Pantry Collective

Apparently, I am a big fan of beef bourguignon, since I actually have another recipe here for it. This one is quite a bit better, though. The sauce is thicker and more flavorful, and doesn’t rely on canned mushroom soup for flavor. I saw the recipe over at Ezra Pound Cake last week and knew I had to make this yummy winter stew again.

I left out the bacon (intentionally) and the pearl onions (unintentionally). I just never have bacon on hand and really didn’t want to buy it just for this dish. And I am one of those people who doesn’t love bacon flavoring in everything, although I know many people do. I’m sure it adds a lot of flavor to the dish, but I promise, if you leave it out it is totally fine. The pearl onions, on the other hand, were forgotten about until it was already served. Oops! I might throw them in when reheating the leftovers.

That’s fresh baked No-Knead Bread on the plate, along with creamy mashed potatoes and roasted asparagus (two accompaniments I repeated from the first recipe). Yum!

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This summer, my friend Shama invited John and me over for quiche. It was quite yummy (although she will do that thing cooks do where they find the one less-than-perfect thing and tell you about that when they describe the dish - I understand, I do it all the time!), and I was inspired to make my own the next weekend. We had it for dinner, but it’s a great brunch dish, too.

I used a random assortment of vegetables. Swiss chard from the CSA, zucchini, onions, mushrooms, and some de-podded edamame (is de-podded the proper term? I have no idea…). I think you can get away with whatever veggies you want in this type of dish, really. I vaguely looked at recipes, but decided quiche couldn’t be all THAT hard and kind of improvised. I did use a store-bought pie crust that I already had in the freezer, so I don’t get any “from-scratch” points here, but hey, it was delicious and easy and that is what matters sometimes.

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Spring in Chicago is temperamental. We’ll have some hot days, so hot you’re considering installing the air conditioners, and then BOOM, it’s 45 degrees and cloudy for a week. Then a warm, sunny day that makes your heart sing, which leads right back into a chilly rain or even some hail. On one of those chilly, gray days, I needed something comforting. I had some beef in the fridge and some root vegetables on hand, so beef stew was the obvious choice. I decided at the last minute to add a hint of sweet (or at least the idea of sweetness) to this otherwise savory dish with some cinnamon and nutmeg. Make this in the crockpot and your house will smell AMAZING all day long.

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I recently had a Lean Cuisine for lunch, Salmon with Orzo something-or-other. I didn’t like the salmon much at all, but it reminded me that I should make orzo more often. I love pasta, and the small, rice-like shape of orzo lends itself well to being mixed with lots of veggies and a bit of chicken. I think. What do I know about proper use of various pasta shapes? What I do know is that this dish was really tasty. Spicy, garlicky, full of veggies, and really satisfying. There’s no cream or anything in the dish, but it comes out tasting somewhat creamy, which is really nice. You could also add some chopped tomatoes, or any other veggie you think would work. I’ll bet this would be really good with shrimp, too. You can also eat it cold, as a pasta salad.

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This isn’t the most glamorous meal, I’ll admit. But what to do when you have half a head of broccoli, a few almost-gone carrots, and some leftover roasted chicken? I wanted to use up the veggies before they went bad, and the chicken needed to be eaten, too. I could have just heated up the chicken, steamed the veg, and made some rice, I suppose… but I had a few other ingredients on hand in the pantry that could make the meal a little more exciting than just leftovers. I’m calling this refrigerator pasta because it’s made with stuff I had hanging around in (you guessed it) the fridge. Obviously there could be many different “refrigerator pastas”; this is just one quick and easy version.

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