operation use up pantry items

Between finishing up my dissertation and applying on a bajillion jobs, I haven't had much time to cook anything overly exciting (nor the time to post about it if I did). With a move looming somewhere in the future (not sure where yet...depends on the outcome of the bajillion job applications) it is my mission to use up the abundance of items I have in my pantry. My cupboards are full of miscellaneous beans, grains, pastas, and other assorted goodies. Sometimes I use recipes, sometimes I throw a bunch of random things together and hope it turns out.
Like this stew. I had a tiny bit of red lentils and a tiny bit of split yellow peas so I combined them. I added some diced tomato, vegetable broth, onion, garlic, spices, and kale, and voila, a nice lentil-split pea soup (not the prettiest thing in the world I realize).

A few weeks ago my husband was in the Bay Area for a work trip. On the way home he picked me up a loaf of sourdough they were selling in the San Francisco airport. Imagine my surprise when I go to pick him up at the airport and he gets off of the plane with a bag of sourdough.

I had a sweet potato in my fridge that needed to be used, plus some butternut squash in my freezer, so I made a sweet potato-butternut soup to go with the bread.


Finally, I also had a handful of couscous left in a jar. Not enough couscous to really do anything with, so I combined it with some chickpeas and topped it with roasted butternut squash, zucchini, eggplant, and onion. This was inspired by a dish from The Kind Diet which I finally got from the library...I've been on the waiting list since it first came out months ago.