Asklemmy

Here's one that's lazy, pretty much foolproof, and uses all canned food from the pantry. (If you know what it's called, good for you.)

1. Add oil to stockpot, put in anchovies, dried red pepper, and garlic, fry it up a little bit until it smells good.
2. Add in a can of crushed tomatoes, drained olives, and caper. Boil, then simmer.
3. Cook some spaghetti to al dente(approximately 6-7 minute, SALT THE WATER, DON'T OIL THE WATER)
4. Drain the pasta and mix into sauce, add olive oil and Parmesan to taste, serve.

Beans and rice, and dry spices, countless varieties of beans and even rice will keep the dish from feeling stale and samey.

Not specific answers for recipes, more of here's some fundamental ideas look online, so for example if I said flour, water, yeast, salt that is bread. Remove yeast you have crackers. Add baking soda you have soda crackers. Add olive oil, you have pizza dough exct.

Flour

Water

Beans

Oats

Nuts

Wheat Gluten

Oil

Dried fruit

Dehydrated vegetables

Sugar

Salt

Rice

Oats

Peanutbutter

Jelly

Tyme or other spices

Lentils

Corn meal

Baking soda

Vinegar

Baking powder

Yeast

Coffee

Tea

Dehydrated meat?

Now, I don't know your situation but if you need food and you are in a financial bind not just looking for stuff that doesn't expire. Check out your local food bank/pantry. There's no shame in that.

Personally I do a lot of canning and foraging for things. So food storage is pretty important. I don't buy a lot of groceries. There are a lot of options for long lasting food, but too many to share.

I definitely would look up homesteading and some recipes from that.

Chickpea curry is made entirely with pantry items and is very delicious. You can throw in non-pantry items if you have them but they are not necessary

https://www.thepioneerwoman.com/food-cooking/recipes/a57629/chickpea-curry/

Spam musubi is a popular snack in Hawaii that's also entirely pantry food. I love spam but not everyone does; if you want pantry meals though chances are you would be okay with it.

https://www.allrecipes.com/recipe/49785/spam-musubi/

Obviously canned soups are a good pantry meal source, no special recipe there

Flaked ham or tuna cans with Mayo & relish (or chopped celery if you have them) are delicious to eat on any type of crackers

https://www.food.com/recipe/simple-ham-spread-397918

That's what I can think of for now haha

Canned milk, jarred tomato sauce or pesto, pasta, frozen vegetables, frozen shrimp or chicken. Cheese lasts a while and you can put it in the freezer if you don't care about texture (such as for cheese sauce). Whole wheat pasta is a while grain and decently healthy and significantly more filling than white pasta. You can make white sauce or mac and cheese with the canned milk.

Most meat can be frozen when packaged without fair (look for tubes instead of flat packages). Flash frozen vegetables are pretty good. You can also portion and package meats for the freezer yourself, it just takes a while and you may want to get a vacuum sealer.

Dry whole grains and dry beans or legumes are the good basis for vegetarian diets, and together will make a whole protein. Just don't forget B12 or also eat meat. Both whole grains and legumes go bad after about a year on the shelf but will last much longer in the fridge or freezer (depending on how bulk you are buying). Oils will also go rancid eventually, especially olive oil or sesame, I keep those in the fridge too but they will last a few years like that.

I want to note that non-whole grains last longer, such as white rice or white flour, due to the oils and proteins (and most of the nutrients) removed.

Soups and stews can be made in advance, portioned for a few meals and frozen. You can use meat, beans, canned tomato for chili. Lentil soup doesn't always need much else aside from stock and seasoning.

If you make or buy fresh bread, you can let it completely cool, then slice it, then put it in as air tight a bag as you can and freeze it. This is great for toast but not as great for sandwiches. You can do the same with bagels, defrosting them in the microwave until still cold and then put them in the toaster. Frozen bagels make for decent sandwiches, maybe because they are already supposed to be chewy.

A soup portion with a side of grain or bread is pretty filling and delicious.

You can probably freeze Burger buns and treat them as I've described bagels, using them for burgers. Pickles are jarred and last a long time in the fridge.

"American cheese" lasts a very long time in the fridge. Unwashed eggs lasts about a month out of the fridge and a few months in the fridge. Use some frozen sausage for breakfast sandwiches.

Frozen vegetables usually have a slightly cooked texture, so cooking them is better. Roasted broccoli or cauliflower from frozen is pretty good. Served with a side of beans and rice with a baked chicken breast from frozen and that's a big delicious healthy meal. Don't forget to season and maybe use hot sauce.

Vegetarian chili. Chick peas, various beans, tomatoes, and a jar of spaghetti sauce. Get some frozen precut onions and sweet corn, or whatever you're into. Good standby meal, takes 20 minutes to put everything together and it tastes even better left over.

Season with garlic powder, onion powder, cumin, and chili powder. Add a little brown sugar (or white) as well to cut the acidity.

Lentil soup. The only fresh ingredient is the greens (and you can freeze them to use later). The finished soup can be frozen.

2 cups black beluga lentils (or green French lentils), picked over and rinsed
1 tablespoon extra virgin olive oil
1 large onion, chopped
1 teaspoon fine-grain sea salt
1 28- ounce can crushed tomatoes
2 cups water
3 cups of a big leafy green (chard, kale, etc), rinsed well, deveined, finely chopped

1. Boil the lentils for 20 minutes, drain and set aside.
2. Saute the onion until soft
3. Add everything else except for the greens; bring to a simmer
4. Stir in the greens and cook for another couple of minutes
5. Adjust seasoning

b e a n s

Vegetarian chili - canned or dry beans and lentils, tomato sauce, canned veggies if you want. It's versatile enough that you can make it differently every time.

Casseroles are what you want for the long shelf life plan. Most are ground meat and canned/frozen vegetables/soup. Most also freeze well, so you could pre make and reheat them when you want them, especially if you don't want to spend a week eating the same casserole. You can get a bit more variety than just pasta and sauce or Mac and cheese this way.

Most every ingredient in bread (cake, cookies, pancakes, etc) can be stored long term if you want to just make bread when you need it, but that is a lot of effort.

I agree with beans & rice, that is the framework for a million great meals.

Whole canned tomatoes are very helpful to have around. Also canned coconut cream and the little cans of curry paste.

Triscuits crackers and nuts are good things to have on hand if you need snacks with calories.

If you are willing to buy lemons, oils, spices, and onions and garlic, you will be able to have a very vibrant and delicious healthy diet with canned or dried beans, canned tuna and sardines, canned tomatoes.

1/2 cup rice

1 cup water

1-2 cups misc frozen veg and frozen cooked meat (e.g. sandwich ham)

stock cube and/or spices

Stick the water and frozen stuff in a pan and bring to the boil, stick the rice in and bring back to the boil with the lid on, boil for one minuite and turn the hob off/take off the heat and don't move the lid. Don't touch it for fifteen minuites. Fluff and serve

Chilli con carne:

• chuck frozen mince in a pot with some oil & spices
• chuck in a tin of chopped tomatos
• chuck in some frozen veg
• chuck in some tomato puree
• chuck in more spices
• simmer for like 15-20 minutes
• eat (with tortilla chips / rice / cheese / etc)

Since you're open to frozen, you can cook almost everything. Applebees entire menu almost starts frozen.

There's relatively few things in the culinary world that cannot be frozen. It's like, a really small list. Like, you're not really supposed to freeze bread, it does change it a little. But you can. And you won't notice the difference in french toast or a panini.

Basically anything but make it with frozen vegetables, and vacuum seal your meat and put it in the freezer?

Most recipes can actually be made from non perishables. Meat can almost always be easily frozen and you can either buy frozen veg or cut some up to throw in a freezer bag. Additionally you can use canned veggies too. You can also freeze minced garlic and ginger in ice cube trays as well.

For cheeses you can buy them pasteurized so they remain sterile until opened. You can also sterilize a lot of things very easily. Put food into a glass jar, boil in the microwave and cap very tightly (it's gonna be hot!). Make sure on the lid that the center has sucked inwards so you know there's a vacuum. If it hasn't then it's not gas tight and will mold.

For fresh herbs try to put the stem in a small cup of water if possible. If you find the herbs going bad then chop them up and let them dry in open air on a sheet, put into a spice bottle and use later.

There are some videos about freezing your ingredients, and food by Ethan Chlebowski on YouTube.

Both pasta and many pasta sauces last a very long time without refrigeration (although the latter only if you don't take it out of the jar).

You can preserve meats through the ancient method of salting here's an excellent video about how to do it

Get a dehydrator and some mason jars and look up all the stuff you can dehydrate.

In general seeds, nuts, dried friuits like raisins, and properly stored grains will last a VERY long time

If you're willing to spend a weekend making, ramen stock freezes very well in pieces.

The stock goes into the plastic soup containers, the meat can be bagged and frozen, many veggies work well frozen (thinking corn), I buy seaweed chips for the nori, the noodles are also bought frozen, and all that's left is an egg to prepare.

My go to is https://www.budgetbytes.com/poor-mans-burrito-bowls/ It's much better with cheese and green onions, but still damn good with just the canned beans, rice, and salsa.

Salsa chicken in the instapot. Frozen chicken, taco seasoning, jar salsa, chicken stock, black beans. Yum.

caramelized onions

Rice, beans (canned or dried - dried lasts "forever" basically), canned or tinned meats or dried meats. Most hot sauces (Louisiana). Pasta. Pasta with 'tinned' sauces. etc.