Weezl and friends Phase 2 -giving it a whirl for Shirl! Testing meal plan for a month

poohbear59 · 14 May 2010 at 10:23AM

kezlou wrote: »

Quick question :- do we have to have raisins as the fruit for porridge /carrot cake as they are quite expensive in Sainsburys. But they sell basics mixed fruit and sultanas quite cheap. Just thinking out loud as another option to keep the shopping list down.

I used raisins in one batch and dried apricots chopped up in another. Maybe say dried fruit e.g. ....

When I put in my order to ASDA the smart price mince didn't exist anymore so I found another and when it arrived yesterday it is 'pork and beef mince'. Just thought you should know. It could be my ASDA only.

The onion tart still doesn't have oven temperatures on the website. Am I looking at the wrong bit to check?

grandma247 · 14 May 2010 at 10:47AM

I have been thinking about the tin size question and I think one answer might be to measure how much liquid a tin holds so that it will not matter if the tin is square, round ,teddy or heart shaped etc. just give an approximate depth if this is important to the outcome.

weezl74 · 14 May 2010 at 12:18PM

Murrell wrote: »

Hiah,

I can volunteer for this one, I shall log on again about 12:30 to see what tasks I have.

Bye for now
Sandra
x

Hi sandra

OK firstly then, how much marmite will each of them need over the month to ensure the B vitamin complex is met? I think you know what else roughly the diet includes so I think you'll know what's missing

Allegra · 14 May 2010 at 12:29PM

Put the chickpeas (for the houmus and the savoury bites)and the marrowfats (for Friday's risi e bisi) to soak in their separate bowls the night before. Read through all the recipes and double-check that you have all the right equipment and ingredients you will need.

Soon as you get up (I'll be optimistic and assume this is 7 am), get a couple of saucepans out, put chickpeas in one, marrowfats in other, put them on to boil. 20 min for marrowfats, 2.5 hrs for chickpeas (30 min rapid boil, 2 hrs simmer).

Get breakfast out of the way, wash up the breakfast stuff, make a cuppa, swish a bit of boiling water from the kettle into each jar you will be using to store your spreads, put on one side of the counter. Don't discard your teabag - you'll need it for soaking the raisins for sweet scones.

Drain the marrowfats. Get all your recipe printouts together in the kitchen, or power the lappy up so you can access them online (although I'd recommend saving them all into a folder on your hard drive, just in case the connection goes mid-cooking !)

It's now 8 am. Put yeast and sugar in warm water and leave somewhere warm to activate.

8.05 Turn the oven on low (no higher than 100 C / Gas 1/2). Pour the water out of the jars, pop the jars and the lids into the oven to dry fully (this will sterilise them and make sure your spreads do not go off). This should take about 5-10 minutes. Once you've taken them out, put the flour for the bread into the biggest non-plastic bowl or pan you can find, pop in the oven to warm briefly. While this is going on, zest and juice the orange, warm the orange juice in a saucepan and add the raisins to soak in it to plump up. Allow to cool.

8.25. Take the flour out, mix the dough, put into loaf tins, put somewhere warm to prove. Chop apple, put on the hob to cook. While it cooks, grate carrot. Mix carrot cake dough, get the jars out if you haven't already, turn oven up to gas 4(180c, 160 fan) put the cake in, leave for 45 min.

8.45. Put your used teabag to soak in hot water and add 120g raisins to it. Grate your block of cheese. Make cheese scones, cut out, put on tray. Make raisin scones, cut out, put on tray. Get food processor out, blitz apple curd, put in jars, blitz nut butter, put in jars, wash food processor. Get carrot cake out of the oven.

9.30 Turn oven up to gas 6 (220 c, 200 fan), pop a tray of scones on each shelf. Cut bacon into small pieces (to freeze), take scones out (9.42 for standard oven, 9.38 for fan)

9.45. Put bread in the oven. Chop onions in processor. Make tangy bean pate. Make pastry for the onion tart while pate cooling. Set pastry aside. Put onions on the hob to cook.

10.10 Take bread out. Drain chickpeas, make houmus. Take onions off the hob, roll out pastry. Make savoury bites, put pastry and bites in the oven. Whisk eggs and cheese together. Take pastry and bites out of the oven.

11. Mix mayo (if making).

11.15. Put filling in, put back in oven. Make either marmalade (for snacking) or liver pate (if you bought the liver already and want to freeze it for later in the month). If it's marmalade you're making, you will need to zest and juice three of the oranges and freeze as you will need them for the other three carrot cakes this month.

Take tart out of the oven, wash up. It's 11.45. If you were making liver pate, it's all over now. If you were making marmalade, you just need to wait until it reaches setting point - either way, your batch cooking is all done by lunchtime.

weezl74 · 14 May 2010 at 1:11PM

Allegra wrote: »

Okay, eagle eyes and reluctant cooks, we need you here Here is a rough draft of how I would do it if I was A Shirley with lots of storage space and no time. Don't pay too much attention to the wording at this stage, this is just-thrown-together to see if I can get the time flow right first; what I would very much like you all to do now is look it over, see if timings seem about right, if I have boobed big time anywhere (like asking Shirl to do the same thing twice, or forgetting to tell her to do something important at all), or any other suggestions that you find important and that I have forgotten altogether.

Put the chickpeas and the marrowfats to soak the night before (separately).

Soon as you get up (I'll be optimistic and assume this is 7 am), get a couple of saucepans out, put chickpeas in one, marrowfats in other, put them on to boil. 20 min for marrofats, 2.5 hrs for chickpeas (30 min rapid boil, 2 hrs simmer).

Get breakfast out of the way, make a cuppa, get the washing up out of the way. It's now 8 am. Put yeast and sugar in warm water and leave somewhere warm to activate. Swish a bit of boiling water from the kettle into each jar you will be using to store your spreads, turn the oven on on low (no higher than 100 C). Put the flour for the bread into the biggest (non-plastic) bowl (or pan) you can find, pop in the oven to warm briefly. Take out , pour the water out of the jars, pop the jars and the lids in to dry fully (this will sterilise them and make sure your spreads do not go off).

It's now 8.15. Mix the dough, put into loaf tins, put somewhere warm to prove. Zest and juice the orange, put on with raisins to warm. Chop apple, cook. Grate carrot. Mix carrot cake dough, get the jars out if you haven't already, turn oven up to gas 4, leave for 45 min.

8.45. Drain marrowfats. Grate cheese. Make cheese scones, cut out, put on tray. Make raisin scones, cut out, put on tray. Get food processor out, blitz apple curd, put in jars, blitz nut butter, put in jars, wash food processor. Get carrot cake out of the oven.

9.30 Turn oven up to gas 6, pop a tray of scones on each shelf. Slice bacon, take scones out.

9.45. Put bread in. (what if bread has overflowed tins by this point?) Chop onions in processor. Make tangy bean pate. Make pastry while pate cooling. Put pastry in fridge.(I wouldn't chill a vegan pastry- what do others think?) Put onions on the hob to cook.

10.15. Take bread out. Drain chickpeas, make houmus. Take onions off the hob, roll out pastry. Make savoury bites, put pastry and bites in the oven.

11. Mix mayo. Take pastry and bites out of the oven. (mix mayo after taking bites out, or bites and pastry won't come out til 11.15 which is too long:))

11.15. Put filling in, put back in oven. Make either marmalade (for snacking) or liver pate (if you bought the liver already and want to freeze it for later in the month). Take tart out of the oven, wash up. It's 11.45. All over ! (Although marmalade can take a while to reach setting heat so possibly longer)

I've written in purple, above.

I think she also needs to read the rcipes through before she starts, and have them printed out, or have the lappy in the kitchen-else she'll be to and fro like mad! Could onion tart appear in bold too please cos even though I' very close to the project it took a couple of reads for me to twig what the pastry was for! Also when is she whisking the milk egg and grated cheese together?

I think we need a few people to give it a go to see if the timings run well. Would that be us or the old-stylers

Allegra it's fab, you have worked very hard :T:T:T:T:T:T:T I love it and I would definitely use it

weezl74 · 14 May 2010 at 1:20PM

I have inserted a new line right at the top of onion tart recipe. Could people look and see if that's better and I'll then add degrees celsius and do it to other recipes

weezl74 · 14 May 2010 at 1:30PM

Sallygirl wrote: »

When catching up this morning, I spotted that Weezl's server had gone down so I'm sending you some of the edits needed again. Sorry! Not nagging as I know you are just a little bit well occupied at the moment but thought you might have lost them. I do a lot of proof reading but don't like to mention all the surplus commas etc as I don't want to be accused of nitpicking when it is such a brilliant site. I've mentioned the website to all and sundry because it is soooo good. I can remember years back when the interest rate had gone up for the umpteenth time, that a news programme had a story about a family that were so hard hit that they had chips with a tin of oxtail soup poured over for dinner because "it was all they could afford". I remember shouting at the tv because there was so much rubbish spouted about how they could not eat properly and I wanted to shake some sense into their heads. Could just point them to the web site now.

Anyway - the errors:

In pasta carbonara:
Drain pasta reserving 100ml of the cooking water add the water back to the bacon pan, stirring to dissolve the bacon juices.
Needs punctuation.

In pasta alfredo:
Shove in oven at 180
Maybe a more usual technical term could be used...

In the method for the carrot cake recipe on the web site, there are a couple of stray capital letters:

Warm the Orange juice in a saucepan

Bake for 45 mins or until Dark golden brown

Dark is also in bold which might be for emphasis....

thank you, I've done those now

If you did ever fancy sorting the commas out, I'd love that, but I'm aware it would be time consuming!

Were there other typos I need to look at?

Hmmmmn, chips and oxtail soup.... I'll pop it on the planner for next month!

weezl74 · 14 May 2010 at 1:32PM

cheerfulness4 wrote: »

I just had to pop on a say that I've just followed the link to the website you're building together and it is truly amazing!
Such a lot of work and dedication to put together a resource that is so very much appreciated by families such as mine - we could almost be Bob and Shelia with our two hungry teenage sons. (well one is now 20)

Just wanted you to know that many of us will be very grateful for all this work you've done.

Thank you

weezl74 · 14 May 2010 at 1:41PM

teddypinkskin wrote: »

Hi Weezl

Have looked at recipe on site and the answer is

Internet explorer/yes/pale grey

re-lurking now!

mangojoesno1fan wrote: »

Hiya All,

Just de lurking to add my two pennorth, I would be happy to use Kilner jars for some of the soups and pastas (in the fridge) and most people cooking for a family can find a willing helper, (I can't keep my grandaughter out of the kitchen if I'm cooking) so maybe SSShirl could ask her helper to prep veg etc.
hth,
going back into lurkdom again

Hello lovely lurkers! Do pop up again please?

SusanC wrote: »

Weezl - if you can let me know what keywords you are interested in and what your anchor text preferences are, I can write you a post about the new site on my blog with appropriate links.

Thank you

cheap family recipes, low cost meals and eat for less were the 3 search terms we were hoping to attract traffic from, although I also think 'budget meals' is good. So any of them really, or another search term you feel is helpful

Can I ask some more info about your blog on lard?

Helen105 · 14 May 2010 at 1:57PM

Hi

I’ve been reading through this thread over the last week and I think what you are trying to do is fab. I can’t believe that you only started in February (and have two boys under 2!).

Imagining myself as Shirley who I see as an inexperienced cook, (otherwise she would have worked a lot of this out for herself), I think the batch cooking day is daunting. As an enjoyable part of the weekend I would be happy to make the bread, carrot cake & scones & perhaps a pate.

Cooking new recipes is always more time consuming than stuff you know, and even well prepared and completely focussed I don’t think I could do all that in one morning.

I don’t get home until about 7 so I am not going to start making bread on an evening but I am quite happy to start preparing stuff for the following day eg whilst cooking tea the other day I had the chick peas cooking for houmous at the same time. Would it complicate your website to suggest two meals that could be cooked at the same time rather than have a one day a week blitz?

I am happy to help any way I can, maybe I should volunteer to try the batch cooking just to demonstrate my failures?

Helen

Weezl and friends Phase 2 -giving it a whirl for Shirl! Testing meal plan for a month

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