I haven’t been dumpstering since the start of covid, but my friend saved this nice lamb leg for a year in his freezer. I rubbed it with mustard and herbs and roasted it and made some peppers stuffed with cheese and rice to go with it.
This week I found a couple of unexpected items: some “chicken style” seitan chunks packaged in a tofu-style container, a bottle of cooking sake, baby broccoli, and a couple of nice bell peppers. With some other ingredients (carrots, onion, garlic, ginger, soy sauce, hoisin sauce, lime juice, a little leftover pineapple juice) I was able… Read More Seitan Stir Fry
On the way home from work Tuesday I found an enormous 15 inch cast iron skillet out on the curb. I carried it about a mile home, stripped and reseasoned it with olive oil. Today I used it to cook a pork loin (seared on the stove, then 400°F for 35 min) with little potatoes,… Read More Cast Iron Skillet & Pork Loin
Probably months ago I found a pound of cod pieces. After making the obligatory codpiece joke I put them in my freezer until I had enough milk or cream to make chowder, something I’d do occasionally when I used to pay for the same bags of fish chunks. This is one of those things I’d… Read More Cod Chowder
Since I’ve been sick for the past few days I’ve been eating mostly frozen meals, dried fruit and little ice cream cones. The little ice cream cones are great because even though they’re melted when we find them, the ice cream is coated in a chocolate shell that keeps it intact until they can be… Read More Pesto Chicken and Asparagus with Cashews
These are premade frozen gyoza, which I actually took out of the packaging and washed because something had gotten on them. I think it was probably a broken egg, because I found a bit of shell in the new bag after freezing them. Normally I wouldn’t keep something like that, but it’s hard to refuse… Read More Pork Gyoza
I don’t have a lot of experience cooking meat, and was brought up to overcook it, because, you know, it’s safer. Steak is something I don’t have very often. But since I managed to dumpster both a couple of top sirloin steaks and a pack of bacon, I decided to see if I could do… Read More Bacon-Wrapped Steak
This is a recipe I normally make with couscous, but since I have orzo instead, I’m going to make it with orzo. It’s a one pot dish that involves putting the bowl of the rice cooker directly on the stove. If you’re not sure if your rice cooker can do that, it’s probably best to… Read More Rice Cooker Orzo
I’ve bought soy chorizo in the past and if there’s one thing I remember about it is that it stains everything red. The sausage is also kind of already crumbled inside the casing, so the sausage shape is really just there to make it look more appealing to customers. If you fry it in oil… Read More Soy Chorizo Tacos
Last week I found my section of the freezer was completely full with meats, vegetables and fruit we’d dumpstered over the past few months. I decided to make more of an effort to use that stuff before it started to piss off my roommates (who don’t usually have any food in the freezer, but that… Read More Salmon with Lemon, Artichoke & Polenta
Good Dumpster Cooking 