30 Day Pantry Challenge

Ever hear of a Pantry Challenge?  Ever taken a Pantry Challenge?


It's not a complicated concept, let's just eat what we already have on hand.  Perhaps you've taken the challenge without even realizing it due to a period of unemployment, illness or just a month that lasted longer than your budget.

I keep a fairly well stocked pantry and freezer.  By most people's standards I keep a VERY well stocked pantry and freezer.  With that in mind I think a pantry challenge would do me good to use up items before their expiration date and to just rotate the old with the new.  I've got freezers full of meat that I'm always in a panic to use before the next hunting season and home canned goods that I'd like to use up before the next garden is ready for harvest.

Our ancestors would stock up and preserve food for winter.  I think that mind set is still in us, bread into us down to a cellular level.  Grocery stores are readily available for most of us yet even they offer several opportunities a year to stock up on canned goods by the case as well as buying meat in bulk. 

Well, winter is hear and I'm ready to cash in.  I figured what better time to take a self imposed pantry challenge than the first of the year.  We all want to lose a few pounds, just the act of eating in rather than out will help achieve that.  Everyone always wants to declutter, why not start with the shelves.  Resolving to save money?  Check, this covers that too.  Have you already bought these groceries, yes.  Will you have to replace them, perhaps.  But coming off of a month of gift giving many may enjoy a month to just breathe a sigh of financial relief knowing that they can greatly reduce their grocery budget.  Finally, how many would enjoy more family time.  Eating together accomplishes that as well.

January 2nd will kick off my 30 day challenge. Will I have a $0 grocery budget, of course not.  There will still be perishables and my hubby has to have his soda and coffee creamer but If I can get by with that being my only grocery purchase I will be saving hundreds of dollars the month of January.

It's likely that my family will not even notice a change in meals the first week or two, as the pantry shelves clear they may notice the meals getting a little more creative but that doesn't mean they can't still be delicious.  Have you ever noticed that sometimes when the power goes out or when you're forced to cook from your cupboards that the meals actually get better than when you have all the conveniences of daily shopping?  I know I have.

Take the challenge with me, or simply follow along for tips or pointers on how to do your own in the future.  Don't have a well enough stocked pantry to do 30 days? Just do a week or two.  Bottom line, any meal that you can make work with what you have on hand is one less meal coming out of your budget for the month

Mac N' Cheese Soup......Comfort Food to the Max

With Christmas in the books and plenty of leftovers in the fridge, I didn't even have to try to pretend I was going to remember to thaw anything for supper tonight.  As I was leaving work and driving the hour plus commute home my mind began to wander down the what's for dinner path.  I knew we had about eight pounds of ham left so clearly that was my best choice.  I quickly remembered a Mac N' Cheese soup that I had made years ago.  I couldn't remember the entire recipe but remembered it had Velveeta Shells and Cheese and Campbell's Cheddar Soup.  I also remembered I had originally seen it in an issue of Taste of Home magazine, many, many years ago. (Probably at least 15 years)  I likely still have that issue on my cookbook shelf but thought it might be in an archive online.  I googled, 'Taste of Home Mac and cheese soup'.  The first search result sounded delicious but was more "from scratch" and definitely not the same recipe.  The second result was the winner, though I almost didn't recognize it because it called for broccoli.  I thought about it a vaguely remembered that perhaps the original recipe did call for broccoli and I just omitted it because I didn't like broccoli at that time.  I do now so I stopped to pick up broccoli on the way home.

Mac N' Cheese Soup

Ingredients:

1 package (14oz) Deluxe Macaroni and Cheese (the one with the creamy cheese sauce, not the blue box with the powder)

1 cup water plus water to boil macaroni in

2 Tbsp Finely chopped onion

1 can (10.75oz) Condensed Cheddar Cheese soup

2 1/2 cups milk

1 cup Chopped fully cooked ham

Directions:

1. Set aside cheese sauce packet from macaroni and cheese mix.  In a large saucepan, bring 8 cups water to a boil.  Add macaroni and cook 8-10 minutes until noodles are tender.

2. Meanwhile, in your stock pot bring 1 cup of water to a boil.  Add broccoli and onion; cook, uncovered for 3 minutes.  Stir in soup, milk, ham and contents of cheese packet; heat through. Drain the cooked macaroni and add to soup pot, stir.

Say grace and enjoy