The freezing, and the pain to come.

savingholmes

Good luck with your goal to get promoted - sounds a good plan


I too have applied for 2 jobs (both promotions to a level have worked previously -pre recession) this week as really want more money and its the easist way to achieve it.


Good luck with the small steps to debt freedom. Getting rid of 18% debt will make a major difference to how much of your debt repayment gets used to pay off debt rather than interest.

Have you tried the snowball system yet at whatsthecost (another website) - it can be very motivating

financial_planner

Nearly two months on in my MSE journey, I've come to the point where I want to share some wisdom. One of the things I am doing okay at, is cooking for myself. So I don't forget, but also in the hope that it might inspire others, I'm going to start writing my recipes out here.

The first is called the 'Farrito'. I've called it this because it is halfway between a Fajita and a Burrito, although of course it would probably be unrecognisable to a mexican. Anyway, the point is that it includes a lot of vegetables and is very healthy. I do recommend however using quite a lot of oil, preferably olive oil, to keep the calorie count up.

The best way to experience the Farrito is by cooking it once for your main meal, and then taking the left overs to work for the next two days running. You can wrap it up in foil, Burrito style, and it will be a LOT better than any kind of sandwich you'd care to imagine. You'll find yourself looking forward to your lunch, with the Farrito. Dependent on the variant, you could even heat it up in a microwave and enjoy it hot.

The Farrito has a core set of ingredients. The measures below create three very generous servings:-

1) Salsa

Tin budget tomatoes, chopped (33p)
Half an onion (5p)
tablepoon olive oil (10p)
splash balsamic vineger
Chilli powder, salt, pepper

2) Vegetable mix

2-3 peppers, chopped (80p)
1.5 onions (15p)
half packet of old el paso's fajita mix (40p - would like to develop my own imitation, but haven't got around to it yet)
several tablespoons olive oil (40 p)
Chilli powder, salt, pepper, paprika,
lemon juice

3) bread

tortilla wraps (or imitation) 8 for 99p in reseable bag from sainsburys - using 3 this would cost 30p. (Note: dont buy from the mexican section of the supermarket, head for the 'bread' section instead.)

Total cost of ingredients = £2.53 - plus another 47p for all the spices (which you probably have anyway) = £3- or £1 PER SERVING!

To start with, you make the salsa.

• peel the onion, and cut it up in to very tiny diced pieces.
• heat the olive oil in a frying pan or small saucepan, and then add the diced onion. (on full heat)
• After the onion has started to soften slightly, add the chopped tomatoes straight from the tin/carton.
• stir the mix together, and then add a dash of salt, pepper, and as much chilli powder as you like.
• Then, add a dash of balsamic vineger, about a tablespoon. (NOTE: It has to be balsamic vineger, not regular chip shop vinegar)
• Turn heat down to medium/low, and stir.

The mix will boil and the flavours will combine, and it will start to solidify as the tomato juice boils out. When about 50% of the liquid has boiled out, take off the heat and put to one side.

Next - the vegetable mix.

• Chop up the onion in to quite large pieces.
• Chop up the peppers in to quite large pieces as well
• Put quite a lot of olive oil in to a large frying pan, and start to heat up.
• Add the onion to the mix, fry in the oil until they have started to soften.
• Add the fajita powder, and any additional chilli powder, paprika and salt and pepper (for taste), and a dash of lemon juice.
• Add the peppers to the mix
• Fry at a medium - high heat, until the onions are brown and the peppers have started to soften (but are not completely limp - you want to keep some of the crunch).
• You can add more oil if necessary to help the vegetables to cook-

Then, put the tortilla on the plate. You mix the salsa with the vegetables, and wrap it together like a burrito... and there you have it. the Farrito!

If you have some salad lying around,particularly lettuce or red onion, all for the better! You can add it to the wrap, or serve as a side salad. You could also cook add rice (ideally cooked with red kidney beans), grated cheese, natural yoghurt or cream cheese to make it even more delicious, if you have any of those ingredients lying around. In fact its a very diverse food and lots of things go with it. Being a vegetarian dish it also contains at least two of your five portions of fruit and veg per day.

But it basically costs £1 per serving:money:, and to that extent is great value for money. The best part about it is that most of the ingredients can be bought individually so you don't have to buy everything in massive packets, that then go off. The only exception to this is the tortilla wraps themselves, but the sainsburys resealable packs (costing £1 and containing 8 tortillas) last for about 10 days. I find it best to wrap the remaining Farritos in foil and take them to work, but this would preclude heating them up, so if you want to do that best to put them in a microwaveable plastic tub.

financial_planner

saving holmes - Thanks, and good luck with your own job hunt!

As for the demotivator, this was very interesting. One of my weaknesses is crisps and chocolate - I always buy this overpriced from the vending machine at work. I figured out that I could save a lot of money in theory by buying multipacks from poundland. Tried it once or twice but inevitably I just ended up eating more chocolate than I would have, otherwise... Damn! Best thing of course would be to cut it out completely, but I'm not disciplined enough at the moment for that.

financial_planner

Recipe 2: Tomato and chickpea curry

This is a rather simple and basic but delicious tomato and chickpea curry.
Makes 4 servings - two to freeze, one to eat now and one to eat tomorrow.

3x tins of basic tomatos (£1)
3x onions (30p)
2 x tins of chickpeas (or other type of mixed bean. Might work with red kidney beans - but i've never tried it!) (£1)
1- 2 tablespoons of pataks curry paste
lemon juice
vegetable oil
salt, pepper, cumin, chilli powder
Rice - for two portions ( 25 p)


Chop up all the onion in to smallish chunks.
Heat up the oil in a saucepan, and add the onion.
Cook until onions brown and start to soften.
Add the curry paste to the oil and onion, and stir.
add some salt and pepper.
Add all the tomatoes.
Mix, allow tomatoes to boil, turn heat down to low and simmer, stirring occasionally.
Seperately, drain chickpeas and splatter with lemon juice. Leave for a couple of minutes.
Add chickpeas to the tomatoes. Stir well. Cover saucepan and allow to simmer for about 30-60 minutes at low heat.
In meantime, cook enough rice for two servings.
Curry is cooked when chickpeas have softened slightly.

Serve with rice. Easy and delicious and works out at only 75p per portion!

Saucer_2

Just found your diary and really impressed at just how well you're doing, the spend comparisons of just a few months apart shows the progress you're making. It isn't easy to stop spending money on things that, in hindsight, we wish we hadn't, but knowing you're doing it at least gives you a chance to sort it out, even if it doesn't happen overnight.

I love the Farrita recipe, I'm going to give it a go week after next when my DH is away on business for a few nights, but I'll probably add some beans to it for extra protein, and get the small wraps, or cut the own brand ones a bit smaller. I'm banded (gastric band for those who are unaware of what banded is ), have to eat smaller quantities and as a result often struggle to eat enough protein, its very easy to fill up on just vegetables.

I've also just started on the home cooking route again, when I was first married (24 years ago xD), money was tight and I always home cooked, but as time went on I got into the habit of "pr.!.ck & ping" meals (that's microwave meals :rotfl:). I've managed to cut my shopping bill by £45 this week, and I'm really pleased with myself.

I've just subscribed to your thread and will be watching it with interest.

savingholmes

cooking from fresh does tend to work out cheaper.

Good luck with the confectionary spend.... my big downfall too

miggy

Hi again,
My head's not together (I can thank working the last few nights for that one) so I'm not going to reply in detail, just commiserate at the expensiveness of things, add that as a fajita fan I read your recipes with interest and suggest that for nice socks you try TK Maxx if you have one in reach?
Re; crips and chocolate - perhaps it's the quality of them that metters to you? I mean, do you eat more choc because you've 'only' had cheap crisps? If that's the case, would a visual reminder of some sort be useful, such as a chart where you cross off 'no vending machine purchase' days till you reach a certain number then you can reward yourself with a vending machine day...?

financial_planner

I was cycling home this evening and wondering what to cook. I had planned to cook some vegetable chilli, but I just didn't feel like it, and it would take ages.

While I was shopping last saturday I decided to buy some 'basics' (I shop at sainsburys) spaghetti and pasta sauce - for a kind of emergency stash. I was thinking about cooking this, but then realised it would probably taste synthetic and disgusting. And so, with the ingredients I had, I figured I would try and create my own basic pasta sauce.

I was totally surprised by the result -it was one of the best quick meals i'd ever cooked. It was absolutely delicious. I'm looking forward to eating the leftovers at work tomorrow. So, this is the recipe.

1 - half a pack of basics spaghetti (9p)
2- one carton of basics chopped tomatoes (31p)
3 - some basil - ideally fresh (fortunately I have a basil plant in my front room) - and chopped
4 - An onion (10p) chopped.
5- A bowl full of frozen mixed veg (again from the basics range) (cost about 10p)
6 - some garlic (in an ideal world, I didn't have any this evening) - chopped.
7 - salt, pepper, chilli powder, dried mixed herbs, olive oil and balsamic vinegar, and some dried parmesan style cheese (total cost, about 40p)


Method

1 start cooking spaghetti in pan of boiling water, with salt and olive oil.
2 While spaghetti is simmering, chop up onion and fry in a pan with some olive oil. add garlic.
3 add tomatoes in juice to onion and garlic. add some salt, pepper and chilli powder. stir.
4 chop up fresh basil. Add to tomato mix. add a splash of balsamic vinegar. stir. simmer.
5 put bowl of frozen veg in to microwave for three minutes, and cook
6 Drain spaghetti. put half of spaghetti, sauce and veg (once cooked) in to bowl and serve with parmesan cheese on top.

And, there you have it! Two meals for £1 - one for now and one to take to work tomorrow. Only takes about 15 mins to prepare.

Awesome;)

financial_planner

Thanks all!
Saucer, best of luck with the Farritos! One downside I found is that the wraps can get a bit soggy when you take them to work the next day, I think its quite important to boil through the tomatoes completely when cooking the salsa. Thanks for your reply and for subscribing.

Saving holmes, miggy,
I don't really know what the solution is to the confectionary purchasing. I think I just have an addiction to it. I'm not going to really try and break it because at the end of the day I get in to the usual cycle of 'quitting' and then I inevitably eventually start again and then feel guilty about failing in my attempt to quit and then I cant bring myself to quit again. At the end of the day, I've prioritised sorting out my financial affairs over everything else. Everything else has been put to one side, for the time being. Buying 60p bars of chocolate is damaging my health but not my financial health, when you consider that previously I was spending up to £20 a day on food and transport. I could save money by buying multipacks but I would just end up eating more. Maybe I should have an accumulator on my desk at work but the fact is that I have saved far more money cutting back on buying coffees (for £2-£3 each) - I've cut back back on coffees because - for the most part - I simply cant afford them any more!

And as for socks, I have a thing about needing high quality socks. I think that's the very last thing I would ever cut back on. Don't ask me why.

dearlouise

Your diary is so interesting! You've achieved so much in such a short space of time. I've subscribed, and you have inspired me to create my own... however it will surely not live up to yours.