Oct 27, 2008
The Daily Poverty Post.
Yesterday Bossy’s brother and his wife invited a few people over to watch some football followed by some baseball followed by Oh balls is Bossy tired!
Because Bossy recently made a commitment to use those items clogging her freezer and pantry, Bossy decided to concoct an appetizer for her brother’s game party made entirely from things already in her kitchen:
First Bossy got a little olive oil going in her iron skillet, and she diced the half onion left over from the Eisenhower administration:
Next Bossy chopped fistfuls of garlic and threw it in the skillet with the onions:
Then Bossy wandered out to the garden to see if she could salvage any basil or oregano from her dying plants:
Next Bossy opened her can of red kidney beans left over from the Truman administration, and she dumped the contents into the skillet:
Then Bossy decided to add a few of the whole tomatoes from this can:
Meanwhile: extra bonus points to anyone who remembers the stale baguette featured in the ingredients photo. This was left over from the Johnson administration, and Bossy chunked it up and tossed it into the skillet with the rest of the sorry lot:
Then Bossy panicked that it wouldn’t be enough—which makes it different from every other meal exactly not at all because when it comes to food, Bossy acts like the 12th starving child in a family of 13.
So Bossy added more beans, the remainder of the tomatoes from the can, and some more stale bread:
And when it was all assimilated, Bossy poured the mixture into her casserole dish and stuck it in a 300 degree oven until it cooked down and became a bit crunchy:
And then Bossy served this nonsense with a specialty food you may not be familiar with:
And so, how—you may want to know—did this innovative use of pantry ingredients taste?
Half nasty. But cheap!
Check out the (below) list of blogs participating in Bossy’s Poverty Party, and don’t forget to comb the comments for links to the latest Poverty posts across the web.
I would love to see more recipes like this, Bossy. I’m on a mission to buy only what is absolutely necessary and use up what is in my pantry and freezers.
May I make a suggestion or two? You might consider making baguette chips with the stale baguette instead of including it in the beans. Slice the bread thim, brush with olive oil, sprinkle with herbs if desired, and bake until golden. You might consider letting the beans simmer a bit and then mashing the beans before putting it into the oven to bake.
P.S. Adding a little bit of green pepper might give the beans a little flavor kick.
I’ve discovered that CHEESE makes ANYTHING edible. Food for thought…..
Oh, your comment about bloggers’ pictures of knives chopping onions made me laugh laugh laugh. Out loud, even.
Gurl, poverty recipes are the BEST. Have you tried lard biscuits yet? I posted about poverty (and Halloween) today too.
http://nannygarcia.blogspot.com/2008/10/silver-lining.html
Ok, so maybe I wouldn’t make this one, but a good laugh is always helpful when the wallet is empty. And boy did I laugh. Thanks!
Living proof that Bossy can feed the masses with one loaf of bread and no fish!
Good job! Good games too.
everything tastes better when “Chef’s Little Helper” helps with the cooking. Was he there? I didn’t see him ..
See, if it had onions and garlic in it, I would be all “yum” no matter how many cans the stuff came out of. Just throw some salt and pepper on it and I’d be chowing down and sending you my compliments.
Discerning palate? Why no, no thanks.
This is really ugly. Did it get all eaten up? I probably would have eaten it no matter how ugly.
Why did Bossy’s brother do the inviting and did Bossy’s brother and/or B.B’s wife bring food too? Which got eaten up first?
I would have made some croutons out of the bread and put the bread on top with some cheese. Soggy bread…..yyyyuuuuuccccckkkkkk! I think there are some websites where you plug in the ingredients and it comes up with a recipe. Might be safer cuz if you have to throw out the weird concoction it defeats the whole purpose of trying to be frugal. Right?!?!?!
Hey boss, Im in over here at the beach..
come see!
http://www.coastalnest.blogspot.com
keepin it real,
Lisa
coastal nest
um….. no thanks?
Well, at least it is a low-fat, reasonably healthy recipe! Or does that not count? Any clue how many W,W. points in a serving?
I digress. If I may make one suggestion, (I either heard it on NPR or learned it from P.W. Ree): add the fresh herbs late in the cooking process, otherwise the flavor gets destroyed, and doesn’t shine through.
I picked most of my basil yesterday afternoon and spent the evening hunting down the dairy food processor, and making a huge mess. But now I have l4 cups of pesto in ice cube trays in freezer for the winter. I defrost gently, add 2x the amount of f.f. plain yogurt, warm in the nuke, and serve over linguini. Yum. Instant dinner.
Take care, p.j.
Hmmm… What could have gone wrong w/ that recipe? Oh yeah, BACON. You didn’t put a hunk ‘o bacon in it. Or cheese, fer chrissake.
Here’s my post for today:
http://chickychickybaby.blogspot.com/2008/10/saving-money-old-fashioned-way-sure-its.html
This totally looks like something that would actually come out amazing! Or maybe like something not so amazing, but I’d eat it anyway? Hmm.
I agree with #15… Bacon and cheese make everything better!
Nice work Bossy!
Yikes! Sounds like quite a, er, creative concoction!
By the way, here’s my post:
http://buenosburritos.blogspot.com/2008/10/chicken-in-every-crock-pot.html
I’m skeptical. But way to take one for the team.
I know that recipe… add Chili powder (without the bugs which usually mine have); replace the bread with old pasta or new pasta (I use shells) and a pound of Cuban Missle Crisis era ground beef. Then the garlic bread as a side… It’s actually quiet nummy. Oh three different kinds of tomatoes also so that helps to use up the pantry.
this is actually an Italian recipe without the cabbage.
Savoy. (forget how you say it in Italian).
Forget cheese…melted cheese turns everything into a TGIF/ nightmare.
that was pretty macguyer-y. making something good out of that stuff.
OK, “half nasty” cracked me up. Also, I totally feel you on the making tons of food thing. I am the SAME WAY and I got it from my grandmother. The whole family would come for Thanksgiving dinner and we’d still be putting away 2/3’s of the food as leftovers.
… only half nasty? Boss… erm… well hey. I have done almost exactly the same thing, although without adding the bread – there seem always to be kidney beans and tinned tomatoes in my cupboard for when the fridge runs out… there should be university degrees in bare-cupboard cooking.
I remember your last posts about cooking everything you own and they petered out quite quickly. I think you should really go for it this time. Not, you understand, because I have ANY vested interest in being amused and amazed by the outcome. No no.
Ok… I can’t even, for the sake of being nice pretend this looked appealing. I know, I know it’s all in the name of saving money and using what you have but EWWWW! Maybe if it weren’t 8:40 in the morning it would look a bit better but these pictures scare me. Each one a little more than the other. But hey, that’s just one woman’s opinion right? I’ve tried things similar….it ended in lots of time spent in the bathroom.
I know how you can save A LOT of money, Bossy! Stop buying knives like that! I know that knife and it’s gonna be pictured in your blog till the day you die. It better anyway! Kudos to the fam for eating that!
Is it just me? Or, is this not so much daily?
I think I would have pureed the bean mixture, minus the bread for a hummusy dip and then sliced the stale bread and served as chips with the bean mixture.
[...] But Bossy will break with her custom and prepare corn souffle in the coming weeks, because who is she if not entertaining her readers with inedible pantry cooking tutorials? [...]