Necessity is the Mother of Invention Tests

Now without wanting to come over all new age hippy, Mr Beedub and I have started to become more conscious of minimizing food waste and trying to use up what we have before we head off to Saino's in search of new ingredients. Also I am just plain lazy.

From experience, this can go one of two ways. Dogs dinner.  Or if you are lucky, MasterChef* Invention Test Boom.

I have also learned that sometimes you are in the mood to be creative and sometimes you are just forced to be. For example:

Today I woke up after a tough work week and really felt like making breakfast. I dug up a few of my favourite books for inspiration and got quite excited about a couple of recipes for Shaksuka - a saucy egg breakfast, Tunisian in origin.

Sadly when I opened the fridge, it was not brimming with fresh tomatoes or peppers as I had hoped and as I was most definitely not up for removing my pajamas and heading to the shop, Shaksuka was not to be. I did, however, spot a lonely half tub of buttermilk cowering at the back waiting for the old heave ho and decided to take pity on it.

The third invention test nugget I am going to share with you is my personal favourite and is as fun as the cooking bit. It is learning the art of typing random things into Google like: "what can I make with pickled onions, yoghurt and celery". This may surprise you, but my old search buddy has never let me down. There is genuinely always a random person somewhere on the planet, who has not only created a recipe using your fridge rejects, but bothered to post in on the tinternet to boot.

With this in the back of my mind, I was filled with quiet confidence that something as lush as buttermilk would be a no brainer. The first thing that my search threw up was page after page of American style buttermilk biscuits and gravy. They looked too much like scones to me and I couldn't reconcile my self with a creamy meaty sauce for breakfast so I moved on.

Serendipity stepped in and the very next thing I found was John Torode's Buttermilk Pancakes on BBC Food (my fourth tip for creating something from nothing - the Beeb has the best recipes on the net by far).

How could that not be a sign when a recipe from the Yoda of Invention Tests shows up right? 

I am not planning rehash the recipe here as a. that's theft and b. it's boring so instead, here's the recipe from the man himself

John Torode's Buttermilk Pancake Recipe

And a few photos to prove that even a kitchen clutz can make these.

Finally a here few observations after making these bad boys.

You can halve the quantity if you don't have enough of one thing. Don't play with the proportions though. I was a bit short on buttermilk and thought I would be clever and use a bit more butter instead - not smart it made them too oily.

This is a bit different to standard pancake recipes I have made in the past. The batter develops into exciting bubbly alchemy which spooked me at first so I wasn't quite sure how to work with it, but stay calm people, they  do turn out well in the end.

Even in the quest for saving the planet and thriftiness, throw out expired bicarb!

All the cook books tell you this, but I have now learned this first hand. Having a good larder (or cupboard above the sink if you like) of great staples like plain and self raising flour, caster sugar, baking powder, bicarb and vanilla essence will stand you in excellent stead for whipping up some very good breakfast staples in emergencies.

Always, always have eggs in the house and buy more bacon than you need and freeze it. It will literally make you shout with joy when you unexpectedly find a pack of rashers hiding behind the half eaten Ben & Jerry's whilst foraging for breakfast food.

 So there you go, from buttermilk to badass breakfast in three easy clicks.

*There are two British cooking shows that have changed my life. MasterChef and The Great British Bake Off. Before I started watching them, I had no idea what samphire was and I didn't own a spatula, much less a springform baking tin. I now do, but can attest to the fact that it isn't really possible to use all three at once.