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Day 3: Lunch and Dinner Lunch was spectacular: leftover ground pork, combined with taco spices, and eaten on home-fried corn tortillas with some toppings—tomato, lettuce, muenster cheese, cilantro, scallions, and sour cream. This was the first time "rationing" was considered when making a meal. We had tacos last week (that's what the leftover pork was from) and some of the toppings were left over from that. The two-day-old chopped tomatoes that my fiancé didn't cover with plastic wrap weren't looking too hot, but I looked around and saw I only had two other plum tomatoes. So, I thought to myself, "I'll probably need those later, and can put these already-chopped tomatoes to good use now." Hands down, every other time I would have opted for freshly chopped tomatoes. In the end, it made no difference in the taco and I forgot about the "not fresh" option of the toppings. Dinner was our first major setback. I had planned on having a grass-finished steak, which I pulled out on Saturday and wrapped in parchment paper, letting the steak breathe but still being covered. When I unwrapped it parts of the steak had bonded to the parchment paper, and areas of the steak were dried out and crusty, something I've never encountered in such a short period of resting time for raw meat. Prior to opening it was a professional frozen and vacuum sealed piece of good looking meat. So, one main component to a meal has been lost. Then the fiancé, Lola, arrived home, not feeling all that hot; she didn't even want me to make the whole roast chicken I had lined up. Makes my life easier! So we ended up eating my childhood comfort-food-staple: buttered macaroni, this time with farfalle noodles. We work on eating local and sustainable as much as possible, and as a result I am so over root vegetables right now. We've been eating them for months and their heavy, starchy sustenance is just not all that appealing. Well, without the green component around the house—dandelions, watercress, arugula, etc—all I'm left with are potatoes, parsnips, sweet potatoes, and the like. Day 4: Breakfast Today I continued to eat the steel-cut oats I made over the weekend, this time paired with donuts from the Donut Plant. (mmmmmmmmmmm) [edit: the Donut Plant donuts were leftovers from Lola's school project. I've been avoiding going out to eat at all as well, which in New York can be pretty challenging.] The plan for today is: simple lunch (probably a sandwich) and a roast chicken with sweet potatoes for tonight.

Sunday, Day Two: Lunch & Dinner Thus far I haven't noticed any real effect on our meal plans from this exercise. I expect this will soon change, though, as I noticed last night that we only have a single head of lettuce and nothing else for greens. For veggies—one head of cauliflower, one parsnip, a couple sweet potatoes, and normal potatoes. I basically skipped lunch yesterday while I worked on this lollipop project, churning out various hard candies and gelées.I ate a small bowl of Crispix around 6 PM before preparing dinner. For dinner, and the Oscars, we invited a friend over and I made a 2-lb grain-finished steak with a simple red wine reduction sauce. For sides we had leftover onion-fennel soup, leftover potatoes-parsnip mash, and some steam-sauteed carrots. For dessert we had some avocado ice cream. On the side was a little experiment: a gelatinized bacon-infused bourbon cube topped with Angostura-vermouth hard candy and maple-bacon hard candy. Really crazy, in texture mostly—still needs a lot of work. The most bizarre event of the night was testing out these lollipops that utilize bioluminescent proteins. We had no idea what would happen, so we turned the lights out and started sucking. Within seconds our entire mouths and the lollipops started to glow very brightly. It was amazing! You could even get them wet and throw the bioluminescent glowing protein water around, making it look like some crazy scene from CSI or something. I'll post a photo later today. Day 3 Plan Breakfast will be steel cut oats with dried fruits. Easy, and yummy. Lunch will be something small, maybe yogurt and an apple (the last apple). Dinner will be a grass-finished steak—but what to eat with it? Rice? Couscous? Noodles? I'm not sure just yet, so we'll have to see what I conjure up.

Dinner last night was supposed to be leftovers: onion-fennel soup, potato/parsnip mash, and a grass-finished steak. But, due to some people coming over, I ate a grilled cheese sandwich and was out the door for some bar hopping. I did make avocado ice cream yesterday, and as a leftover had some egg whites. I used those this morning for a egg white hash with leeks, bacon and gruyere cheese. Now I'm consumed with making lollipops for this art project (today I've tried absinthe, kaffir lime, and maple-bacon). Tonight for dinner is a grain-finished steak and the leftovers that were intended for dinner last night. And some Oscars!

I love Fly Pigs Farm, and their products are top-notch. I do find their prices a bit ridiculous when purchased directly from the Grand Army Plaza farmer's market so I've opted to go with stuff from Dickson Farmland Meats, which is also local and of the upmost quality. I bet that's some good kielbasa though!

Haha! Spamalot Spam—I didn't know they produced that. And a preserved duck egg—how do they go about preserving it? It looks like it's covered in hay, or wood chips! Update: I found this on Wikipedia: The accompanying photo to the article says: "Century egg coated in a caustic mixture of mud and rice husk." Sounds somewhat scary.

I think the next couple days will be easy for most people. I'm really looking forward to the meals from Wed - Saturday! This morning for breakfast I had scrambled eggs with scallions and garlic, topped with parsley, and served alongside D'Artagnan bacon and toast. I'll post photos when meals are actually interesting enough to photograph!

I'll add some images as well to show my pre-week bounty.

Or, I've made an awesome smoked trout risotto with leeks and lemons. You can find similar recipes online for that. Or just eat 'em on crackers with creme fraiche!

I'm going to join the party, starting today. (I shopped yesterday.) I don't anticipate this to be much of a problem from an ingredient perspective, though still a challenge. My main concern will be fresh vegetables, and although I do have some here we generally tend to eat quite a bit paired with their protein friends. Like someone else mentioned, I certainly have some odds and ends in the Asian section of my pantry that could use some investigation, like shrimp paste, quail eggs, canned bananas, and attap fruit in some syrup. So, I'm assuming this means no going out for meals as well? I live in Brooklyn, and although we don't go out much for food because I cook at home every day we do find ourselves spontaneously joining plans with other folks at times. I'm excited to work through some of the canned stuff. I have so many beans in there!