Before the craziness of the past month started I was rooting around in the pantry and found that I had a package of seasoning for slow cooker pot roast. I also had a 2lb roast in the freezer left over from cutting my own steak tips. Since I'm still following the Pantry Plan as much as possible, I made a great meal that I could eat several times and still have some left overs to toss in the freezer to make soup at a later date.
While my mom was here Indian Summer gave way to late fall; which means soup and stew season is officially here. Using the left over pot roast, another container of home made beef stock, a package of stew meat I found on sale at Stop and Shop, and a large bag of frozen mixed veggies I had in the freezer, I threw together a large pot of beef barley soup for us to have over the course of several evenings.
One of the other things I love about using freezer left overs for soup is it always makes enough that I can share with the neighbors too. The soup and a loaf of Irish oat bread were a perfect way to introduce myself to my new upstairs neighbors.
I still have a little left over and tonight, after a long day in the city on a construction site and coming home with the beginnings of a cold, I heated the last of the soup up, fixed myself some toast after I fed Curley and Larry, two of my starters who are happily bubbling away on my counter for some serious bread baking over the weeekend, and settled down to watch Keith Olbermann and Rachael Maddow.
All in all, a pretty darn good evening...
