Day 8: It's starting to get interesting....
So then, Kitchen Store Cupboard Challenge watchers, here's the skinny.  Since my last post on Day 5, i've now run out of the following: fresh milk, any type of bread and a box of Puffins oat cereal.  On the critical list, nearing extinction, is the remaining almond milk and soy milk (only got a couple cartons of each left) as well as my last box of Kashi Puffed Wheat cereal.  Also demolished over the course of the last couple of days since I got back from NYC were the remaining Stacy's Naked Pita chips and the final chocolate digestive biscuits from back home.  All the easy stuff is slowly being whittled away and i'm finally being driven to explore the furthermost reaches of my cupboards....

To preserve my last box of cereal for when i'm really in need, I decided to use up some of my watermelon this morning and opt for a healthy breakfast smoothie.  First improvisation was the use of the watermelon and mint juice i'd made yesterday in my Omega juicer instead of milk, followed by handfuls of watermelon chunks, frozen strawberries, a banana and some almonds.  It wasn't that bad although i cant say i really recommend mint and banana as a winning flavor combination.   But it did the job, was Cupboard Challenge Compliant and didn't send me straight to the pot, so that was a result i suppose.  Yet again, i was up earlier that i wanted to be, courtesy of my feline alarm clock (just what the eff is his problem??) and, after finishing Fifty Shades (actually, the whole *ahem* trilogy), it was time to get my lazy arse off the sofa and do some serious housework and tidying.

After that was finished, my thoughts turned (with some trepidation) to supper and what to make.  I figured it was time to start getting a bit creative so, rather than the grilled salmon (from the freezer) and broccoli and cauliflower mash I'd planned to have, i decided the time had finally come to start making a dent in the sufficient-to-withstand-a-nuclear-winter number of jars of creamy alfredo sauce that i'd bought during one particularly enthusiastic trip to Costco.  God knows why i bought so much (other than it being Costco, obviously) or why i bought it at all (its not very healthy and chockful of fat) but i think its evident of that special place in your mind you go to when shopping in these places.  And a good part of the reason i'm undertaking this crazy-assed challenge now.

Anyway, here's what i ended up with:
Day 8: Cauliflower cheese and chia seed pasta bake
Ingredients: cauliflower, fusilli pasta, chia seeds, jar of Alfredo sauce, oyster mushrooms, garlic, onion, some cubed havarti with herb cheese, Worcestershire sauce, salt and pepper, crushed-up whole wheat crackers.

DoD = 2 (lots of crazy assed ingredients)
II = 3 (lots of crazy assed ingredients)
PfBF = 3 (lots of crazy assed ingredients)

Overall assessment: OK, so there were a number of wild cards to this "dish".  While you cant really go wrong with either cauliflower cheese or a pasta bake, the two together?  With just a jar of alfredo sauce to bind the whole lot together?  Hmmm..... In the end, it was OK - edible but just shy of tasty.  I think i was intimidated by the chia seeds (still not quite even sure what they are and what they are doing in my cupboard) so overcompensated by throwing a whole lot of other flavors into the dish.  I felt terribly proud of my inventiveness by crushing the crackers for a topping but - unfortunately - the taste of wheat crackers is pretty pervasive, so it was much more wheaty and crackerry than i was expecting.  So, dear readers, perhaps my first (probably of many) slightly odd dish of the experiment.

And one which i'll get to enjoy again tomorrow.  *sigh*

ps given the aforementioned dairy shortfall, i can now confirm that i am drinking my Tetley's with soy milk.  SOY MILK!!  And it is bloody disgusting.....