MrsB's Challenge

I wanna hear from y'all! Please continue to leave your comments and thoughts in the comment sections of the entries. I enjoy reading your comments and being able to interact with y'all. So anyway, I want to know what you want see here. What brings you back?
One of my favorite quick meals is a chili recipe with only FIVE ingredients! I wanted to post it sooner but I couldn't find it in my recipe book! LOL I really need to re-organize that thing! I have a 3 ring binder with dividers that I'm supposed to put my recipes in. But somehow they all end up in the little "pocket" in the front and back of the binder.
Here's the recipe:

Quick & Easy Chili
1 lb ground beef
1 diced onion
1 can tomatoes
1 can Pork 'n Beans
1 TBS chili powder
Brown the ground beef and onion in a skillet. Add tomatoes, beans and chili powder. Stir well, bring to a low boil, reduce heat and simmer for 10-15 minutes. If you have time let it simmer longer to let the flavors combine, but its yummy eaten immediately too.

I just got the Rachel Ray "Express Lane Meals" cookbook. Its full of 30 minute meals and helpful tips. Each recipe has a side note stating which items you should have on hand and which items you need to go to the grocery store and buy before you make this recipe. This is going on the assumption that you work outside of the home and that you can stop at the grocery store and pick up the items in that list and just go through the "express lane" (hence the title of the book). Personally I don't go to the grocery store everyday since it not only takes up to much time but also is too expensive. The "Express Lane Shopping List" can still be helpful though since you can compare that list to the sales fliers, etc. Anyway, she has a full list of items that you should keep on hand at all times in the beginning of the book, and its divided by catergories (spice rack, freezer, fridge, etc). Another good thing about this cookbook is that if you have to buy a full container of any item for a specific recipe (buttermilk for example) she will tell you what you can do if the leftover (freezing the leftover buttermilk and using it for another recipe for example). To my point I know I'm rambling. LOL I wanted to post the list hopefully to help some of you. I don't have all of these items on hand and some of them I'll never buy b/c we just will never use them. But its a great base to build off of. What I'm going to do is make a "masterlist" of the items I think we'd use that I don't have and look in the weekly sales fliers for those items because I know in doing my pantry stocking a few weeks ago I know I left out a few things.
OK OK here's the list. lol The book lists how much of each item you should have on hand, personally I think it depends on each indiviual household and how much you use (like she suggests keeping 2 quarts of milk on hand but we keep a gallon). Anyway I'm not going to list the amounts but if there is an item you want to know how much she suggests just let me know and I'll post it.

Spice rack

coarse salt
coarse black or peppercorns to grind
chili powder
ground cumin
grill seasoning (she suggests using McCormick's Montreal Steak Seasoning but you can use whatever you like or whatever is cheapest)
paprika
smoked sweet paprika (?? I've never seen this, does anyone know what the difference between this and regular paprika is?)
whole nutmeg
curry paste or powder
ground coriander
poultry seasoning
bay leaves
red pepper flakes
dried oregano
dried thyme
ground cinnamon
fennel seeds
ground allspice
cayenne pepper

Fridge

Milk
heavy cream or half-and-half
Unsalted Butter
Eggs
Parmigiano-Reggiano cheese
Pecorino Romano cheese
bacon
hot sauce
Dijon Mustard
Spicy Brown Mustard
Capers
Flat-leaf parsley
celery
carrots
mayonnaise

Freezer

Frozen Peass
Frozen Corn
Frozen Chopped Spinach
plain and Italian bread crumbs

Somewhere in the Kitchen

Idaho Potatoes
small, red baby Yukon Gold or small white boiling potatoes
lemons
limes
Spanish or yellow onions
shallots
peanut butter, chunky or smooth
garlic

In the Wine Rack

White Wine
Red Wine
Dry Sherry

In the Cupboard

chicken stock, in a box
beef stock, in a box
diced fire-roasted tomatoes
diced tomatoes (regular and petite-diced)
crushed tomatoes
tomato paste
tomato sauce
chipotle chilies in adobo or dry chipotle powder
black beans
chickpeas/garbanzo beans
cannellini beans
long-cut pastas, such as spaghetti, linguine, vermicelli, angel hair, and fettuccine
short-cut pastas, such as penne, ditalini, gemelli, and cavatappi
plain couscous
white rice
all-purpose flour
white sugar
brown sugar
Italian tuna in EVOO
tuna in water
Alaskan salmon
Worcestershire sauce
vegetable oil
tamari
balsamic vinegar
red wine vinegar
cider, white wine and/or rice vinegar
honey
EVOO (personally this is too expensive so I use regular olive oil)
anchovy fillets
roasted red peppers in water
canned clams, whole baby

I hope this helps someone! If you get a chance I recommend at least watching one episode of one of Rachel Ray's shows on FoodTV. She's so awesome! I miss having cable so that I could watch her shows. Luckily one of our local stations is going to starting showing one of her shows in the fall. Yay!!
I mentioned my change jar the other day. I finally got it counted and I'm going to start keeping track of how much I put it in through my blog. I still having decided on a monetary goal for it yet. :-) I took the $7 I made at a yard sale saturday and $10 of my birthday money and stuck it in my jar with my change. So my total is $28.61 so far.

Also I was talking to my dh last night and we decided to take some of the money that we received from my grandparents as a housewarming gift and get a patio set for our porch. Well while I was telling my mom about our plans she reminded me that the patio sets would be going on sale soon because its getting close to the end of the season. Soooo I'll be waiting on my patio set and in a couple weeks I'll start my "patio set clearance" search. Wish me luck!

Posted by Kelly on Monday, July 10, 2006 at 9:14 AM | Permalink