Cooking for one (Mark Two)

SunnyGirl

My sausage pasta dinner was as lovely as it was last week and I ate the lot. It helped that the sausages were really nice ones with a high meat content. I think they were Sainsbury's specially selected or whatever their range is called

Holly It makes a lovely change to be cooked for I'm glad you enjoyed your lunch and am sure you'll enjoy your pud at tea time

I'm not CFO at all tomorrow either as my daughter is taking me and my Mum (her Nan) for lunch as a belated birthday treat as she was working late shifts last week and couldn't come to Mum's for the celebration. It's a local pub that has been done up in the last year and none of the 3 of us have been although my 2 sons have and they reported good things about the food :T I am having tea at my Mum and Dad's too as Mum said she'd like me to go more often. I have been so determined to live alone and cook for myself that I haven't been for a meal in a while up until my birthday last week. Plus with me working weekends I don't go for Sunday lunch anymore I could go for tea but the dog has been on his own all day and needs letting out for a call of nature!

caronc

PasturesNew wrote: »

I then popped into £land for a couple of things ...of which they had none, so I looked for my favourite chocs and there they were. I grabbed a bag.... and I also got a pack of chicken in case I do a dinner - although that crumble would mean I can't have both.

My fave chocs used to have a big sticker on the front announcing "25% extra free; 250g instead of 200g" - but the last 2-3 weeks there is no sticker, but I hadn't thought to check the bag weight.... I just weighed the bag and there's only 150grams in the bag now! So I was paying a good £/100g price for the chocs before (40p), but now the pack's so much smaller it's much pricier (66.6p). I'll ease off on those now they're not such good value.

I've scoffed some chocs for dinner

PN - saw this and thought of you https://www.theguardian.com/lifeandstyle/shortcuts/2017/jul/30/mock-chocs-is-poundlands-cut-price-confectionery-the-answer-to-shrinkflation

Hollyharvey wrote: »

I've had a lovely day today without any CFO. I'm over at my brother's house at the moment. My SIL cooked us roast chicken, roast potatoes, stuffing, yorkshire puddings, carrots/peas, cauliflower, broccoli and runner beans for lunch. We were all too full for the cheesecake for afters so are going to have that shortly with a sandwich for tea.


I'm so glad now that I thought to give breakfast a miss this morning to make way for the large lunch.


It makes a lovely change not to have to cook for myself

Oh Holly that sounds lovely and so nice not to CFO:D

SunnyGirl wrote: »

My sausage pasta dinner was as lovely as it was last week and I ate the lot. It helped that the sausages were really nice ones with a high meat content. I think they were Sainsbury's specially selected or whatever their range is called

Holly It makes a lovely change to be cooked for I'm glad you enjoyed your lunch and am sure you'll enjoy your pud at tea time

I'm not CFO at all tomorrow either as my daughter is taking me and my Mum (her Nan) for lunch as a belated birthday treat as she was working late shifts last week and couldn't come to Mum's for the celebration. It's a local pub that has been done up in the last year and none of the 3 of us have been although my 2 sons have and they reported good things about the food :T I am having tea at my Mum and Dad's too as Mum said she'd like me to go more often. I have been so determined to live alone and cook for myself that I haven't been for a meal in a while up until my birthday last week. Plus with me working weekends I don't go for Sunday lunch anymore I could go for tea but the dog has been on his own all day and needs letting out for a call of nature!

SunnyG - do you think your Mum would adopt me?

Good evening everyone,
Not much by way of CFO today, tattie scones and duck egg for brunch (so much for using the cooked beetroot and cucumber up:o) and I'm still pondering re dinner probably a steak bake, nuked veg and LO sweet potato wedges. Short ribs have been slow cooked and I'll finish this off tomorrow so at least I know that one meal is planned for this week. Despite good intentions I can't seem to get back into proper meal planning something when I was working I was really good at. I'd like to blame the new meds as they are making me really lethargic [STRIKE]lazy[/STRIKE] but it is something I've struggled with for a while now. I think I do better at meal planning in the winter! My sister popped by for a cuppa earlier so I offloaded a spare cucumber to her. Thankfully I think it will be a good few days before the next one is ready as that was three at once.:eek: If they keep going at this rate I'll pickle some but do prefer them raw.

poppystar

Total fail on the dinner front:(

Veg curry, which is usually delicious but I left the veg currying and had a relax which because I've had a week of sodders (love that new word!:)) led to me falling asleep and consequent over cooking of curry - very soft veg and burnt bits on pan:( Then i cooked the rice and failed at that too - it was a new pack from a different brand and although I followed the instructions re ratio of water to rice it cooked in about half the time stated and with loads of water left - soggy mess:(

I did get a £4 bowl of fruit for 40p earlier from M&S so, assuming I haven't completely cooked all nutrients out of the veg I have at least achieved 5 a day today (hooray!).




May follow my own advice and 'bubble and squeak' the remaining curry and rice on Tuesday rather than just microwave. Monday night is an out night - no cooking:D


SunnyG Your mum and dad sound lovely as does your mother's cooking - any chance of them adopting me?;)
edit - just seen caronc eat me to that one while I was typing - room for two?

SunnyGirl

caronc wrote: »

SunnyG - do you think your Mum would adopt me?

.... Despite good intentions I can't seem to get back into proper meal planning something when I was working I was really good at.

She'd gladly adopt you - she loves cooking and making food for other people although she says if she'd been widowed instead of me she'd live from M&S ready meals :rotfl:

On the meal planning front it took me a while to get back into once I'd been made redundant but I much prefer to plan as it makes everything easier and takes the indecision of what to eat every day away. I look at the plan in the kitchen and either get it out to defrost or make what it says. A form of laziness really as I'd live on toast or crumpets otherwise!

poppystar wrote: »

Total fail on the dinner front:(

Veg curry, which is usually delicious but I left the veg currying and had a relax which because I've had a week of sodders (love that new word!:)) led to me falling asleep and consequent over cooking of curry - very soft veg and burnt bits on pan:( Then i cooked the rice and failed at that too - it was a new pack from a different brand and although I followed the instructions re ratio of water to rice it cooked in about half the time stated and with loads of water left - soggy mess:(

I did get a £4 bowl of fruit for 40p earlier from M&S so, assuming I haven't completely cooked all nutrients out of the veg I have at least achieved 5 a day today (hooray!).

SunnyG Your mum and dad sound lovely as does your mother's cooking - any chance of them adopting me?;)
edit - just seen caronc eat me to that one while I was typing - room for two?

I hate it when a meal is a total disaster and have done similar many times so feel for you. Munch on your fruit instead - superb price btw :money:

Mum would take another waif and stray happily I joked with my youngest son the other day when I said that his Nan had missed him and was getting the fatted calf ready for his return in September :rotfl: They are both lovely are my parents and I'm lucky to have them. Aged 83 and 76 respectively they are generally well and healthy and have a lot of contact with me and their grandchildren. They have helped me co-parent my kids since DH died (the kids were aged 20, 18 and 14 at the time) and I really couldn't have done it without them. They are my number one cheer leaders and advisers of all kinds for us all.

moneyistooshorttomention

Farway - re that thorn in finger. Do you have something along the antiseptic type lines to put on it?

Me - I tend to head for tea tree oil (as I have a collection of aromatherapy oils in). But I guess something like TCP, Dettol - even at a pinch some salt in water perhaps? put onto the wound.

Making sure you kill off any germs. There are odd incidents of tiny things like that turning septic on the one hand - and we are starting to go into "antibiotics stopping working" territory on the other hand these days.

Would prefer not to be sitting here in a couple of weeks time thinking "Now where did Farway go? He's not posted recently".

Doom_and_Gloom

Breakfast - overnight oats.
Lunch - fruit and a HM fruit and nut bar.
Dinner - some of the rice, veg and lentil mix from yesterday with half a pot of store bought soup (Vietnamese super green), kimchi and some nori.
Snacks - fruit.
Drinks - water, coffee and mint tea. May have a vodka and diet lemonade later.

Doom_and_Gloom

poppystar wrote: »

Hi all you freezer savvy CFO people.

In an attempt to up the daly veg count I am wondering about trying other frozen veg. Any suggestions as to what is good, still tastes and looks edible etc. when bought frozen?

I only remember frozen veg from childhood and that isn't a good memory!

I eat a lot of frozen vegetables. Peas, sweet corn, mixed vegetables, peppers, spinach, edemame beans etc. I've even bought vegetable stir fry mix and OH used that to make me sweet and sour vegetable and tofu. It was perfectly fine.
Sure I prefer fresh vegetables but there is nothing wrong with frozen.

caronc

SunnyGirl wrote: »

She'd gladly adopt you - she loves cooking and making food for other people although she says if she'd been widowed instead of me she'd live from M&S ready meals :rotfl:

Just tell me where and when and I'll be there :rotfl:
I'm sure you're parents' are delighted were able to support you, probably one of the reasons they are so fit and healthy now

Charis

kittie wrote: »

Money I noticed a post of yours about soya beans. Amazon is best value, they sell the organic (none gm) beans from wholefoodsdirect. I bought an amazon kilo the other week and am making soya milk this morning, soaked all night. It costs me < 18p in beans, 30g of beans. For any whole beans in food, I use tins or jars, not worth the energy cost in cooking them from dried
http://www.realfoods.co.uk/shop?search=beans[/URL

Sadly Amazon has bought Wholefoods ... For $13.7 billion.

[Deleted User]

Charis wrote: »

Sadly Amazon has bought Wholefoods ... For $13.7 billion.

there are many whole foods companies. Amazon has not bought the ones I use. They bought ONE whole food company, a world wide one . The ones I use are small businesses and I have used them for many years. Some retailers have chosen to sell various products via the amazon market place, all well and good as far as I am concerned as I get a cheaper price if I factor in PnP, being a prime user. I buy direct if I need enough to get the free PnP. The organic GM free soya beans are sold via amazon by wholefoodsonline

https://www.buywholefoodsonline.co.uk/

http://www.realfoods.co.uk/

https://www.goodnessdirect.co.uk/cgi-local/frameset/script/home.html

Suma were one of the wholefood instigators, we joined a suma wholefood co-operative in 1976 and went on from there. In those days it was simply a group of people buying sacks of food jointly and taking turns to pack for everyone.

I really want a good roast dinner, realising that I never cook the whole works for myself. I think I will have one this week but will go out to get it in a small place where they do home grown and home made cider. It costs about £5 for a good sized childs portion. Think I will have lamb or maybe beef with the yorkshire pud