make do and mend for tougher times

Shropshirelass

Hello everyone

Have missed you all for the last 24 hours - now I dont have time to catch up with all messages, but Happy Happy to all birthdays.

Fuddle I think I'll also try some bird cake today, I bought some seed last year, but the spoilt birds round here would not eat it, they prefer the peanuts, which are a terrible price, so will try cake and see if they are fooled. I will have to anchor it down though, as Squirrels are hyper-active at the moment.

We had a lovely wedding, 2nd for both of us, and I was terribly nervous. We lived on the Isle of Man then, and our local Reg. Office was in the castle at Castletown, a wonderful setting without us searching for one. We informed all the family, who all lived 'across', but we only had room to put up our children, so they were the only ones who came. What a relief! So we had a quiet, sunny day, perfect memories now I realise the nerves were un-neccesary, as hubby has been a star for 15 years now. :A

September 1st - I love autumn, looking forward to coloured leaves, frosty mornings, warm suppers,then Christmas and all lights and twinkly decs and mince pies etc etc. :j Minimalist presents this year, but that really matters not a hoot.

Bad news on inflation front, will just push us to cope better than ever. I'm really tempted with that WWII Farm book... Anyone who has it, could you give a quick score out of 10 please?

[Deleted User]

Hi MRS VEG PLOT - Congratulations to your DD for super results at A level and her place at Uni - hopefully DD2's will be just as good when they do arrive.

I have boiled all the early spuds and frozen them in 2 portion bags (only 2 of us usually) and also made some bags of mash from the damaged main crop spuds so as not to waste them. I think you can also successfully freeze cooked roasties and part cooked wedges, know for certain you can freeze cooked Jackets which defrost very well. If you have enough Big Jacketers, do a whole oven full and save on fuel. They reheat a dream in the microwave but you have to remember to pierce them with a skewer or they explode. Hope that helps, Cheers Lyn x.

meme30

"What are you all stocking up on at the moment?"
:rotfl::rotfl::rotfl:
Sorry for laughing MrsVegPlot:- that's a red rag to a bull question to this lot!!

I'll chip in on teabags, pasta, and tinned anything. also A*da is selling frozen 800gm Apple Crumbles for £1 at the moment so I have [STRIKE]liberated[/STRIKE]acquired a few of those.:p I'm sure everyone else will have their own list!

mardatha

I've got my garden tatties in an old mini bread crate thing on the floor in a corner of the kitchen, under a table. Each layer covered in newspaper and plenty air circulating - but we will need to eat them before the real cold weather when the wee field mice tend to visit us for a heat
Could I ask if anything's going sky high in the shops lately if anybody notices please post it.
And kittie or anybody else who watches the weather forums - what are they saying about winter? if anything?

grandma247

fuddle wrote: »

I think I'm turning into a telly grotbags. I only watch 2 programmes a week, soon to be 3 though, so that's progress.

I did that a few years ago. Tv has just got worse and worse. I knit while dh has Tv on. I started buying Tv series on dvd because I am so fed up with it all.



I do jacket potatoes then split them and take out the middles and mash it up. Put it back in the shell and either freeze on trays as they are or sprinkle with cheese and freeze. I bag them when frozen.

I also half cook chips and freeze the when they are drained. I open freeze on trays so I won't need a crowbar to use them.

Pooky

I'm playing the "potato" game this afternoon Mrs LW, I brought 4 bags of the Al*i baking spuds (2.5kg for 69p), will bake them all off in the main oven this afternoon then scoop out the middles when they've cooled slightly. I use some of the infers just as mash and freeze it down in portions (I use an ice cream scoop - 2 scoops per person is right for us), the rest gets mashed with cheese and butter and refilled into the skins. I freeze them down in batches and they take 20 mins in the halogen from frozen....they go all gooey and lovely and cheesy. The remained of the empty skins get filled with a mix of cheese, onion, bacon etc, what ever needs using up and then frozen or just left empty to fill another time.

Need to get my apples on for wine and chilli jam, the juice needs collecting and that takes hours of dripping normally.

katieowl_2

mardatha wrote: »

And kittie or anybody else who watches the weather forums - what are they saying about winter? if anything?

I've not been looking at the weather, but I picked up a hitch hiker the other day (don't worry she's an elderly neighbour I've never really spoken to before, who was waiting for the bus into town) who was saying that the locals are saying that this is going to be a hard winter. There's hardly any fruit, sloes, berries etc for the birds, but apparently there are loads of nuts, which she said was a sure sign :eek:

Kate

Possession

When the Aldi super 6 includes potatoes that might be a good thing to do with a job lot of those, although I have 3 full freezers at the moment as still have a lot of catering stuff left which will get eaten but slowly.
Fuddle I barely watch any TV these days. DD wants me to watch X Factor with her and I will watch Strictly when it comes on, I watch Wimbledon and I did watch the Olympics, and I watch Downton abbey and Sherlock. Any recommendations welcome, but otherwise since I don't get a TV mag I don't know what's on anyway.
I now have good stocks of teabags, flour, pasta and rice, plus quite a lot of tins of rice pudding and custard so DS wouldn't pine away.
ETA: Cross-posted with you Pooky, great minds think alike!

westcoastscot

Not anywhere near as detailed as Kittie's fantastic weather analysis but i've read in two different places that winter is to be harsh and early with a lot of snow and ice. It's been cold at night here (temps of -0.4 degrees further north) and hail showers.

WCS

mardatha

I cant stand to look at weather forecasts any more, it always says sunny and warm with temps in the 20s and I get all happy, until my eye hits the last tiny awful sentence
...cool and wet in Scotland :eek::eek::eek: