Cooking for one (Mark Two)

PasturesNew

I took a run out to Mr Sainsbobs.... so, as I was there, grabbed a basket and shuffled round.

They had some seedless red grapes YS, not by much, down to £1.17 from £1.75 - but as I like those and the cheapest usual price is £1.65 at 4ldi/L1dl I bought a pack anyway. Due to the usual high prices I've not bought any for about 6 months.

Next I passed tomatoes.... nearly got suckered in there; put a pack of cherry tomatoes in my basket (£2.46/Kg, compared to other tomatoes that are £6-8/Kg) and then saw the boring salad tomatoes were £1.75/Kg, so I put the cherry ones back and grabbed a pack of 6 boring (but cheaper) salad tomatoes.

Pizza aisle....disappointing. Bought nothing.
YS section ... usual overpriced 6 items, all horrendously expensive and not what I eat anyway.

Bit more of a shuffle round (no reduced doughnuts) ... and I was in the freezers. Checked out their choc ices (thought I'd get them there even though price is higher than 4ldi by 11p, as I was in the shop already) - but they had gone up to £1.10 so I snorted and jogged on....

Then some strange urges grabbed me - and I was looking at frozen pizzas; picked one (chosen based on £/100g) ... some £1.25 pizza usually £2. That'll do. Then I thought about my cooked chicken and had a hankering for giant yorkshires. Although they only do Aunt B's and they're not on special price, so they're much pricier than any other supermarket ... I bought a two-pack anyway "Hang the expense; I'm worth it" I thought. Of course, I can't cook/eat them until I've worked out what veggies to go with the chicken - and bought those veggies. Might shuffle down to 4ldi in a bit, grab a swede if they're still 45p and get some choc ices and carrots.

Back home I've scoffed some red grapes and made a sandwich as I had bread to eat and I'd just bought tomatoes. So it was cheese, tomato and salad cream sandwich.

Hollyharvey

PasturesNew wrote: »

I took a run out to Mr Sainsbobs.... so, as I was there, grabbed a basket and shuffled round.

I've just called into my local one as I was near there anyhow, I thought that as they close early today there may be some decent y/s bargains going, but I found the same as you. Not much there, and hardly anything off. I find them the worse around here for y/s reductions, they don't seem to take much off at all .

PasturesNew

Did an 4ldi run ..... it's a good job I live alone as somebody else would've said something about my haul

First, £land for my favourite choccies.... nom nom.

Then 4ldi. Got a swede (49p there too today); got 500g carrots (28p today, so up by 1p). No bready bargains at all. Hardly anything in the chiller reduced (about 4 items that are pricey anyway and I don't eat).

So, off to the freezer. Frozen peas (because they are a cheery item on a plate and go with everything) .... and the choc ices .... and Oh ... what're these? mmmmm cheesecakes.... 99p .... hmmm ... could I? should I? I DID! One frozen lemon cheesecake bought.



Freezer's a bit tight now. The "keep empty" drawer has the two Giant Yorkies and frozen chips ... so that's my cue to buy no more frozen food until I've eaten what I've got.

Farway

SunnyGirl wrote: »

I am having a yearning for sausage rolls now - warm and yummy. Luckily I have no money to buy any so can't fulfil this unhealthy yearning anytime soon

Guess what I had mid afternoon? Just trying out the mini oven in warming mode, honest

Grass mown, loads more apples picked up, blackberry & apple jam session is GO sometime this week. Was going to be tomorrow but weather forecast is good, so off to RHS Wisley before the weather returns to Autumn again

After grass & apples I tackled the disgusting outside drain, blocked with old leaves and general smelly yuck :eek: Now clean but not spotless, sort of not smelly & water drains away, it will have to do due to lack of bendiness these days

Dinner was as scheduled, used up lots of odds & ends, last 2 crusts, last of the beans, last of the eggs and now have enough dirty crockery to fill the dishwasher so another good result.

Just room later for either some Choc cake or stewed apples & yoghurt. Or both

caronc

Good evening everyone
Glad you got an oven Farway:D
After having a lovely snooze I thought I better do something domestic so I was good and swept & washed my floors:), I then had the good excuse to sit in the garden with a cuppa & my book while they dried;). Had a pottle around the veg patch and managed to pick about 1lb of brambles, same of peas, some chard, a few runners and broad beans and a few Sungold & baby plum tomatoes so a good haul. Although rain is forecast to come at some point overnight everything was dry so had to water the garden and the midgies were out in full bitey force so I didn't linger:(.
I've defrosted a bit of steak so that & some tatties and veg will be dinner and I'm going to make some peppercorn sauce and will freeze the excess. :)I need to have a think about meals this week to use up some lurking bits though I'm not sure if I'll have my main oven after Tuesday for a few days. I do have an non-fan oven but it's big and horribly inefficient so I hate using it. The seal is coming off the door of my main oven (it is 15+ years old and never been replaced) so I'm hoping the repair guy will have a spare but you never know. It's a Belling cooker so i'm hoping it's a fairly standard part, we'll see.

PasturesNew

Farway wrote: »

Guess what I had mid afternoon? Just trying out the mini oven in warming mode, honest

The way I tend to do those is:

No pre-heat.
Top shelf, on the little tray (lined with foil to save washing up).
S/rolls in upside down.
Set to top element only.
~180C
Set for 10 minutes.
Flip.
Turn down to 10C lower temperature.
Set for 5 minutes.

Any higher/longer and ready-cooked s/rolls can tend to start turning a bit darker than one'd like.

PasturesNew

As most people know, 99% of my food is nuked from scratch. This isn't usually a problem as I'm cooking small quantities ...

Having bought a swede and carrots today though, I wanted to just cook them both up (separately) and mash them (together and separately)...

Unless I buy a new nuke-gadget that stacks, I can only cook one at a time, so it took about 25 minutes to cook those (1.5Kg of veg) as larger quantities take longer -and- I was having to cook them one at a time.

I then mashed them both and produced two separate piles: just swede & swede/carrot. Those are now in the fridge.

That's one step closer to a Giant Yorkie dinner I figure.... so tomorrow will probably be: GY + chicken + stuffing + mashed spuds + swede/carrot + some cheeky peas + gravy.

Today, having bought food and made food .... I am in no fit state to even consider eating anything that's "a proper meal", so I'll probably nibble on grapes ... and might make another tomato sandwich or toast, depending how I feel.

Somehow, food prep etc really makes me not wish to eat anything/much - and, usually, especially what I've just made.

It's like those people in the sweet factories that stop fancying sweeties.

When I bought the frozen pizza earlier this afternoon my head was telling me "that's tea sorted!" but I really don't fancy it at all any more...

candygirl

SunnyGirl wrote: »

I am having a yearning for sausage rolls now - warm and yummy. Luckily I have no money to buy any so can't fulfil this unhealthy yearning anytime soon

I got 2 veggie sausage rolls for £1 today, at the £1 bakery.They are really good, n full of flavour, n don't have that awful fake meat taste 😀

SquirrelSmall

Back from Somerset; when you start the weekend with a pint of cider in a pub in Glastonbury, you know that all is going to be well with the world.

We didn't exactly pose any threat to the Michelin-starred lot with our culinary efforts this weekend. Takeout Indian on Friday, then I did seared duck breast with saut!ed potatoes and assorted green veg last night (sounds whizzier than it is - actually super simple).

Back to the big smoke today and pizza and salad for my supper. The freezer is WAAAAAAAY too full, but not a lot I can do about that.

Both cats are alive and happy, and my cat sitting friend is up a bottle of nice red.

moneyistooshorttomention

Nice to have a good weekend away - and good that your "furry owners" are happy.

I like hearing about cat tales myself - as I tend to feel its too much responsibility to get one of my own - but I do do friendships with cats. I've got a new cat friend living nearby now - so maybe I can "adopt a cat" temporarily sometimes:rotfl:. Cat owner was busily telling me their cat is a bit nervous (ie of other people) and cat concerned promptly headed straight for me and started winding themselves around me begging for attention - to the obvious astonishment of their owner:rotfl:. Think that could be me up for cat-feeding duties if owner goes away...

EDIT; Agh! Don't know how many of my own apples I'm going to get to eat over next few months. The birds have virtually taken the entire crop of one of my trees - darn it. Now I've discovered another one has got problems with its apples - just looked it up and it's called "brown rot". Off to find out what natural method I can use to deal with it. It's moving fast - as I only checked out the tree yesterday and have had to remove 3 more apples from it today.