Weezl's phase 1- recipe testing and frugalisation- come one, come all!

Lesley_Gaye

weezl74 wrote: »

ok! success

After much searching on the office of national statistics and the Defra stats reports, it seems that the average spend for our family of 4 (on food + drink eaten in the home) in the uk would be £407.43. (Based on 08 figures because Defra haven't published the 09 data yet).

Well, this is fab

If Bob and Shirley spent the average... then we would save them, wait for it, I'm very excited about this :D:D:D:D:D


Drum roll:



£3619.73 in a year :j:j:j:j:j

And wait, it gets better!

If they are average then Bob and Shirley have also been spending

£425.48

on eating out, but the meal planner takes care of all their meals, so they can also make that saving with no extra spends, if they choose to.


Well, I'm thrilled about that

wowee, that would make siginificant dents in any debt our family have to tackle, and that is without any other cutbacks they make - how fab

Lesley_Gaye

weezl74 wrote: »

volunteer testers list. I've been struggling with this, and found it a bit off putting. I'd advertised for testers in a few places and got lots of responses of 'yes please!' in a lot of places. But I wasn't very able to hold it all in my head, navigate back onto here, and stick them all up, everytime I did it I would be chanting the names out loud, Fergus would then need something:), it would go right out of my head and I'd have to wait for the next quiet moment and start again.

The really sad thing is that a few folk felt missed out because they weren't /aren't on the list. I'm very sorry about that. I shouldn't have offered it in so many places and I perhaps didn't need to include it at all. My PM box became very full very fast with me not having done enough of that list maintenance.:o

Could I suggest that we lose the list, and that folk just come on and join in as and when they like?

Or if that doesn't help perhaps someone else might manage the list?

I agree with others, I don't think we need an actual physical list. If we did have one, what would its purpose be? As far as I can see, so long as we get enough people testing recipes and enough feedback, we don't need anything else.

Lesley_Gaye

weezl74 wrote: »

thanks Potty, I hope we can come up with something to collect the feedback!

Beetroot question: Borscht. Not seeming very popular (in mass appeal terms) , so wondering about losing it.

However the beetroot and red cabbage were there to ensure that not all the purple fruit anti-oxidants came from dried fruit sources (ie the raisins!). I wonder if anyone can think of another way to include them? 2 packs shrink wrapped beetroot and half a jar of red cabbage is what we're looking to frugally reapportion.

Look forward to any thoughts!

xxx

If I had a pk of beetroot to use up, I would probably have it as a hot vegetable or a salad ingredient. For the red cabbage, the chutney sounds good and can be used here and there throughout the month, or maybe as a salad ingredient (in a coleslaw perhaps, with the other cabbage)

weezl74

another little thing for you all to be mulling over....

Bob and shirley and the kids (I was thinking Jenny and Jason, unless anyone else has named them :rotfl:)

Puddings and sweet snacks/treats cake biscuits.

Any thoughts on amounts and variety on these?

So far we have

• oaty honey and raisin cereal bars
• carrot cake
• weetabix loaf
• and I think we can do a rice pudding once a week after the sunday dinner

extras I can think of if needed at a stretch:

• shortbread
• another evening pudding of pancakes with lemon and raisins in
• muffins if we have enough egg. (to be sorted once we've worked out the carrot cake requirements.

I was thinking of allowing 1-2 pieces of cake/biscuit/pudding per day. One after evening meal and 1 as a snack. it's probably their only snack though, so be honest if you don't feel this is enough

Lesley_Gaye

The poor people's food provoked a lot of thought for me.

When I was growing up there were 6 in the family and not much money. Dad grew veg and raised rabbits and Mum cooked everything from scratch. So it was basically good - BUT we had far far too much sweet stuff - cheap broken biscuits, chocolate and HM cakes.

So for me, poor people's food is comfort food of cakes and biscuits and the high fat high sugar stuff that involves trying to make yourself feel better via food when you are struggling with getting enough to live on (not many people comfort themselves with chickpea crumble!) Most people head for the brown food mentioned earlier, pappy bread, cheap pizzas and all the stuff that on OS we try not to do.

Lesley_Gaye

zarazara wrote: »

HI weezl, I might be on the wrong thread here but could you post your HM baked bean recipe again please? they are DELICIOUS but I've lost the recipe.

Is this the recipe you were after ZaraZara?

Soak 125g dry weight haricot beans for 5 hrs or overnight. Drain.
Boil vigorously for 10 mins, drain, then put in slo-cooker with 150 ml water, 3 tablespoons tomato puree, 1 tablespoon vinegar, 1 tablespoon sugar (or honey ceridwen!) a scant quarter teaspoon chilli, 2 bay leaves if you have them. You can add thyme leaves if you have them.
Cook 4 hrs on high, or all day on low.
Serve with mash and sausages. A 23p evening meal!

homegrown_life

I'm not sure of costings or if it's nice but how about Beetroot cake? Actually quite a few beetroot recipes on that site if you search for beetroot.

grandma247

I have printed off the current recipes and will give them a go tomorrow (payday)

Have I got this right? you are serving just the sweetcorn fritters and salad as a meal? Is it intended for lunch or main evening meal? I personally would serve for either but for evening meal I would add potatoes or rice to the meal as dh has sandwiches for lunch.

I would use the cabbage as a hot salad sometimes with a grated eating apple,grated onion and a bit of cinnamon,a little sugar if needed and s&p.
Just stir it all up in a pan with a little oil.


I used to make little pancakes with cinnamon and raisins in and served them hot and buttered for desert. especially if we had a cold salad in winter.

http://allrecipes.com/Recipe/Russian-Cabbage-Borscht/Detail.aspx
I see no reason why you could not use the half jar of cabbage for this. The vinegar smell and taste will disappear with the cooking.


I forgot to add I have a recipe for pancakes with a beetroot and chive filling.

Lesley_Gaye

Sian_the_Green wrote: »

Surely this must have some bearing...

Something I have thought about a lot. Everything works together in the rich/poor divide almost always to the detriment of the poor.

Such seemingly unrelated things such as teeth for instance. Poor people have the highest proportion of bad teeth, and teeth with plaque push toxins into your system that damage your body, esp your heart.

I know that cleaning teeth doesn't cost much, but dentists do, even NHS ones, and when you are struggling to survive, things like teeth can seem unimportant and can easily become neglected

weezl74

grandma247 wrote: »

Have I got this right? you are serving just the sweetcorn fritters and salad as a meal? Is it intended for lunch or main evening meal? I personally would serve for either but for evening meal I would add potatoes or rice to the meal as dh has sandwiches for lunch.

Hi Grandma247

no salad I'm afraid, that was just what sistercas had in so her family ate it last night. The meal planner was going to have the fritters and chutney and 1-2 80g serves of the veggies that are on the list, probably peas or beans. Sistercas and family and DH and I found it filling enough without an extra carb, so you may be surprised how many you end up with, it's probably more than you think!

Try it out though and see, I'll be very interested in your thoughts.