It's Wednesday! Time to clean out the refrigerator and start with a clean plate. I mean, slate. Whatever.I'm not doing too badly, folks. I've been making my kids eat the leftovers more (not cooking helps to facilitate that), and it shows. Sort of. Still, despite my best efforts, on the right there we have 2 Gladware containers of leftover "enchilala duff." (Named by one of our toddlers, can't remember who...) That's black beans, corn, salsa, canned diced tomatoes, and tomato paste, all thrown together in a crock pot and then dished out in taco shells to a semi-appreciative crowd. These particular leftovers must have gotten lost behind something else; otherwise David would have finished them off in lieu of eating our normally carnivorous fare. They are accompanied in the leftover category by a small amount of pot roast (glass dish) that has passed its "eat by" date. Not too bad, not too bad...
Atop the roast is a jar of maraschino cherries a neighbor found in her cabinet and pawned off on me. (Believe me, when you have 6 kids, everyone brings you their extra food.) I love maraschino cherries, at least when I get one or two on top of a milkshake or ice cream sundae. But a whole jar? Not so much. They start tasting poisonous. What does "maraschino" mean, anyway? "Bad for you"?
Next to the cherries is a full container of margarine. I was about to use it when (luckily) Theo walked into the kitchen and pointed out to me that I had bought the kind he is allergic to. So I put the lid back on and jammed it into my black hole of a refrigerator, thinking I would give it to a neighbor when I had a minute to spare. By the time I rediscovered it, there was a hole burned in the lid by the refrigerator bulb (does this happen to anyone else? Please say yes), so I felt funny about giving it away. I mean, what would I say? "Here, have this margarine. Don't worry about that hole in the lid. I don't think any plastic melted onto the margarine itself. And margarine's sort of fake anyway."
On the left, this week's piece de resistance: 2 jars of salad dressing that I made for our 4th of July BBQ. One of these jars has already been featured twice in this blog - once when I first removed it from the refrigerator, and again when I discovered it on my counter 2 weeks later.
It's the Rasputin of refrigerator discards. It will not die.
That dressing is SCARING ME. I will have to stop coming to your blog soon because I DO NOT DO SCARY THINGS - Freddy Kruger and Jason did me in to a point of not being able to sleep in my own bed for weeks as a tweenager. Can't do it. Your dressing is haunting me. Stop it.
ReplyDeleteAnd the light bulb burning in the fridge thing? Honestly? I have never heard of it before. My stuff freezes often or gets kind of icy if it sets too close to the vent coming into the fridge. But, never had anything BURN in the fridge.
KEEP BELIEVING
I'm with Angie on this one. Never heard of it, never had it happen. Definitely pitch the margarine.
ReplyDeleteI'm trying to be more like you and leave food in my fridge to molder and spoil. Or just sit. I just threw out a roast from the first of August. I thought of you.
ReplyDeleteSalad dressing that will not die...yep, scary, scary.
ReplyDeleteI'm impressed...no foil wrapped 1/2 of a egg salad sandwich.
ReplyDeleteOh, and what ever did you do with the cashew butter?
ReplyDeletei don't think, ever, in my whole life i've ever had anyone randomly bring me a jar of marischino cherries. i'd never even had to spell that word until just now, and i probably spelled it wrong. whatev. my kids would've gobbled them up.
ReplyDeleteMaybe instead of giving the margerine to the neighbor, you should give them the salad dressing.
ReplyDeleteI keep throwing stuff out of my fridge, and yet it still seems as full as it was before, if not more full.
How does this happen?
cleaning out the fridge? I didn't know that was possible. i'll have to try that sometime...
ReplyDelete"maraschino" means dyed in arsenic and then colored nuclear red. At least, that's what it used to mean. LOL!
ReplyDeleteSoy Garden Margarine all the way, baby. It's non-hydrogenated oil.
ReplyDeleteHowever, it's so darn pricey!
That last comment was me, forgetting the laptop was logged in as my husband.
ReplyDeleteI also wanted to comment on your leftovers... they make me hungry. I LOVE leftovers!
Leftovers? Now that I'm the homeschool cafeteria lady, we're eating a lot of leftovers during the day. That helps. It also cuts down on my corn chip budget. "Hey! Who wants noodles for lunch?!"
ReplyDeleteI did find the "when did we last have" hot dogs in a baggie. How do you tell when they've gone bad, when they don't smell good in the first place? ;)
I think that salad dressing should just accidentally fall into the trash one day and be forgotten about :-)
ReplyDeleteAs for the light bulb - hasn't ever happened to me. But I also don't have 6 kids that I'm sure stand in front of the fridge with the door open half the day...
Rasputin! Ha!
ReplyDeleteI'm inspired by you--pulled a v. old lasagna from freezer to heat up for dinner tonight. And I need the pan it's in.
When your kids go to college, your refrigerator magically empties! You don't have to maintain 4 gallons of milk, an endless supply of juice, soda and Kool-aid, or 3 pound blocks of American cheese, or separate bottles of everybody's favorite salad dressing (6 bottles' worth in my refrigerator!)just to get by. Nor do you need two pounds of lunch meat or bacon each week, and the cupboard looks pretty bare without 2 3-pound jars of peanut butter (one creamy, one crunchy)in it. The grocery bill would look better if I didn't know the difference was going to the food plan they're not using at school!
ReplyDeleteI'm thinking that I should do something drastic like posting the contents of my fridge on the internet so that it gets cleaned on a semi-regular basis.
ReplyDeleteI'm laughing so hard right now . . . I just love your refrigerator posts. I identify too readily.
ReplyDeleteAnd being mom to seven, I get free food (and clothes) from people all the time. Yesterday, it was fresh okra.
"I'm not doing too badly, folks. I've been making my kids eat the leftovers more (not cooking helps to facilitate that)".
ReplyDeleteI agree! I have found that the best way to make sure we use leftovers is to only cook every other day and eat leftovers on the days that I don't cook.
The kids sometimes whine about the repetition (although I do try to change enough in the leftover meal that it's kinda new), but we retort with all kinds of money and saving and using instead of throwing talk that pretty much puts an end to the complaining.
I am so glad you said those jars were salad dressing. I have jars and cans of similar looking material on the counter next to the stove from time to time - usually after browning ground beef.
ReplyDeleteThanks so much for visiting me on my special day…I could hardly sleep last night I was so excited!
ReplyDeleteLee :)
Use the maraschino cherries to practice tying the stems into knots with your tongue. Impress your husband.
ReplyDeleteOh wait. Never mind. hee!
Hi! Because you are hilarious I gave you A Major Award, over at my blog.
ReplyDeleteJust so you know of your far-reaching influence and power - I decided today to clean out my fridge. There wasn't too much spoiled food to throw away, but the remnants of too many spills ignored finally got to me.
ReplyDeleteIf that's not influence, I don't know what is.
I just did that little dirty duty about two weeks ago. I insisted it was not going to get messed up again but I am afraid I already have some unidentifiable items. Saddest part, we could feed the hungry with all the food we waist in my house.
ReplyDeleteI have issues with cottage cheese. I have not ever finished a container in my life. There's one in the fridge now that expired at the end of July. I cant open it because it will be gross so there it sits.
ReplyDelete"...then dished out in taco shells to a semi-appreciative crowd."
ReplyDeleteand
"Don't worry about that hole in the lid. I don't think any plastic melted onto the margarine itself. And margarine's sort of fake anyway."
You. Crack. Me. Up.
omg - this made me laugh! Every now and then, I skip the weekly fridge clean and just shove the new groceries in front. Oh, it gets disgusting! I can't figure out how to make all the leftovers go away either.
ReplyDelete