The Perfect Pantry®

Frozen fruit (Recipe: pink yink ink drink) {vegetarian}

A week of ingredients featured in kid-friendly recipes from the Green Eggs and Ham Cookbook by Georgeanne Brennan. Welcome to Dr. Seuss Week, Day Two.

In our neck of the woods, berry season lasts for six or eight weeks a year.

Even if you don't have your own strawberry fields or raspberry brambles, you know when it's berry time, because PYO (pick your own) or U-Pik signs appear on electrical poles all over town.

For the other forty-four weeks of the year, our best option is frozen fruit.

I'd never choose frozen fruit over in-season ripe fresh fruit, but individually quick frozen (IQF) fruits, prepared commercially or in your own kitchen, frozen at the peak of ripeness, retain almost all of their nutrient value. IQF fruit is 100% natural, with no added sugar or preservatives. It's trimmed and washed, and economical to use. Take what you need, and leave the rest in the freezer.

Coffee (Recipe: how to brew the perfect cup of coffee)

Guest post and photos by Sarah in Boston

Like every dad, mine gave his opinion freely, but there were some things he considered life skills. He couldn't understand how you would ever be able to get through life without them.

These included: how to drive a car while shifting between gears so you could glide through curves and down hills instead of using the brake; staying at a consistent speed on the highway to conserve gas (in the days before cruise control); parallel parking in three turns of the wheel. 

He also felt very strongly about his coffee. This wasn't about buying expensive coffee or the perfect coffee pots -- just the basics on how to brew a strong cup of coffee. And whether you planned to use the brewed coffee in a recipe or drink it straight, the method was still the same.

Marshmallow Fluff (Recipe: Rhode Island hot chocolate, with faux fluff)

Despite having close to 250 items in The Perfect Pantry, I can think of dozens of ingredients that might be in your pantry but are not in mine.

Almond extract. Anchovies. Bacon. Wild rice. Fennel pollen. Marshmallow Fluff®.

I know... you think Fluff is not an ingredient. But here in New England, it is.

Without Fluff, there would be no Fluffernutters or Whoopie Pies, two of our regional claims to fame.

Fresca (Recipes: Fresca cake, salad, and a cocktail)

When we were in college, my best friend Joyce and I went on a Fresca®-and-tuna-sandwich diet.

Two weeks later, we'd each lost a couple of pounds and gained a life-long addiction to the grapefruit-flavored sugar-free soda.

Last week, in a post about food gifts for food lovers, I wrote that Fresca did not meet the test for a pantry item, though I drink it every day and always have copious amounts in my refrigerator, because it's not used as an ingredient in creating other dishes.

I was wrong.