How to Clean Out the Fridge

I’ve been a terrible cooking slacker throughout baseball season. There were many uninspired slow cooker meals, and also a whole lot of reliance on Blue Apron and Gobble (I promise to write about Gobble soon; it’s like Blue Apron’s simpler cousin).

But school is out, and I’ve once again returned to cooking things. Sort of. See, Gobble and Blue Apron have gotten me out of the habit of grocery shopping. I’ve only been going to the store or farmer’s market for milk and produce. That’s it. So needless to say, the house isn’t exactly stocked with essentials.

Tonight I made polenta and topped it with a rustic sausage sauce. This is less of a recipe and more of a suggestion of how to combine what happens to be in your fridge or pantry.

While the polenta cooks:

• Slice sausages, whatever kind you have in your freezer. (Tonight: chicken, roasted garlic and artichoke).
• In a large skillet, cook the sliced sausages until browned.
• Add sliced onion. Cook until softened.
• Open a jar of roasted red bell pepper strips. Add as many as you’d like.
• Open a can of tomatoes. Dump them into the pan.
• Find garlic stuffed olives in the fridge. Slice them in half and add them to the pan.
• Rinse a tablespoon or two of capers. Add to pan.
• Simmer until polenta is cooked. Serve over polenta.

You could also toss this with pasta, but I was feeling fancy and opted for polenta instead.

Results

The Assistant helped cook, chopping the red pepper strips into more bite-sized lengths (his choice) and quartering some large olives. Something tells me that he cut twice as many olives as actually went into the sauce. (Yes, I saw that.)

“I LOVE this sausage!” he said with great enthusiasm. “I didn’t think I’d like the rest of the stuff, but I did. You can make this again.”

This may become my new go-to meal.

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