Welcome to Food Pantry Feasts!
On the care and feeding of family.
Welcome! We are Nick and Zizi, as well some children mixed in.
There was one day years ago when the two of us, a newly-engaged and not-terribly-wealthy couple, came back to my (Nick's) apartment one night and decided that the two of us were extremely hungry. As it turned out, there was only an assortment of odds and ends around the kitchen without much to choose from. I looked at my soon-to-be-wife and said, "I'll cook!" She decided to let me play out my chef's fantasy as she sat on a nearby stool and watched in amusement. (She has cooked at several restaurants and is an amazing gourmet chef. However, she chose to be awesome and keep her mouth shut while I fumbled around trying to do it myself.)
We were young-ish once. Seems like a long time ago.
A half-hour or so later I had created my first dish, affectionately titled the “Poor Man's Meal.” It consisted of boiled spaghetti (or angel hair), mixed in with canned butter beans, canned peas, garlic, onions, chick peas, and all fried together into a wonderful mess of tastiness with whatever oil I could get my hands on, along with a good dash of Greek salad dressing.
From that one humble meal came recipe after recipe we’ve developed, using some of the cheapest ingredients available on the store shelves. We might look at an existing recipe and discover that one ingredient on the list is too expensive, so we modify the recipe to do without or take something cheaper. That particular recipe might become ethnically inaccurate in consequence, but it's hard to care when you are on a shoestring budget.
Part of the reason we are here is to prove that you don’t need to completely compromise the quality of your food the lower your income gets. Of course, sea scallops won't be available every day, but there is so much awesomeness out there to discover and be discovered concerning food.
We are also here to chronicle the other types of feeding necessary for family: the need for hobbies, games, travel, eating out, spirituality, gardening, building, and every other aspect of the care and feeding of a large family. Because we are a large family. The money is usually tight, but we’ve found workarounds to all sorts of things to bring the expense down and make things work.
So please enjoy these thoughts of ours, and enjoy taking a journey with us. We’ll be doing a lot in our little corner of the world, and we’d love if you joined us!
