Inventory

My last post was about the 30 day challenge I am doing to clean out my pantry and freezer. On Saturday morning, I emptied the pantry and the freezer part of my fridge. I found the following:

• 10+ cans of various types of beans
• 3 bags of brown rice
• 2 bags of red kidney beans
• 3 boxes of cold cereal
• 2 boxes of instant oatmeal
• 2 jars of peanut butter
• 2.5 gal of juice PLUS 8 cans of frozen concentrate
• 3 boxes of assorted crackers + 2 boxes of animal crackers
• 5 packages of frozen brats
• Various other canned, box and frozen goods

This doesn't include the deep freeze I have in the garage that I have yet to be brave enough to dig through. Off the top of my head, I know there are several roasts, multiple packages of pumpkin puree, 1 or 2 honey hams, and possibly some sweet corn and green beans.

So far, we have came up with several easy meals, including the following:

• Steamed tilapia and veggies
  
• Garlic butter shrimp with butter noodles
• Taquitos and canned pineapple
• Cheese quesadillas and baked potatoes with bean dip
• Spaghetti and garlic bread

I have even re-purposed some of these meals. I cooked some brown rice and added it to the tilapia and veggies for lunch Monday. There were alot of butter noodles (spaghetti noodles thrown with butter, parsley, and garlic) leftover, so I dug the shrimp out and put the noodles in with the spaghetti. The bean dip was perfect for dipping veggies into for a snack, also.

Several people have told me they had the same problem with their pantry and out-of-control grocery bills, so they went to a monthly meal planner. I'm very seriously thinking about adopting this policy. I'm sure there will be a little more effort that goes into this, rather than cruising the aisles of the grocery store at 5 pm deciding what I will cook for supper. However, I'm sure it will be well worth it when I can cut my grocery bill in half. I have hardly ever bought more than 1 gallon of milk at a time, but when I stopped to think about it, there is no reason why I can't. Brody and I go through a gallon of milk in a week or less and usually the sell-by date is 2 weeks out or more. I stopped by last night and bought 2 gallons, so that should make it easier to stay out of the store for awhile, also!

Here is the link for the bean dip I made. I modified the recipe to suit the ingredients I had (pinto beans; lemon juice from a bottle; no coriander, onion, lime zest, or tomato paste) and it turned out wonderful! I spread it on my cheese quesadillas and my baked potato (I'm weird), and dipped green peppers in it.