There was quite a bit:
- Two cups of wilted, browning spinach
- 1/2 cup taco meat
- 2 slices of bread
I took the spinach out of the fridge to make veggie pizza last week and was surprised to see that it was mostly bad. I salvaged what I could, rinsed it off, and put it on the pizza. There was still a lot to throw away. The taco meat I found in the back of the fridge in a ziploc bag. I remember putting it in the bag because I was out of small leftovers containers. Then the bag obviously got pushed toward the back where it was hidden and promptly forgotten.
This confirms my theory that too many leftovers in the refrigerator leads to wasted food. The bread was in the freezer and when I took it out to thaw to make some french toast I noticed that there was a lot of ice crystals in bottom of the bag which I dumped out so that the bread wouldn't absorb the water and become soggy when the ice melted. Well, instead of soggy two of the slices were rock hard and maybe a little bit freezer burned too.
Lesson learned: the freezer is not the answer to all my leftover food storage problems.
This week's successes:
- Instead of tossing out the whole package of spinach when I saw that some of it had "turned" I picked through and got the leaves that were still good. In the past I would have thrown away the whole box without seeing if any of it was still usable. Same thing with the leftover stale bread.
- The spinach/tomato pizza was good. But my sweet little Buttercup does NOT like "lettuce" and sliced tomatoes on what would otherwise be tasty pizza.
- I ate simple foods at home this week when I was hungry instead of buying pre-made or drive-thru food while I've been sick.
On the dinner menu this week:
- Homemade chili made with ground beef and black beans from the freezer and homemade cornbread.
- Broccoli/rice/chicken casserole from the freezer.
- Chicken sausages and homemade macaroni and cheese.
yum
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