Sure you bought some fresh produce at the market or meat from the butcher but are you really eating whole food?  I brought a WHOLE food to a whole new level this week.

Feeling awfully ambitious, I also picked up two whole snappers at Fresh Market.  Here’s a fantastic recipe.  I used dill instead of thyme and was very fresh and tasty.

 

I reserved the head, tail and bones from both and added a couple roughly chopped carrots, an onion cut into chunks, fresh herbs, and filled my stock pot with water.

I brought to a boil and then reduced to low stirring occassionally for three hours then I strained the mixture into quart-sized mason jars.  I used a gravy separator to strain to pour into the jars.  It worked great!

 

The next night, I used the stock to make shrimp risotto. This was my first time ever making risotto, and, despite having a needy puppy, I managed to pay enough attention to the risotto which resulted in a risotto which would certainly get Chef Ramsey’s praise.  My homemade and fresh seafood stock made the dish.

Later in the week, with some more of the seafood broth, we made our own tomato sauce.  We used this recipe as a base and substituted half and half for cream and doubled the quantity.  We also used the seafood broth instead of chicken broth. Then, we added about a 1 teaspoon of onion powder, garlic powder, dried oregano, dried basil, and red pepper flakes along with 2 tablespoons of tomato paste plus a cup of red wine.  Use an immersion blender to combine and let it simmer for an hour or two (as long as you can).  Serve with your choice of seafood — shrimp, scallops, etc. — and pasta.

This is the final recipe for savory seafood tomato sauce

Ingredients

1 quart homemade seafood broth

14-ounce concentrated crushed tomatoes

28-ounce tomato sauce

2 cups half-and-half

Coarse salt and black pepper

1 teaspoon each — onion powder, garlic powder, dried oregano, dried basil, and red pepper flakes

2 tablespoons tomato paste

1 cup red wine

Instructions

Add all the ingredients into large pot.  Combine using wooden spoon.  Heat over medium heat.  Blend using immersion blender.  Once the sauce is gently boiling, reduce to low and simmer for at least an hour and up to two hours.  Serve with seafood and pasta.

I’m sure my use of the carcus is pretty obvious but I then got to use some ruffage from my veggies.  I’m grateful to have a fancy Breville juicer – just like this.  At Whole Foods, I purchased 5 pounds of carrots and juiced them all.  It yielded about a quart.  Then, I was stuck with a bunch of pulp – 4 cups whole to be exact.  Freezing 2 cups for future use, I set aside the other half to make something.  Then, I found this great recipe online – http://www.plantoeat.com/blog/2013/05/mighty-juicer-pulp-muffins/ – and they came out great using all carrot pulp.  I baked a dozen right away.  It took closer to 20 minutes to set correctly.  I reserved the remainder of the batter to bake later.  That yield a half dozen tasty delights.

Here’s that batch!  The first dozen were eaten too quickly as I made them quickly before work and took them into the office.  They were office approved!

 

So there! I told you!  You can really use even more of your food to springboard into other dishes.  I hope that you’ll also try to use more of your food.  Share your successes with me!  I’d love to get some tips and tricks from you!