mango's very tidy and sparkling clean kitchen.
Welcome back, Cure-takers and Cure-voyeurs. I don't know about you, but I'm totally inspired by all the cleaning out, nipping and tucking going on in people's kitchen cupboards and fridges.
mandarinmarie says "The fish sticks are already gone and I'm throwing out the stupid grape jelly that we haven't touched for a year, though."
Given the processed foods discussion, we heard quite a bit about grape jelly. Hopefully, by now, we've settled the question. As inspiring as it is, and as great of a job you've all done, I'm ready to move on from seeing photos of your ingredients.
It's time to cook.
Amalia12481's before and after shots are almost a Where's Waldo game since they don't actually look that different. But visit her Flickr page and read the plethora of notes on each photo.Let's review. Last week you went tearing through your kitchen and got rid of (donated, threw away, recycled, Freecycled, composted, etc.) highly processed foods, hopefully, and any remaining expired or other foods that are not suitable to be used. You also went through your tools and equipment, only keeping what you really need. While your cupboards and drawers were empty, you polished to a shine.
You are exhausted. And you are probably hungry.
mango, having finished her assignment from Week Two, jumped the gun and moved forward, seemingly reading my mind. She stocked back up with wholesome ingredients, and then cooked with them. They even ate by candlelight.
This Week's Assignments
• Finish up any unfinished business from Week One and Week Two
• Open all your cupboards and your fridge, take a long hard look at what you have, and cook a meal using the ingredients. If you are stumped, submit your list of ingredients with a photo, if possible, to our cupboard challenge - we'll help you.
• Photograph the process of making this meal: ingredients laid out, cooking, serving, eating. Post on the Flickr page, with photos labeled.
• Then, and only then, take a trip to your local market. If you have a farmers' market in your area, go. Purchase between one and three pieces of locally grown produce, if possible. Depending on your location, this might mean green-house lettuce. Maybe strawberries if you're in the southwest, lucky you. Report in, tell us what you find. Here in New York, it's pretty grim, but there are micro-greens, and cellared root vegetables. Ramps soon? Incorporate your purchase into a meal. Again, document it.
• Don't worry about how fancy your meal is. Next week we'll talk about culinary skills. This process of making this meal is meant to get you centered, using your new sparkling clean kitchen, and to show me and your fellow Cure-takers where you are in your cooking.
• Continue to check out The Kitchn Cure Flickr Page and upload your "before" and "after" photos. Open those cupboards and refrigerator doors and dare to show us the state of things. If you want to highlight your pics, put your link in with your comments. This will allow us all to talk about one and learn from one another's project. Remember to label your photos. By uploading your photos to the group pool, you are granting us permission to use them in a future post. Please enable permissions in your Flickr preferences.
• About half of the three hundred of you have taken the preliminary survey. It would be a great help if the rest of you did. It only takes a few minutes. Scroll down; the survey is at the very end of this post. Only take this survey if you've already officially joined for the Cure. The survey is at the very bottom of this page.
All The Info
• Kitchn Cure: Week Two! Going Deeper - Goodbye Processed Foods!
• Kitchn Cure: Week One! Getting Started and De-Cluttering Your Food
• All Kitchn Spring Cure 2008 Posts
• The Kitchn Cure Flickr Page
Here is the survey. Please, only take this survey if you've already officially signed up for the Cure.
Ack -- I already cooked a meal using the ingredients remaining after the cleanout...savory cornbread (homemade cornbread, of course) pudding, yum! But I didn't take any pictures. Darn, even though I got the step (ahead of time, no less) I feel like I missed it!
view SexyAnteater's profile
I too have been cooking my way through the excess as I go. Tonight will be a red lentil soup. I have a tried-and-true recipe with herbes de Provence, but my mom just sent me one with cumin and tomato paste. Since I have a tube of tomato paste that needs using up, I'll be trying that soup tonight.
I have a farmer's market visit planned, but I was on a mission to buy a mint plant and a chive plant. Wasn't hoping for anything much here in chilly NYC, but I will see what I will see. I did plan to snip a few chives for the weekend's scrambled eggs, though.
view cmcinnyc's profile
I also cooked a meal with my left over ingredients. I make a asian chicken udon noodle soup. It was a big hit with my boyfriend, and super easy to make.
view Christal's profile
I just cooked a meal last night too. Made a turkey pot pie using puff pastry that's been in the freezer I don't know how long (but it was still good), leftover turkey from the weekend, a few pieces of bacon that were left but not enough for breakfast, etc.
I'm hoping with fewer ingredients in stock I'll be able to remember better what's there and not double up on things by forgetting that I already have them.
Now to find the solution to recipes for which you need to buy an ingredient, only to use about a tsp of it and then it just sits there.
view ah-ha's profile
I've been lacking on posting my after photos, but I just finished this step ahead of time, too! I picked up green garlic and baby kale at the farmers market, and sauteed it up together. Had dinner al fresco with some BBQ'd salmon marinated with herbs and meyer lemons from our tree.
view cleverpseudonym's profile
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view Rosie's profile
Meh, underwhelmed. Like others, I've been cooking with a few things I've found during week 1 and 2. I think most people motivated enough to sign up for the cure are already centered in their kitchen, spiffed up or not. Plus here in NNJ, the farmers' market doesn't start until end of the month.
Here's looking ahead to week 4 and a more interesting assignment.
view SnorkelVik's profile
cmcinnyc, could you post that recipe? I've got tomato paste and red lentils, too!
view RebeccaCT's profile
Not sure that it's the same recipe, but here's a red lentil soup with tomato paste and cumin. It's delicious, and I plan to make it once there's room for more soup in fridge/freezer.
http://query.nytimes.com/gst/fullpage.html?res=9500E3DD1739F93AA35752C0A96E9C8B63&sec=&spon=&pagewanted=2
view renata's profile
I swear I don't usually have fish sticks! I don't think I had eaten a fish stick in 10 years until a few weeks ago when my husband decided he needed some.
I'm not gonna lie, though--they were delicious in that special, overly processed way. :)
view mandarinmarie's profile
Ok, I just posted the after of the upper cupboards. I admit, I completely forgot the timing when I signed up! We are leaving in a couple days for the next month so the cooking portion will have to happen either at my mother-in-laws mid week, or my mom's after next week. Sorry! I'll do what I can but will be without computer access for a couple weeks. This has been great so far anyway. I have moved stuff around and have all the essentials in my kitchen now, just have to work in the drawers and probably get rid of some never used items.
http://www.flickr.com/photos/25016255@N05/
The after set of pics, actually only 3 new ones.
LOL about the fish sticks!
view Shell's profile
I made a meal too! I found salmon in my freezer that my Dad brought us about a month ago. Turns out it was salmon that one of his buddies actually caught on some sort of crazy fishing trip. I also made stir-fried vegetables with cuban mojo. I had made a batch of mojo a few months ago and put it in there and forgot about it, so when I cooked the veggies I just cut a little frozen cube out of the container and threw it in. In addition to this, I attempted to make coconut rice, but managed to eff that up and had to convert it into coconut rice pudding, which my husband refused to eat.
view ShaniLO's profile
mandarinmarie... I actually love fish sticks. (I might be a 5-year-old girl at heart.)
view Carla Jean's profile
I gave into a frozen fish stick craving earlier this year, and the weakness bit me right in the butt when they got recalled a week later. They weren't very good, but I have an abiding faith in the concept of fish sticks. It's all in the execution, unfortunately.
And anybody who feels guilty about it or gets any flak should just call them goujons.
In my Cure progress, I finally got some pics up under rzta, and I finally found the bluetooth thingy that will let me free my "before" pics from the camera.
It's been going well, and I am in fact relieved to see it get emptier and emptier.
view renata's profile
Sorry for being a day late. Here's the recipe I used:
2 Tbs olive oil
1 med-large onion, minced
2 large cloves garlic, minced
1 Tbs tomato paste
1 tsp ground cumin (I used cumin seed as I'm out of ground)
1/2 tsp salt (I ended up adding more)
1/2 tsp pepper
pinch cayenne to taste
1 qt vegetable broth + 2 cups water (no broth--I used all h2o)
heaping cup red lentils
large carrot, diced
juice of 1/2 lemon
Saute the onion, garlic, then stir in the tomato paste & seasonings. Add the broth/water, lentils, carrot & simmer partially covered for 1/2 hr or until lentils are soft. Puree 1/2 the soup, return to pot and add the lemon juice.
It was excellent. Fresh parsley or cilantro would have been a nice garnish (had none).
view cmcinnyc's profile
cmcinnyc - could you post your recipe using the herbes de Provence as well? I bought some, and my father said they smelled like his mother's (or grandmother? They were both gone before I arrived,) cooking. I would like to find more recipes to use them in.
view cara_mia's profile
OK, here's the other red lentil recipe! This one is from Lorna Sass' Short-Cut Vegetarian, and it really does take about 1/2 an hour from start to serving:
5 cups water
veg stock powder or veg boullion or skip it (I usually do)
1 cup red lentils
2 cups chopped leeks or onions (leeks are better)
3 large carrots, sliced
1 1/2 Tbs herbes de Provence
salt & freshly ground black pepper to taste
fresh chopped parsley to garnish
Boil the water (and stock powder/boullion if you're using it), then add everything but the parsley. Simmer about 20 minutes, stirring frequently as the lentils tend to clump.
For some reason, my toddler really, really likes herbes de Provence, so this is a lifesaver quick recipe. Enjoy it!
view cmcinnyc's profile
I decided that I'd use up the rest of a bag of http://www.flickr.com/photos/sarahbest/2391397625/" target="_blank">frozen red raspberries this weekend by baking a batch of berry muffins for my sleeping boyfriend. (The recipe is in Marion Cunningham's Fanny Farmer Baking Cookbook). Ryan's birthday is this weekend so I thought I'd wake him up with some breakfast in bed. Unfortunately the muffins, which I've made many times in the past, turned a scary color of blue. I woke Ryan up and said "hmm, yeah I don't really know why they're blue." We started to eat them and they tasted like they didn't have any sugar in them. I later realized that in my bleary morning fog I'd switched out baking soda for baking powder. We had a good laugh about it, and I switched the blue muffins out for some cereal and oatmeal with fresh berries.
view sarahbest's profile
I just finished my "cupboard cooking" assignment. I made breakfast for my boy. Vietnamese omelets with all sorts of stuff I dug out of my cupboards/freezer. They turned out a bit salty (I forgot to subtract salt when I added fish sauce) but they were pretty good.
pictures and "recipe"
view mango's profile
Ah, life gets in the way sometimes, doesn't it? Although I always seem to take on these projects at what feels like the busiest, most stressful times, I do it because I want balance, and interests in my life that go beyond, but also incorporate, cooking and caring for my family.
I've caught up on week two and am inspired to go tackle the cooking challenge. Photos to come! Reading these posts has motivated me to get going again, so thanks everyone. Cheers.
view phillippa's profile
I keep a vegetable garden in my urban back yard. We've had near-record breaking snowfall this season, but the melt-off has started. Underneath the snow, we discovered overwintered carrots, beets and radishes, still in the ground! I'd heard that you could leave them there all winter, and pull as needed, but the snow was too deep to do that all winter long. Can't get more local than that! The radishes were perfectly crisp, and went into salad. The texture of the beets and carrots suffered somewhat, but they will go into soup.
The farmers' markets here won't even open for another couple months, and the produce at my local grocery store is terrible, and I really mean terrible, more often than not. I usually drive to a smaller, more produce-oriented store that is out of my way, but worth it.
view gremlin's profile