Waste not

It occurred to me the other day while grocery shopping that I have lots of food items in my pantry that just sit there. And sit there. And sit there.

I, personally, am getting tired of spending $80 for what used to cost me $40 six months ago. While I realize the prices aren't going to go back down, I could save a little bit of money if I would just use the stuff I have more efficiently. Um, I mean if I would just use the stuff I have. Period.

For example, I have a can of tuna fish sitting on my lazy susan. The thing gets spun pretty darn frequently when I grab diced tomatoes and canned peaches. But I keep buying lunch meat and peanut butter even though I have this perfectly good can of tuna fish that I could eat. So now I've got the tuna fish and a can of tomato soup sitting on my counter so that I will remember to eat it (because tuna fish sandwiches go really nicely with a bowl of tomato soup). I've got about 4 more cans of tomato soup on that same lazy susan that need to be consumed....so there's at least 4 more lunches.

I do this periodically. I try to clean out virtually everything in my pantry so that I can go to the grocery and really restock. This boils down to about 2 weeks of eating rice, canned pineapple and Ovaltine just so I can get rid of shit. When I go to the grocery feeling all psyched because I'm "starting fresh," I end up with a $300 grocery bill, which just leaves me depressed.

But I just can't help myself once I get on this kick of using up the foodstuffs.

Awhile back, D sent me a link to this site called Recipematcher.com, which allows one to type in a food or ingredient one has in the pantry, like chili sauce, and it will spit out a bunch of recipes using that item. I thought it sounded brilliant until I realized it would only spit out recipes using chili sauce, not a recipe utilizing all 12 obscure or unappetizing items I have in my pantry. If I have to go out and buy 4 more things to use up my half-used bottle of chili sauce, I'd just as soon let it sit there for another year. Where is the genius chef site that will make a meal out of this?

• A chicken flav Ramen noodle package of just noodles, no flavor pouch (that was used in another recipe).
• 1/2 cup of lentils
• that damn jar of chili sauce
• nearly full jar of red curry paste (bought to make a recipe that sounded good but kinda sucked)
• almost a full bag of salted soy nuts
• 1/2 a bag of bulgar wheat
• a smidgen of tapioca pudding pellets (or whatever the word is for them)

Items that are actually sitting in my pantry as I type this.