Showing posts with label frugal food. Show all posts
Showing posts with label frugal food. Show all posts

13.3.15

A frugal feast

I keep peering hopefully in the fridge, which is a bit mad.
Last day of the Challenge though, and even with an empty, echoey fridge, no one's gone hungry.
I thought I'd quickly whisk through how we've managed to stretch out our £15 supplies this week.

One of the first things I made was a tomato sauce, using the tinned toms, onion, sugar and a squeeze of ketchup (plus the end of a carton of passata). Very handy for pizzas and pasta, and I'm hanging on to what's left for the grand finale pizzas tonight.

Bread. Such a joy. We wouldn't have got through the week without homemade bread. I mixed the plain cheaper flour I bought with half a bag of strong white and some wholewheat flour from the cupboard. Worked a treat I've got to say. One kilo for each batch - enough for two decent sized, (flattish-looking) loaves. I did all the kneading before school pick up, and by the time we got home they'd risen, and were ready for the oven. Warm bread with a (rationed) slither of butter. So good.


The oat cookies kept the kids happy on the way home from school. We all decided they were better than my usual ones; probably because the porridge oats from Lidl are a bit finer than the oats I normally use. 39p a bag too - definitely be buying those again.

AND the 30p a bar dark chocolate. Of course no one noticed a change in the brownies; they disappeared just as quickly. No cries of, 'Mummy, I simply can't eat brownies with such a low cocoa content!'
Can you imagine.

A few spoonfuls of mango chutney livened up the mild chicken curry, so that's worth doing again too. We could have managed without splashing out 40p on rice - we didn't use much and I had a little left in the cupboard. The 40p could have gone towards getting some more milk…. I had to buy extra after the 10 year old (the only milk drinker) knocked the bottle over at breakfast. I hate cleaning milk off the floor, especially at 6.30 in the morning.

Making pancakes is another thing I don't really want to be doing at 6.30 in the morning - but the kids loved them, and for about 10 minutes I was the best mum ever.

The gnocchi was a revelation. I've never made it before - there only appears to be 3 basic ingredients (potato, flour, egg), but, frustratingly, ever recipe I found was different. So, I just mashed some spud, added an egg and mixed in flour until it looked sort of like dough. It was messy- even messier than my bread making, which is saying something, but everybody liked it. Even the fussy one.

I suppose I've missed fruit and a bit of green - our meals have been a rather samey yellowy orange colour… you've probably noticed. But we've all had plenty to eat; it's just meant more planning and more making for me. I've liked being one step ahead - though, as I've learnt from previous years, not quite enough to change my bumbling-along ways!

Still, I've picked up a few useful ideas and we've raised money for Comic Relief, so that's all good.

Fish and chips tomorrow.


19.3.14

Charity Challenge Day 4 - The art of deception

The fussy one had eaten nearly all his Almost Spanish Omelette before he realised there was potato in it. I'd cut the potato really, really small. Needs must you see.

Another Charity Challenge highlight has got to be using a chef's ring for the rosti - honestly it's not been out of the drawer for aaages, and I'd forgotten how a bit of neat uniformity can magically make things seem more appetising. Appearance matters for kids - well it does for mine, and frankly I'll take all the help I can get.

So I'll be making round food more often, and have another go at rosti cakes, though next time I'll squeeze more of the starchy liquid out of the grated potato; pretty sure that's the key to a good rosti.


We're over half way through now, and not wanting to tempt fate or anything, but our £12 veggie week is going better than expected - I'd even say my fussy blighter has eaten more than he usually does.
This has probably got a lot to do with a ready supply of homemade bread. Last year I used Recipe Junkie's delicious bread recipe, and even made a bubbly, yeasty sourdough starter, but this time I've gone for speed and stripped my bread prep down to the bare bones.

500g of strong flour in a big bowl with a 7g sachet of yeast sprinkled on one side and 5-10g of salt on the other (so the salt doesn't kill the yeast), then mix in 300ml of warm water, plonk out onto a floured surface and knead for about 10 minutes.
Put the dough ball onto a very lightly greased tray and leave, covered with a tea towel, somewhere warm for one hour plus. Score the risen dough, and pop into a pre-heated oven at 220 degrees C for about 25 minutes. Should sound hollow when you tap the top, and seems to have worked fine so far, even with my old/new flour mixture.

I made some cider bread today, and know I've banged on about it before, At Length - but it really is the easiest bread EVER. No need to knead, and takes only a few minutes to prepare. If you've got some spare cider/lager/guinness knocking about do give it a go. I had the end of a bottle of cider in the fridge and cut back on the cheese and butter quantities so it didn't make too much of a dent in our rations.
It's best eaten on the day it's made, but that's never been a problem!

Also wanted to mention I've kept any spare bits of bread and ends of loaves for something I'm going to try tomorrow. I know I'm going to like it, just not so sure about the kids...
All will be revealed in the next post.

16.3.14

Day One Charity Challenge - The List

Okay, so call me Norma.

No other takers for the Charity Challenge….obviously didn't make it sound remotely tempting!
Don't blame you really.

Anyway, my £12 shop took me all of 5 minutes, but planning what to buy took A LOT longer. It's all about the prep with something like this: squeezing as much as you can out of every single penny.
There was a good deal of list tinkering, calculator bashing, sighing, crossing out, cheek puffing, more sighing….


I'd have liked to try a few different vegetarian meals, but there's no point if the kids won't eat them, so I've played safe. All my groceries came from Lidl, except the tin of peaches I bought in Tesco's last week. The cheese was reduced which meant I had enough money left to buy some cream crackers…the height of excitement I know, but they'll provide a bit of variety for after-school snacks, so the kids don't tire of muffins. I purposefully haven't given them muffins for a while…or carrots. We'll be eating a lot of carrots.

It goes without saying there's nothing organic going on here...

15 eggs                 £1.35
Cheese 250g            90p
milk 4pts                £1
butter                        98p
2xplain flour (3kg)   98p
tinned toms               34p
passata                      29p
carrots 500g              75p
sugar 1kg                  79p
vegetarian sausages   98p
tinned peaches           35p
Pesto Rosso               89p
cream crackers           38p
dark chocolate           79p
pasta 500g                 29p
red lentils 500g          89p

TOTAL               £11.95

One big advantage I have over last year is I don't have to make packed lunches. The kids now have school dinners - pre-paid - so this should take some of the pressure off, and possibly ease the whinging.  I'm thinking mainly about the eldest here - he eats more than his Dad and is permanently starving.

There are five of us to feed today and next saturday, but during the week it's down to four. I'm starting off gently with homemade bread for breakfast, and tonight, everyone's favourite - margherita pizza and garlic bread pizza. Got to keep them happy. Like I said, it's all about the prep…

I'll post the full 7 day meal plan tomorrow, and explain why I blew 79p on a bar of dark chocolate.

13.3.13

Comic Relief, Carrots and Cake



'DAY 5 in the Comic Relief Charity Challenge house, and the housemates are getting restless...'


not really a massive surprise considering there's very little food left from my £12 shop. Just two more days to go now.
And in case you're wondering, £12 is all I've spent to feed the four of us for 7 days! Definitely a challenge. Possibly mad. Still, it's for a very good cause, as the rest of the money I'd normally spend on my weekly groceries is going to Comic Relief.

It's certainly keeping me on my toes and I'm baking like a dervish, trying to stay a step ahead. The kids are doing pretty well; they haven't gone hungry, but inevitably the lack of choice and empty fridge takes it's toll, and there's a rising wave of whinging! I'm doing my best to gee them along, and I've heard the older two talking to their friends about the Challenge and why we're doing it, which is encouraging. It's great they feel involved.

Now who'd have ever thought you could get bored of muffins? But I know the kids are tiring of them, and fair play really as muffins have been the only sweet treat on offer for the last 5 days. My supplies are limited: I haven't any butter and just enough marg left for sandwiches - the only thing I can use is vegetable oil. So my cunning plan was to make muffins that look like CAKE...and seeing as The Gallery theme this week is the letter 'C'.... I give you Comic Relief Charity Challenge Carrot Muffins Cake!


I just poured the carrot muffin mixture into a cake tin - and the shape change plus the absence of muffin cases seems to have done the trick! They loved them. Should get us through to friday. I'm sure the topping helped too, but only enough cream cheese spare for these three, and HUGE disappointment when they realised the carrot was made of plasticine..

There's more about our Comic Relief Charity Challenge here

and The Gallery theme this week is the letter 'C'

12.3.13

Frugal food - Charity Challenge day 4

I've had to plan meals down to the last grain of rice so I can stretch the food bought with my £12 budget across the week. I don't really mind the planning bit, and it's less daunting than last time, because things like making bread don't phase me as much as they used to. I make it regularly now, thanks to the very lovely, talented Recipe Junkie and her tutorials on growing and using a sourdough starter. I wasn't totally sure what a starter was to be honest; now I have a jar of bubbly, yeasty goo sitting on my window sill, constantly reminding me to make bread.

sourdough starter

So, this week breakfast is bread or toast, and lunch for me is some kind of orange soup (lentil/carrot or to spice things up carrot and lentil..)  I have packed lunches to make too: my fussy one has them all week - the others have a mixture of packed lunches and pre-paid school dinners. I'm giving them ham and cream cheese sandwiches, a muffin, 2 cream crackers with marg, and a carrot.
They are going to be sick of the sight of carrots by friday.


So the family meals work out like this:

Saturday      Lunch: Lentil soup and bread
                       Tea: Homemade ham and mozzarella pizza and garlic pizza
                       (sauce: one tin chopped tomatoes, half the passata, onion, tsp sugar, seasoning)

Sunday         Lunch: Tomato, mozzarella and ham pasta
                       (leftover cheese and sauce from pizzas + chopped up ham)
                       Tea: Roast chicken, potatoes and carrots

Monday         Spanish style frittata
                       (chopped and fried up potatoes from day before, half an onion, a little ham, 4 beaten eggs + cheeky handful of peas from freezer for a splash of colour..other than orange..)

Tuesday        Savoury chicken rice
                       (leftover chicken pieces, half a leek, half an onion, carrot, stock)
                   
Wednesday   Tomato and ham pasta
                       (another batch of tomato sauce made with spare tin and rest of the passata - save about half for friday pizzas. Maybe add a dollop of cream cheese to pasta sauce)

Thursday       Leek and carrot soup with cider bread 
                        (Cider bread is really worth a go - so quick, easy and delicious. I'm using some cider I keep in the fridge for this recipe - but no cheese or butter)
                     
Friday            Ham pizza and garlic pizza

I bulk out the meals with bread, and after-school snacks and puddings are muffins. Peach, carrot or banana on offer this week. Squirrel is having break.


Snackless squirrel

The homemade pizzas on saturday night were a great success



375g of flour made dough for 4 bases (2 tomato, 2 garlic)

We even had enough to feed a hanger-on; and apart from one slightly tense moment as I watched my son's friend carefully pick all the precious pieces of ham off his pizza, everyone was happy!

Sunday roast is always a winner - and there's enough chicken left for savoury rice tonight, plus a big bowl of fresh stock. I cut the potatoes up really small for the frittata yesterday, but they were spotted by my fussy potato avoider.
spanish style frittata
Still, he did eat it. Very slowly. Every single thing has to be eaten up this week!

No one's going hungry, that's for sure, and I keep reminding them we're doing it for Comic Relief - but think the novelty might be wearing a little thin..

You can find out more about our Charity Challenge here

27.2.12

Twelve pound Charity Challenge - done and dusted!

Amazingly it hasn't been that bad!  
Living off £12 for a week sounds mad, but we've done it, 
and it really has made me stop and think.


I had got into the habit of last minute meals.  It would get to 4 o'clock:  
"What's for tea mummy?"
"..ermmm, something lovely..!" [hopefully opens fridge door]
But last week I was one step ahead - and it felt good.  So more planning needed I think!  I'm going to try to go shopping with a proper list, avoid going when I'm hungry, which is lethal - and  think more carefully about what I put in my trolley.


The kids were running out of steam by the weekend.  The grumbling had definitely kicked in.  When they get bored they ask for food, so I took them cycling in the Forest of Dean to distract them, with the added bonus that it wore them out!  
Yesterday we had pasta with the last of the chicken in a creamy sauce (butter, flour, splash of milk, water and half a stock cube, taste of mustard and a spoonful of cream cheese) which I'd frozen - and baked beans and cider bread for tea.  The last of the muffins too.


I know I have more planning and cooking time on my hands because I'm not working, but a part from the bread and pizza dough, nothing I made last week took longer than 10 minutes to prepare.  I am an impatient cook!


The small amount of fruit and veg has been a struggle; still we scrapped through and it's fired up my enthusiasm to grow our own.
On the plus side, the kids are drinking water and have stopped asking for juice,
I got them to eat soup and my fussy eater ate potatoes (even if he didn't know it!),
there haven't been any biscuits or crisps in the house (sadly temporary - 1 against 3),  
I rediscovered muffins and would have faced a mutiny without them,
cider bread! - who'd have thought it?
I actually quite like cream crackers.


Last, but definitely not least, there's a cheque in the post for the Rifles "Care for Casualties" Appeal.  And you know what, I'd do it again!

26.2.12

Cider bread? Really? - Charity Challenge DAY 6

Having next to no food in the house is bringing out my creative (desperate?) side.  I need to think a lot harder to stretch my Charity Challenge supplies and keep everyone happy. 
I had a rummage through some of my favourite old recipes and found this one, which is a cracker!

Guinness and Irish Cheddar easy loaf

250ml Guinness
350g self raising flour, sifted
60g caster sugar
100g strong Irish cheddar, grated
2 tbsp pumpkin seeds (optional)
2 tbsp butter, melted
(180 degrees C, gas mark 4)

Now, I have no Guinness, no cheddar of any nationality and no pumpkin seeds.  But I do have half a bottle of cider that's been in the fridge for ages.  

So I have an idea.  
  
It is the easiest recipe. You just mix everything together (a part from the melted butter) Spoon the dough into a buttered loaf or 8" round tin - and leave in a warm place for 30 minutes. No kneading needed. 
All that's in mine is cider, self-raising flour and sugar.....


Bake for 35 mins, then drizzle the butter over the top and pop it back in the oven for another 10 mins, until it sounds hollow when you tap it.


I think the cider was probably a bit flat, but the bread is surprisingly good.  It's quite sweet, but some cheese would probably balance that out.  

We finished off the other large loaf at lunch time with child-friendly lentil soup (no chilli powder!)  I'd sliced the bread into toaster-size pieces and put them in a bag in the freezer.

Two homemade mozarella pizzas and a garlic invention for tea - voted the best meal yet!
Must try and make them more often.



Just a day to go....and a tin of baked beans in the cupboard...   

24.2.12

Magic Muffins! - Charity Challenge DAY 5

They are magic!  Well, they certainly have been this week.  Muffins not only filled a space in the lunch boxes, they also filled that tricky gap between the end of school and the evening meal.  
The children are always starving when they get home and head straight for the biscuit tin.  It's a fine balance - giving them enough to restore household harmony without spoiling their appetite for tea! 
This week there haven't been any biscuits in the house.  Instead the kids have had a muffin and I've made sure we eat a little earlier.  They're all hungry by teatime which is perfect.  Even my fussy eater has finished meals he'd usually play with. 


So muffins have been my Charity Challenge saviour!




They're so versatile and you can fiddle about with a basic recipe as much as you like - I always do.  This is the one I use, but there are loads out there.


260g plain flour
2 teaspoons baking powder
1/2 teaspoon bicarbonate of soda
1/2 salt
110g sugar (a little more or less is fine)
1 egg
240ml milk
90ml of vegetable oil 
190-200 degrees C for 25 mins

For the peach muffins, I used half a tin of peaches, chopped up, and half the light syrup - so reduced the milk to 150ml.  
I think you could put more fruit and juice in, but my supplies were limited this week. I watered down the milk for the same reason - and they still tasted good!  


I put three large grated carrots (300g would be best) in the other batch, 100ml of water instead of milk and added some cinnamon, vanilla essence and a tablespoon of honey.   
Sift the dry ingredients together, mix everything else including the egg in a measuring jug and pour the wet mixture in the bowl.

Top tip is not to over beat the batter, just 10 seconds then into the cases and into the oven. 
didn't use proper muffin cases, just the smaller cupcake ones to make it go further.


I got distracted yesterday, so here's a quick run down of what we had.
  
I made a sauce with the two tins of tomatoes, the large onion and a rather soft garlic clove I found in the cupboard.  Pepped it up with a splash of vinegar, spoonful of sugar, a squirt of tomato ketchup and some grated carrot. (yes, those carrots keep on comin'!)
We had it with pasta and there's plenty of sauce left for tomorrow's pizza. 




Tonight we're having an almost spanish omelette.  I'm using the five eggs I've got left, a teaspoon of mustard, fried potato and a small handful of frozen peas (a slight bending of the rules, but It was either that or more carrots!)  


And guess what's for pudding?!


         

22.2.12

Time to get a breadmaker? - Charity Challenge DAY 3

The kids finished off the drop scones for breakfast and the last of the bread, so I needed to make a new loaf. Now that sounds very casual, like I do it a lot, but the truth is I can count on two hands the number of times I've made bread from scratch. 
I wasn't very confident about it at all.  

Maybe it's time to get a breadmaker?  So many people swear by them, but I don't have a great track record with small kitchen machines.  After my initial burst of enthusiasm they tend to get neglected and just clutter up the place.  Have to say though, I was just about ready to order one, when my hands and rings (eejit!) were covered in sticky dough and the phone rang....  

I chose Jamie's Basic Bread recipe as it sounded easy - and kept my fingers crossed because the flour had been in the cupboard for a very long time.  I wasn't brave enough to start on a flat surface and make a well for the water in a mound of flour, (just asking for trouble) so started in a bowl and then slapped the mixture onto the table. I managed to make a right old mess!  

I used quite a bit of flour, but it kept stubbornly sticking to the wood - is there any way round this or is it just part and parcel of making bread?  Things improved after that and I love the squeaky noise the dough makes when you knead out the air.  
It wasn't until I got to this stage that I realised there were no timings or oven temperature on the recipe! Luckily I found them in the comments - 200 degrees C for 25 minutes, then check. Amazingly that tatty bit of dough on the table turned into this.  It's huge!


We had savoury rice with chicken for tea.  I whizzed up half a large leek and a carrot (surprise!) because l find there are less complaints if they can't work out what vegetable they're eating....  You see, I do have one very tricky eater, who would be deeply suspicious of chunks of leek, but if they're finely chopped in a food processor, I seem to be able to get away with it (find it works a treat with courgettes too)  He's not keen on potatoes either - how can you not like potatoes?!  So I begged him to eat a few small,crispy ones on monday and didn't tell him what was in the soup yesterday! (he loved it)


Back to tea and I fried the vegetable mix for a few minutes, added the rice, stirred it all together and poured in my homemade stock.  When the rice had absorbed the stock and was nearly cooked I added some of the leftover chicken. Then some seasoning, parsley from the pot and a quick squirt of lemon juice at the end to zing it up. 
Plain yogurt, the rest of the peaches and a splash of honey for pud.  Day 3 done!

20.2.12

Twelve pound Charity Challenge - DAY 1

Just to make the Challenge extra especially difficult, I went shopping with the children!  Not the best plan, but it was the weekend.  My usual ploy when they're with me is to keep the trolley rolling, so I walk and lift on the move, while scanning the shelves ahead.  Stop and the trouble starts.....


This time I had to stop. My carefully crafted list was short but I needed to take a really good look at the prices.  I also needed to shop around and went to FOUR supermarkets.  Luckily they're all close to each other; that was the only lucky thing! I was on my knees by the last one.  


It was hard deciding what to buy, but it did make me think about what I usually put in my trolley. My food shop can be seven or even more times the £12 limit.  What have I been buying?!  I used to be quite good at guessing my total as I waited in the checkout queue - now I'm always way under.


So here's my 'teeny weeny bit over' £12 list. I know lists are dull, but this one is important! 


ASDA
small chicken       £2.82
large onion                14
2x500g pasta            60
soft cheese 250g      68
plain yogurt 500g     55
baked beans             29
bread                          47
mozzarella                44 
LIDL
2xtinned toms           62
milk 2.272l             1.00
10 eggs                     85
carrots 1kg                59
rice 1kg                     40
cream crackers        36
split lentils 500g       88
TESCO
cornflakes                 39
tinned peaches        29
FARMFOODS
potatoes 2kg            69
TOTAL              £12.06


Blimey! It looks so short and took me so long!  A neighbour has kindly given me two leeks from her garden and I have half a tub of Clover left in the fridge.  That's it though, a part from leftover flour, sugar and cooking oil in the cupboard, plus the odd dollop of jam or honey.  I don't think that's pushing it really? And as I've already said, the money normally spent on the weekly shop is going to the Rifles "Care for Casualties" Appeal.


I probably have a bit of an advantage because I'm catering for the kids and only one adult. Still, three pounds each stretched over seven days - it's going to be interesting!  


Breakfast this morning was straightforward enough; just one for milk and cereal and toast for the rest of us.  Packed lunches looked a little anaemic, (I'll delve into them in more detail tomorrow when I've heard the verdict!) and lentil soup for me.


Tonight I'm going to lull them into a false sense of security with chicken, roast potatoes and carrots!