My family has a thing for condiments. The more the better! We joke that some people use second fridges for beer, but we need one just for our condiments. What do you do with all those little bits left in the bottom though? 4 ideas: Sauces, salad dressings, sandwich spreads and marinades.
Dab of jam? Add some soy sauce, sesame oil and sesame seeds, maybe a dash of chili paste – instant stir fry sauce or meat marinade.
Ketchup, horseradish and Worcestershire with a dash of siracha makes a pretty good cocktail sauce for shrimp, crab, fish and chips, fry sauce. Near empty mayo jar gets rice vinegar, celery seed, squirt of agave and salt and pepper to make coleslaw dressing. Another use for nearly empty mayo or sour cream or even Greek yogurt is to add some siracha to make a spicy sandwich spread, excellent on banh mis.
To that almost empty mustard jar, add some olive oil, diced shallots and vinegar (I’d use wine vinegar or balsamic), salt and pepper to make a basic vinaigrette. Use for dressing a salad or as a sauce for roasted vegetables or add to leftover cooked potato chunks for potato salad. One of the weirder combinations I’ve done recently was with orange marmalade. I do so love orange marmalade! I kinda did a riff on a honey mustard by adding Dijon mustard, rice vinegar, tarragon and shallot to the marmalade dregs. Mixed it right in the marmalade jar (to my husband’s bemusement), added salt and pepper and it was great! Ate it on a romaine and arugula salad with mixed sweet bell peppers that night, served over roasted asparagus the next then added the dregs of the dregs to an orzo salad for the win!
