Empty food containers
- May 20
- 5 min read
"For a moment you are fully present in your life, clear about the value of every last bit of it." Tamara Adler
I'm still working through the pile of books on my desk and have come to another one - like David Chang and Nigel Slater - which has so many yellow stickers poking out of it that it will take me some time to deal with it. So I don't see that pile diminishing any time soon.
So I decided that rather than deal with the book as a whole today I would just deal with one of the chapters - if you can call them that - the last one in fact - How to Give Thanks: Empty containers. It is graced by this rather lovely painting by Caitlin Winner who provides a similarly beautiful work to introduce each chapter. Without these full page beginnings there would be no images to lighten the load provided by more than 1,500 recipes that fill the book. If you can call them recipes that is.
For this is a book about leftovers, and those recipes are barely recipes, merely a paragraph or very occasionally two which explain what you could do with a particular kind of leftover. It was a Christmas gift from my elder son, who has somehow divined that I do a lot with leftovers - maybe from finding out for himself - although I doubt that.
I decided to do the leftover containers first, because last night I used the very last of the oil from a jar of sun-dried tomatoes as my cooking oil for some curried cauliflower. I was about to rinse it out and clean for use as a future jam jar, when I realised that there was still oil and herby bits in the bottom that just wouldn't come out and so I set it back on my kitchen bench for further thought. So I checked - and alas there is no solution there for anything similar. And so I shall have to use my own thoughts - the most obvious of which is a vinaigrette. Well I do need to add something more liquid as it's the oil that is clinging to the jar. A lemony, herby something perhaps as an addition to a risotto or a pasta dish - even potatoes perhaps. Yes - I'm making shepherd's pie tomorrow, so maybe add some parsley and lemon plus milk, to add to the mashed potato topping.
Back to Tamara Adler who has arranged her sets of suggestions in alphabetical order for the leftover ingredients - or in this instance - containers. Hence she begins with Almond butter - empty jar and ends with Yoghurt - empty container. Now I'm pretty sure you all know to rinse your tins of beans and tomatoes out with water, to extract the last of the juices, and also to make vinaigrette in a finished jar of mustard - shaking it vigorously to get all the last bits of mustard off of the jar. But here are a few of her suggestions that I thought were novel enough to mention - this is a very short chapter.
The last bits of jars of things like chilli sauce or miso - break eggs into them, shake vigorously and make scrambled eggs.
When you have a messy pan of some kind after a braise or similar, put it back on the burner, pour in some water, followed by a splash of something - she suggests fish sauce, vegetable water, bean broth - but it could be anything really, bring it to the boil, as you scrape up all the bits left in the pan, pour into a jar, refrigerate and use as a broth to perk up something else.
So a few A-Z ideas
A for Almond butter empty jar - well any kind of empty nut butter jar. Apologies for the blurriness of this photo - it's a screen shot from one of the endless Instagram/Facebook/TikTok videos for peanut butter noodles from an almost empty jar. The key thing with this type of ingredient is to first pour in boiling water as the butter needs to melt. Depending on whether this is going to be a dip or a sauce, or something in between, add more or less water as you please. Shake vigourously until it's smooth and then add your flavourings. For the almond butter Tamara Adler suggests adding garlic, salt, fish sauce, lime juice, sugar, chillies. Add to your cooked noodles and then add fresh things like spring onions, prawns, shredded vegetables ... whatever takes your fancy. An idea that can be taken in a million different directions.
Butter wrappers
My mother used to keep butter and margarine wrappers for greasing cake pans and the like and Tamara Adler does indeed suggest doing this, but she also suggests laying them on the surface of leftovers if you've lost the lid you're putting them in, or on things that will develop a skin whilst cooling - because the last bit of fat on the wrapper will melt and protect.
Jam in a jar
Tamara Adler suggests making tea in the jar, or adding some booze and pouring it over ice - but the internet has gone mad for almost empty jam jars as cocktail shakers. Heaps of ideas out there. Which illustrates how pleasing and fun it could be to play around inventing such things. It doesn't even have to be alcoholic.
But Tamara - and probably countless others online - also suggests making a syrup to drizzle over pancakes, biscuits or tea - she says - but ice-cream surely? Anyway pour in a little boiling water, scrape and shake well and then in a pot combine with some honey, bring to a boil and cook until it's a syrup.
Vanilla beans
I'm sure you all know to put used vanilla beans into caster sugar to make vanilla sugar, but did you know you can make your own vanilla extract from them? Simply put in a jar or a bottle, cover with vodka and leave until it's the right colour - then remove the beans. Vanilla beans are expensive, so it's good to know you can make your own vanilla extract - and you can also add a teaspoon of water to that last bit of vanilla extract to make just a little more.
Yoghurt empty container
This is a picture of an alternative I found online - Overnight oats definitely not for me but doable.
What she does is to add a crushed clove of garlic with salt, 1 1/2 tbsp of mayonnaise and 1 tbsp of tahini and 1 tbsp water - Shake. The amount of yoghurt quoted was 1/4 cup - which will produce a sauce you can use for various Middle-Eastern things - or add different stuff and give it a different vibe.
So there you go. I will revisit the book as a whole. Take this as a sample of some of the things on offer here.
YEARS GONE BY
May 20
2024 - Soupçons
2023 - Nothing
2021 - Missing
2020 - Missing
2018 - The shape of bread
2017 - Nothing
Containers... you can never have too many of them!! 😱