There’s something you should know about me before this relationship goes any further. I’m just gonna come clean, I guess…

I, Michelle Calva-Despard, love to scrounge.

Some people get a kick out of restoring old cars or antique furniture. Me? I get a rush out of taking a bunch of “what the heck could you possibly make out of these?” ingredients and creating a masterpiece of a meal. When I go to someone else’s house and get to see what treasures they’ve got in refrigerator drawers and pantry (I know. Seriously. Who does this!?) and then, if they let me cook it up!? Well (insert sigh here,) that’s my weird slice of heaven.

I get this from my maternal grandmother, Millie. Grandma Millie grew up in the Great Depression and although my grandparents literally died millionaires, still wondering of the bottom could fall out again, my grandma dutifully cut open her toothpaste tubes to scrape out the last of the paste before tossing the tubes in the trash.

Honey; that’s “scroungy” like no one’s business. Me combing through a bunch ‘a random food items barely compares with Grandma, but I’m still young. 😉

Making something out of what someone thought was nothing. Man do I love it.