Grits Bar: feeding a big crowd with dribs and drabs

For Adam's birthday last year, I bought him a fuzzy logic rice cooker to replace our old school standard rice cooker that we've had for years. It [unintentionally] turned out to be a classic Homer Simpson gift. Adam never wanted a rice cooker and I was the one who wanted a new one, but I'd transferred my yearning for a new rice cooker onto Adam. At least I didn't get the rice cooker engraved with my name. Fortunately, I'm delighted with the new appliance and I've been using it to make all sorts of things. Most notably, easy grits or polenta with almost no work. It's awesome!

Last night, I was on to cook dinner for our church small group. Cook a meal for a dozen people including vegetarians and gluten intolerant folks, only use food I already had and clean out the fridge/freezer while I was at it...challenge accepted! I only had dribs and drabs of a bunch of different things, but I was inspired by previous dinners my friends had cooked. I always loved it when I could top my own [baked potato, taco, chili] with my own toppings [cheese, sour cream, veggies, meat]. Feeling inspired by my friends' genius ideas, I put my rice cooker to good use on the porridge setting and cooked up two batches of grits. I dug deep into the fridge and freezer and found all the little bits of ingredients that were hanging around for a grits topping bar. One friend even said my dinner was "restaurant quality" which was super sweet and nice to hear although I'm pretty sure it was because I liberally salt and pepper all my food. I'm a one trick pony, but it works.

Rice cooker easy grits (From Fifteen Spatulas)
4 cups water
1 cup grits or course cornmeal
1 cup grated cheese (parmesan or cheddar)
Salt + Pepper to season
1/4 cup half and half or milk or cream
2 Tbs butter

1. Put water and grits in rice cooker
2. Cook on porridge setting
3. Stir in other ingredients when it finishes cooking

My dribs and drabs...whatever you have that you're trying to get rid of. Please remember to season with salt and pepper.

• Bacon bits: 5 leftover slices in the freezer
• Sausage: 2 andouille and 4 boar sausages from Laurel, also from the freezer
• Garlic shrimp: small bowl of frozen cooked cocktail shrimp heated with garlic and olive oil
• Chopped scallions
• Mushrooms: 2.5 caps from the fridge that yielded only about 1 cup cooked
• Wilted garlic spinach: half a box of baby spinach cooked down with garlic
• Green beans: also leftover in the fridge
• Peppers and onions: leftover in the fridge from Boston Organics