lemon rosemary salsa pasta with grilled chicken on top rescued from dinner

So Julian brought me a couple of DELICIOUS roasted lemon chicken breasts from whatever fabulous party he had catered that day which prompted a beautiful exploration of how to combine salsa sauce and pasta sauce (i had about a third of a bottle of each in fridge) as well as finally use the giant sprig of rosemary that has been sitting in the crisper for oh, 2 years.

from pantry:
rosemary sprig thing and actual rosemary in it
salsa sauce
marinara pasta sauce
spaghetti
sriracha


add ons
lemon chicken breast from Julian's gourmet cooking. could be any leftover chicken thing you have

 

the fun part is the i combined salsa sauce and leftover pasta sauce to make the sauce with a tiny splash of sriracha and then took the rosemary and used that to tie the flavors together. It was actually delish!! the lemon with rosemary added to spicy tomato base PERFECT. This pic uploaded sideways. you get the idea though. didnt add any additional seasoning because salsa sauce took care of that.

Raid your friend's pantry

Yeah one thing i have learned is that if you visit your friend who is probably also part of the poverty jet set like you and me, on the day before they travel to an out of town gig or go visit their parents in Australia or go cat sit at their friend's beverly hills pad for  a week, you can raid their pantry of perishables.  Just go :"should I take your milk and eggs and cheese or whatever? I dont mind taking them off your hands so they don't go bad". sounds like you are doing them a favor but actually you get to pantry raid in a different zip code!!

brown rice eggs for brekkie mmmmm

from the pantry:
a half a thing of takeout chinese brown rice
pepper flakes
a dollop of parmesan artichoke dressing

add ons leftover half bagel and ramikin of cream cheese from craft services at dr phil.
              2  eggs ($2 for the dozen)


cost: $2

check it out.  nothing is wasted -- that little bit of rice from takeout or leftovers adds crunch texture and some rice protein to eggs.  Pepper flakes mmmm spice her up! the dressing is a thing i might have invented.  From door of fridge when doing a scrambled egg, instead of little bit of water or milk, adding dressing adds instant seasoning and flavor. Annies Artichoke and Parmesan is great example of a thick gorgeous dressing that can be repurposed in this mix.

Bagel and cream cheese were pulled off craft table at dr. phil and i took em home instead of throwing out uneaten portion because um, hello fabulous breakfast!! pic is mediocre but it tasted sooooooo good.

What the farfalle? tuna casserole.

Get crazy with your spices and ingredients.

From Pantry:

1 beat up can of cambells cream of mushroom soup
1 half box of random farfalle pasta
half a bottle of salsa
half a bottle of spaghetti sauce
salt and pepper
red pepper flakes
parmesan (or garlic i can no longer tell what it is)

add ons: none

total cost today: 0

Right-- real quick this is from childhood and i still love it and it has a very homey taste.  cook up your pasta. Stir in the Campbells cream of mushroom soup over low heat which by the way is apparently a staple for a zillion recipes. Classic. anyhow. then pour in the tuna and stir around for awhile. If you wanna get fancy pour whole mix into casserole dish top with parmesan or whateva cheese and breadcrumbs and bake for a few minutes.  Me, i just season with the salt pepper and flakes, throw in some parmesan on the top (although it could be garlic i don't even know where i got that dispenser), and away we go. mmmmmmm.

Asian influenced american chicken chili rice in a bag mashup

from the pantry:
chicken chili leftovers (could be any kinda thing like it)

a beef broccoli rice in a bag thing
1 persian cucumber
8 peanuts
sriracha


add ons: none
cost today 0$


So the chicken chili was leftovers from a catered party my friend went to which is kind of sort of an add on but it could be pretty much any chili/casserole/meat thing.
The idea was to make something good with the " knorr's sides" rice in a bag broccoli and beef flavor which sat in the pantry for a long time because is just seemed so SPECIFIC. I cooked that up and heated up the leftover chili, which got put on top of the seasoned rice side, then topped it with some peanuts and sliced cucumber, with sriracha sprinkled on it.  A kind of indonesian spin on a pretty all american side dish and protein.  It ended up being a pretty delicious and it looked sort of like dinner at aunties house in jakarta. sort of. That pack of persian cucumbers went a LONGGG way.

Sriracha rules the pantry for zing.

Pantry Raid Staple
cost: about 5 bucks
On Top Chef one of the contestants said she would put sriracha in ANYTHING -- And for pantry raiding i have to agree.  My relatives in Indonesia call anything spicy hot "sambal" and i think there is actually a sambal brand.  It is wayyyy hotter and is mostly pure chili, i like it on rice and dark meats. But the blend of garlic and chili in sriracha seriously amps any egg, pasta , even salad, and because you don't need much one bottle goes a longggg way. My fridge door feels naked without one of these badboys in it.  The secret to pantry raids is to make even the most mundane of foods taste delicious and well conceived. Sriracha is one of the ways to do that.  I sprinkle some on top of a dressed salad, especially the creamy Goddess kind of dressing that I prefer, which by the way also functions as a great flavor burst in eggs, sandwiches etc.  I put sriracha on a grilled cheese and sprinkle it on kraft mac and cheese.  in my tuna salad it gives a little kick.

Melty spicy Cheese and persian cucumber jaffles

From Pantry

2 slices american cheese
margerine
Siracha sauce
one half persian cucumber
2 slices bread
salt and pepper
1tsp of parmesan artichoke dressing

Add ons: none
Total cost today: 0
All these ingredients can be subsituted but the point was to make a hot gourmet tasting sandwich with whatever weird things i had left. And to use those american cheese slices which are hard to make taste high brow.  The key to this was to make something in the style of the Australian Jaffle  which is cooked on the outside, on all sides actually. 2 kinds of cheese flavor amps a sandwich and a spicy kick helps too. I melted some margerine in a frying pan, browned one side of the bread, then placed between the bread, both cheese slices, the siracha hot sauce, the parmesan dressing (which again can be substituted for any creamy dressing OR a second kind of cheese) As a unit i browned the outsides of the bread in the pan turning the whole sandwich over and over while making little cucumber slices from the persian cucumbers I inherited from my traveling friend.  When cheese melted I removed form heat and inserted the cukes between the bread, sliced in half and made a very delicious, spicy melty sandwich with a crunch.

NY Deli Egg and Ketchup Sandwich (from inherited ingredients)

From pantry:
2 slices honey wheat bread (from half loaf left to me by carrie who went to new york last week)
1 egg
kethcup packs (from random trip to the carls junior)
salt and pepper
1 slice american cheese (left in fridge by subletter from september)
Add ons: None
Cost today $0


I remember from New York how two eggs on a roll is a buck 25 and tastes really good with ketchup pepper and salt on a melty soft kaiser roll.  So I had exactly one egg in the pantry (left to me as part of a half dozen,  last week by Rachel who went to Miami.) Normally I am a two egg one bread or two egg one tortilla person but since i only had one, I toasted up 2 slices of bread because the loaf looks like its teetering on its freshness date anyway and fried up the egg seasoning with salt and pepper. I took a slice of the american cheese that has been languishing on the bottom shelf because I rarely use it for anything, and put it on top of the egg to melt.  I margerined up one side of one slice of toast, laid on the egg and the cheese blend and then opened up 2 ketchup packs that have been sitting where the butter is supposed to go in the door of the fridge.  sliced the sandwich in half and to my delight pretty much recreated the taste of monday mornings in new york on the corner of 83rd and Amsterdam on my way to school at Lincoln center. And I gotta tell you, in this particular context a kraft slice tastes PERFECT.

Cous Cous Faux-entine.

From pantry:
cous cous
half bag of frozen spinach
5 raisins
10 peanuts
pat of real butter
olive oil
tbsp of parmesan artichoke dressing
one egg
pepper and salt to taste
Purchased Add ons: none
cost today: $0

This is from a rather meager pantry-- about half way through what was in there when i arrived two weeks ago.  Remember the goal is to eat everything in there before i go the the grocery store.  If people go on vacation and give me their perishables it adds to the pantry. If my friend who is in catering brings me back half a lasagne it adds to it and so on.  I am someone who is known to order 50 bucks of food from yummy.com just to avoid going to the store (it's LA that is DRAMA), and eat their prefab sushi and sandwiches and smores which are kind of to die for actually, and I can easily drop 30 on bottled water cool whip and mighty leaf tea.  So this is a real change of attitude for me.  Recession mentality. I also feel like Patsy and Edina when they tried to be poor and ended up blowing six figures because of all the trouble they got into.

Today was east meets west with a spinach/egg/cheese florentine flavor added to moroccan cous cous.  I made a box of cous cous which takes five minutes and a cup of water. When it had puffed up to cous cous size I added 5 raisins which I have been rationing from the one box i had in the pantry, to throw on top of salads and whatnot, and 10 peanuts from a jar that some subletter left here this summer. There are about 30 peanuts left as well as the peanut dust which i am going to put in a sauce. This is pantry raid people, we use EVERYTHING.  Then I made the bold move of cooking up the half bag of frozen spinach that was in the freezer-- again I think left over from some errant subletter.  I seasoned with pepper and salt and a pat of real irish butter that kristen likes to eat when she visits (i myself am a margerine girl) I immediately put half to couscous and half the spinach in tupperware.  Then I set the spinach on top of the cous cous (and raisins and peanuts) and poured on some Annies artichoke and parmesan dressing which sits in the door of my fridge for when mysoy free gluten free friends visit.  Remembering that on Top Chef people like to put an egg over easy on things and break the yolk for texture I cooked one egg in the spinach pan in some olive oil, flipped it and then put it on top of the spinach and cous cous. Broke the yolk let it mix with the sauce and couscous and greenery.  I have to tell you it tasted pretty freaking delicious. It reminded me of those hippy restuarants like Juice For Life in Toronto and Real Food Daily in Los Angeles where they make rice bowls and just kinda mash on textures and vegetables and usually some version of tahini and it tastes healthy and sort of like dirt.  And all the wait staff are white people with dreadlocks who leave a waft of patchouli and cayenne pepper as they swish past your table in their hemp clothes.  It's a style and i like it sometimes. Mine had a kind of moroccan flair from the raisin peanut cous cous action with a florentine french twist from the egg and spinach.