Few leftovers cannot be used up by baking them into a loaf of quickbread

I love that concept; it suits my sense of order in the universe. Finding little stashes of food in the fridge that no one really wants to eat anymore, and turning them into something yummy and healthy, that the kids and the boyfriend will love...that is just such a good thing. Recycle, reuse, don't waste; when I can do that, I feel virtuous.

L has a bad ear infection, and it hurts him to chew, so I've been making him soft foods the last couple of days. Tuesday night I gave him mashed sweet potatoes from the farm box, with a little russet potato mixed in to improve the consistency. Those CSA sweet potatoes are soooo sweet, they're more like dessert than like a vegetable, so to tone it down, I blended in a little garlic basil cream cheese from Full Quiver Farms. They were delicious, but since I also made pasta with roasted beets and sauteed chard from the box, and a wonderful piece of fennel from Boggy Creek Farm for the rest of us, no one else wanted the potatoes, and there were about two cups left over. This could be a sad thing if you don't have a good grasp of food reincarnation. I mean, who wants to eat leftover mashed potatoes?

So, last night, rummaging around in that ridiculous little European-style, super energy efficient refrigerator boyfriend just had to have, I located a small container of cream cheese blended with some orange/apricot chutney that I had made last week as a filling for a pretend birthday cake. Quick taste... hmmm.... still good, but won't be for long. Also found a container of tomato soup I had made for R last week when SHE was sick. Good lord, why does it seem like one or the other of those children is ALWAYS sick? It can't possibly be what I'm feeding them!

I took half of the sweet potatoes and blended them with the tomato soup. Added about 4 oz. of half and half, a couple tablespooons of tahini, a little lemon juice and a few dashes of Crystal Hot Sauce, which I discovered on my last trip to New Orleans. You can use a lot more of it than you can of Tabasco, 'cause it's mostly flavor, not heat. Served this soup with some chopped chili lime peanuts, and a huge salad (farm box was brimming with lettuce this week) and I have to say, it was fabulous. A little hot, a little sweet, a little tart. What more could you want from a soup? R had TWO bowls and there was none left over.

But the best part was folding the orange/apricot cream cheese into the rest of the sweet potatoes, and baking it into a quickbread. I used the Joy recipe for pumpkin bread 'cause it said it would work with mashed sweet potatoes as well, but I cut back on the sugar from 1 1/3 cups to just a cup. I say, never put more than a cup of sugar in a quickbread.

And that was breakfast this morning. Now the sweet potatoes are gone; the tomato soup is gone; and best of all, that orange/apricot chutney cream cheese that I had no idea what to do with, is gone. I am at peace.