What do 4-months-open cheese crackers, stale croissants, frozen-whole-unpeeled bananas, cold polenta and endless, endless amounts of dry French bread have in common?

They were all contributing to the now near-crisis point lack of space in my kitchen and therefore needed immediate reinvention. Moreover, with only two of us around for only two days, they needed reinventing into something that could be frozen.

The results were several tasty meals, a few treats to fuel our long bike ride (following the principles of Bread & Not-Butter Template – Sweet or Savoury) and a freezer now stocked ready to feed the next crowd of hungry children, cyclists, walkers & fabled ‘unexpected guests’ who arrive. Obviously we could have fed them before, with a miscellany of stale bakery goods but I doubt any of them would have returned in a hurry.

One tip – invest in a great bread knife. Some of the stuff I was dealt here needed a chain saw to salvage it from the bin. It was a workout cutting this lot even with a sharp knife.

The weekend’s bounty:

Crispy Stuffed Polenta Balls stuffed with Cranberry, Pine nut & Goat’s Cheese Spread

Banana, Salted Caramel & Chocolate Croissant Pudding

and a tomato & pesto version of Bread & Not-Butter Template – Sweet or Savoury

A final use of the bread which didn’t warrant a recipe page on account of being neither my recipe nor in any way off-piste was a take on a panzanella salad. This simple Italian classic was a great use of bone dry bread, I can’t recommend enough. Look up a recipe – you’ll find loads. It will be featuring a lot more in my French repertoire from now on, if people insist on over-buying in the bakery in the morning I need evening meals to keep pace with the resultant dry-ends.

The final irony? Having cubed, crumbed, soaked and seasoned my way through nearly a kilo of stale bread in two days, we sat down to our final lunch which included sautéed mushrooms and a garlic sauce. What was this crying out for? I can’t even bring myself to say it. And you already know that there wasn’t a slice of the stuff in the house.