Dec 2, 2008
The Daily Poverty Post.
A while back, someone asked Bossy to write about what kind of meals she prepares utilizing the canned goods in her pantry, and Bossy thanks you for that question because now she has a reason not to use those very cans to hurl at her husband’s head the next time he goes to the store and forgets to write down what he purchased.
The photo above summarizes what Bossy has remaining in her pantry, only times six divided by one tin of smoked oysters.
So, for instance, Bossy will heat up the Chicken Vegetable soup and eat that. She knows, right? It’s a culinary wonder.
The Mandarin Orange Segments is something Bossy bought in case she gets in the mood to put them in a salad, along with thinly sliced red onion and almond slivers. But the funny thing is, Bossy never thinks she deserves to make her salads fancy; the occasion is rarely there — although that’s not true because sometimes Bossy will go to the store special just to purchase crumbly blue cheese for her salad, or pine nuts and goat cheese. So maybe it’s that Bossy doesn’t really know how to make a good salad using her mandarin oranges because whenever she has done it in the past, the salad tastes watery. So maybe Bossy is waiting for Bossy’s mother to come over and prepare this salad for Bossy, because when Bossy’s mom puts mandarin oranges in her salads, it’s never watery. Hi Bossy’s mom!
Next we have the Tomato Juice, which Bossy keeps in the house for hangovers, where keeps in the house equals sending her husband out to the store for tomato juice because what do you mean somebody already drank all of the hangover juice — and what do you mean “It was Bossy” ??
And Bossy has other tomato products in her pantry, such as tomato paste and canned whole tomatoes, which Bossy uses as the base for her gravy. And yes, it’s called gravy, it’s not spaghetti sauce.
Next we have the Whole Kernel Corn, which Bossy bought to make her Corn Souffle, even though Bossy sort of thinks of Corn Souffle as a summer food, but the issue remains: when Bossy makes it in the summer she uses fresh Jersey Corn, which is the best in the country. Shush up, Illinois.
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?
The Coconut Milk is an easy one– Bossy and her husband use this in everything when they get in the mood to prepare their faux Thai food, where faux Thai food equals It contains Coconut Milk, doesn’t it?
And next we have the Cannellini Beans — although Bossy also has many cans of Butter Beans and other beans — in fact Bossy has enough beans to propel her windy roommate to the next BlogHer conference.
First Bossy drains the beans and then she puts them in a pan with a splash of olive oil and diced fresh garlic and ginger and maybe even a splash or two of milk and lots of flat-leaf parsley and sometimes a diced whole tomato or two, and the result is somewhere between a soup and a side dish.
But it’s oh so delicious, where oh so equals Oh, so this is why beans have the reputation of being gaseous.
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Thanks, Bossy.
We just purged our pantry of outdated items and it is still overflowing.
Perhaps, draining the madarin slice on a paper towel or through a collander would help. I guess to be truly frugal we would have to use the juices in the dressing, right?
Also, a good way to use up your beans is to add them to your fancy salad.
Beans for chili. It’s inexpensive and so easy to make. A crock pot full lasts us several meals.
Mandarin oranges. My kids eat them by the can fulls.
Soup, another staple.
My pantry was empty but for refried beans and spices. Stocked up on soup.
Jersey Corn and Illinois Corn have nothin on Iowa corn. Nuff said.
We’ve been cleaning out the pantry, too. You can’t believe some of the crap I’ve concocted and you won’t believe we actually ate it. God I wish I was rich.
tomato juice – bloody marys!
corn – make corn bread/corn muffins!
mandarin oranges – add to vanilla yogurt!
soup – all by itself!
Every year, around this time (when it starts the downward temperature spiral until it hits 30 BELOW zero), I start thinking I like canned soup. So I buy canned soup, only to remember months later that it is the vilest thing on Earth. Sigh.
If you’re not Italian (and for some reason I’m thinking Bossy is so NOT) I personally believe it is affected to call sauce gravy. And really, how many cocktail parties have you spent (read ‘wasted’ arguing about this? Medigans = sauce. Italiano = gravy. Even if you have many friends in S. Philadelphia, frequently shop in the vicinity of 9th & Washington and can spell E-A-G-L-E-S but pronounce it Iggles. Really.
I can’t believe you don’t have one extra small can of tuna fish (in OIL, nonetheless) or a random can of Yams. Both seem to live in my cupboard despite my best efforts.
We had Coconut Milk still in the cupboard last week and used it for Thai rice made of Bismati rice. It was good and got rid of that dreadful looking can.
Oh gawd! I thought that was a picture of the ingredients, and that you were going to make us a meal using all those cans put together! Aagh!
I think we could live for months on the canned food in the pantry. If we ever get snowed in (here in San Diego) – we are set! On the other hand, I’ve been spending hand over fist on fancy lunches and nights out (see today’s post) lately so maybe we will have to crack open up a few of those cans soon…
15 minute white bean soup (adapted from Everyday Food). I love this recipe because I generally have all of the ingredients so there’s no excuse to eat out:
One 19 oz. can of white beans (duh)
16-18 oz. of chicken broth
2 tsps of olive oil
1 clove of garlic
1/4 -1/2 cup diced onion (give or take depending on taste) OR 1-2 scallions
1 1/2 tsp. fresh lemon juice
some dried herbs like oregano, basil, rosemary, parsley (about 2-3 tsp.)
course salt and pepper
Heat oil and brown onion, garlic and herbs (5 minutes until soft). Add broth and beans until heated through. Smash some of the beans with a wooden spoon to thicken broth. After it’s heated, add lemon juice and season to taste. This makes enough for two, but is easily doubled.