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Old Style vs the USDA head-to-head challenge...
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Hi
I need to make a spread sheet to work out the cost of things. Just had filling and cheap (I think) meal of lentil bol.
Lentil Bolognese
Olive oil
Big onion
big carrot,
200ml wine or veg stock
tin toms
300ml can lentils (??? I used 150 dried from the pack)
Garlic and seasonings. Fresh herbs if available (ie in the garden and FREE)
I did double. I will make some into a nice lentil lasagne with the additon of lasagne sheets, 1pt white sauce and some cheese.[SIZE=-1]"Knowledge is knowing that a tomato is a fruit. Wisdom is not putting it in a fruit salad"[/SIZE]
Trying not to waste food!:j
ETA Philosophy is wondering whether a Bloody Mary counts as a Smoothie0 -
Yep...Julian Graves sell a good selection of pulses, dried fruit, herbs, fair trade & sweeties:p & their prices are a lot better than H&B. *note to self...check out possible sale *
We've a couple of those 'scoop & weigh' places, but you need to watch the price-per-gram cuz they can be more than supermarkets.
I'm really gunna have to try the pate & houmus recipes, but not sure how the offspring will take to them:o They have very traditional taste-buds; I've only recently begun putting peppers in stuff:(
Could I ask what the difference is between red & green lentils? I'm trying to 'smuggle' more stuff like it into their sheep pie, but don't want to blow the cover with too out-there tastes:D
Evening! The red lentils go mushy and sort of disolve with cooking, whereas the green ones tend to keep their shape and stay a bit more solid. It's easy to incorporate the red ones into mince dishes, just throw in a handful with some stock for them to absorb and nobody ever knows they're there!
GC Oct £387.69/£400, GC Nov £312.58/£400, GC Dec £111.87/£4000 -
Hello there,
purpleivy, thanks for a lovely sounding recipe, I shall try that!
Just made a really nice green olive tapenade for more sandwich filling variety.
I jar campolargo green olives in oil with chilli and hebs 66p
blitz with some of it's own oil
add something to thicken if you like, breadcrumbs, cooked rice blitzed...
yummy, and cheap, 4p a sandwich:money: already has the seasoning, and I ended up with 80ml flavoured oil, which I'll use to make aubergine curry with. I'll post the recipe later.
My sig reflects a scary state of affairs, but I've got enough meals left for 45 evenings, so I really think I'm going to make it. I've used what I've spent already pretty wisely I think!:D
A further thought, scrimperjan, one thing that's made a big difference from where I was when I couldn't get below the £15 per person per week threshold, was to reconsider what meals I would be prepared to eat. Although I'd gone to the lowest brand available for everything, I was still building meals around a large protein component, rather than a large carb component like now. This has made a big difference.
TTFN,
Weezl x
:hello:Jonathan 'Fergie' Fergus William, born 05/03/09, 7lb 4.4oz:hello:
Benjamin 'Kezzie' Kester Jacob, born 18/03/10, 7lb 5oz:)
cash neutral gifts 2011, value of purchased gifts/actual paid/amount earnt to cover it £67/£3.60/£0
january grocery challenge, feed 4 of us for £400 -
Every time I see your sig Weezl I just go 'Wow!'. You're my hero :blushing: I'm even more excited about May's GC to see if I can continue to cut corners - our budget will never be as low as yours as we have several animals (and OH will only go so far I think) but there's still so much more we can do yet. I just keep thinking of what we can do with the money instead of eating it :jThe 1,000 Day Challenge:Feb 16, 2016500/30,000
1.67%0 -
mummysaver wrote: »Evening! The red lentils go mushy and sort of disolve with cooking, whereas the green ones tend to keep their shape and stay a bit more solid. It's easy to incorporate the red ones into mince dishes, just throw in a handful with some stock for them to absorb and nobody ever knows they're there!
If they don't mind carrots then grate carrots in with them too -then if they notice any "orange bits" you can say must be the carrots
Took about a year for the step kids to notice and ask what the "orange dots" were - red lentils - we showed them the pack and explained they'd been eating them for nearly a year
They still happily eat them mixed with mince. working on clearing the clutterDo I want the stuff or the space?0 -
I know that lots of bean based meals have been suggested here, just got back from Somerfield and they have 5 cans for a £1 - pick your own varieties. Think this is pretty good value if you just want to try out different types of beans and find out which ones you like, rather than buying big bags of dried ones.GC Oct £387.69/£400, GC Nov £312.58/£400, GC Dec £111.87/£4000
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I know that lots of bean based meals have been suggested here, just got back from Somerfield and they have 5 cans for a £1 - pick your own varieties. Think this is pretty good value if you just want to try out different types of beans and find out which ones you like, rather than buying big bags of dried ones.
On another note, not food related, but grocery related they had packs of 9 own brand loo rolls for £2 - Sammy Kaye take note
I can't believe that I'm now standing comparing loo roll prices and whatnot, but I am going to cut our grocery budget, I just need to think before I grab a bit more! No good making a meal plan and shopping list then adding loads of little extras all the time!
Whizzed into Lidl's cos I was parked free in their car park, cucumbers are still 29p in there, bargain! But couldn't find their sun dried toms, wanted to make weezl's bread, does anyone know if they've stopped selling them in jars, they used to be with the peppers and olives, but no more.GC Oct £387.69/£400, GC Nov £312.58/£400, GC Dec £111.87/£4000 -
Although I'd gone to the lowest brand available for everything, I was still building meals around a large protein component, rather than a large carb component like now. This has made a big difference.
TTFN,
Weezl x
This has made a huge difference to my budget too, and I've found a lot of inspiration came from turkish cookery (one good thing about the ex husband, and only one :rotfl:)
A few ideas include:
Lahmacun - a turkish pizza. Has a very thin base, and is topped with a combo of lamb mince chopped finely with flat leaf parsley, onion and chilli flakes. The mince is so finely spread that about 100g can serve 4 people in this way. There's no cheese.
Gozleme - no real translation for me with these. Some people translate as filled pancakes but they're not. Basically you make a water based dough, roll as thinly as possible and fill with your choice of the following - "patatasli" grated cooked potato, onion and flat leaf parsley, "peynirli" mashed feta with cooked onion and parsley or "etli" with the same meat mix as the turkish pizza.
Pide - This again is a bit pizza style, but like the lahmacun not much in the way of cheese. Many choices of topping. My fave is cooked spinach and onion with a few small pieces of feta. You roll a thin circle of dough, top it, then fold in the edges until you get to an eye shape.
The recipes for all the following are online, I'm a fan of "Binnurs". These all also freeze well and travel well for packed lunches.Softstuff- Officially better than 0070 -
Softstuff - thanks for these ideas, I like the idea of the lamb "pizza", sounds like a great summer sort of food. Do you have a website that you use for these recipes that you can recommend, or are they all in your head? And another question, the big Turkish flatbread, do you have a nice recipe for that - not yet managed to make it successfully! Thank you!GC Oct £387.69/£400, GC Nov £312.58/£400, GC Dec £111.87/£4000
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mummysaver wrote: »Softstuff - thanks for these ideas, I like the idea of the lamb "pizza", sounds like a great summer sort of food. Do you have a website that you use for these recipes that you can recommend, or are they all in your head? And another question, the big Turkish flatbread, do you have a nice recipe for that - not yet managed to make it successfully! Thank you!
The lahmacun is indeed great in summer. Even better if you wrap it around shredded lettuce sprinked with lemon. Mostly it's in the head, but I've used https://www.turkishcookbook.com too. I've never successfully managed those flatbreads, I simply don't have an oven that would go high enough to make it puff up unfortunately.Softstuff- Officially better than 0070
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