Don't Throw Food Away Challenge 2012

ScarletRaven

Made an onmlette last night to use up some leftovers and use up the last two eggs before they went off, so I'm rather annoyed at myself for forgetting to take it to work today for my lunch as intended By the time I was home tonight it didn't look to edible anymore, so that's been binned = 68p.

Also, just had to throw out an unopened pack of chicken slices that I bought for the other half to use in sandwiches, can't believe he's not even used a single slice! :mad: = £1.03 (that's really damaged my target! ).

MUST TRY HARDER.

Had fish, potatoes and green beans for dinner and there were a few potatoes leftover, so they'll be thrown in a tub with some cheese and salad cream for lunch tomorrow, that I will remember to take to work with me! lol.

Mrs_Veg_Plot

emmaa2231 wrote: »

Noticed you mentioned an ice cream tub for stock making - would you mind explaining what/how to save things that i caould use for stock making? i generally just use the carcass or bones with a carrot/onion/celery/bay(from tree in garden) and peppercorn which i just simmer for a while.
you mentioned peelings and i've seen others refer to this but not sure what/how to do. Thanks in advance:)

emmaa2231 I put any veg trimmings ie, peel, stalks that are not manky into my carton in the freezer. When I think that there is enough for a stock or a soup I put it straight into a pan with boiling water to make stock/soup.

I have a very large sack of spuds and a large net of onions stored in the garage (under a blanket to protect from frost). These will last me all winter and have no BBD on them. The spuds are still ok to use even if they go a bit wrinkly or start to sprout.

I have decided to make my total for Jan £5. I was only on 40p until today when I had to throw away 15p hoummous and 40p olives so that makes me 95p/£5 .

Had left over sausage casserole today for tea. There was still a very small portion left so I have made up some couscous and have mixed the two together for lunch tomorrow..

Just need to finish next weeks meal plan and write my shopping list for Saturday, really need to keep the grocery spend down to a minimum this month.

Mrs VP

Bella79

Well i had two chicken legs from the roast the other day, we had them tonight with a can of campbells condensed soup a few wilting mushrooms ans rice yummy! and i even got enough for tommrows lunch, well its quite a small portion but will be ok with a bannan and apple ! all good here

Willow92

Used up one of the manky bits of broccoli in a tomatoey chicken bake thingy

Byatt

Just made a bread pudding with left over stuff; if you don't hear from me again, you'll know why! :rotfl:

I've started using my eyes and nose for the food test; the bread's been in the fridge a while but looked okish. The dried fruit was old but ok, the eggs were just 2 days (or was it 3?) after best before date; milk has been okish but wouldn't last till tomorrow. So...it smells nice cooking.

gastronomix

squeaky wrote: »

I made some experimental no yeast bread yesterday - only to find that I couldn't get it into the oven... guess which muppet had completely forgotten about half a tray of roast potatoes! Call it 40p.

It's not really the waste itself that bothers me - it's the fact that roasties are a rare treat and I didn't get to eat them

Huh?? You didn't think to eat them cold, or whack em thru the microwave??
If they had a furry overcoat I'll forgive you :-)

squeaky

Nope.

The three different colours of mould on them put me off!



So, am I forgiven?

jack0212

Thanks everyone for your help to inspire me again! I used to be pretty good at using up food but my other half is so picky that he wouldn't eat leftovers so most things got binned! Now due to my redundancy a couple of months ago we need to tighten up. I feel quite proud for using up leftovers for lunch yesterday and today. I have just put bread in bags in the freezer to use for toast. This would have once been thrown away. Small steps at a time... I am sure I will get as good as you kind people in the end

Cazzdevil

Dammit. Had to chuck 2 bags of chestnuts last night which I'm gutted about but they'd been sat there since Christmas eve and since OH put them on top of the spice cupboards I forgot about them (out of sight out of mind). They were reduced to 50p a bag so that's £1.

Also a small handful of blueberries which had gone a bit mouldy, I picked out the rest of the good ones for the top of the pavlova, so that's maybe 20p's worth.

!!!!!!, I'm at £1.20 already. Grrrr...

Firemunchkin

cheeswright wrote: »

frozen packet of cooked mussels in garlic sauce (left by an old lodger)boil in bag - serive wiith crusty bread and v cold white wine ? - I'm a bit loathe to eat it like this as processed sauces and my tummy don't get on, am wondering if I defrost this, drain the sauce and rinse the mussels if possibly I could put the mussels into a seafood pie?
- bag of frozen soya beans (the OH doesn't like them) liquidise and throw in shepherds pie with mince - will not notice them - good tip, thanks! will try that. Will add lots of protein too!
-2 processed beef burgers (left over from a BBQ, we're unlikely to want to eat these as we don't eat processed food) - I decided that I'll defrost these and mash them up with some herbs and other mince that I've got in the freezer, then reshape into new burgers, they'll taste much nicer and hopefully the processedness of the original bits won't bother my tummy too much.
- frozen apricots and nectarines (about 2 years old, chopped into pieces, had thought I'd make a crumble or something with them but does anybody have any other ideas or know whether they'll be ok when I defrost them, i.e. will they just go brown and mushy and icky?) bung in bottle of vodka - first removing large swig to make room - add sugar leave for 3 months - then make really good billinins - will be soft but not mushy - so making an apricot and nectarine liqueur? We made cherry liqueur once, it was lovely, but never thought about apricot and nectarine - do you think that will work?
- leftover cheese from Christmas - a bit of brie and 1/2 small round of goats cheese. Not enough to make a sandwich with, and I'm fed up of cheese & crackers. Any other ideas? chop roughly throw into a small quiche - with some lefttover crispy bacon bits - throw in the rind too by the way - I don't have any leftover bacon, but I do have an opened jar of beetroot which will need using up soon, so will make a beetroot and cheese tart and possibly throw in some of that cooked kale...
- handful of curly kale - not enough to make into a meal for two, and it shrinks to virtually nothing so seems a bit pointless for a stir-fry.
- pureed tinned peaches - tried making billinis for a Christmas party, it didn't work. Still got 1/2 pot of the pureed stuff, it smells ok, isn't mouldy, but haven't a clue what to do with it! chuck in jelly mix and set - or stir into custard or plain fromage frais - easy fool - I've put it in the freezer as I didn't want it to go off, wondered if maybe it would work with one of the pots of natural yoghurt I've got in the fridge (past their date but looking ok at the mo), an old banana and possibly some of those defrosted apricots/nectarines to make a smoothie? I've never made smoothies before so not sure whether this will work and am very keen to not throw it out if it's horrid.

I am thinking organisation is key to not throwing out food - so I put the loaf of bread in the fridge (the date on it is 2 days ago, so I know it's going to start growing something soon) - by fridging it I know it will be good for our weekend use where I'm sure it will get used up, anything that isn't is going in the freezer.

I will also be having a small portion of leftover spicy rice dish with a single chicken & chorizo patty which is past the date but smells fine (right??) and the small bit of tinned sweetcorn leftover on the side as a lite snack tomorrow afternoon.

The new vegbox arrived for the week and now I've got half a fridge full of vegetables. Lovely, but so many I am going to cancel my veg box for next week as I'm sure I can make it stretch to two weeks.

My aim, in addition to not throwing food out, is to use up what I've got in the house already without buying anything else for the next two weeks. That will be £60 saved (we have £30 a week budget for supermarket shopping) which I'll put towards a meal out.

Yay!