I am very pleased that today when I was looking through the pantry and the refrigerator, there was no food to toss! And I don’t mean that I’m just hoarding it until next week when it will get thrown out, I legitimately did not waste any food this week. I’ve already done a post on some things to do with almost-spoiled bananas. Today I thought I’d focus on other fruit items, non-citrus.
Berries-go through the container and toss the bad ones of course. For larger items like strawberries, you can cut bad spots off. There are lots of good recipes online for blueberry muffins. Or, toss the fruit into a blender with a few ice cubes, some yogurt, and you’ve got a smoothie.
Make breakfast tarts-just choose what your crust will be-an English muffin, bagel thin, waffle. Make a frosting with cream cheese and powdered sugar, or just cream cheese, or just jelly. Spread your ‘frosting’ on it, then arrange the fruit. Kids will love making designs out of it if you have them do it themselves, or make a smiley face with the fruit.
Apples, pears-cut the bad spots off if there are blemishes. It’s very easy to whip up a baked apple or pear crisp or cobbler, many recipes to be found online. I really like the recipe from the side of the box of Cinnamon Corn Flakes. I use that one all the time and just modify it. I’ve used pears instead of apples and I dislike nuts and nutmeg so I leave those items out.
If you find yourself with an abundance of apples or pears, here’s an easy dessert. Just peel it and core out the middle of the fruit. Put in a tbsp or two of butter, pack it with brown sugar, some cinnamon. Take a refrigerated pie crust and wrap it on the outside of the item. Bake at 350 for about an hour and yum! Serve with vanilla ice cream, pudding or whatever. Very easy, it can bake while you’re cooking and eating dinner and it makes the house smell wonderful.
Fruit pizza! Serve it for breakfast, lunch or dinner. Hey, why not? Here’s another recipe from Pillsbury. Although I’ve eaten cookies for dinner on several occasions, I don’t know that I would serve it to my kids. But it would be a good dessert or snack, and at least the recipe gives you a good baseline to work with for adapting and modifying to suit your needs.
My friend Barb has this idea to share: Had blueberries, strawberries and mangoes to use up so I diced the mangoes and sauteed them down with a little butter and a sprinkle of brown sugar. I also added a little vanilla and some pumpkin pie spice. Then I added the blueberries and strawberries. Cooked for a few minutes then added some Mojito mix and simmered for another 5 minutes to cook off the alcohol. Will be serving it either over French toast or pancakes.
Feel free to share your ideas for fruit!
Note: This is a post from 3/29/11. Got it out, dusted it off, added some ideas & checked the links–good as new!
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