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Here at the Food on Fridays carnival, any post remotely related to food is welcome—though we love to try new dishes, your post doesn’t have to be a recipe. If you want, you could simply snap a few shots of your garden, farmer’s market or the produce department of your local supermarket to show readers where you buy your fresh food.
My point is that we’re pretty relaxed over here, and posts like that are as welcome as menus and recipes.
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Food on Fridays with Ann
When we bought our house, I realized it didn’t have a pantry. We bought it anyway, resolving we’d be fine dedicating two or three cabinets to food storage and tucking extra cereal boxes or soup cans in the basement—after all, taking the stairs a few more times each day would burn more calories. It would force us into a healthier lifestyle, right?
Well, trudging downstairs for ingredients got old pretty quick. Before long I got lazy and started sending the kids down, avoiding the trip whenever possible.
Two years ago we installed shelves in the laundry room and transferred a few food items there from the basement; but you have to slip through the bathroom to get to our laundry room. I’ve never asked, but I’m sure our guests have been puzzled—even disgusted—watching us head straight for the bathroom to retrieve a bag of chips.
Well, we saved our pennies and hired a handyman to remove a couple of cabinets and a kitchen desk to make room for some kitchen storage. In that space, he hung drywall, installed deep shelving, hung sliding doors, and now?
We have a pantry. A real kitchen pantry.
I collected food from the basement, the laundry room shelf, the cabinets where I had been stuffing boxes and bags and cans. Now it’s all in one place.
I discovered cans of tiny shrimp I intended to use for dip, several canisters of old-fashioned oats, numerous bags and partial bags of egg noodles, seven cake mixes, and seven cans of evaporated milk.
Seven cake mixes!
Seven cans of evaporated milk!
I made an angel food cake the day the pantry was installed, to celebrate. And one of my daughters is making another cake even as I write. So we’re down to a reasonable number of cake mixes.
But seven cans of evaporated milk is a bit too much. To systematically use it up, I did a quick search for recipes listing evaporated milk as a key ingredient and plan to make these in the next few weeks:
- Quiche Lorraine
- macaroni and cheese
- corn chowder
- Pumpkin pie (I’ve made this recipe)
We’re downright inspired, and it’s all because of my new pantry.
14 Responses to Food on Fridays: Kitchen Pantry
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Blogger: Pursuing a Christ-centered, creative, curious, slightly quirky, slow-down life and sharing it with you, post after post. (Home of Food on Fridays).
Author: Not So Fast: Slow-Down Solutions for Frenzied Families
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ann kroeker. curator. (read it, liked it)- I Do: Doing | The High Calling February 22, 2012
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Thank you for hosting! I’m sharing two recipes this week.
I am so happy you have a pantry! No kitchen should be without one!
One way to use up one can of the milk is to make my Chili Relleno. 2 Eggs, 2 T flour mix with a can of evap milk. 1/2# jack and 1/2# cheddar cheese shredded, 1 can diced green chilies . Layer the cheese and chilies and pour milk, flour and egg mix on top. Bake@ 350 degrees 30 min and then cover with 1 can tomato sauce, back in oven for another 15 min. Enjoy. This goes good for a side dish when you make tacos.
If you have extra white or yellow cake mix, we found a delightful peanut butter cookie recipe on the internet using cake mix. (suggestion) I had a LOT of white mix I got on sale so – - -
Your pantry looks wonderful! I have a big kitchen, with lots of cupboards, but no actual pantry. I really think every kitchen needs one. I like the recipes you linked to as well, especially the pumpkin pie. Thank you for hosting
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If aliens invade, I’m coming to your house because your brand-spanking-new pantry actually has food in it. Mine only has tea and wine and cereal.
Oh, I can’t wait to see it! I think I remember an earlier reference to a new pantry, but I had no idea how inspiring it would be! And to think, SEVEN cake mixes! That’s a lot of cake. Maybe I’ll be there for one of them!
By the way, last week’s Mexican salad was AMAZING! I don’t think I stuck exactly to the recipe, but it was still great!
Hurray for your new pantry!!
Haha! That was fun to read
I can only imagine that poor food wondering around the house to finally end up were it belonged!
)
I see you like your beans and that you’re also a “pasta fan”. The same thing happens to me: I keep buying pasta and noodles and wherever I turn there’s another bag laying around
Have a nice we! I know you made mine!
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Aren’t pantries the best? I was 48 before I had a pantry. It’s satisfying to see it full. I bet the woman in Proverbs 31 had an amazing pantry.
14 She is like merchant ships;
She brings her food from afar.
15 She rises also while it is still night
And gives food to her household
And portions to her maidens.
I want to call down a blessing on your pantry…may it nourish your family well.
Jealous. We have this great house, but NO PANTRY! And my wife keeps saying, “What were they thinking when they built this?” We didn’t really notice until we lived here a while, and started seeing pantries in other houses.
Like you, we have substituted other cabinets for the pantry, and keep talking about messing around with building something, somewhere. But it hasn’t happened yet. (We’ll survive, I’m sure!)