Greetings From the Bottom of the Bottle

Last night I was sad to discover that I'd got down to the bottom of the bottle of sesame oil, one of my favorite Asian condiments. I'd tried to be prepared for this one, knowing I was low, but every time I went to buy it I didn't like the price. This is an item I usually buy in quantity, so I don't know if it's been a while since my last sesame oil purchase or if I'm completely out of touch, but I was not willing to pay $10 for 8 oz. of the stuff, so, we may be going with out for a while. By the way, I have now added labels to my blog, so you can search on the side bar for all sorts of stuff. This post is going to have 2 labels, one is Depleted Supplies, to which I also need to mention paper muffin cups and paper lunch sacks. Again, I knew I was low on these paper goods, not to mention paper plates and cups, but I didn't write them down, so they were forgotten in all of my last minute grocery shopping madness. Maybe that should be another label: things I should have written down. But for sure, the other label for today's post will be Recipes, because I did do something write and my family actually had something to eat last night. Thanks to Chef Bren for helping on the meal prep.

What we ate: Lettuce wraps with rice (from food storage), potstickers (from the freezer - if you wonder why they're called that, just fry some up and you'll see), and an awesome Asian sauce (100% pantry produced). Here’s a recipe or two:

Lettuce Wraps

Lettuce wraps are a favorite in our house. We take long leaves of romaine and line them with rice, add on veggies (carrots, broccoli, onions, all raw), herbs (cilantro, basil, mint, etc), meat is optional, tonight we used prepackaged potstickers. And then, gratuitous amounts of our favorite Asian sauce.

Awesome Asian Pantry Sauce

3 Tbsp soy sauce
2 Tbsp vinegar
1 Tbsp peanut butter (optional)
1 tsp. sesame oil
Dash ginger
Dash garlic

Whisk heartily and serve as topping or dip with any Asian food; rice, stir-fried veggies, egg rolls, etc. Also, add a little ranch dressing for a new twist on raw veggie dip.