Using what I have to plan meals... I'd like some other ideas

[eastkygal]

I'm trying to not spend more than the $231 I have left in our food budget for this month. I have been going over our $271 monthly budget by about $100-200 a month. Needless to say, my pantry is pretty well stocked. I know I'll need eggs, meats (breakfast), milk, cheese, nuts, potatoes, raisins, bananas throughout the month as that is what we eat more than anything.

Here is what I have on hand. I'd like some ideas for meals using what I have and maybe a little here and there from the store.

Grain:
-Armanth
-millet
-quinoa
-in the process of making 3 sourdough loaves
- 2 pounds whole wheat flour
- 2 pounds oatmeal
-2 pounds of long grain brown rice
- whole grain brown rice noodles
- one loaf Ezekiel bread
- 2 bags Ezekiel corn tortillas
- 1 bag Ezekiel burger buns
- corn flour and corn meal

Veggies:
- 2 large cabbage heads
- 2 pounds of carrots
- 4 sweet potatoes
- 10 Irish potatoes
- frozen organic corn
- frozen organic peas and carrots
- canned organic corn
- canned tomatoes
- 2 jars marinara
- 1 bag dried fall beans (leather britches)
- 2 cans sauerkraut
- 1 box onions
-2 heads of garlic

Fruit:
- 1 bag frozen blueberries
- 1 pound frozen wild blackberries
- 1 bag frozen strawberries
- 1/2 bag frozen raspberries
- 2 cans pineapple in juice
- 6 can mandarin oranges in juice
- raisins

Meat:
- 1 small pack TF friendly Bratwurst
- 1 small pack TF friendly weiners
- 1 pound ground beef
- 16 pieces of wild rabbit
- 2 cans salmon
- 2 cans tuna

Beans:
- pinto (lots)
-black ( a little)
-red kidney
-green split peas
-red lentils
-green lentils

On hand now I have some cottage cheese, sour cream, butter, whole milk, 6 eggs, bacon grease, coconut oil, olive oil, sesame oil, several vinegars, white wine, and fish sauce as well as a variety of spices. I have sorghum, maple syrup and honey for sweeteners.

Wow! That's really a lot of food. I'd love some more ideas on what to cook.

[FairyRae]

One of our favorites is a rice and beans dish--black beans, quinoa or rice (now we use riced cauliflower being grain free and it works just fine!), diced tomatoes, green chiles, onions, garlic and peppers and chili powder and cumin, approx equal parts plus salt to taste (I add lots). (You could leave out the peppers and use some sort of hot spice, cayenne maybe? in place of the chiles.)

Sautee the onions and garlic and peppers, then add in the pre-cooked beans (you could totally use the kidney beans here too) and tomatoes and the rest. Add enough water to cook the grains (or none if using 'riced' cauliflower) and simmer until the grains are done (or throw in precooked grains and simmer for 10 minutes or so). Sooo tasty!

ETA: I see you don't have onions and garlic on your list--if you're spice cupboard is stocked perhaps you could use onion and garlic powder in place of them...

[eastkygal]

Oh! I forgot... I do have a whole small box of yummy onions and a few cloves of garlic.

[katiesk]

i would say...drink some of your white wine and make lentils with cabbage, tomatoes, some onion and garlic and nice spices.

(more wine) bean burritos with some of your beans, tortillas, sour cream, cheese, maybe cabbage, corn, whatever other veggies you like. i usually put spinach, kale or zuchinni in ours, depending on what we have.

[motherbirth]

I made this Mexican pinto beans dish the other week, left out the pork, and served it with Mexican quinoa (you could just find a good Mexican rice recipe that you could swap out the quinoa in... or maybe just saute some onions and carrots, add some cooked quinoa and Mexican spice, maybe cumin or something, add some corn).

I have used hot dogs in a stewed rice dish.

Good luck!

[velcromom]

Do you have any bone broth? You could make a hearty autum soup based on broth with red lentils, sweet potato and carrot. Use onion & sea salt & some herbs if you have any in your pantry, thyme and rosemary, maybe bay leaf. I've done a similar recipe that called for it all to be pureed at the end and it turned out pretty good, & a very pretty soup to serve too!

For a breakfast or brunch, you could use milk & eggs to create a berry clafouti. Just saw a recipe at Nourished Kitchen that looked good.

The other day we had a made-up dish for lunch - Salmon Hash - I took some whole cooked potatoes and browned them with some minced onion, then pushed them to the side of the pan, added a pat of butter and a can of drained salmon & browned it then tossed it all together. Was really good!

[nicolelynn]

Pureed soups work great with lentils or beans

Spaghetti bolognese over the pasta, shredded cooked cabbage or quinoa

Bean tacos

Sloppy joes with the marinara sauce on Ezekiel buns

Lentil burgers on Ezekiel buns

Franks and beans with a side of sauerkraut

Bigos (Polish national dish...so delish google a recipe. You could use the kraut, sausage and potatoes)

Succotash type dish of beans, any combo of veggies and canned tomatoes and corn

Chili

Tamale bean pie

Salmon or tuna patties

Tuna casserole (made with the brown rice pasta and frozen veggies)

Fried rice (with some frozen veggies and shredded cabbage)

Rabbit stew (with potatoes, carrots, etc)

Potato soup (with some crumbled bacon)

That's off the top of my head....

[eastkygal]

Thanks for these suggestions. It is starting to amaze me how much food I have and how little I have actually spent. It's just we get in these ruts and cook what we know. Now, I need to step outside of the box.