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waideron domesticus
What do people keep in their fridge?
I'm living on my own, with a job that takes up too much of my time and an occasional tendency to spend the bulk of the evening in my local pub. Upshot being that I generally don't cook a whole lot in the evenings, which means that the only foodstuffs you'll find in my house pretty regularly are ones that keep for long periods of time. I'll occasionally attempt healthiness and/or organisation and have some salad items and enough meat to cook dinners for the week and so forth, but come Friday the fridge looks like I just moved in (or out) again. And occasionally, last fortnight's lettuce pleads with me to put it in the bin.
Yet I have visited friends in similar living circumstances to mine, and they can barely shut the fridge door because of all the stuff in there. Since it's kinda rude to go poking through people's cabinets, I'm asking anyone who feels like volunteering the information what y'all put in the cold box in the corner. Or the rest of the kitchen, for that matter.
I'm living on my own, with a job that takes up too much of my time and an occasional tendency to spend the bulk of the evening in my local pub. Upshot being that I generally don't cook a whole lot in the evenings, which means that the only foodstuffs you'll find in my house pretty regularly are ones that keep for long periods of time. I'll occasionally attempt healthiness and/or organisation and have some salad items and enough meat to cook dinners for the week and so forth, but come Friday the fridge looks like I just moved in (or out) again. And occasionally, last fortnight's lettuce pleads with me to put it in the bin.
Yet I have visited friends in similar living circumstances to mine, and they can barely shut the fridge door because of all the stuff in there. Since it's kinda rude to go poking through people's cabinets, I'm asking anyone who feels like volunteering the information what y'all put in the cold box in the corner. Or the rest of the kitchen, for that matter.
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But what I usually have:
- bread
- beer
- juice
- milk (for coffee, natch)
- yogurt (I eat a lot of yogurt. I like it and it's healthier than ice cream.)
- salad greens & veggies (so very American--you can now buy prewashed, preshredded packaged salad greens. It feels absurd, but I do it anyway because it ensures that I eat salad more often. I'm lazy.)
- fruit of various kinds--whatever's in season and I always have apples and oranges because they keep for a long time.
- sliced sandwich meat, usually turkey
- eggs
- cheese, mostly sharp cheddar, parmesan, blue cheese, and feta, the latter two for salads
- pine nuts, again for salads
- more beer
- ketchup, mustard, and no-fat mayo
My food budget's bigger than it used to be, because I'm living with someone and (currently) have a steady income, if not a large one. My first summer in Seattle I survived on lentils and toast. Much of the above, in fact, is because I brown-bag my lunch almost every day; either salad with some bread, or else a sandwich and a veggie, plus some kind of fruit and a thingie of yogurt. I'm more likely to bring lunch if I can put it together in five minutes.
Also my freezer contains frozen veggies including edamame, Boca burgers, sometimes ice cream, currently a piece of fish courtesy of our last houseguest, and Erik's butter supply. (I don't know why, but we must have several pounds of butter, salted and un-, on hand at all times.)
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in the freezer i generally have several kinds of frozen vegetables, some ground beef or buffalo, chicken breasts, a chunk of salt pork, and assorted cooking ingredients that are hard to come by (or homemade) but freeze well, such as kaffir lime leaves, bay leaves, coriander root, thai chilies (red and green), and chipotle puree.
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i am IMPRESSED.
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For wintertime I try to keep handy a few kinds of pasta, a chunk of parmesan, tomato sauce (jars or tins), and/or pesto. Then at least I can get together something approximating a hot dinner pretty quickly. Having a few things like calabrese sausage, cheddar and olives to nibble on (you never want more than a bit, they're all rather heavy) is satisfying in the colder weather. If I want animal protein I go out: I hate stinking up the house with meat or fish cooking.
In summer my groceries tend to run to yogurt and fruit, or tortilla chips and salsa. Can rarely be bothered to heat up the stove in a heat wave; once again, if I find myself wanting animal protein I'll go to the corner and get a shish taouk or something. Let the professionals deal with roasting meat and cleaning up after it, I say.
I love good bread and can and do eat nothing but toast for a day or two when I have some. But it's in the category for me of "don't buy it often because when it's in the house, I eat it" as are plenty of other things.
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(sauces/condiments, tonic water, milk for coffee, eggs, sometimes lunchmeats, sometimes mixers, beer if there's any leftover from the most recent party.)
But I usually have a usefully stocked pantry.
Boxes of pasta, biscuit mix, el-cheapo muffins, cornmeal, flour, sugar (all for cornbread), vanilla, ramen for making sticky noodles, sugared cereal in a bag. (and the liquor shelf at the top with a rotating cast of poison.)
(oh. biscuit in the american sense, 'southern' fluffy bready things. :)
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There are also lots of things that don't strictly need to be refrigerated, such as grains, nuts, etc., because I'm wary of mice and moths. Cheese...not much, but I do keep a big lump of pecorino and occasionally feta for salads and garnishes. Lemons.
I don't much like dealing with meat at home. If I do buy meat or fish, it's because I have a particular project in mind and I use it right away. Right now I have beets, lettuce, broccoli, and I think one more fresh onion, but those things vary. Also a bottle of Alsatian Riesling.
Outside the refrigerator I usually have pasta on hand (Mediterranean type and rice noodles) but haven't felt like it much lately. Too hot. There's always some kind of fruit, often a pineapple.
I have an odd breakfast staple: I cook up a bunch of whole mixed grains (wheat berries, rice, barley, triticale, whatever else is in the bag) with sesame seeds and fruit. It keeps for 4-5 days and I just scoop some into a cup in the morning.
At this time of year there's a reasonable selection of herbs growing outside.
Over the last year or two I've been away from home a lot, and that complicates things.
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