Hi everybody! Welcome once more to Waste Not, Eat Lots. Today I offer you the most delicious thing I’ve eaten at 2am since the last time I ate at 2am. Actually, this is the exact same thing I ate last time. Let’s jam econo for this installment — with only three ingredients, we’ve got ourselves a classic case of beauty in simplicity.

Volume III: Quesadillahh, What the Hell

tortillas
cheese
salami

At its worst, a combination of these three things will taste awesome. However there are a few subtle things you can do to really stretch that dollar, so pay attention to the details.

Step 1: I don’t know when I figured this out, but I’ve been doing it ever since — whenever you eat salami, be it on a sandwich, in a pancake, or straight out of the can, fire up the stove and give it some heat in a frying pan first. This does two things. One, it makes the salami way more delicious. It becomes warm and a little crispy, just like bacon. Great! The second benefit is that it releases a ton of grease from the sausage’s savory pores, which you can dab off with a paper towel. Be proud that you are eating that much less fat, and compensate by eating more grilled salami! Win/win!

Step 2: The rest of this story writes itself. Quesadillas are just two tortillas with cheese melted in between (I prefer extra sharp cheddar), and then whatever else you choose to put in there (I choose fried salami). On medium heat, use the same pan to finish the job. The grease left over from Step 1 will help you avoid losing a stuck, burned tortilla to the frying pan, making this process as smooth and rewarding as possible.

See you next week! Until then, I challenge you to not buy groceries. Just eat whatever you’ve got! Let that bustling metropolis of a fridge decay into a ghost town, and see what you can do with the remnants. You might surprise yourself. Or die.