Weezl and friends Phase 3 - sitting pretty with Kitty

artybear

Hi all, sorry have been very busy lately, I have been writing my MA dissertation. It is nearly done now (although I have to do all the footnoting today grrrrr, I always leave it till the last minute lol) so I will be able to keep up more and also more importantly test more!!!!!

MDW I hope your work thing sorts outxxxxx

Lifeinturmoil WoW, you have tested so much, are you a very good cook? I cant wait to test some of these recipes and I'm so happy that there are lots of new faces that are excited by the project too.

Allegra Brownies look good, I'll be at your house soon to try some ;-)

Anywho just wanted to pop in and say hello to all

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weezl74

life_in_termoil wrote: »

Well I see from the costing that you have 81p to play with for xmas week, so how about adding a carrot, parsnip and maybe some pearl barley or broth mix. Both pearl barley and broth mix are really cheap and come in at under 50p each for 500g

LIT those are fab ideas!

i'm sorry i should have said already that i'm seeing that little bit of headroom as covering the seasonings, so it truly is a £25 meal planner

Allegra

weezl74 wrote: »

allegra, swapping some dark choc for milk was my way to try to reduce the sugar needed so i was heartened to see they are sweet! can they lose a leeetle bit more sugar successfully?

Can definitely take another sugar reduction I'd say - we all thought them very sweet

life_in_termoil

weezl74 wrote: »

life in termoil, , i'm sorry cos you've probably already said, but how many/how old are the family group you are feeding? Not to be nosey but it is a v v useful indicator of whether my portion sizes are ok

We are a family of 5. Me, DS 21, DS 18 DD 15 and DS 13

Portion sizes are abit large for us to be honest but then again we arent a family who eats a starter, main and a pud no matter what the occassion. So xmas day will be breakfast of eggy bread without the sausage, lunch will be just the main of pork (served about 2oclock) then round 6 we will probably have either the mushroom soup or xmas pudding. The snacks my family tend to eat are savoury rather than sweet although the brownies did go down well so snacks will be dips with melba toast or tortilla chips (made from tortillas brushed with alittle oil and baked in the oven untill crispy)

Today I am making the pork tortilla wraps but will made double the amount of tortillas and see how they turn out as tortilla chips.

weezl74

Allegra wrote: »

Can definitely take another sugar reduction I'd say - we all thought them very sweet

Probably a bit hard to say:o but can you recommend an amount that our next testers can roll with? I do need the sugar reductions more than any other ingredient.;)

LIT that's good to know re portions, we were slightly worried that the planner is a little light on calories, so I'm glad indeed you are feeling it's filling!

life_in_termoil

The brownies you should get away with using only 275g of sugar

Allegra

I'd go for 280g sugar in the next stage, as I'd be worried about the texture otherwise (loss of too much of the dry ingredient). If you could spare another 40g flour, though, go as low as 250g sugar.

MadDogWoman_2

Afternoon,

Breakfast - Apple Curd on Toast, Curd I'd made previously and chucked in the freezer, finally got DH to try it - he likes it, also a hit with DD.

Lunch - Potato and Onion Soup - delicious, DH couldn't believe how little bacon was in it as it really helped the flavour - I did tweak it a little bit as I had some leftover homemade chicken stock so substituted then topped up the difference with water. Plenty left to go in the freezer for another day.

Tea - Chicken and Onion Pie.

Once the kitchen is sorted from lunch, Katie and I will be making carrot cake, savoury scones, bread and chicken and onion pie.

The pre boiling of the chicken before putting it in the SC really does work, the poaching liquid is definitely clearer than when I normally do it.

jenid

Hi all,

OH and I have just eaten more than our fare share of the brownies. They're very nice but definitely far too sweet for our taste. I think you could stick to the origional amount of dark choc (200g) and lose at least another 70g of sugar, if not a bit more, but as has been mentioned I thing you'd need to put in a bit more SF flour to balance things out.

I cooked it for 10 mins longer than recommended and it was still very soggy on the bottom, so the addition of the extra flour may help to firm it up a bit.

Would you like me to try it?

oh, and Weezl, no twinges or anything here yet but I might give the star jumps a try if I can find the energy. I had an evening with my NCT friends and all their gorgeous little babies last night and had heard that that can kick start your hormones into giving birth. Nothing yet though!

jenid

p.s I also tried making the caramerlised onion hummous but my onions didn't caramerlise very well. And I was a bit worried that my hummous was a bit think so I added some more oil which was a big mistake as it was then far too oily and still not runny enough, so added half an extra can of chick peas to make it less oily, and some water to make it more creamy. Maybe this could go on as a tip for the recipe, to add a little extra water to get it to the right consistency?

VenusFlytrap_2

Hello Weezl and co! :wave:

I'm a long time lurker on all your threads going back to April when you were testing the first planner, have followed your progress on and off, picking up loads of tips on cooking and frugality along the way as well as enjoying the banter between you all - you've created a lovely little community and I was glad to read the meet in London went well.

Anyway, thought it was about time I delurked to say a massive WELL DONE to you all on what you have achieved. :beer::beer: The website is looking fab, very professional, content is excellent and very pleased for you that it was the 2nd result on the first page of my Google search for "cheap family recipes"! I've also noticed CFR being recommended on other boards on MSE, by users who I don't recognise as regulars from these threads, so the word is definitely getting out there and there must be others like me who are observing your efforts without getting involved. :cool:

If you're wondering why I've followed you for so long but never joined in, part of the reason is that I don't feel I have much to offer. I'd make a rubbish tester as unfortunately am too much of a veg-phobe to enjoy most of the main meals, but I do love baking and keep meaning to make a batch of your recipe scones and a carrot cake - now that I've delurked I'll let you know how that goes, from the perspective of a cook who's much more amateur than all of you!:o

Even though I can't be much practical use to you, I do have one little tip that might help someone! One of the things from the planner I like and eat a lot of already is porridge, but I know it's not everyone's favourite and wonder if some people trying the planner might struggle getting their kids (or even OHs!) to enjoy eating it on a regular basis. Something that might help is adding a spoonful of cheap hot chocolate powder - think Asda Smartprice do a jar for 50p which might not be too nice to drink, but makes porridge taste just like chocolate Ready Brek, only nicer and much cheaper! I realise hot choc powder is not on the plan, but people might already have it in their cupboards to use up and it would make a cheap addition to the shopping list that might encourage someone's kids to eat their porridge in a morning!

Going to stop rambling and go back to lurking now... have been computerless for a while so need to catch up a bit. Really just wanted to say well done and thanks to you all, for a great read and all the tips over the past few months. :beer: