I feel so much better now!

Hotpoint_2

OMG, I've had a great day today!

My sister lent me £10 so I've got a bit of money to tide me over for a bit. And then I defrosted my freezer, and found a chicken! :j It's a chest freezer, and I hadn't defrosted it for months. Actually, make that years. I think I'll wear gloves next time.

So I've got chicken for dinner

And then I visited the CCCS website, and worked through their thing using rough numbers. It came to much less than I thought, so I bravely gathered up any papers and worked it out using real figures. And I've worked out that as of last month (I don't seem to have anything more recent than early September in any case, and August for some) I owe

£4489.93

So it's kinda not as bad as I thought. And then I got a downloady pack about Debt Management Plans from the CCCS, so I'm going to read that soon. It probably won't be today as I think I've done enough so far. But somehow this isn't quite as bad and scary as I thought.

immoral_angeluk

Well done for taking the first steps... and nice one re: the chicken! We have a frost free chest freezer so not likely to find any secret chickens anywhere.. :rolleyes:
Enjoy your dinner!

LookingAhead

I am really pleased for you!

Just one thing concerns me......and that's the possible age of the chicken!! Hope it's gonna be ok to eat....

Hotpoint_2

Well, the chicken looked ok, smelt ok, and tasted ok. Actually, it tasted really nice. I'm quite proud of myself, as it's only the 3rd whole chicken I've ever cooked!

misspixierocktastic

That your one step of me i dont know how to cook a chicken i feel so ashamed, blimey that would be great to come across such gems in the freezer
Will keep an eye on the thread my work colleague told me about cccs they really helped her out so i hope that works out for you and i might have a word with them too :T

taxi73

Well done and what a lot you have achieved on your first day

Gillianh2

Well Done Hotpoint, What a difference a day makes.
Keep posting and let us know how you get on.

BlondeHeadOn

A chicken is a real result! :j

I defrosted out chest freezer recently and discovered some unidentifable object in the ice cap covering the bottom, so I waited with great excitement to discover what item of forgotten delicious food it might be....Several hours and a polar melt later I found out - it was.......

.....

.... A pile of wooden clothes pegs and a frozen chip !! :rotfl: :rotfl:

What a let down !

To explain: we use clothes pegs to fasten open packets of chips, frozen peas etc. in the freezer. Several of them must have worked loose and ended up in a pile at the bottom of the freezer... where they grew their own little igloo and lived quite happily until the big thaw happened.

:snow_laug

kizzykizzywizzy

BlondeHeadOn wrote: »

A chicken is a real result! :j

I defrosted out chest freezer recently and discovered some unidentifable object in the ice cap covering the bottom, so I waited with great excitement to discover what item of forgotten delicious food it might be....Several hours and a polar melt later I found out - it was.......

.....

.... A pile of wooden clothes pegs and a frozen chip !! :rotfl: :rotfl:

What a let down !

To explain: we use clothes pegs to fasten open packets of chips, frozen peas etc. in the freezer. Several of them must have worked loose and ended up in a pile at the bottom of the freezer... where they grew their own little igloo and lived quite happily until the big thaw happened.

:snow_laug[Jump over to the old style board I'm sure they'll have a recipe for that:rotfl: ]

kizzykizzywizzy

Well done on all counts hotpoint, you sound so much more positive, hope you didn't waste any chicken & are using any that's left for sarnies or a curry or something:p
Good Luck:A

RAS

Hotpoint wrote: »

Well, the chicken looked ok, smelt ok, and tasted ok. Actually, it tasted really nice. I'm quite proud of myself, as it's only the 3rd whole chicken I've ever cooked!

Glad to see thing coming up a bit.

This may seem sad but my mum used to stretch a chicken to at least three meals, often four for the 4 of us. Some of thes ideas would be useless as you are on your own, so putting the oven on for one baked tattie is not worth it.

Day 1 - roast - either breast and drumstick or breast and wing.
Day 2 - cold with baked tats and salad - the rest of the breast meat.
Day 3 - one of the following from the meat pulled off the carcass=e

Chicken curry and rice
Chicken in white sauce with rice
Stirfry with rice or noodles

Then the carcase went in the pan and was boiled up until it fell apart nicely. My job was to dismantle the carcase and pull out the remaining small amounts of meat and strain the stock.

Day 4
Add pearl barley, rice or tats to the stock with some onion and any other vegs knocking around for a hearty chicken soup. Alternatively some beans, a tomato and a bit of chilli for something vaguely latin american. Only needs a light second course as a main meal.

I recommend Jocasta Innes "planned cooking" from the Pauper's cookbook if you can get your mitts on it.

One oven = A couple of pie cases for next firing, one quiche/ Alsatian Onion tart, one lemon merangue (SP) pie, baked tats, a casserole, shepherds pie or hotpot, some roast vegs. possibly a chilli or other mince dish for the freezer box, that can be used for pasta sauce, baked tat filling or as the base of a potato topped pie later. also some scones usually.

That lot would see me through half a week. Diced cold baked tats make a rustic "spanish omelette", even if the only other veg were onions with a few herbs, once the quiche/tart had gone or as a break. The main course did two or three days, then I would stir fry. Some of the vegs could be re-heated, others mashed and then turned into soup.

If you are broke, it is not only about what you cook but about maximising the value of your fuel use.