An advice column!

Show me your go-to ingredients, I'll make you dinner.

Welcome to Show Me Your Forevers, I'll Make You Dinner, a long name for an advice column here at 40 Ingredients Forever where a reader shares the ingredients they always have on hand (and perhaps are tired of? Don’t even want to look at?) and I’ll dream up three dinners using those ingredients. To play, head here.

The Cook: Jenn (she/her)

Occupation: Cookbook editor (I Dream of Dinner’s editor!)

Residing in: Kingston, NY 

Feeding: 2.5 (2 adults and a picky toddler)

Forever ingredients: 

• Proteins: eggs, ground meat/fresh sausage, canned fish

• Vegetables: baby spinach, cabbage, carrots, cucumbers

• Starches: pasta, rice, potatoes

• Flavorings: Parm cheese, fish sauce, soy sauce

The Dinners

Sausage & cabbage stir-fry

The char of the cabbage, plus the garlic and spices and fat in the sausage, carry the stir-fry so that you don’t need to oomph it up with much more than soy sauce.

Uncase fresh Italian sausage and sear in a large skillet over medium-high, breaking into smaller pieces, until browned and cooked through, 5 to 8 minutes. Remove the sausage with a slotted spoon, leaving the fat in the skillet. Still over medium-high, add 1-inch pieces of cabbage. Cook, undisturbed, until charred underneath, 3 to 4 minutes. Stir, spread into an even layer, and cook, undisturbed, until charred in spots and crisp-tender, another 3 to 4 minutes. Stir in a tablespoon or two of soy sauce, return the sausage and any juices, and season to taste with more soy sauce. (Inspired by this tofu and cabbage stir-fry.)

theanchovybar

A post shared by @theanchovybar

Sardine rice with carrots & cukes 

An incredible bite is this dish from San Francisco’s Anchovy Bar, where anchovies are topped with a nose-tingly raw sambal of lemongrass, chiles, shallots, and lime. Bring a similar balance of assertive brightness and oceany fattiness to a weeknight meal by cooking rice (in coconut milk or coconut water —h/t

Andrea Nguyen

—if you have them), then when the rice is resting off heat, add tinned fish like sardines or mackerel (including their oil) to warm on top.

For the crunchy part, mix together whatever raw vegetables you have (in Jenn’s case, thinly sliced carrots and cucumbers). Dress with fish sauce and lime juice or white or rice vinegar, plus any of the sambal ingredients you have. Throw in some ginger, garlic, mint, cilantro, basil, cashews, peanuts, or toasted coconut if you have them. 

Another canned fish + carrot idea: Use the structure of this Tunisian tuna and carrot salad from

emily nunn

‘s Department of Salad to use what you have: Boil and chop carrots, then dress in something spicy (even a few shakes of hot sauce or chili crisp). Dress canned fish with something bright (even just a squeeze of lemon or lime). Top with any crunchy or briny ingredients you have (nuts, pickles), then eat over spinach.

Tunisian Tuna and Carrot Salad

Pasta cacio e uova (AKA vegetarian carbonara)

Follow any carbonara recipe but replace the meat with a few tablespoons of melted butter (or follow this video, sound on for delight). In rich pastas like carbonara or alfredo, I like to add equal parts pasta and hearty greens for texture and variation in flavor. Spinach is so good when you want a pasta that’s silky and soft, which is what’s happening here without meat breaking up the comfiness of the egg and Parmesan sauce. (Inspired by the 50/50 Buttered Noodles & Greens from I Dream of Dinner.)

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Editing: Caroline Lange

Brand design: Linda Huang

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Thanks to Jenn for spilling the contents of her kitchen. If you have more ideas for her: