Talk to Tesco about your store cupboard hero and your top three ways to use it - you could win a £200 Tesco voucher NOW CLOSED

[AngelieMumsnet]

We've been asked by Tesco to find out about Mumsnetters' store cupboard heroes.

Here’s what Tesco say, “The Tesco Eat Happy Project is our long-term commitment to help children have a healthier and happier relationship with their food. We’ve got lots of recipes for healthy, tasty dishes that we think they’ll love – especially if they help you prepare them. But we’re keen to hear your recipe ideas too.”

So, what is your store cupboard hero and what are your top 3 ways to use it? Perhaps you always keep pesto in your cupboard, to stir into pasta, pep up a risotto or spread onto pastry to make a savoury puff? Or maybe you like to have lentils in stock, to add to soup, bulk out a stew or make a warm winter salad with?

Whatever your store cupboard hero is, Tesco would love to hear about it!

Everyone who adds their comments to the thread will be entered into a prize draw to win a £200 Tesco voucher.

Please note that any comments posted on this thread may be used by Tesco in further marketing material (anonymously, of course).

Thanks and good luck,
MNHQ

Yet another tin tomato lover. There are so many things you can do with it. They are super versatile. As so many people above have said. So I'll pick another to be my store cupboard hero. Kidney beans. Cheap (tesco value ones are good) and they can be added to a lot of meals. My favourite use is in chilli con carne!

Just saw the fact that it I needed to add another 2 uses for kidney beans. Bean risotto and enchiladas.

tinned tomatoes and tinned new potatoes. you can make sooo many things with tomatoes, from chilli to a soup and potatoes along with a bit of meat you can make a very basic roast dinner quickly in the week.

Chic peas
Healthy tasty and can add to any dish to bulk it out and add goodness and make it more filling.
Chicken casserole and curry, always add a tin
Chilli con carne, add a tin as well as kidney beans
Plus homous..
Can't go wrong

Chickpeas here too. Fast way to make a nutritious meal, with a protein source my DS likes (he's not a meat fan).

Three ways - 1. As a chick-pea curry

1. chick-pea and chorizo stew (which can be served with any carb quite deliciously, even if it's just toast)

1. adding to a vegetable soup to make it more filling.

My Tesco Store Cupboard Hero is Baked Beans.
The obvious choice is baked beans on toast .. great at any time of the day, including a hearty breakfast.
Baked beans will sit comfortably, as an easy and quick accompaniment, to sausage/burger/fish/chicken and chips.
Busy day? Pop jacket potatoes in the oven and continue with your business. Later on, just add beans and grated cheese to the jacket potatoe .. and enjoy.

Baked beans are an important source of protein and fibre in the diet.

Baked beans also provide calcium, potassium and some iron. The combination of beans and toast actually provides a good balance of amino acids (the building blocks of protein).

Honey is ours - as well as going on toast, it's lovely in a toasted sandwich with chopped banana (gets very hot though), sweetens homemade sauces without using sugar (even tomato sauce for pasta), helps sore throats especially if you mix it with hot water and lemon and make great glaze for duck or ribs.

Pluses are such hard workers, plus very healthy.

Dried lentils - can make a tasty daal or lentil soup with very few random ingredients & everyone likes it. I make an awesome brown lentil and kale soup most weeks. And Lentil salad - I use an Ottonlegi recipe to take to BBQ's.

Baked beans - with toast, eggs, or added to another dish to bulk it out everyone loved BB's.

Tinned chickpeas - for cooking with (butternut squash & chickpea curry) or making hummous.

Love 'em or hate 'em, mine is anchovies. They have to be in a glass jar though, the tins that rip half your finger off when you're opening them are much less useful. An opened jar takes hardly any room, and keeps for ages in the fridge - take it out before using to allow the oil to melt at room temperature.

Use 1: Chop them into tiny pieces and add to any strong flavoured tomato sauce e.g for pasta. They add a certain umami (oooh, get me!). Use a little of their oil when sweating onions etc at the start of sauce making, too.

Use 2: Mini pizzas. Make individual pizzas with a flatbread, pita, or even a slice of good quality sliced loaf. Toast one side under the grill. Spread the other side with a smear of pesto, top with some thinly sliced tomatoes, a slice of melty cheese, and dot with anchovy snips. Pop back under the grill until the cheese is to your liking.

Use 3: They are very low in calorie, but pack a huge flavour punch. This makes them ideal on low-calorie days such as in the 5:2 Fast Diet approach. Smush 2 anchovies into a tablespoon of Greek yoghurt and drizzle over a wedge of crunchy lettuce for a Ceasar Salad lunch.

Pasta! Base of quick easy dinners that everyone eats. Pesto pasta, bolognese and pasta bake favourites in our house

Stock cubes great for a base in casseroles and stews as well as a soup base so much to do with it. Also great with couscous

Tinned chopped tomatoes.

Use to make spaghetti bolognaise, tomatoes on toast, chilli con carne, lasagne, tomato and basil sauce, my dd and I love them.

Mine has to be tinned tomatoes so versatile and I really like the East End ones from Tesco no need to pay more and good quality to boot (I'm a chef who's picky and tried loads, before finding these it was Napolina all the way). They are used two or three ti.es a week, a good base item for sauces the usual bolognaise, chilli, mousakka, enchilladas etc but also a great base for a soup or a casserole or can be used in a morrocan tagine. I think the main reason is there flexibility and ability to add but take on other flavours into a dish, and are wonderful with herbs and spices to accentuate and lift them. They always have pride Of place in my cupboard!

Baked beans - great for lunches, side dishes at dinner and cooked breakfasts

I'm not going to break the theme here, it's chopped tinned tomatoes for me too. So versatile - pasta sauces, curry, soup, chilli, Spanish chicken. I probably cook using tinned tomatoes two or three times every week.

Mine is sun dried tomatoes in olive oil. I cut them in half and add to plain pasta, sometimes with other, lightly-fried vegetables too. Or I chop them finely and use on toast as bruschetta. The third use is the olive oil - there is always plenty left in the jar after I have used the tomatoes. I use the olive oil to stir-fry vegetables in a wok.

Thought about passata (for pasta sauce, lasagne etc) but think it's actually pesto. Blitz with broccoli/spinach and stir into pasta for quick DC-friendly dinner when rushed; use on salmon to pep up frozen fish and serve with veg; use with puff pastry for palmiers/pinwheels which are good for dinner party nibbles and also great for lunchbox variation!

Thanks for all your comments! The winner of the prize draw is MimiJoy :)