Cleaning out the Pantry

This week I have been so broke I am cleaning out my cupboards and my fridge and my freezer before I buy any more groceries. (My car was almost a year over due for a service and the bill showed it!!! Oh well, now it isn't going to explode.)

Anyway, the above picture is a salad I made on Sunday to take to work for lunches. I based it on something out of Concious Cooking. It's basically: quinoa, red onion, half a cucumber, 1 grated carrot, spinach leaves, orange and spring onions. The dressing is made from rice bran oil, orange juice and red wine vinegar. It was delicious. All the flavours worked very well together and I enjoyed my lunches immensely.

We are having more leftovers of this one tonight. It's also from Concious Cooking and I was a bit wary of it because I decided a little while ago that I did not like fennel (as in the fresh bulb, not the dried seed or herb). I bought it to juice fresh and it ruined the flavour of everything.  However, to my taste buds surprise, fennel tastes completely different when cooked! Thank god. The recipe is called 'Whole Wheat Penne with san Marzano tomatoes'. I just used a tin of Australian tomatoes, kalamata olives instead of stuffed green, red wine instead of white wine, and skipped the tarragon. It was a delicious meal and I am glad we have more to eat tonight. I'll be throwing in a can's worth of white beans to stretch it out a bit. (I cook dried beans and freeze them in zip lock bags in 1 1/2 cup amounts).

I think this weekend I'll be busting out a lentil and black eyed pea curry that'll feed an army.

Tomorrow we are having friends over so we're making nachos and having beer. Hopefully Nadine buys the beer! Apparently white beans and green peas make a good substitute guacamole (according to Robin Robertson's Vegan on the Cheap) so I'll just buy 1 avo instead of two and try that! I'll let you know how it passes with the friends. There is also a recipe for vegan sour cream in that book, so I'm going to give that a go. I already make my own mayo, why not sour cream!?