Apricots - failed -1

A bag of Milk Chocolate - Mint Chocolate Chip Ice Cream Cake + 1

Corn Flour - Failed, I actually used corn meal instead of corn flour -1

Gluten - I actually used this in fried rice.  It was not photo worthy and I'm just glad I finally got rid of it.  +1

 

Total: +1

 

This weeks Challenge Items

Dried Apricots

Corn Flour

Ginger Bread Cookie mix (This is from Christmas)

Chickpea

White Chocolate Chips

 

Hopefully I'll do better this week :D  I just have 4 Dozen Siopao to make. 

A Challenge for myself

Z

Confession time.  I'm horrible at grocery shopping.  Every time I go to the grocery store:

1. Forget something
2. Get too much stuff that I have no plan to use yet 

 

The funny part I bring a list with me all the time.  For some reason, I also miss something and than I find something really interesting and I buy it.  Take yesterday's trip, myself, The Brother, and The Daughter went to Caputos (my favorite place) to get ready for a BBQ I was having for The Brother's birthday. 

 

Happy Birthday little brother, just wait to see what I make :D

 

It was mainly our close friends and family coming over, I figured I'll make a few things I haven't done for a while.  Like fresh lumpia and I'm making an ice cream cake.  Hopefully this time, I'll be able to take pictures :D.  As I was getting all the produce, I found that they had fresh guavas.  What do I do, I got 4 of them.  I have no idea what I'm going to do with them yet and hopefully I'll figure it out.  This happens on a regular basis so The Husband put me on the chore of using everything in the fridge, freezer (we had a lot of meat), and pantry.  I don't know about you but I have only known Asian families that has two refrigerator and in some cases a freezer too.  Well we have two refrigerator and could you imaging both freezers were jam packed.  For the last two months, I wasn't allowed to go grocery shopping unless I really needed something.   The both freezers are now bare waiting to be filled up again :D.  Now on to the pantry.  This has been an ongoing battle for me.  Especially since The Mother loves to send stuff from California to us.  When they are here, they feel that they have to fill up my fridge, freezer and pantry which is great but we don't get to everything.  So long story short, I really need to work on the pantry.  I found different types of flour I didn't realize I had.  I also have 10 lbs of semisweet chocolate.  Who has that much just sitting around?  Well I do :D  So

 

This is my challenge, take 5 ingredients and use it every week.  I'm even scoring myself :D 

1-2 ingredients: only 1 point

2-3: 2 points

3-4: 5 points

4-5: 10 points

and All five: 50 points. 

 

I hope I keep this up :D I meant to start this last week but I didn't have a chance to evaluate the stuff in my pantry.

 

This weeks:

Guava Paste (I cheated and made something on Monday but I'm counting it)

Dried Apricots

A bag of Milk Chocolate

Corn Flour (I have three different corn type of flours: corn flour, corn meal, and even instant masa)

I guess I have include something savory.....hmmmmm.....Gluten (The Mother got us cans of the stuff)

 

I haven't decided what I would do if I don't use one of the ingredients.  Any ideas?  Should I:

1. Carry over the ingredient to the next week
2. Subtract a point

What do you guys think?

 

 I'll post my progress and I will try as hard as possible to use my ever growing collections of recipes I have saved.  I think I'm over 400 recipes now.  I better get cooking!