Frugal Living Challenge 2011 - part 1

never_too_old

Went to Mr A before school to try and redeem the vouchers i had just printed off for fabric conditioner and chocolate buttons.

got my fairy fabric conditioner for free but didnt have the white buttons,
had a look at the reductions and managed to get some diced chicken breasts whoopsied.another lady was looking and i had trolley envy she had about 4 whole chickens whoopsied in trolley.

SandraScarlett

Oh what a lovely day! Had my physio this morning, then met my ex-pupil for lunch. As a surprise, she brought along another 4 friends, who she is still in touch with, and we had a great time, talking about the good ol' days. I taught them 30 years ago, and 2 of them are grandmothers!!

They made me feel so special and wouldn't let me pay for a thing. When I got my bus pass out, one of them said she was going my way, and would take me home - in her BMW! :eek: :eek: :eek:

So pleased to see you posting Erne.

xx

miss_empty_piggy

With regard to the frozen food theme, my sister was putting a whole FROZEN chicken in the oven one day, she said that she always used to defrost her meat before cooking it until she was doing this with her Australian friend who asked her why she was defrosting it??? Her friend said that in Australia they don't leave meat out to defrost as it is so warm that it goes off too quickly. My sister was dubious at first and was worried that everyone would come down with food poisoning or something, but they didn't, and she has been doing it for years. Obviously it needs cooking for longer, but as long as you check that the meat is properly cooked then it's cooked!!!

With regard to the pork chops, I would cut the meat off the bone, chop up in smallish pieces, cook through/brown off in some oil and onion in a big flatish pan, add rice (2.5floz measured in jug per person) and boiling stock (twice the amount of stock to rice e.g. 2.5floz rice= 5floz boiling stock, teaspoon of salt (and seven spice). This is the ONLY time you are allowed to stir it through - put a lid on, turn down to the lowest setting and leave for 15 mins (if white) 40 (if brown). When timer goes off, turn heat off, remove lid, place tea towel over for 10 mins to absord steam and you have lovely chinesey-style pork and rice. My girls love this and so do I.

feel hungry just thinking about it.....yummy

mooomin

I think I'm being good and frugal at the moment, but to be honest I don't know because my laptop is broken and I am waiting for replacement parts to come from Dell! Without the laptop there is no Spreadsheet of Wonder, so there's going to be a lot of inputting into it when the battery finally arrives! I suspect that the thought of completing the spreadsheet will put me off buying anything too extravagant though

I'm in Leeds again for work, so am about to go and find some dinner - I think I'm going to do a Pick and Mix dinner from Tesco to be honest. We went out for a team lunch today and I'm not hugely hungry, so I'll get some bread rolls and some fresh fruit and that will probably do me.

I do also need to find a Primark here though as I forgot to bring a belt and the trousers I have for work tomorrow really need one!!

On the plus side, I booked myself into a nice hotel that has computers in the rooms for guests to use for free! I'm having a great time catching up on the threads on here and I'm going to do some free clicks, B!ngoport and find out how much I'll get for recycling Mr F's phone. I renewed his contract yesterday - it's still going to be £15 per month but he gets a nice shiny new phone which he's pleased with. I think that I will get £40 worth of Boots points for recycling it through their scheme, so I'm thrilled too :rotfl:

landregistrylass

midwinter wrote: »

Enjoy your dinner

Looking forward to my first car boot sale bargain hunting too, but have to wait until the first Sunday in February!

Hope the books are a great read

Good luck with the ebay sales!

Thanks. I see you are in North Yorks. So is my daughter and her 3 boys. Where is the car boot sale - I need my fix when I go to see her!!!!!

cw18

midwinter wrote: »

Haven't seen a February thread, but as I didn't do this challenge last year, don't know if the threads are changed monthly!

normally every 3 months, so next will start on 1st April

23rdspiral

i had a Very Minimal spend day - 1.05 in a charity shop on 2 craft mags, a bangle for a bag project and handmade uber cute pin cushion. and i met a like-minded craft person whilst looking, so all in all a good lunch break

Thanks for all the great sounding pork recipies... it's often cheap but OH hates chops, so ways to disguise them other than brazed in cider sauce are very welcome!

grandma247 wrote: »

23rdspiral
I do understand about the slowcooker. My modern one gets very hot , way hotter than my older one from the 1970s and I always put defrosted stuff in that. If I am unsure about whether it will defrost I put the newer one on high for a couple of hours either at the beginning or near the end of the day.

umm, yes, they're all so different arent they. That is a good idea for putting it on high at start /end to make sure... might also help the carrots to cook better if i did it at the start!:)
wow!! midwinter - that's a brilliant result!!! i've been hoarding any Mr M petrol vouchers for the last year for a rainy (maybe redundancy) day.

Sandra - what a very nice day! how nice they've remembered you fondly enough to do that. (saying that, if Mr Bowman the history teacher is out there, i'd buy him a pint in a split second!)

salski

Thank you all for the pork chop recipes! A fair few to try out here
Ive had a NSD today as Im feeling way too hormonal to leave the house Keep crying then laughing at myself! Im a loser lol.

Again thank you all - v helpful x

rubytuesday

Aah hope those hormones soon get back into line Salski!

lynzpower

Evening frugalites :wave:

Hope everyone is ok out there, Erme glad to see you are back and posting and feeling a bit better.

A rather unfrugal day in that I bought a number of drinks today at uni and spent 3.00.Im not impressed with this, some of this is diet coke so Im giong to go poundland and get the 3 dfor a pound as I am obviously buying them still!

I took the parnsip soup which was gorgeous, and I'll be making a bit more of that- have created a little space in the freezer lol so ill probably make some tomorrow night.

The bad news is that the flights have gone up by almost 100 each which is gutting to say the least. I am goi g to reshuffle the plans and fly into another airport instead I think, just need OH to come on home then I will run it past him then book before other stuff also goes up!

Dinner is a couple of small chicken fillets, some leftover sweet pot wedges from last night, some couscous salad and a pitta. Perfectly acceptable dinner for one!

Otherwise not much to report, jsut hoping everyone is ok and a hug to those who are not xx