These ideas were introduced to me by Chef Joel Garamon. This is just a small sample of his ideas. He has written a book called Cooking Scrappy with over 100 recipes for cooking with the things we might be throwing away unnecessarily every day.

What do you do with  the tough ends of asparagus?
How can you use kale, broccoli, mushrooms stems?
What about broccoli and cauliflower leaves?
What do you do with onion skins?
What do you do with the stems of herbs?
What can you do with  stale bread?

Spent Coffee Grounds

Swiss Coffee - made with reused coffee grounds
  After thinking about this idea of spent coffee grounds,  I created this coffee drink to go with my pastries.
I use the leftover grounds from the morning coffee. Run more water through the grounds.  Add  this coffee to some warm almond milk. Then add some sweetener of your choice, a sprinkle of cinnamon, 1/8 tsp of cardamon and stir it all together.

 

I also make the coffee from spent grounds that I use in my tiramisu cake recipe instead of fresh coffee.  I have even mixed it with chocolate pudding to give the pudding a coffee flavor.

After I reuse the grounds, I mix them with eggshells and make compost for my garden to enrich the soil.

Breakfast Granola

Mix roasted squash seeds, unsalted pumpkin and sunflower seeds, with whole oatmeal. Add dried cherries and blueberries, salt, and enough maple syrup to hold it all together. Place the mix into

a 9 X 9 baking pan (oil pan or use parchment paper) and bake in a
350 degree oven until cooked through. Slice into bars.

Soups and Stews
Use broccoli or asparagus stems, radish greens, onion and garlic skins and/or mushroom stems in soups and stews. They are all full of flavor and nutrition. You will have to cook the soups and stews long enough to soften the tougher stems. I use a crock pot. Plus all of these scraps can be stored in the freezer until you need them. Remove the onion
and garlic skins before serving.

My Scrappy  Chile Recipe.
Over time, I add small tomato pieces, green onion stems, and chopped garlic to my frozen scraps container. I use those last bits of tomato around the stem that we usually throw away. When I use the top of a scallion, I cut up the long green parts and freeze them. When chile-making day rolls around, I thaw the frozen scraps and throw them into a pot with some water or beef broth. Once they cook through, I add some black or pinto beans (previously cooked) or from a can, some salt, pepper and chile powder.

My Approach to Joel Garamon's Recipe for Tomato Bread Soup
Sauté some chunks of day-old bread in butter - set aside.  Place chopped tomatoes, onions and chopped garlic and bit of crushed basil (if using dried basil, use a smaller amount) into a pot with a little water and cook until everything is tender. If you wish, you can also add a chunk of rind from a piece of Parmesan (remove before blending the soup). Then add the chunks of bread into the soup. Blend the soup in a household blender. ***Be sure to leave the lid of the blender slightly ajar whenever blending hot liquids so the steam can escape or your lid may blow off the blender. Move away from the blender so the

steam doesn't burn you.

Asparagus Ends Soup  Topped with   Crispy Potato Skin Crisps 
You can use just the asparagus ends or you can use the whole asparagus spear.  Sauté some chopped onions and garlic in oil. Chop the asparagus and add everything to a crock pot. Add salt.

                        Cook on high heat until the asparagus stems are soft.

                                                      Top with crispy potato skins.

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Baked Crispy Potato Skins

Peel some russet potatoes keeping the skins as thin as possible. Slice the peels into thin strips. Top with salt, pepper, paprika and garlic. Sprinkle some oil over the potatoes. Place on a lined baking sheet and bake at 350 degrees until crispy.

Vegetable (or Chicken Vegetable Soup)
Inspired by Joel's Wild Lettuce Soup Recipe, as well as his use of unique ingredients in general, I threw everything I could find into a pot. Onions, onion skins, garlic, garlic paper, carrots, celery, tomatoes, spearmint, marjoram, and fennel. I added already cooked chicken breast pieces and enough chicken broth to cover the ingredients.

Then, I added red leaf lettuce, butter lettuce, and romaine lettuce, using  lettuce from my vegetable bin that had begun to wilt. I added salt and pepper. And cooked it on the stove top until everything was tender. 
So good. And it was even better the second day. *Remove onion skins and garlic papers before serving.

Homemade Croutons for Soup or Salad
If your bread goes stale, cut it up into crouton-sized pieces. Bake in the oven at 350 degrees until crispy. You can also sprinkle it with herbs. sea salt and olive oil before baking.

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Fish or Chicken Baked on a Bed of Herbs

Cook fish or chicken on top of a bed of herbs. Put a little olive oil in a casserole dish. Layer a bunch of herbs on the oil - tarragon, thyme. fennel are good. Place the fish or chicken on top and bake. You may want to season your fish or chicken on top with salt, pepper, garlic salt. 
 

Chop Suey
Use anything in the vegetable bin that needs to be eaten to make chop suey. Here's my recipe: Sauté chopped garlic,  chopped onions, broccoli, cauliflower, Bok Choy leaves, broccoli leaves, tender carrots sliced diagonally. You could add baby shrimp or small pieces of pork loin. Cook until all the vegetables are tender. Serve them over egg noodles.

 

Omelets - Any time of the day. If your spinach begins to wilt in the vegetable bin, use it in an omelet. How about combining some wilted spinach and some cut up tomatoes that need to be eaten? (You can also make a wilted spinach salad to go with your omelet).
                                                                             
Herb Stem Salts  and More
Cut up your dried herb stems mash them with a mortar and pestle until they are very small (for example use basil, thyme, parsley, cilantro). As you mash the stems, the oil will release. Mix the mashed stems with sea salt (1 tbsp herb stems to 1 cup sa salt. This may seem like a lot of salt, but over time the herbs will infuse the salt).  Use the salt to season soups or eggs, on toasted bread. Lasts forever because of the salt but will begin to lose its flavor after a couple of years.


Stems of mint make a mild tea. Just place some stems in a cup and cover with water. Let it steep.

  Sugared Mint Stems.

Moisten the stems, sprinkle with sugar and let them dry.

Use them creatively. Place into a cup of tea, stick some stems in a scoop of ice cream when serving...

Mango, Plum or Peach Pits Jam
Put 4 fruit pits with any flesh still attached in  with 1 cup sugar  1/2 tsp vanilla,  Cook on high temperature until it boils, then turn it down to low and cook for about 40 minutes, scraping the loosened flesh away from the pits.  Remove the pits, let them cool down and then scrape the remaining pulp and put it back into the pot. Add 1 tbsp fresh lemon.

Use this jam over homemade yogurt, swirling it with the yogurt lightly.Top with sweetened berries - strawberries, raspberries, blue or blackberries.

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I HOPE YOU HAVE FUN WITH THESE IDEAS!

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