This week we are continuing to focus on food and eliminate food waste as well as using the items we have in the pantry and freezers. I am using today (Saturday) to focus on making some convivence items that simply need to be heated in order to serve. First up was an Artisian Cinnamon and Raisin bread. This used up 3 small boxes of raisin and was a huge hit. The downside to this bread is the 20 hours it takes to make. I will save this one as a weekend treat when we are out of bread again!
We took 5 pounds of raw ground beef from the freezer to turn into Taco meat. Matt fried up the meat and we added some tomatoes, tomato sauce, water and taco seasoning to the crockpot. It cooked on low for 2 hours and then on warm overnight. This morning I was able to turn off the crockpot and let cool down. I packaged a total of 8 meals – 2 one-pound packs and 6 -meat for 12 taco packs. These are stashed away in the freezer for the upcoming spring busy season.
Matt found the last remaining pound of Italian sausage which I turned into 2 baked spaghettis. This meal actually used up all the provolone cheese and ricotta cheese from the freezers as well.
Additional time was spend moving items and looking through the freezers as well. I have finally been able to relocate all the cans from under my desk to the pantry shelves. From the freezers, our last gallon of milk along with several cartons of chocolate milk and containers of apple juice have been moved into the refrigerator so that we can begin to use up these surplus items as well. I suggested that we may want to try and clean out completely our chest freezer and defrost in order to keep it working properly in the future; This appears to be a task that may take longer than my anticipated time frame as we can now close that freezer easily without weighting the top down, but it is nowhere near empty, and the stand-up freezer remains busting at the seams.
After attending our friend’s anniversary party, we were invited to help eat up the leftovers for our meal after church on Sunday. This is a huge money saver as Sunday lunches continue to be our treat meal out most weeks!