The Simple Bare Necessities feat. Gratitude & Recipes

mcculloch29 · 24 February 2017 at 5:15PM

Already had the HM pizzas here with DD and DGC - Flora Sheddon's flatbreads made from 250g flour and 100g yogurt plus milk as the base with torn mozarella, sundried toms, flaked tuna, anchovies, and grated mature Cheddar as the topping.
Oh gosh they were yummy - and so filling compared with my usual quick pizza base of tortillas. Very MS too, much cheaper than using tortillas, far quicker than bread dough, which is what I used to use.

Also with these flatbreads I could use my square griddle pan to make square pizzas as an alternative to round tortilla or frying pan flatbreads.

Greying_Pilgrim · 25 February 2017 at 1:30PM

Good [STRIKE]Morning[/STRIKE] Afternoon :hello:

Cheery - we took the remaining 2 calzone on our picnic/walk last Saturday too - perfect for carrying about. And. depending on the filling, I think they are better cold - the flavour intensifies. Although I appreciate that cold brocolli wouldn't be to everyone's taste!

rtandon - how did the 'collards' go? Did OH use bacon in yours?

mcculloch - this is what irks me when folks say they can't cook xy or z. I appreciate that home economics is no longer taught in schools - and I think it is a travesty, cooking is a life skill. But given the internet and books, and some learning 'sitting next to nelly', it should enable some cooking skill - and as you have shown, there really are many ways to make a dish that can be called 'pizza' - room for everyone to give it a go.

My pizza turned out ok last night. it was oooohey, goooey, tasty and filling

3 cheese pizza with wilja wedges, picture here;

I haven't made the curry for tonight yet. I won't make the one I was going to. I'll come up with something else.

I have come to the end of the wilja tatties now. Those that are washed in the fridge are the last; the bag is empty. I guess I have thrown about 6 potatoes out, one big rotten one, and the rest were smaller, but lime green - so potentially poisonous. a reasonable wastage ratio, and from a local farmer too, so a good buy I think.

We have already been up the high street to pick up a few pieces, including the (frozen) fish & chips for tomorrow night's tea. I bought a cauli for 85p - which I realise is 26p more than...... L1dl? have them for, but it was big, fresh as a daisy, and to a certain extent, I am supporting a sole-trader who has veg at reasonable prices all year round, not just for weekly offers.

Somebody very kindly offered to help when they saw me struggling with trying to zip up my coat, whilst balancing BG and my shopping. I managed to do it myself, but was grateful for the offer of help at least.

Right, lunch time, best get some tucker rustled up!

Thanks for popping in, reading and discussing your food and cooking adventures. Appreciated.

Greying X

brizzledfw · 25 February 2017 at 4:31PM

Havent been by in ages...sorry..have missed your lovely foodie photos..

Agree a HM pizza is such a yummy thing.. and a good greengrocer is a wonderful asset for any community..

Have a great weekend and hope its not too grey (;)) with you...its been raining here for about last 3 hours

rtandon27 · 25 February 2017 at 6:02PM

Greying_Pilgrim wrote: »

...My pizza turned out ok last night. it was oooohey, goooey, tasty and filling 3 cheese pizza with wilja wedges...

YUM! - cheese & 3 kinds to boot - how could you possibly go wrong?!? - looks lush as always GP!

I know you've told us before (forgive my memory) but how do you make your pizza sauce? Do you batch prep it?

Collards - well my instructions to OH were a bit loose - bit of onion, ginger, garlic, cooking fat & greens I said - simple, easy, you can find the recipe on the net...

I may have forgotten to use the word collards...

:rotfl::rotfl::rotfl:

Came home to chinese stir-fried spring greens in oyster sauce...

OH is not supposed to eat shell-fish anymore, so gave him an anti-histamine before dinner along with a little lecture & then asked how he managed to virtually travel from the u.s. deep south to china!?!

He swears he never heard the word collards!

Upside is threefold...
1) veg was soooooooooo good that it will be purchased again!
2) veg seems to have multiplied in the pot & made 4 servings so will be two meals worth for about 70p
3) we are out of oyster sauce so he won't forget to not use it next time

Ah the joys of culinary adventures...

(...may try to get some lardons for the next time as bacon does not last 2 minutes in this house...:o;))

Greying_Pilgrim · 26 February 2017 at 11:53AM

Good Morning :hello:

ay up brizzle :wave: t'was grey here, but luckily, getting our 'arris into gear to go up the high street meant we missed the rain :j

rtandon - I do batch my pizza topping sauce; an onion, garlic, celery if I have it, sometimes a carrot fried in oil. add a tin of tomatoes or 3/4 of a box of passata (or whatever i have) cook down, correct with sugar & salt if needed. add pepper and blitz. Check seasoning, add oregano/basil. Portion. Freeze

Lardons! that was what I was seeing in my mind's eye, but couldn't think what they were called. Have watched far too many episodes of DD&D!

Tea last night was 'curry kinda'. I ran out of time and oomph, so pulled the remainder of the 'bottom of the fridge stew' out of the freezer, added in some leftover dhal (it already had lentils in it) and some coconut sauce (from some cauli dish I did) and some coconut milk. Cooked it up, added in 'fresh' (frozen) coriander and served up with rice and steamed green beans. No pic, but it was orange

nowt but glorified dhal really, but given I can never make that exact recipe again, it was very tasty!

Fush, chups and mushy peas tonight. We're not going adventurizing - we've chores overload. We're swamped with 'stuff'. People have been very kind, and given us all manner of things for BG, but we've not had chance to get to grips with an 'item in/item out' policy, and there's no room to move. We've already made a little headway this morning and I've enjoyed scrambled eggs on toast for brekkie and time to drink a cup of coffee - BLISS! DH has had porridge and scrambled eggs on toast - betta get some work out of him today - mush!

Although it is not quite the end of the month, i am in despair that I am already into the red by £3 with my food budget

a quick analysis doesn't reveal any 'luxury' goods, no caviar, gulls eggs nor Dom Perri's Pop

I spent £10.79 on cheese, but that actually equates to nearer a £6/7 normal spend, as I still have cheddar in the freezer- 8 bags? Nuts were a huge chunk at £9+ and given these are used for snacking, not in cooking, I supose that is my 'filet steak' moment. Although I am now buying 'processed' food for our sunday 'tea', the total for this month (4 teas) is £8.56 - I'm not seeing that as onerous, so I don't think that is the issue. I suppose it is just indicative of where £140 goes to - on 'pedestrian' food choices, heavy on vegetables (fresh & frozen), some fruit (fresh & frozen), nuts and dairy. I have only bought a few tins of pulses this month, using pulses from stores, but even then, I haven't been 'buying' them out of the stores.

Arrggghh, will I need to up the budget? I can't see how I can lower my costs. We use valoo brands or the discounters as it is. I don't get the YS'd 10p goodies - I can't access the right shops at the right time. When I do get YS'd things, I'm usually paying aldee price, but getting it from mrW or paying half price (just about afforadable) for a 'luxury' item we otherwise wouldn't have.

I would hazard a guess that I am paying...... about £5 extra for convenience, or for getting something from the high street that is cheaper in aldee or mrL or icyland or fArmF0ds, but I can't get to those stores easily. The 21p 'premium' I paid for the cauli is an example, but then I've not seen the size/quality of the mrL ones - I assume they are British though, as was the one I bought. I paid 50p extra for a jar of coffee from mrL compared to my normal one from HB, but HB have been consistently OOS, so it's pay 50p extra, or do without...... mind, we've not tried the 'new' coffee yet, hope we like it

I'm aware that 10p here, 21p there, 50p here, etc all adds up. But at least I'm not just walking into a supermercado, buying anything/everything I want, and mindlessly putting it on the plastic - there is some thought going into the matter.

Right, best get on with a big more shuffling of stuff.

Greying X

Greying_Pilgrim · 27 February 2017 at 9:49AM

Good Morning :hello:

Hope the weather is better with you than it is with us

I cannot believe that the farce that went on at an awards ceremony has dominated every news headline that I have heard. Pity anyone cowering in a basement in a war-torn city, any child turning up to school hungry, any person sitting in their own excrement until their 'carer' turns up......

What Matters? What should matter?

I should be meeting up with some mum-chums today, which I am looking forward to. They are a really nice bunch - realistic about things and they all have their senses of humour intact. Life is not a competition with them.

Tea this evening will be stew - it is indeed the weather for stew! It will also allow me to use up some ancient ingredients from the freezer and some not so ancient, but need to be utilised, stuff from the fridge. I will aim to serve it with polenta and cauliflower.

Bread, milk, lemon (optional) and banana purchases will take me over £5 into the red today. I am still miffed at myself, but cannot see the achilles heel that is my spending downfall. We haven't even entertained this month!

Right, best shuffle orf, and do a bit more. Ta for popping by. Appreciated.

Greying X

Verbatim · 27 February 2017 at 2:54PM

Can't you add back the amount of money for cheddar cheese that you've still got left? It's still available to you and you won't need to buy anymore for (insert number of weeks/ months here) I don't know how long.

Greying_Pilgrim · 28 February 2017 at 12:51PM

Good Morning :hello:

Baby Greying decided they did not need sleep last night and so tea was taken in shifts and mumma and papa are shattered........

Tea was chestnut stew. Hearty congratulations to anyone that can actually spot a piece of chestnut! Picture here;

I didn't serve it with polenta in the end, as there was plenty. The cauliflower was lovely - it had an almost buttery taste, which was disconcerting, but nice! The whole tea used storecupboard/fridge/freezer ingredients, so winner dinner.

verbatim - I get what you mean, but I can never get to grips with paying out, or paying back or second purse, or bulk buying and 'shopping' from stores. I can't make it add up, or if I do 'literal' money transactions, then I've never enough change in the house. It wouldn't be so bad if my bulk purchases were limited to (eg) pulses and spices in the next city along - I spend about £30-50 2 x per year and porridge oats which cost c.£13 3 x per year. But this month, I dropped on the cheese for £4 - which you are quite right, will crown about 3 months worth of pizza, and I also spent c.£5 on the mayonnaise offer from icyland - again, that is probably 3 months supply. Some months I spot no bulk buy bargains, other months there will be plenty - I don't know how to ameliorate it so that I always have the cash to jump on bargains. Even if I always bought them on cc, I would be paying off the bill (sometimes) before I had used up the stock - where would the money come from to pay off the bill - I don't understand. I'm probably being majorly thick. But I also thought that this was the primary reason why people on low/fixed-incomes could never 'get ahead' with food purchasing, there is never the additional income to fund a 'float' to grab bargains/bulk buys from, and then pay back over time.

Tea this evening will be Harira soup and pancakes. I've even remembered to put the chickpeas on to soak - go me!

I don't think that I will wander up the high street today, there is nothing that we need and I am now £6 in the red, so best stop the rot! And if the mayo is factored in (paid on card) then I've ended the month £11 over budget

I think the non-food budget has done well, I have £15 left over - which sounds a lot, until you factor in it was a no haircut month and only 2 visits to the launderette for drying. Depending how weeks fall, there are sometimes 3 visits. I think £60 is now about right for the non-food budget. I wonder if I stepped the food budget up to £150, whether I would be similarly pleased next month? Still seems an awful lot of money, given the kinds of things that we eat. And that has no gift to the food bank factored in, either. Not too sure what to do about that. Do I set a tithe and give regardless each month, or do I try to stay within my budget and give the surplus to the food bank? We've not given as much to charity this February as we did in January in terms of donations (predominantly non monetary), so I'm feeling a bit jittery about that - keep the karma flowing Greying, keep the karma flowing........

Baby Greying has fallen asleep on my arm again - wish they'd sleep at night....... Best see if I can move and maybe do a bit more whilst they slumber.

Greying X

rtandon27 · 2 March 2017 at 7:24PM

Hope all is well chez GP
Xoxoxoxo
RT

Greying_Pilgrim · 2 March 2017 at 9:23PM

Good Evening :hello:

Yes, thank you rtandon - minor blip yesterday, nowt in the grand scheme of things, but needed to sit in a corner and lick wounds.

All good today.

Anyhoo, I am a fraud on this site, as by this morning, Baby Greying had already depleted my household insurance budget by a further £16. Small people, it seems, are an added burden to the underwriters calculations

And no, I'm afraid that I did NOT bother with the comparison sites. I value my time much more highly at the moment, and as it is, we're having dodgy phonecalls, which according to the internet are eminating from an insurance source. Cheers for that.

We walked up the high street move some money about, so that our outgoings would be met. I 'splashed' out on some bananas and some tommy katsup, and came away with 2 books and a map from the library - go me! The sunshine was lovely at times, so it was actually a pleasure to be out and about.

Tea this evening was along the lines of a buddha bowl, but was something of an unknown quantity, until this afternoon, following my trip to the library. I took advantage of Baby Greying contentedly amusing themselves to peruse through the library books (and plan our expedition using the map - we'll need crampons and everything :eek::rotfl:) and came across a recipe for Puy lentil, brown rice and sweet potato salad. I had all the ingredients - or close subsitutes - in stock, so i made it

My version had beluga and brown lentils in it, and broad beans (British

) instead of Edamame. I sprinkled chopped sunflower, pumpkin and sesame seeds over the top, with crushed walnuts, and some paprika flakes. I also drizzled some tahini, miso lemon dressing over. Picture (enhanced with the 'food' style feature on Pbucket - it was too light otherwise, I forgot to set the camera up - it wasn't that 'red', but the alternative version was too light

) here;

Nice, tasty, used 'store' ingredients and used up the last of the sweet potatoes. I also cooked an apple crumble to utilise the oven fully.

Today I am grateful for these 3 things;

for a fresh start - draw a line under yesterday

for support - so grateful......

for baby laughter - infectious

Thanks for popping in, reading and checking on my whereabouts. Appreciated.

Now I'm off to scoff crumble and ice-cream with my husband

Greying X

The Simple Bare Necessities feat. Gratitude & Recipes

Comments

Categories

Get our FREE Weekly email full of deals & guides - and it’s spam-free