It isn`t tough for us. We are OS and we COPE

taplady

charlies-aunt wrote: »

Just to be contraversial - I like tray and table cloths - our scran is cheap and basic but I try to serve it nicely .

Very OS style as most of our glasses, crockery, dining chairs, table linen etc are hand-me-downs from family, nothing much matches but every piece has a memory of the person that it used to belong to .

It may only be baked beans but served on a nice plate to a table with a tablecoth on with a glass of council pop on the side - it tastes better somehow

I vaguely remember a biblical quote along the lines of 'better a dinner of herbs served with love than a fatted calf with hate'

I couldn't agree more Charlies-aunt :T we dont have expensive things and a lot doesn't match but I like each piece and like my meals to be well presented.

ChocClare

Well, I did Latin at school and it was by far the most useful subject taught

Then when I went into the Sixth Form we had two lessons per week which were for "core studies". A group of us A stream girls asked if we could do cookery as we'd never been allowed even to try it. The Home Economics mistress thought it was all super fun to have us gels to teach - she treated us as if we were very dear but slightly mentally !!!!!!, as we would clearly never need the skills she was teaching us but were just doing it for a bit of fun. She was very strict that we needed our wicker baskets complete with budgie cover on the top to bring ingredients to school in, however! I can honestly say I learnt absolutely nothing in cookery but it was huge fun!

Needlework you had to do up to the third year; in the first year, you had to make a blue gingham apron with smocked panels and a heart-shaped pocket with the recipient's name embroidered on it in pink silk: this was all made by hand and although the result was fairly hideous, I did actually learn quite a lot from that. In the second year, you made a skirt which took all term as it had to be pinned, tailor's tacked, all seams hand tacked and ONLY then sewn up. One of the girls had the effrontery to sew a seam on the machine which she had merely pinned together: the Needlework mistress nearly had a fit and said, in a voice shaking with disgust, that if we wanted our clothes to look as if we had bought them at - she closed her eyes in horror - Chelsea Girl - then we were going about it the right way. Actually, she did teach us how to adapt patterns, which was jolly useful later on, though I remember thinking it was a total waste of time at the time.

We also had deportment lessons - now that was handy :rotfl::rotfl:

And I own traycloths and tablecloths and napkins and use them all regularly.

Ah yes, et in Arcadia ego... :rotfl:

mardatha

There you are - see !! - being forced to sew tray cloths makes you schizophrenic !

kezlou

charlies-aunt wrote: »

It may only be baked beans but served on a nice plate to a table with a tablecoth on with a glass of council pop on the side - it tastes better somehow

Aw charlie you've cheered me right up!
Nobody ever gets it say we used to have council pop when we had our tea. Haven't heard that saying for ages..

When i was younger we always had a table cloth. We don't now, don't see the point as it would be covered in cat hairs.

I only went to secondary school for a year before i dropped out, and the only i learnt was never use a sugar spoon to stir your tea.:o

Instead i've learnt to cook, sew completely from scratch.

katholicos

charlies-aunt wrote: »

Just to be contraversial - I like tray and table cloths - our scran is cheap and basic but I try to serve it nicely .

Very OS style as most of our glasses, crockery, dining chairs, table linen etc are hand-me-downs from family, nothing much matches but every piece has a memory of the person that it used to belong to .

It may only be baked beans but served on a nice plate to a table with a tablecoth on with a glass of council pop on the side - it tastes better somehow

I vaguely remember a biblical quote along the lines of 'better a dinner of herbs served with love than a fatted calf with hate'

That brings back memories for me, my mum and dad used to refer (still do sometimes) to tap water as 'corporation pop' :rotfl:

taurusgb

As soon as I open a new packet of yeast I store it in the freezer tightly closed. No need to defrost, just add the relevant amount to your breadmaker and it works perfectly everytime -never goes out of date that way :T Oh and I never use sugar or milk powder in my panasonic either (or when I make bread by hand)....just flour, yeast, salt and water - though I do find that if I have whey left over from straining my yogurt that works beautifully in place of plain water.

I can't remember where I read/heard it, but the price of flour could apparantly double by April :eek: - it is definately going to be a hard year ahead. More stocking up soon I think, though I already keep large stocks of staple foods and am a great source of amusement to my family and friends in my choice of places to store it - behind the books on the bedroom bookshelves seems to create the most laughter :rotfl:(though I had the last laugh when we had awful weather over Christmas) ...... you would be amazed how many tins of baked beans you can hide behind a row of books!

InaPickle

taurusgb wrote: »

you would be amazed how many tins of baked beans you can hide behind a row of books!

:rotfl: :rotfl: :rotfl: :rotfl: :rotfl:

ceridwen

mardatha wrote: »

There you are - see !! - being forced to sew tray cloths makes you schizophrenic !

Clearly a useful mindset to have then Mardatha - I've just sent my "other half" over to read the "other half" of the Its Tough thread on Moneysavers Arms.

There ya' go - as modern science says its theoretically possible for us to be in two places at once I'm just getting in practice :rotfl::rotfl:

Psst...do you think that means I can "double up" on holidays - and go on holiday in Spain AND France at the same time? LOL

Back to food - note to self: must remember I need to stock up with canned tomatoes (mine are downright expensive enough anyways - at organic prices - eek!). I grew loads extra last year and was able to store some of them on through. I've still got some dried ones and theeenk I've got the idea as to how to manage to dry them now - cut VERY thin and dried a lot longer than I think (ie to make sure they are absolutely BONE dry) and then decant from initial container into ziplock bags. So - I shall grow EVEN more this coming year..

Must remember to acknowledge my achievements so far to myself on the food front. I seem to be spending about £25 per week on food - which is about £10-£15 less than I must have been spending a couple of years ago. So I've managed to negate the effect of inflation so far and cut my food bill too. (Just wish I didnt have to buy so darn much at once of some things as part of the cost-cutting. Any time I spot fruit/veg I want in Sainsburys it seems to be on a "Buy 2 for £4 or 1 for more than £2" - so I curse and have to buy 2 packets (when I only wanted 1) - so that I dont get charged the "single supplement" on my food and then go off muttering to myself about having to find ways to use the extra packet I've had to buy before it goes off (as my freezer is crammed full already of what I myself CHOSE to buy in the first place..so no room for the "forced" buys). So - the achievement I'm patting myself on t'back for today is managing to spend the same amount as the average British person does on food - despite the fact that my food features such a high proportion of organic food (unlike the average British person) - so yay me for that!

GreyQueen

countingthepennies wrote: »

I work in a Catering department and this week we got an email warning us of the continued rise in food prices. Basically because of extreme weather conditions across the world, such as flooding, and the bitter cold winter here we can expect to pay more for pretty much everything. Rice, wheat based products, meat (presumably because the cost of animal feed has risen), tea, coffee, sugar, cocoa, orange juice (because of a combination of a lack of rain and a disease of the fruit trees), butter, potatoes and vegetable oil are all creeping up in price. :eek:
This emphasises to me the importance of a store cupboard. I know I am preaching to the converted here but definately we should be storing dry goods such as rice, pasta, noodles, tea, coffee etc and I am adding olive oil and long life juice to my stores.

Countingthepennies is bang to rights. I had Mum on the phone last week, had I seen the price of a litre of ordinary old cooking oil?! It's a shocker. I stocked up on pasta and veg oil a while back to use a Mr T "spend £20 get £3 off voucher" as they were long-keepers but it seems I accidentally did better than I knew. Going to be investigating laying in some tea and some other staples but flour is a problem as it doesn't keep for very long. Anyone else out there buying ahead? And which items?

ChocClare

You can keep flour in the freezer - also keeps weevils at bay!