Plan two weeks of meals, we are advised, in order to do fewer grocery shopping trips.

Well, I sort of plan. But these days my kitchen successes often stem from lack of planning, or from purchases made too far back to confess.   

Recently, I overbought milk and forgot yogurt, so I’ve been making my own yogurt using the last bit of the store-bought stuff as starter. I’d forgotten how good home made yogurt tastes.

Ditto tea made from tea leaves. Rooting around in the back of the cupboard, I found some fancy Wagh Bakri Darjeeling tea in a green box (never opened.) Someone must have given it to me as a gift. I made a pot. Wow! That is a different animal from tired old tea bag tea. There was enough caffeine to put me on the ceiling.

For the next pot, I used less tea, and for the one after that, a little more, doing what my dad called “titrivating” (Woodmanese for titrating.) It’s taken a number of tries to titrivate to perfection, but I think I’m there.

Meanwhile, Will is expanding his breakfast repertoire. Blueberry pancakes—with ground flax seed and an egg in the mix, to give it some heft. Eggs scrambled to exactly the right consistency. Oatmeal with chopped walnuts and dried cranberries excavated from the back of the fridge.

We’ve also eaten some pretty venerable nonperishables and lived to tell the tale. (Is that what nonperishable means–something that doesn’t kill you?) Several cans of sardines had been sulking on the shelf since the Obama administration, saying, “Hey, you there! You need some omega-3s! Eat me!” Finally, we did.

So now, on to the kamut. Did I buy that? I must have, since there’s a note in my handwriting on the jar, saying “cook for two hours.” Maybe it will go with those edamame beans from the Mesolithic stratum of the freezer—cooked up with the miso sauce that was lurking behind the ketchup on the refrigerator door.

Okay, tonight’s dinner is planned! Only thirteen more menus to round out the two weeks.