16 oz prepared red cabbage with apple bits

Mix everything except the cabbage and paprika in a bowl. Knead until every item is distributed evenly. Place cabbage on bottom of baking dish. Sprinkle paprika. Spread meat mixture on top of cabbage. Cover and cook in oven for one our at 350 degrees. Forty minutes in, feel free to drain. With ten minutes left, cover with sauce.

Sauce for meatloaf

• 4 tablespoons minced onion
• 1/4 cup ketchup
• 4T of brown sugar,
• 4T vinegar,
• 2T Worchestershire Sauce
• 1 teaspoon basil leaves

Simmer everything in a small sauce pan and stir constantly. Serve with meatloaf.

Spinach, carrot, cucumber and apple

• 1 large carrot
• 1 cucumber
• 2 small handfuls fresh spinach
• 1 palm full sliced white onion
• 2 small apples
• 2 teaspoons lemon juice
• ground cumin

I started with a bed of spinach with which to lay everything upon as I prepared the produce. If you know have a technique or a tool for slicing things very thin, almost as thin as what a peeler would produce, use it here on the carrot. Otherwise, this could end up slightly dry. Arrange the carrot slices across the bed of spinach and feel free to overlap them. If you want to get fancy, place the carrots in overlapping groups of three and that will make the final product come out in sections.

The cucumber doesn’t need to be sliced as thin, here. Slice your cucumber and arrange in a layer on top of the carrots. Follow the same rule of threes here as you did with the carrots.

If not prepared correctly, the next step could cause the salad to look unappetizing. Apples tend to brown quickly so as we are slicing our apple wedges, approximately one-eighth-inch, we are going to have a plate of lemon juice ready. Gently rub each side of the apple in the lemon juice before placing on top of the cucumber. At this point sprinkle a light layer of cumin on top of the salad. I’ll describe the dressing next.

A single serving would ideally be three slices of carrots, three slices of cucumber, some bits of onion and a quadrangle of apple on a small bed of fresh spinach.

Creamy spice dressing

The dressing is almost as simple as the salad but with a couple twists. I honestly didn’t pay attention to the amounts of each ingredient I used so you may have to experiment until you reach the desired flavor.

• 1/4 cup olive oil
• 1/4 cup apple cider (juice will work just fine)
• 2 tablespoons distilled white vinegar
• 2 pinches marjoram
• 2 dashes black pepper
• 1 pinch coriander seed
• 1 pinch cumin
• 2 tablespoons milk (half and half or cream would work as well (not whipping))

This will be a sort of creamy vinaigrette. Start with your oil and add your spices. This will allow the oil to take on some of the flavor of your spices. Feel free to crush up the coriander seed just slightly so the flavor can leech into the oil. After a few minutes mix the apple cider and vinegar together in a separate container and whisk into the main dressing. Whisk the milk or cream next and splash the dressing generously onto the salad. This is a light dressing and compliments the salad perfectly.

Here’s a closer look at the salad. You can’t really make out the spinach or the carrots but it was prettier when eating. I added some crumbled dried bread to the top.

Closer look

• 6 cups crumbled cornbread (to be cooked prior to this)
• 4 apples (cooking apples)
• 2 sprigs parsley
• 2 sprigs sage
• 2 sprigs rosemary
• 2 sprigs thyme
• 4 stalks celery
• 1 large yellow onion (2 small onions will work)
• 3/4 cup Half and Half
• 2 tablespoons olive oil
• 3 eggs
• 5 links Colosimo’s red wine sausage
• 8 tablespoons butter (this is a whole stick)
• 4 cloves garlic

Melt one stick of butter in a frying pan and soften your peeled cored diced apples and place these aside.

The purpose of the sausage is to help make a base for the stuffing. We can do this by slicing each sausage in half, then scraping the meat from the casing. Discard the case.  Brown the sausage like you would with ground beef. After the sausage is browned, add the sliced celery and onion. Cook until slightly tender.

Using your fingers, scrape the leaves from your sprigs of herbs and chop them finely before adding to the mixture.

Take your crumbled cornbread and mix with the apples. Blend the eggs with half and half then add to the cornbread mixture. Knead gently. Once this is all blended, mix with the sausage mixture by hand.  Make sure that things are moist enough to form into balls.

Roll into balls slightly smaller than your fist. You’ll only get one shot at shaping these correctly. Place into muffin cups in a muffin tin and bake at 375 for 20 – 30 minutes. For extra pizazz you can garnish each serving with a pecan or parsley or whatever you think would be good.

I may or may not edit this post in the near future for better readability.

Here’s a great way to use up all those canned tomatoes you have in your food storage. You’ll need three different types. Fresh produce can be difficult to come across during the winter but with the right spices (if you’ve been stocking your pantry properly) you can make some decent tasting food.

Spaghetti Sauce

• 1 28oz can crushed tomatoes
• 1 16oz can stewed tomatoes (I got lucky and this one had bell peppers in it)
• 1 16oz can diced tomatoes
• 1/4 cup brown sugar (to taste)
• Italian seasoning (most people have this instead of parsley, oregano, rosemary and thyme)
• splash of olive oil
• minced onions
• onion powder (to taste)
• garlic powder (I’d normally use garlic but I’ve noticed a lot of households don’t carry it)
• dash of cinnamon
• 1/2 of an apple

All you really need to do is cook your sauce first so that it can stew slowly for a while. This will allow all the flavors to blend. Plan on spending about thirty or more minutes with your sauce.

Start with the crushed tomatoes on a medium heat and then add your spices. After everything has blended for a few minutes go ahead and add your stewed tomatoes. If they are whole, slice them. If they are already sliced, you will still want to cut them in half or quarters.

Do not put in the diced tomatoes or the apples until the very end. If you have baking type apples then you can put them in with the diced tomatoes about10 minutes before you are finished. About the same time you start your noodles.

Most people make the mistake of starting their noodles with everything else. Generally, you will want to save the noodles for last.

I wanted to make some carbonara but I didn’t have any pancetta or Parmesan, so I just tossed the noodles with a couple of raw eggs. Don’t let this scare you. All you need to do is throw the noodles into a bowl with eggs and black pepper immediately after you drain the water. The heat from the noodles will cook the eggs well enough. Once the noodles are in just keep stirring and tossing those noodles.

I know this isn’t anything fancy but many people might like to know how to make spaghetti sauce if they don’t have the pre-made stuff laying around. I served tonight’s dinner with some fried and breaded eggplant with a side of green beans and apple muffins for desert. We just used the Jiffy brand boxed muffin mix. Nothing in this meal was fresh but it should be appropriate for the way most people stock their kitchens.

I took some pictures but I failed at figuring out how to transfer them from the cell phone to the computer. Hopefully your imagination makes it look yummy but that’s hard to do knowing everything came from cans.

Later I will share how with only another fifteen to twenty-five dollars per month we can keep our pantry stocked with items to round out our meals nicely. This will include spices and cooking essentials.

Standard Share

• 2 lb. Chicken Breast
• 1 lb. Diced Beef (Beef Stew Meat)
• 1 lb. Pork Spare Ribs
• 1 lb. Lean Ground Beef
• 1 lb. Rice
• 1 loaf Artisan Wheat Bread
• 1 pkg. Mushrooms
• 5 lbs. Red Potatos
• 8 Kiwi
• 6 Apples
• 6 Oranges
• 1 bunch of Green Onions
• 1 Red Leaf Lettuce
• 3 Artichokes

I did some comparison shopping at Albertson’s. All items were identical with minor differences in the spare ribs and maybe the size of the artichokes. Grocery store would have cost around $55.00 give or take tax. Here is the list broken down by price.

$4.98 – 2 lb. Chicken Breast
$4.49 – 1 lb. Diced Beef (Beef Stew Meat)
$4.99 – 1 lb. Pork Spare Ribs
$2.99 – 1 lb. Lean Ground Beef
$2.00 – 1 lb. Rice
$3.99 – 1 loaf Artisan Wheat Bread
$2.49 – 1 pkg. Mushrooms
$5.99 – 5 lbs. Red Potatos
$4.72 – 8 Kiwi
$4.47 – 6 Apples
$2.49 – 6 Oranges
$0.99 – 1 bunch of Green Onions
$1.29 – 1 Red Leaf Lettuce
$8.97 – 3 Artichokes

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$55.00