So interesting about the caraway seeds and the rise! Also, thanks for the reminder. The caraway and sesame seeds are in a different place than the seeds and grains I throw in bread, so I forget to use them. I think I'll do caraway and corn in this week's. :)

As to staples, I do keep trying to keep only whole grains, seeds and spices, and only grind/mill enough to use. Theoretically, it should reduce the clutter. In reality, I seem to have just that much more. I have managed to cut down on condiments, however. I don't buy two for ones anymore, and I'm trying to keep only one jar besides what's open, even for the things that are harder to come by. I'm also trying to use up some hard to come by ingredients (preserved) that I've bought or made by the case--they're not precious, you have six, use them or they'll go bad!

It became a project in December 2015 and will be ongoing for awhile. Like you, I just don't have the room for them - in cabinets or refrigerator.

I intentionally kicked toasted sesame oil out of the fridge and sesame seeds out of our lives...(let them run out...we get tired of things like dumplings and sesame noodles)...not even humus lately.

Just let them back in last grocery list as it has been since last spring i think. (been thinking about spring rolls, dumplings, and sesame noodles).

About Rye. A year ago x-mas i gave my parents a clear and perfect recipe for my sprouted grain rye, complete with the pans, the DanishDoughWhisk, all the grains, sprouted spelt flour. Instant expresso powder, etc.

I made it a few times during that visit. They both watched.

Sent them a photo step-by-step recipe as well but they lost that...(in the inter-google my dad calls it)

When Dad made it without me it came out dead flat, dense, hard outside and wet inside.

Well, talk about cutting gluten strands. Since i had left so much for them in the freezer, they did not make it for a while. When the recipe called for fifty strokes with the DanishDoughWhisk mixing in the same direction...my mother handed him a pastry cutter. Talk about memory loss.

(i found the dough whisk in the shed. They had no clue what it was)

sleevendog, that's the fun of getting old. We just FORGET things, and then others have to make bread for us. (grin)

Lars, rye bread sounds good. I like caraway, but Dad didn't, I've not tried it with fennel, but now I'll have to. Grainlady's dill addition sounds good too.

Right now I'm trying to cut down my spice cabinet, I have three pull out trays that are 12 inches wide and 36 inches deep. All three are full with spices and spice mixtures. I'm a sucker for those free Penzey's deals, so I have three jars of their Fajita seasoning. Too bad we don't like it. Same with their frozen pizza blend. It's OK for spaghetti sauce and such, but how soon can I use four jars? (Mine, Elery's, Amanda's, my Mother's, fortunately Ashley took her own and didn't leave it with me!)

The biggest offender in my pantry, though, is hot peppers. I have them canned, pickled, dried. Every year Elery wants to grow more and I have three 2 quart jars of them dried, I'm sure they've lost any flavor because they've been there 5 years or more. I think we should toss them each year and just replenish the pantry, but Elery wants to keep them ALL. I ought to just grind them all and make my own kind of gochuharu for kimchee, or make homemade chili powder. And I need to quit buying BIG jars of sesame seeds and cinnamon sticks and nutmeg, geesh, they'll be there a decade from now!

But staples? I think the first thing to go needs to be quinoa. It's OK, I eat it, but I don't really like it. It's like having a mouthful of bird seed or tiny pebbles or something, I just hate the texture, so I have three boxes and probably won't use it, ever. After that, jarred mayonnaise, because I don't use it very often and it's just so easy to make. I'd give up cheese in an instant, but Elery can't, he's an addict, LOL.

Annie

I do have dried dill in my cabinet and I also have some volunteer dill that has been growing in my back yard, but it's not quite big enough yet to harvest. The parsley has grown back with a vengeance, however, and so I do not have to buy that, which is nice. The parsley and dill that I grow in the winter is more tender than my summer crops. I use dill in a lot of things, including what is now going to be a sandwich spread. It was supposed to be a type of ranch dressing, but I added some dried cayenne that I picked in my back yard, and it was a lot hotter than I expected - almost as hot as my Habanero chilies. The cayenne stays on the plant and dries in place, but I should harvest it soon so that it doesn't get wet in the rain.

I just bought a small package of quinoa because I saw Martha Steward make some that looked good, and I saved her recipe on DVD. I have a habit of buying things I don't need when I'm at the Lebanese market - thus I have a fair amount of couscous that I need to use or else store in the freezer. I just do not make couscous that much, but I have at times put it in meatloaf.

Annie, I love quinoa -- especially in my veggie burgers! But don't toss it... grind it into flour and use it for making gluten-free stuff for your daughter, et al. I haven't tried it yet, but my niece claims that the GF quinoa pasta she buys is the best.

party, I wouldn't toss it, but you've given me a great idea. Feed it to other people! That's perfect. Quinoa burgers, or a breakfast cereal kind of thing. Hmmm. Then I'm not buying any more.

Annie

Annie, re quinoa. I really didn't like it until Cook's Magazine turned me on to a MUCH better way of making if. Instead of just adding liquid that is double the amount of quinoa and cooking it, do this: First, dry toast the quinoa until you hear it popping. Be careful not to burn it. Then add the liquid, but add only slightly more than the amount of quinoa itself. For example, if you have 1 c. quinoa, start with 1 1/4 c. liquid. You can add more if necessary, and you only need enough to make the little tails come out.

Quinoa is remarkably more tasty this way, and everyone who has tried it agrees.

Thanks for that laceyvail. I don't care for quinoa except when accompanied by something else that will cover up its taste, so I'll try that and see if it helps.

Sorry about the quinoa detour on your thread, Lars!

Just wondered if those who dislike quinoa know that it needs to be thoroughly rinsed before cooking? some can be purchased pre-rinsed, but rinsing is required to remove the saponin coating that makes it bitter.

No problem - I wanted more info on quinoa since I bought it for the first time last week-end, and I have not made anything with it yet.

Here's some more quinoa info from a previous thread. I'll be looking at that more closely before I cook it. I had not made a permanent mental note to wash it thoroughly, but I do wash brown rice well before cooking it, for a different reason.

Lars, have you eaten quinoa before? I primarily use it in my veggie burgers, as a substitute for bulgur in Tabbouleh, and have experimented with a couple side dishes containing things like sweet potatoes, chick peas, kale... really good combined with a sesame-based/Asian dressing!

Yes, I've eaten quinoa before, although I do not remember exactly where or how it was made, but I do remember that it was slightly sweet - possibly some sweetener had been added to it. I was planning to cook it with vegetables, the way I do rice in the pressure cooker. I have plenty of Bulgar for Tabbouleh, and so I need to use that up - or else add that to my already crowded freezer.

I like the idea of using a sesame dressing on it, perhaps with some ginger and soy. I need to buy more Beni shōga, as I used up most of what I had the last time I made okonomiyaki.

I thought quinoa also benefitted from friction? Rub between your hands while rinsing? I really like it when it's broken open and fluffy but a lot of people don't cook it right and it's just like grit. I like it in salads a lot. Much better than a lot of the heavy meats people put in salads. Puffed quinoa is delightful, too. :)

Thanks, Laceyvail, I'll try that.

party_music, my problem isn't with flavor, it's with texture. It's just little grainy seeds, they seem to small to chew and too big to just swallow, it just feels "icky". Yeah, I know, I have texture issues. The gelatinous goo in pie filling causes the same gag reflex that jello does, I just cannot eat the stuff. That's why all my pies have fresh fruit filling that I make myself, no goop.

plllog haven't figured out how to cook it so it's fluffy, it's ALWAYS grit. I've never seen puffed quinoa, although I've gotten some gluten free pasta with quinoa in it and it was bitter with an aftertaste and I've gotten a couple of kinds of chips/crackers with quinoa and they were OK but I couldn't tell there was quinoa in there, which was probably why they were OK.

Now, back to Lars' rye bread, which I like far better than I like quinoa!

Annie

Since Lars's question was about cutting staples, and since you have a daughter with celiac disease who might benefit from your keeping quinoa, let me just add this: A friend loves these instructions on The Kitchn. There are plenty of pictures of properly cooked quinoa there, as well, or just Google Images "cooked quinoa". It says to just stir them around. I prefer "rub between your hands". The problem is that the instructions on the bag or box are often wrong!

I like to rub quinoa with my hands in a large bowl of water, which I change a couple times before spraying with water in a fine-mesh strainer until the water runs clear.

Another quinoa tip: After the cooking time, place a clean cloth over the pan and place the lid on top of that. Wait 5-minutes and remove the lid and cloth. NOW fluff the quinoa. The towel will absorb the moisture in the pan that would have normally accumulated on the lid and fallen back into the quinoa. This will help keep it from getting mushy. You can use this tip with any cooked grain.

There are two types of quinoa available - imported and domestic. The imported variety is large, about the size of millet, and uniformly buff or cream color. It has been well-processed so that most of the bitter saponin coating is removed.

Domestic quinoa is smaller, with a deeper flavor. The seeds vary in color from off-white to dark tan and even a few black seeds in the mix. This type of quinoa requires an extra washing and cooks up less dry and fluffy even though it requires less liquid (2 cups liquid to 1-1/3 c. domestic quinoa - as opposed to 2 cups liquid to 1 c. imported quinoa).

-Grainlady

And there's another issue, plllog, Amanda who is celiac, doesn't like quinoa either, for the same reason I dislike it. It's not taste, it's texture. So, I'll try a different way to cook it and see if I can get past the "bird seed" feel in my mouth...

GL, the stuff I have on hand is "Fair Trade Certified", and "distributed" by a company from Chicago. It contains red, white and black quinoa. Of course, there is no country of origin anywhere on the label, but I'm assuming it's imported due to the Fair Trade Certified designation.

Annie