Posted by kathryn in Blogging

Back in September I set a cooking challenge: given a list of 15 foods, what would you make for dinner?.

The Pantry Challenge was born from my belief that even with a limited range of long-life ingredients, you can still make a healthy meal from what’s in the cupboard.

Planning your meals and eating fresh food are really important strategies for health. But sometimes this falls over. Sometimes life gets busy, you run out of time and it feels like there’s nothing in the cupboards.

Cooking from the pantry isn’t easy. It can take some lateral thinking. But in September several of you rose to the challenge and we ended up with seven fantastic meals.

Risotto, a salad, pasta, paella, two types of of spicy chickpeas and a tagine. All made from a choice of just 15 ingredients.

And now I’m challenging you again. From the list below, what would you make for dinner?

1. Olive oil
2. Tinned tomatoes
3. Tinned legumes or beans
4. Soy sauce
5. Frozen vegetables
6. Flour
7. Pasta or rice
8. Tinned fish
9. Eggs
10. Bread
11. Olives
12. Meat from the freezer
13. Fresh onions
14. One spice or spice mix
15. One dried herb or herb mix

The Rules

I’ve tweaked the list of ingredients slightly. However the basic rules stay the same:

• Make a meal using ingredients from the above list.
• I’ve allowed some flexibility in the list, for example you can choose your own herb, spice and so on. You don’t have to use all the ingredients but your recipes must only use these foods. No tweaking the list and no adding in extra sneaky ingredients.

• If you have a blog, post your recipe on your site and then send me an email. Please include a link back to this post, announcing the Pantry Challenge.
• If you don’t have a blog but still want to take part, then please, please do. You can email your recipe and any photos directly to me and I’ll include them in the round up.
• In your email please state your name, blog name (if you have a blog) and where you’re from. Include a link back to your blog post and feel free to also include a photograph of your dish.
• You can enter more than one recipe.
• The closing date for entries is Sunday 30 November.
• Due to time constraints I can’t accept late submissions.
• I’ll post a round up of the recipes and entries during the week following the deadline.

Let me know if you have any questions. Otherwise happy cooking . . . from the pantry.

Are you going to take part in the Pantry Challenge?

Spice photograph by Whirling Phoenix.

13 November, 2008