hand in the air........

My name is Deanna and I'm a cheater.............

Currently in my pantry/freezer:

Zatarain Rice mixes
Bottle salad dressings
Instant potatoes
Cream of __xxxx__ soups
canned mushrooms
canned chili
Heat and eat chicken strips and fish sticks

Ummmmmmmm........I'm sure there's more, but hey!
Sometimes I just "Don' wanna"..........whiney, whiney, whiney.....

Put me on the list too.....

I have

Cream of ********* soups
Blue box mac & cheese
Cake mixes/frosting from Betty (for those "I need 36 cupcakes for school tomorrow" moments)
Bottled Salad Dressing
Several rice mixes
Boxed croutons

There are probably more.........

I would kill for a box of Annie's "deluxe" shells with Wisconsin cheddar right now. And some Progresso soups. Bob's Turkey Farm potpies (anyone out there near Lancaster, Massachusetts?) always used to be in my freezer, as well as Chatham sea clam pies.

Alas, I'm in Holland. Home of lots of cheese but not home to much in the way of palatable ready-to-eat fare. I have found a very tasty Bernaise sauce in a jar that I will truly miss when I move back to the States. Also a packaged sauerkraut with Riesling wine, and a similar packaged spiced red cabbage with apple "stukjes" (pieces) that is quite good.

Also here, jarred pasta sauces are quite good (all from Italy).

Really miss chicken broths and good quality canned soups (just the 2 of us and a tiny cramped kitchen).

Just tried the pork tenderloin cooked in a baguette (posted on the Recipe forum). Bought a package of Knorr mushroom sauce to serve with it - doctored that up with fresh mushrooms sauted with butter, and a bit of Marsala and cream. That will certainly be in my pantry from now on...

seagrass

Soirry....about the only convenience foods I buy are frozen boneless skinless frozen chicken rbeasts and various bottled marinades. With osome of the chicken "chips" and some Soy Vey terayaki or Newman's ginger I can make a mean hunk of grilled chicken in a very short time...
But in a pinch I may do a cake mix...but not brownies.
However when I have a housefull of grand kids, you will find Kraft Mac and Cheese, those prewrapped single slices of faux cheese, presweetened breakfast cereal...but never a pop tart!!
Linda C

Does Meals on Wheels count as cheating? I've been ill most of this year and can't cook for myself any more, so that's what I've been eating.

Prior to that, I cheated quite a lot, really. Frozen pastry, instant mashed potato, bottled pasta sauces, stock cubes, commercial French and Italian dressing, frozen veges, prepackaged salads, commercial biscuits (cookies) - they all contributed to my laziness, as cooking-for-one will do to you.

Gee, my pantry is in sore need of a thorough clean-out. Everything's probably out of date by now!

Oh yes, I "cheat". I always have canned garbanzo beans in the pantry for hummus, some nights I don't want to cook a darned thing. Peanut butter too.

I also have Velveeta Shells and Cheese for Ashley, a box of Krusteaz pancake mix and a box of Cocoa Puffs. (grin) Oh, and Makayla's birthday cake was "funfetti" from a mix, that's what she wanted. I made homemade chocolate and homemade banana cakes but you know what the kids all ate? Yup, the cake mix....

I have also been known to use that pie crust in a box from the refrigerated section, the red box one? Ahem. As a final confession I have two cans of the red and white can cream of mushroom soup in my pantry. Ashley eats it out of the can, undiluted and cold. Ewwww. I also use it for the yearly green bean casserole which my kids just love. Remember, they're heathens....

Lori, I hope you feel better soon, I'd come and make you some soup if I were closer.
Annie

Who has time to cook from scratch every single time? I admit I am a cheater. Brownies, cake mix (usually doctored), muffin mix; spaghetti jar sauce (also doctored), frozen mac & cheese (for son because it is his favorite), Progresso soup (for me for lunch), real potato flakes (actully not bad), rice mixes, bottled salad dressing (I am addicted to CA French), biscuits in a can and sometimes I even buy a cooked chicken. Heaven help me!
Clare

I keep a variety of rice and couscous mixes. Joe likes to have canned soup on hand for when he works late and bottled salad dressings for his big salads.

I also keep stuffing mix and 1-2 yellow cakes mixes, jello and pudding for quick desserts like trifle.

Michelle

Lori - I hope you feel better soon!!! How did you end up with pneumonia? Please be careful - and stay in bed for pity's sake:-)

Both of my boys love Velveeta Shells and Cheese, and I also use a jarred marinara sauce (usually Barilla) when I don't have any homemade sauce around to make pizza. I do make my own crust typically (I like whole wheat), but in a pinch I have used Boboli crusts and they are pretty good. I don't typically care for canned soups, but every once in a blue moon I'll buy a can of Progresso Chicken and Noodle because my older son and DH like it when they are sick.

I think using shortcuts are fine, especially if you have young children who can be fussy eaters. If you're sick or just plain tired (and who isn't???), then it's good to have a quick convenience food that tastes good and is comforting to you.

Daisy, I hope you're feeling better soon. Lori, take care!
DONNA

I have bought bread the past two times in a row. Something that I haven't done in over a year and should really be ashamed for! I also bought "Goober" for peanut butter and jelly sandwiches, but will not do so ever again. I also bought commercial bread crumbs, and they were very convenient... I always buy spaghetti sauce and pasta and condiments. Probably more to come, but those are all that come to mind at this time.

I hope your feeling better soon, Lori!

I use boxed Chicken stock sometimes, Rao's marinara, boxed brownies, Nestle tube cookies. ( make my own, too, but hey, if I'm running around like a loon during the week, I go for easy. My DH and my kids ate McDonalds and all kinds of junk before I decided I loved cooking, their tastebuds can deal with the easy way way out once in a while!

I love ravioli in a can and the blue box mac n cheese, but we've evolved, I like it better in the microcups :) and my absolute favorite is Stouffer's frozen mac n cheese. So i guess I'll see you in hell! I hope they have ravioli in a can :)

I'm not listing.. lol..my head is pounding..
but yes I have some convience foods, either for what they are worth as is, or to use in some cases to add to them, and make it semi homemade.

I see nothing wrong with a little help in a pinch or whenever it suits you better...

My kids love Mac n Cheese from a box, but they also love my homemade...
Progresso makes great soups..but high in sodium since a can is a "real" serving! LOL
Their low sodium ones aren't quite as tasty and come in limited flavor choices..

Oh, I think we all do this! I like to always have:
certain brand of cheap and easy to add to tomato pasta sauce
certain Italian import of pesto sauce
Imagine brand "no-chicken" veggie broth
frozen organic corn
canned chi chi beans!...not organic...
the one rice mix we have is Spanish rice...so much better than we make it
although I won't eat this more than once or twice a year, I love that Annies (or is it Amy's?) shells and cheese from a box...so salty, so good
and once every million years= K**** brand mac 'n' cheese
We have tried the jarred Indian sauces, but over time we have figured out how to make them ourselves and they seem much less oily that way!
This was fun, thanks for posting this

Oh Lori...love and chicken soup to you. Get well soon!

I have no qualms about using a mix for something, but we have found that too many of them are both too salty and too bland for us.

Dick likes the Pr...Soups for a quick lunch alone, and I confess to eating canned ravioli ...cold...out of the can. It is the one thing I stocked after 9/11. I might die of malnutrition but I'd die happy. Dick can tolerate seeing me do this but my occasional Twizzler binges appall him. Plastic chemicals I know but I love the chewiness and rue the day that TJ's stopped selling the 'good' Australian red licorice. What they have now is toooo sweet.

But mostly I cheat by going out to eat. ;-) Maureen

I think if you add more than water, give yourself credit for cooking it. At least you control the ingredients that go into whatever. DH loves F.Alfredo, but not me, and I just discovered this in a box or package. What a timesaver and that makes him happy and I have time to fix an additional side dish I prefer. Everyone's happy and I can go another day without makeup (that's code for going out to eat). Life has been so much easier since I discovered cream of mushroom soup! LOL!

Frequently use:
Chicken stock
canned great northern beans, navy beans and black beans
Frozen Pastry
Canned tomatoes, puree and sauce
frozen purple hull peas
frozen okra
frozen corn
Rao's marinara
artichoke hearts
roasted red peppers
jellies and jams for DH
peanut butter
mayonnaise
other types of condiments

An ocassional:
box of brownies
Cream of.....soup
Velveeta

And I have absolutely no interest in making my own pasta so I have several kinds of pasta in my pantry.

Oh, and I don't milk my own cow or make butter. ; )

Gosh, I think we all take whatever shortcuts we need to take. Here's my "sin" list, but I don't really think it's all that sinful! LOL

Canned black beans
Jarred spaghetti sauce (I have canned my own, but it's gone!)
"Cream of" Soup
Bottled slad dressings
Boxed mac-n-cheese (I hate it but Tim likes it)
Canned tuna
Spam (hey, I live in the Spam capital, doncha know...)
Uncle Ben's boxed rice side dishes
Frozen vegetables (I prefer them over canned)
Boxed or frozen pie crust (but Nancy's gonna help me eliminate the need...)

And an occasional frozen pizza for Tim (again, I hate 'em, he loves 'em...)

Never make baked goods from mixes, just don't like the quality (or lack of...). And I don't count Mayo, canned tomatoes, peanut butter and the like as shortcuts, it just makes sense to buy some things.

Linda

There are a number of convenience foods that I use, but thanks to Sheshebop, apple pie filling is no longer one of them.

I'm eager to eliminate boxed English muffins after reading about the recent successes.

I've found that no craft show or store bought pepper jelly can satisfy like Annie's Habanero Gold.

Probable the most used for me is bagged spring mix for salads.

Interesting what some consider a sin.

I'm drinking store bought beer and thinking myself a fool... probably right in my thinking. A bottle of claret on the wine rack along with "boonsfarm". Never attempt to serve decent wine to people who prefer $2 Booners. About 3 gallons of wine I could bottle and have my own but that would be work.

I get punished if I forget or don't have time to cook lunch. Better a pb&j from home on store bought bread then anything from the vending machine at work. Last sandwich I bought from the machine seemed like very low grade catfood... lower then I buy for my cats. At that level a pb&j is home cooking.

I bought meat but have a field full of rabbits. If I don't eat them a coyote or fox will. Shhhh... be verwy quiet...

Habenera peppers growing live in my kitchen and a freezer full of jalapeno/serreno/cayenne/hungarian... so there is dry cayenne powder in my cabinet... dusted my burger with it today. Sliced american "cheese" on that burger. On store bought bread... store baked at least it was. Been mixing store bought mayo and taco sauce to make burger sauce and contemplating buying dill relish to mix with it.

Was a box of Mac&Cheese in the pantry. Dolly got it out and ate the cheese and the cardboard box portion. I don't remember putting it in the pantry so I let Dolly have at it. A jar of Tikka Masala sauce in there but Doll ain't getting that.... well maybe I'll share some. Doll likes chicken nuggets from the drive-thru so she has no sense of real food.

: )
lyra

Sorry you're sick Lori! I have been known to heat up a can of the red-and-white chicken noodle soup when I've been too sick to cook. Mom made Lipton's from a packet sometimes, buttt...euw.

I can a lot of convenience food, does that count? We keep soup bases around, beef, chicken and vegie. And, while we're confessing... cream of mush....I have a couple of recipes that just aren't the same without it.

Boboli in the freezer for Thai chicken pizza.

No box mac and cheese, but I have the orange cheese, and some dried white cheddar.

Cake mix, yes...I bake something for my employees' birthdays and they save me lots of time. Today was cupcakes for a volunteer, spice cake with apple filling plooped into the middle and a caramel glaze. I have a few tubes of assorted fillings around, too. Makes great cupcake filling...Bavarian cream in mocha cupcakes...mmmmm.

DH keeps Costco frozen casseroles around for those nights when he has to 'cook'. There's one with shrimp and fettuccine that's not half bad.

Hi Lori, my name is Ellen and I'm a user of convenience products...
More than I care to list. I cook, but I use short cuts too. I'm busy but lazy and want the end product to taste good. I'm not into working so hard that I'm exhausted when the meal is through.
A few canned soups--not progresso (I confess to loving Wolfgang Puck's tomato soup), chicken broth or stock, although I do make some from scratch, definitely rice mixes, jams and jellys that don't have sugar, bread, pasta, and occasional cookie, cake or brownie mixes! You can peek in my pantry, anytime!

Lori, I hope you're better soon...:-(

I am a user. Yes, I admit it. I'm a user.

On occasion I've used:

canned broth
pre-chooped onions and bell peppers
Paul Newman's Olive Oil and Vinegar salad dressing-I love it!
frozen puff pastry
flour and corn tortillias

Now that the kids are gone I really don't keep any food in the house. That's why my list isn't loooong.

My problem is... now I'm eating the baking chocolate because I no longer buy or make the cookies I once did for the kids. I know...I'm a sad pathetic person :-)

Hope you feel better soon Lori.
Well, I use lots of shortcuts. And I don't feel guilty. Yes, I love to cook and bake, but let's get real. If we work AND have a life at all, there are just not enough hours in the day to do it all. I use canned dressing, especially now that I am on Weight Watchers and need No Fat dressings. I use canned mushroom soup when I make a roast for my in-laws. I never make boxed brownies, but I do make boxed cakes. Doesn't mean I don't ever make "real" cakes, but I spend my weekends cooking for the in-laws, and I need all the shortcuts I can get. I used Chi-Chi's corn pudding mix, and rice mixes, and black beans and rice packets, and Sunbird fried rice seasoning, and boxed Lipton sides (for the in-laws) To be honest, they like plain plain food, and when I do something exotic, or with lots of interesting spices and tastes, they are suspicious. Example: "Now, Sherry, this doesn't have garlic in it does it???"
See what I mean.
I don't think anybody here should feel guilty for doing shortcuts. Some of them are actually pretty good.
I do plenty of scratch cooking, but I can't do it all.
Peek in my pantry anytime!
Sherry

Interesting thread and when you really consider the kitchens of our ancestresses, we all use "convenience foods".

We don't have to grind our own corn, or seek out a hive for honey to sweeten our food. We take for granted spices, flours, coffee, teas etc.

So I would say that there is always something in my kitchen that is "convenient" :)

Lori, I am so sorry you are sick. I had pneumonia when my kids were really little and remember how sick I was, like it was yesterday. Please take care and get pleny of rest! Let's see in my pantry things I use in a pinch: Spiced Cake mix, jarred pizza sauce, chicken gravy, rice mix and instant potatoes, which once upon a time my family perferred to the real ones!!
Get back to bed!!! Gina

I took the easy way last night...Shake and Bake pork chops and Rice a Roni... I keep a few things around like that for ease when I'm in a time crunch. Last night I was up to my elbows in cabbage...finally got my sauerkraut started.

Things you'll find hiding in my pantry... cake mix for an occasional dump cake, Jiffy cornbread mix, jarred cooking sauces from American Spoon, tomato soup and in the freezer I usually have a box of those toaster pastries...the cream cheese... I love to toast them and spread with a little homemade jam...

Nancy

Thanks for all the well-wishes. (I'm feeling much better today). Amazing what a good night's sleep will do for you - and a day out of work finally (ahem).

Ohiomom, your statements were exactly what I was thinking when I started the thread. If I had to mill my own flour, etc, I never would have survived years ago. I'm way too selfish for something like that. I need my "me" time.

The problem with the boxed stuff is there's so much junk in most of it. But it's what I grew up with and I know many, many families do today. Life goes by fast. But it is hard to find a happy medium between healthy and convenient.

It's funny, several people listed it as convenient food, but I don't think of canned/boxed chicken broth as a convenience food. Of course it is. I use so much of it for so many different recipies, I can't make enough on my own to keep up. But I still do, at least once a week.

Same thing with peanut butter...just makes sense to buy it.

So I got up some energy this morning and drove to the store to buy everything for chicken soup. But I still bought a can of Progresso just in case. (never had it before, BTW, but a couple of people mentioned it, so I'll probably give it a shot)

Well here's my confession for the day..
I have two classroom parties today..
Class 1) Bring popcorn and candy corn~for those glove filled treats...(boxed Healthy Request popcorn, and well can't make my own candy corn quickly, LOL)
Class 2) Bring something ooey gooey~Boxed Brownies, with coffee for water, (shh don't tell the 5th graders), little dabs of homemade chocolate frosting to hold the candy corn pumpkins on, Cocoa Ball Marshmallow bars(extra marsmallows), and a box of Apple Muffin mix(made into mini muffins), with homemade unsweetened apple sauce for the oil, and apple juice for the water.

There I said it..I used convience, convience and more convience. LOL

Enjoy your soup Lori, which ever you choose!

I bet Grainlady wouldn't have a very long list on this thread, if any at all! She amazes me!

Glad you're feeling better, Lori.

Guilty! Boxed stuff, frozen stuff, bottled stuff, cream o' soups. Yeah, I got em all. What can I say?

Lori, if you have a Chik-fil-A near you, try their chicken soup next time you're sick. It's pretty good!

Ditto what Lowspark said. I use em all. Worse yet, I've been on the road for work more than I have been sleeping. It's been a lot of late nights going through drive thru windows. YEEEECCCHHHHHH!

Always on hand in my pantry are several varieties of Imagine Soups - No Chicken Broth, Creamy Portobello, Tomato Basil and Butternut Squash and canned beans - chick peas, black beans and kidney beans. In the winter I usually have frozen peas and corn. I consider all those staples though.

What I should think of as cheating I guess would be the frozen pie shells, cake mixes and brownie mixes. But since those folks at Duncan Hines, Ghiradeldi (SP?) and Oronoque Farms do such a good job, who am I to compete?

During a recent period of "sitting shiva" a good friend brought me some packs of frozen Tabatchnik Split Pea Soup. She said, and rightly so, that they would come in handy when all the supportive friends and neighbors went back to their usual schedules and we found ourselves alone and not in the mood to cook. She was right and even when no-one was around we were supported by a good friend.

Lori, I can my own chicken stock but I'm sure not making my own peanut butter. Actually, I tried, but I only like Peter Pan. My own stuff was kind of grainy, not smooth enough. I added honey but it still wasn't right. I added molasses. Nope.

I gave up and bought Peter Pan, LOL. Oh, and believe it or not, our local Subway has a chicken noodle soup that doesn't completely suck and my grocery store has rotisserie chickens that are cheaper than buying a whole chicken and roasting it, when they are on sale.

I'm glad you're feeling better, though. I had pneumonia a few years ago and remember just being so tired that I thought I'd have to stay at the office because I was too tired to walk to the parking lot. It's one of the few things that actually kicked my b*tt, so be careful and make sure you get enough rest and lots of that chicken soup!

Annie