Unintentional Pantry Challenge

I'm not doing the classic January Pantry Challenge, where you try not to buy any food for a whole month and just cook with what's already in the pantry and freezer.  I would run out of eggs and dairy, not to mention fresh produce.  Also, I'm as concerned about inflation and product availability as everyone else, and don't want to pass up a good deal when I see it.

However, I did find myself creating this month's meal plan almost entirely based on what I have on hand.  Yes, that's the point of this blog.  I also think I stored up too much last year when inflation was unchecked.  Anything that didn't seem too expensive went into storage.  I probably have six months of legumes and pulses, if I ever want to go vegan.  There's still kale in the garden, and I really want to use up what's in the freezer to get that space back, plus whatever new things I'm growing now.  There's also everything I canned, since that was my fun new toy.  I need to use and rotate all this food, or the money spent on it is wasted.

First up was pinto and kale enchiladas with pesto.  I was considering calling them "Italian Enchiladas", but that would be manicotti.  Pesto in the filling and a very mild tomato enchilada sauce.

New Year's breakfast, I usually make waffles, but I had some pumpkin pancake mix in the pantry.  That, plus some frozen hash browns and one of several packs of sausage links in the freezer was a fancy way to start the new year without buying anything.

I finally had enough arugula in the garden for a salad, and cobbled together one with other items scavenged from the garden to have with franks'n'beans.  Not fancy, and certainly not blog-worthy, but it was a really satisfying meal.

I didn't get my peanut butter cream pie for Christmas because of remaking the pumpkin one, but I had already bought the ingredients.  Made one for myself, which did take a week to finish.

The second week of the year, I finally needed to go grocery shopping in order to make a lasagna.  It actually ended up being a lot of filling, so I made a second 8x8 one for the freezer.  I added enough routine items to my grocery list to make it worth the trip.  I really missed shopping those two weeks, but the truth was I didn't need anything.

I don't know how many trips I'll end up making this month, but I'm definitely going to spend less than usual.  It's the end result of buying in bulk, canning, and having a year-round garden.  Makes up for the price of eggs.