A Pantry Worth Crying Over

Have you ever watched a cooking movie like No Reservations or Julie and Julia, sat there for two hours of them making food that looks so good you can almost smell it through the TV? And you end up, at the end of the movie, so hungry that you would eat just about anything, even if it didn't look like that? So you go to your pantry or fridge, determined to find something even marginally awesome to eat. You open up the door. And want to cry.



Let us have a moment of silence for that horrible, horrible feeling.

*Sighs*

Ok, everyone done? Do you need another moment? No? Ok, moving on.

For anyone who didn't follow, the reason we are all crying and having a moment of silence is because the contents of our pantries and fridges . . . in no way resembles the kind of pantry or fridge you need to reproduce anything even slightly similar to what you just watched Amy Adams eat. Don't even get me started on having the patience to even give it a decent attempt, given ideal ingredients and kitchen accouterments.

This is just so not fair. And it has gotten to the point that I don't even watch Julie and Julia anymore unless I am prepared with something good to eat afterwards! Because I know what will happen, and I can't endure that heartbreak!

Or something like browning butter. Excuse me? I am already dragging out a mixer, half a dozen measuring cups and spoons, whisks and spatulas and spoons and EVERY OTHER DISH IN THE KITCHEN, but now you also want me to get out a pan, and painstakingly melt and saute butter in there until it is brown but not burned? Are you out of your freaking mind?! Come on, I am the kind of girl that reads a recipe, gets to the end and says, "Well, THAT'S not going to happen," and then either disregards it altogether or cuts corners like I'm late to work. Honestly. There is not way I'm going to sift those dry ingredients. The best you're going to get is I'm going to dump them all in a bowl together and give them a good stir with a whisk.

You know what needs to exist? A grocery store that will deliver 24/7. So that when people like me decide to watch a food movie at eleven at night, we actually have an option available when our mouths are watering and we're starving. "Yes, I need to order one of your meals from the freezer section. I don't care, something that looks even remotely similar to what Catherine Zeta-Jones just made that can be ready to eat in ten minutes." Such a place could make a killing, I'm telling you.

Come to think of it, y'know what would be even better? A magic fridge. "Fridge, I want chicken parmesan." *Ding!* "Ooh, yummy!"

"Fridge, I want Girl Scout cookies." *Ding!* *Munch*

"Fridge, I want a half-naked male model." *Error!* "Aww..."

Anyway . . .

This is a serious problem, people. These beautiful food movies and sadly lacking fridges are contributing to food depression all over the world! Something must be done! Raise awareness! Because there are few things in this world sadder than a fridge, a cupboard, or a pantry worth crying over.

The Evaporated Milk Miracle

I am going to share with you possibly the most life-changing cooking secret I have ever stumbled upon. And I wish I could say that it has been my new trick that has been keeping me away from my blog for so long, but sadly that would be a lie. I just haven't had anything to write, honestly. But I do now, yay me! And so . . . the secret.

Anyone who cooks regularly and is on a budget, like me, has a certain set of skills that are necessary for their kind of cooking. One of them is looking at a recipe, and depending on the list of ingredients or the number of steps it takes to get to a finished product, lots of recipes go on the "Psh, that's not happening" list. Another skill is being able to see the shortcuts or cheats in a recipe, or even the ability to look at the picture, the ingredients, and be able to kind of wing it on their own without needing a recipe. And then there's this skill: the inconvenient ingredient spotting.

You know what I'm talking about. Shallots, pecans, buttermilk, puff pastry, weird herbs, wonky mushrooms, phyllo, milk of camel, eye of newt, you get it. Those ingredients that, yeah, you could find at most grocery stores, but honestly, you don't keep them in your house. And you wanna know the number one reason? You don't use them a lot, and they don't keep.

If you're buying yourself a pint of buttermilk and only using one cup and two tablespoons of it, what the crap are you supposed to do with the other cup? It would be immensely convenient for me to have a complete recipe database where I could look up things like "Recipes that use buttermilk" and then I'd be ok because I'd end up being able to use all my buttermilk. But I don't have that, and frankly, the thought of making one gives me a headache despite how much I would love it.

So, you find a recipe you want to make that calls for one of these pain in the butt ingredients. Sometimes you're already planning a trip to the store with enough money, so getting this ingredient is no problem. But then there's those times that you either just went to the store and you're not wasting the gas to drive there again for one stupid ingredient.

Half and half or heavy cream is one of those ingredients for me. And for good reason. There is no practical use for cream on a daily basis, there just isn't. I don't drink coffee, and that's honestly the only thing I can think of that would justify me keeping cream on hand. Which means that unless I buy it specifically for a recipe, I do not have it in the house, because it will spoil before I get around to using it, even though I have several recipes that call for it. So I've been suffering without these particular recipes simply because I was missing that one dang ingredient.

Well, folks, just recently I discovered the magic secret that has changed my cooking life. And I didn't even find this intentionally, I literally stumbled across it in an article or blog or something that I was reading. And it is this: a substitute for half and half or heavy cream in a recipe is . . . evaporated milk.



*Heavenly glow of light* That's BRILLIANT!

I seriously had a complete *DING* of awe when I read that! It's so simple, yet so genius! I have evaporated milk in my pantry, I use it enough that it's on hand all the time! Because, this is the BEST PART, it's CANNED! Which means, it lasts for a long time! I can buy four cans at Walmart in April, and they're still good at Christmas!

I'm serious, I almost had an aneurysm over this. Ecstatic fit. And that very night, I made one of my new recipes that I'd found and discarded at first because it called for heavy cream. It was a peaches and cream overnight french toast, incredibly easy to make (once I found out I could use evaporated milk!), and it was DELICIOUS. I'm going to make it again, it was so yummy, and I had every single ingredient on hand in my pantry. *Boogie dance*

So, ladies and gentlemen, that was my wonderful discovery that I just had to share with the universe. The magical substitution that changed my life. So many avenues are now open to me, I can do whatever I want! Who knows, maybe someday soon I'll learn how to FLY! (Ok, maybe this has gone to my head a little).

Now . . . if only I could find a good substitution for cream cheese . . .