Weezl and friends Phase 3 - sitting pretty with Kitty

poohbear59

I would love to try out some of the recipes for a frugalised Christmas dinner. Our Christmas is quite frugal already but I am always willing to go a bit further

Butternut squash risotto for the family tonight and I am poaching lots of bits of lamb lap so I can roast it sans bones for tomorrow's dinner.

aless02

Christmasy things to frugalise:

- mince pies (easy, like Allegra said)
- Christmas cookies (we have 1 cookie recipe already - can we maybe add a few different ones with different flavors?)
- something chocolate pleeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeease



Doing the whole meal will be fun - can we afford a turkey???

Tip:

Homemade gifts for people are usually received very well and cost just pennies to do, especially if made from foraging ingredients!

Some ideas include making jams from gathered blackberries & chutneys from your garden gluts. Candies are also easy to make - buy a bag of peanuts and make a huge batch of praline. Roast some nuts you've gathered and then coat with cinnamon & sugar to make a sweet snack. Make your own toffee popcorn to give away, or try making some fun "hot chocolate" or coffee mixes toput in a bag and then gifted in a mug (great mugs are available from the (99p store!).

Allegra

I think Weezl is thinking chicken. And frankly, unless you are entertaining multitudes, I think chicken would do just fine.

I usually cook for 3 meat eaters only on Christmas Day, and used to just roast a ham, but then caved in under pressure and did turkey for a couple of years, and goose last year. The great big whack of money needed for the bird which will then be eaten ad nauseam put me right off though and this year we already agreed that chicken is what we'll be having.

How's about Samhain (better known as Halloween) as the test date for the dinner timings ? Keep the pagans amongst us happy, too.... And it falls on a Sunday this year, which is handy.

poohbear59

http://www.allfreecrafts.com/christmas/index.shtml

This is one of my favourite websites. Great for chutneys,Christmas decorations etc.

Allegra

What we normally eat round Christmas time:

Christmas Eve - fish stew (essentially smoked haddock and potatoes)
Christmas Day - a bird with all the trimmings
Bioxing Day - a breakfast of home made bagels with cream cheese and smoked salmon

Plus mince pies, Christmas pudding, cookies and - yes, Aless, I totally agree - something chocolate My fave is rocky road - brazil nuts (Asda do a smartprice version) which practically makes them a health food, marshmallows and smartprice chocolate. Frugalicious, baby....

weezl74

use brown paper decorated with a holly leaf shape, cut from a half potato, and printed using green poster paint to save money on wrapping paper.

MadDogWoman_2

Loving all the Christmas ideas, I'll get my hat on and think remember what I normally cook for Christmas.

I'm currently in the kitchen making the onion tart, pastry is resting and onions are caramelising, I'll have pictures later.

I need a bigger kitchen so I can have a proper size food processor, it's taken ages and lots of tears for me blitz the onions in my mini chopper.

For reference I weighed out 800g of unpeeled and untrimmed onions which worked out to be 700g prepared

ETA: I made a 1/2 batch of porridge for DD and my breakfast this morning, another hit. There's enough left for DD breakfast tomorrow. I made it with sweetner instead of sugar as I have to watch sugar intake, it definitely kept me going until lunch time.

hornetgirl

Forage for sweet chestnuts (end Oct ish?) rather than buying them and prepare then freeze. Use to tart up your Christmas brussel sprouts.

artybear

for weezl

I wanted u to see my camera skills-I'm trying lol

MadDogWoman_2

Pastry Resting


Onions


Pasty Case ready for filling


Ready for the Oven


Cooked


Ready to Eat


Confession Time - I can't eat cheesy things without tomato ketchup so I added a splodge after the photo was taken.