Four MSE Ingredients (Recipes)

kunekune

I'm sure there is a similar book by Jill Dupleix, that would be pretty good.

Here's mine (without instructions).

1) roast chicken for weekdays

2 (or more) chicken legs
cherry tomatoes
olive oil
salt & pepper
rosemary if you have some

mash: either potato, polenta or bean mash
veg: I like broad beans with this

2) lamb and apricot polo

Cook diced lamb in a pan with water, cumin, coriander, cinnamon, onions and chopped apricots. Half-cook your basmati rice. Layer them in a casserole pot with a tight fitting lid and bake for 30 minutes or so. Serve with either salad or green beans (preferably tossed with almonds).

ritac1

I love this thread. I have copied and pasted every recipe in my attempt to begin meal planning to save money.

Hopefully there are loads of other money saving recipes to come !!

Bump Bump:money:

KarrieBee

150g chickpeas (i use dried but i think this is roughly a can)
onion
tinned toms
chorizo or sausage - whatever is in the fridge and needs using up

from the pantry - garlic (optional) paprika (optional if you use chorizo) thyme

Chop and fry the onions and sausages. Add the tomatoes, fill the can with water and top up with that. Add optional herbs and chickpeas. Bring to the boil then leave to simmer for about an hour.

This serves 2* for dinner and then 2 for lunch next day and we have it with HM bread but with rice it would certainly do 4 for dinner.

*OH has hollow legs so this is one normal portion and one hungry bloke portion!

rachbc

Carbonara

bacon
egg yolk
cheese
pasta

cook pasta, fry bacon, grate cheese (parmesan ideally but strong cheddar is good too) beat the egg and stir in cheese. When the pasta is cooked put back in the hot pan with a nob of butter and stir in the egg, cheese and bacon, stir til the egg cooks and thickens.

My favourite end of week, can't be bothered dinner!

scattymam1

glad this thread got resurrected - got quite a few ideas.

Tonight I made Creamy sausage and mustard pasta
350g pasta
450g sausages
250g mushrooms
2 tbsp dijon mustard

from the store cupboard: garlic, juice of 1 lemon, 2tbsp half-fat creme fraiche, salt and pepper

cook pasta
cook sausages in oil in a frying pan, add garlic, mushrooms, salt and pepper.
Then add mustard when the mushrooms are cooked, and the lemon juice and 2tbsp water, remove from the heat and stir in the creme fraiche. Serve with pasta.
I think it was a weight watchers recipe so it's probs better if you go for fat free sausages.
I wanted a really cheap meal so I got a bag of frozen sausages from Mr T - half the bag=67p, half a bag of mr t pasta =approx.25p, mushrooms =89p, mustard, garlic, creme fraiche, lemon, salt and pepper = say30p for all these so that's approx 2.11 for a meal that willl serve a family 3-4. Just over 50p per person.

yum yum in my tum

Stephen_Leak

According to the original rules, this only has 1 ingredient! It has got to be my simplest and cheapest recipe for the most wholesome and filling end result – ever. My box of dried peas cost 36p, so each serving cost just 9p!

PEA SOUP

Serves 2

INGREDIENTS
125g (½ a 250g box) of dried peas
500ml of water
Ground black pepper to taste

METHOD
Soak the peas in water according to the instructions.

Put the peas into a saucepan and cover with fresh water. Bring to the boil, then turn down the heat until it is just boiling (simmering). Check the liquid level from time to time and top up if it starts to dry out.

Continue cooking the peas until they are the desired consistency. Adjust the quantity of the liquid to the required quantity of soup.

If you have a food processor, put the soup in it and blend it to the desired consistency. If you have a hand blender, put it in the soup and blend it to the desired consistency. If you don’t have a food processor or hand blender, use a potato masher, press the soup through a sieve with the back of a spoon, or leave it lumpy.

Season with the pepper. Continue to cook for another couple of minutes.

ADDITIONS & ALTERNATIVES

You can use fresh, frozen or tinned peas. These do not need to be soaked.

Pea soup can be any consistency from a thin liquid with soft peas floating in it to a thick paste you can stand a spoon up in.

You can also make this as Pea & Ham soup, if you use the leftover cooking water from a boiled bacon joint.

Stephen_Leak

This is another good one. I trialled this with the cheapest supermarket budget own brand pork steaks I could find (I knew they would need a bit of fat in them as I wasn't adding any) and the bones just fell out of them, they were so tender. It even makes it's own apple sauce. And the gravy from the juices was delicious and meant that there was absolutely no waste.

PORK IN CIDER

Serves 2

INGREDIENTS

250ml of cider
1 apple
1 onion
2 pork chops or steaks

METHOD

Pour the cider into a measuring jug. Peel and core the apple, cut it into thick slices and put them into the cider to stop them going brown. Peel the onion and chop it into tiny pieces.

Put the onion in the bottom of an ovenproof dish with a lid. Put the meat on top. Add the cider. Arrange the apple slices on top of the pork. Put the lid on the dish.

Cook in a preheated oven at 150°C, 300°F, gas mark 2 for about 2 hours. Check the liquid level from time to time and top it up if it starts to dry out.

ADDITIONS & ALTERNATIVES

Stir 2 heaped teaspoons of gravy granules into the onion and cider left in the dish to make the most delicious gravy.

TIPS

Any cheap cider (that doesn’t have the word "white" in the name) will do. The long, slow cooking in the alcohol tenderises even the cheapest meat.

dutchy

On the radio yesterday I heard two Australian ladies being interviewed as they have published a best selling cookbook in Australia called 'Four Ingredients. It does what it says, ie. every recipe contains only four ingredients or less, and all recipes are super fast and economical. I'm very interested, but the UK version of the book is $17.95, so before I buy I was wondering if anyone out there has already seen it and is it really as good as it sounds?

Cheers,

Dutchy

newlywed

I bought one book that claimed to be a few ingredients and less...

and found that the recipes started with ... take a whole pack of croissants... or take a pack of brioche.... or use a jar of sauce....

It also used storecupboard ingredients as extras not counted in the number of ingredients and used some things I really didn't have in on a regular basis.

Most recipes looked really nice but were mostly like that so I decided it wasn't economical for a family of four and gave it to someone who lives alone - for days when she wants something different and can't be bothered to cook much

I appreciate that this one is probably different as the recipes weren't in cups or anything so think it was a UK one, it was a couple of years ago, and it certainly didn't claim to be economical.... but I've kinda been put off those type of books now as I think OS cooking from scratch often uses a few more ingredients than that


I think this was the book I bought:http://www.amazon.com/Best-Ever-Three-Ingredient-Cookbook/dp/0681186631/ref=sr_1_9?ie=UTF8&s=books&qid=1237370730&sr=1-9 (don't bother with it)


But this one looks like the Book1 of the version you want - cheaper on Amazon:
http://www.amazon.co.uk/4-Ingredients-Kim-McCosker/dp/0646470809/ref=sr_1_2?ie=UTF8&s=books&qid=1237370777&sr=8-2

They are visiting various cities in the UK if you want to check them out before buying:
http://www.4ingredients.com.au/

ragz_2

I had a similar book with recipes using 3/4/5 ingredients but I have to say it really wasn't much cop. The only good ones I found in it were a stronganoff recipe and a recipe for gammon steaks ion cream sauce. the rest really were rubbish but thankfully it was a present and I think a cheapie from a book club. not worth buying IMHO.