£57 for food for the rest of the month

maman

You seem to have cheered up a bit already losingpatience so well done.

I'm doing a careful spending diary of all our food this month (just wanted to check how I'm doing) and have just worked out I've spent about £57 so far so it's definitely doable. That includes a few specials I bought for the storecupboard and milk and bits today for the coming week. I cook for OH and I too (but no guinea pigs any more sadly:().

Occurred to me that the more meals you get from each 'main' ingredient the better. For instance, if you make a beef casserole type meal with plenty of onions and carrots you could probably get two meals from it especially if you made a couple of pies with a pastry or cobbler topping and plenty of potatoes.

It's the rubber chicken principle.

You could also keep a bit from the joint to make another meal if there's enough or, if not, just cut off a few strips to put in a stir-fry. I don't know how many sausages you have but you could probably get away with three between you if you cut them into 12 or more bite-size pieces rather than leaving them whole. Then it just feels like you've got lots of meat. Fill up with potatoes and veg. That may free up some sausages for another meal.

Don't worry about how long things have been in the freezer, they'll be fine. The guideline is just for perfect condition, nothing to do with food safety.

HTH Good Luck

EstherH

I made cobbler last week. Had some stewed steak,with carrots and onions in freezer from a previous batch cook. It was in a tub labeled 3 portions. DD was coming for tea so I cooked some potatoes and made a scone topping and put it all in a big square dish. Made mash and added some frozen veg, and when I started to put it out, only used half for four of us. Nobody complained that there wasn't enough meat and were really pleased I'd made cobbler. I managed to stretch it to 8 portions as we had the rest the next night. It's amazing how little meat you can get away with. I do this with left overs from a joint aswell.