Empty the Storecupboard Challenge: Week 10

It’s Week Ten already and the Store Cupboard Challenge is nowhere near running out of steam, although there’s now a visible dent in the amount of stored food we still need to use up. If you want to check on the progress yourself, it’s been updated in the original article.

The weather’s mostly been very warm and muggy over the past week so we had some storecupboard salads: giant cous cous with prawns, pasta with mozzarella and roasted vegetables, and quinoa with tofu and beetroot.

The cous cous salad (see above) used up some more of the giant cous cous. I added defrosted prawns, a squeeze of lemon, baby broad beans, cucumber, and a handful of fresh dill, and it was just right for a simple supper.

The quinoa salad (below left) got rid of the tiny amount of quinoa, and to be honest we could have done with a bit more of it for balance in the dish. Maybe that’s why it had been sitting there for so long in the first place – too little of it left for a proper meal. Anyway, it had a generous amount of cooked beetroot added to it, plus shredded spring onions, home grown sugar snap peas, tofu cubes and some teriyaki sauce.

Finally, the pasta salad (right) was what used up the end of the first bag of dried penne. It also used up a load of leftover roasted vegetables, some mozzarella, a few olives, basil from the garden, and a few drops of balsamic vinegar and olive oil. An easy old favourite, but still a good one.

Salad was the only way to go last week, and we enjoyed all the fresh flavours.

This week’s three meals

It’s going to be a busy week, so I’ll be keeping it simple over the next few days with these dishes:

1. Sausage casserole with paprika sauce. This should use up the last carton of paprika sauce and some more cous cous, and I’ll add some extra vegetables to bulk it out.

2. Macaroni cheese with vegetables. A handy way to get rid of the last box of macaroni mix and whatever veg is lying around the bottom or the fridge or ready in the garden.

3. Another pasta salad. Anything to get started on emptying that second bag of penne!

I’ll also try to remember to make up a batch of chocolate pudding to serve with fruit, as we haven’t been using that up as fast as I’d hoped.

Are you doing your own Empty the Storecupboard Challenge? How are you preventing food waste and using your stored food up?