So in the picture above, you see what I threw away this week:
- about half a cup of homemade rice milk
- about 1/4 cup of rice
- 1 piece of fish
I learned something this week: I need to make 2 cups of rice milk at a time instead of 4 cups. Four cups generally go bad before I get around to using them, but I’d definitely use up 2 cups within a few days. I use rice milk in all cooking and baking for My Certain Little Someone.
I am not exactly sure why I had only 1/4 cup of cooked rice left over… it came from a container of rice that had actually been frozen, being extras cooked on purpose for that very reason. I should have just thrown that last 1/4 cup into the blender when I made the rice milk. But then again, it would have been wasted anyway, so whatever. Odds and ends are the hardest to use up!
And then there was that lonely piece of fish that nobody wanted to eat 3 days after the fact. Once again, this fishy little food remnant came from a container of leftovers that had intentionally been frozen. We ate up his companions, but alas. One little fishy still remained.
What this picture does not show is the carnage left over from my rampage through the snack cupboard. I am slowly organizing all my kitchen cabinets as I have some spare time (ha!), and this week, I hit on the snack cupboard. Goodness gracious, there were some ancient snacks in there, like half-licked lollipops and such. I tossed them all! But it was all junk to begin with, so I don’t really regret the loss. Too much.
But on a happier note… it’s peach season! I loooovvveee peach season. I look forward to it almost as much as strawberry season. Last week at the farmers’ market, I was able to pick up a peck of seconds peaches for $3.50! Woot! And then this week, they had baskets of “small” peaches for $3 less than the regular price, making them only $5. Sheesh, I don’t care how small my peaches are! Especially if they cost less!
So we are eating a lot of peaches around here. (Not that we mind.) If you find yourself with an overabundance of peaches (and I hope you do!), here are some suggestions for enjoying them:
- Can them. Canning is absolutely my favorite way to preserve peaches because it keeps their color and texture (mostly) intact. That’s kinda hard to do. Dehydrating and freezing peaches can really turn them brownish blackish, which is just not pretty. And thankfully, canning peaches is super easy, as I explain in my eBook, Your Grocery Budget Toolbox. One of the easiest things to can, in fact! I’ve already canned one quart jar this year, and I hope to can quite a few more.
- I have frozen peaches before. And they look fine… until you thaw them. Then they turn into a pile of brownish blackish mush. Ick. Apparently a little splash of lemon juice before freezing can help with that, but I haven’t tried it.
- Ginger Peach Shortcakes are an excellent use for peaches. Even better than strawberry shortcake (and I can’t believe I’m saying that!).
- Peach Sorbet is the bomb. Nothing beats the smooth and creamy texture. And the flavor. I am trying to figure out how I can squeeze my ice cream maker into the freezer because I seriously want to make this ice cream tomorrow!
- I always make a couple batches of peach jam during peach season. It’s very much like strawberry jam in the method, although the ingredient amounts might vary slightly.
- There’s apple crisp, there’s strawberry crisp, and then there’s peach crisp. In a league of its own. Follow this method - 1-2-3- Fruit Crisp! - for any fruit you have on hand.
- Peach fruit leather is also quite delicious, one of my favorite flavors of fruit leather, in fact. There are lots of tutorials on the web, you can try this one: Weelicious Peach Fruit Leather.
Or, of course, you can just eat each peach one by one, bite by delicious bite. The taste of summer!
How do you like to eat your peaches?
Rice is a leftover I have a hard time finishing off in our house. Does rice milk freeze well? When I was dairy-free, I made almond milk in 4 cups batches but froze half of it. I used the thawed stuff for baking mostly, since the texture changed.
Yay for peaches!!! Our local produce guy isn’t giving away his seconds produce anymore (someone started buying ALL of it up at the end of the day), so it’s been killing me paying full price :-P. But I did learn that Sunday’s a good day to buy for cheap because they’re trying to clear out everything for the new batch of produce on Tuesday.
Yes, rice milk freezes fairly well. I have done that before, but then I forget about it, lol. Or I need it Right. Now. and don’t have time for it to defrost. And that stinks about your produce stand! Bummer
I relate to this. I keep filling my fridge for the bits and pieces and then I concoct something, for a meal. I can’t follow recipes because, I have to include a little bit of t his and a little bit of that.
I still throw away too much, as far as I am concerned. Thursday is the night to clean out my refrigerator to make room for the weekend food, so leftovers go. I must work harder on getting them out, sooner.
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I know; that’s why I started this challenge! Gotta stop wasting so much food!
After you can peaches, you can use the skins to make peach honey. If I can remember correctly from last year, you boil the skins in water for a long time, then strain and add either sugar or honey and cook until thickened. I just use cheap honey for this, since it gets boiled anyway.
The result is very jelly-like and you can tell lots of pectin came from the skins. It has a gentle peach flavor and the honey flavor isn’t very strong either. I actually like it better than our local raw honey…although I know the raw honey is more beneficial!
So, here you go, on food waste Friday here’s an idea for something that you might normally throw away! Unless your kids are like mine and they beg to eat fruit skins when you’re cooking something!
I had read about this a couple years ago, and actually intended to give it a try. I don’t remember if I never tried it or if it didn’t turn out, but at any rate… I’ve never had the peach honey. I am interested in trying it next time I have a whole bunch of peach skins!
Dehydrated peaches are delicious! Frozen peach slices, with skins still on, work wonderfully in smoothies, just throw them directly in the blender with the other ingredients. I freeze them in slices on cookie sheets, then throw the individual pieces in a freezer bag.
We are so sad this year that our province’s trees blossomed early, then were hit with a very hard frost…no peaches this year. (Also almost no apricots, pears, apples, cherries, plums.)