Cooking for one (Mark Three)

caronc

Good morning everyone, 
Foul weather here today with weather warnings for wind and rain. We had planned to pop to the harbour side to buy fish after lunch but due to the storm they are offering deliveries instead. Not long ago I took delivery of over 1kg of huge prawns, 4 haddock fillets and 2kg of octopus all for £22 . I had hoped for a monk fish but they didn't land any. I'll prep it all later after we've been out for lunch so at the moment it's all stashed in a basin in the fridge.
I had a really nice meal at the tapas place and with the Eat Out discount we paid £17 each including tip for food and wine. I'm heading out for lunch today so doubt I'll want much, if anything, for dinner tonight.

Farway

I heard the weather for your area,Caron, not nice. Here of course it's dry as bone, dull with bit of a breeze.

Our rain, as Brambling pointed out, has detoured northwards.

I was thus watering the volunteer border this morning, and had my first physical shopping trip since March, over to the Co-op for milk, layout changes meant no mooching for YS, so in & out. I did want to look at eggs but forgot and no idea where they would've been anyway

I'll start on another C & C shopping list this week

Lunch, frozen slices, toasted, with HM marmalade

Dinner, probably frozen breaded cod fillet, HM AF chips + frozen peas. My own grown ones have now finished

Brambling

Trip to one of the local garden centres with my sister we had a chicken and bacon toasted sandwich, large slice of passion cake and a cuppa for £5 each, I'm not sure if I agree with the government eat out scheme but we did take advantage of it.  I then spent the time trying to educate my sister on what the difference was between perennial, annuals, shrubs etc as she wants to turn  bit of lawn into a garden and seems to have completely missed the gardening gene 😁 as I tried to explain although pretty a bed full of perennials may not be a good idea for half the year 🙄 I made her take photos of the plants and labels of those she liked and suggested she got my nephew to dig the bed first and then i could help her plan it unfortunately tbh my gardening skills are a bit shaky as well 😁 we need one of my 3 older sisters who did inherit the gene 😁 at least she knew what a evergreen plant was 🙄

it it was a bit piece of cake for lunch so dinner was berries and yogurt 

PasturesNew

Not posted as nothing much's changed.  But ... I am trying to eat my way through the stuff I'd been gifted at Xmas from my sibling (had a food cupboard clear out, holding up items from the cupboard asking "do you want this? what about this? this?") + some random longlife/tinned items I bought pre-lockdown just to make sure I had "food to eat", not good food, or meals, but food.  If the shops are empty, if there WERE strange looting/rioting or problems, then a tin of peas is food ... so I bought an assortment of things that are food that can be eaten cold.  There are also a couple of items I've randomly spotted/bought in recent months, as you do when you spot them.  The sort of thing you buy in the shop, put in your cupboard, that's often still there a year later, but, one day, you suddenly eat it. 
I've mostly got this stuff now in the car boot as it's a hefty bag and, rather than lug it up 2 flights of stairs and find room for it, I thought I'd leave it in there and pick items out every now and then. 

From my variety of bizarre food stashes, in the last 3-4 days I've managed to consume: 
 - the pack of cocktail sausages my sibling bought for me when she was Xmas food shopping, that I took to the last place and stuck in the freezer, that sat in the freezer then came here and into the freezer.  Finally defrosted those (pack of 40) and have had some in a flatbread with ketchup, some with baked beans on toast and as a pizza topping. 
 - two Napolina pizza bases my sibling emptied from her cupboard, topped with sausages, beans and cheese
 - one can of mandarin pieces (Mr T, 37p can). 
I've also had a few more of the pouch rices.

I've still got half a cucumber here and 5 eggs.  On the one hand I should boil one of those eggs and use up the cucumber making two flatbreads of egg/cucumber + two flatbreads of cucumber/salmon paste.  On the other hand I've just bought these six flatbreads and kind of don't want to "waste them" now and wish I had them on Friday when that African hot plume heatwave is due to hit and I'll want easy food.    

I popped to Mr T yesterday and bought the usual quick grab items: Flatbreads, crumpets, sweeties, doritos, fizzy pop (hot weekend coming).  Also got:
an 8-pack of dark chocolate choc ices (£1) https://www.tesco.com/groceries/en-GB/products/268039573 
a  6-pack of sausage patties (£2.30) https://www.tesco.com/groceries/en-GB/products/289706028 
The sausage patties are because I bought burgers last time, so wanted something similar but different.  
Ideally the patties would be served in a toasted muffin, topped with a poached egg - but, here, minimising things, I'll just serve one patty in a flatbread with ketchup. 

New Home Status: Nothing much is coming to market of note.  I am now more focussed on location rather than property ... the clash always comes when you're trying to combine both.  There are plenty of passable "family homes", e.g. 3-bed end of terrace, 3-bed semi, available, but they are too large for me.  I don't want to buy a property that is too large, causing maintenance issues for the future.  I just want a "nice little place", there's a shortage of "little" really.  Also, as a single person, my ideal is, say, 2 bedrooms, 1 en-suite + 1 regular shower/bath room... the trouble in the main is that most properties with that space have squeezed a 3rd bed in because 3 beds make more money than 2 because of the peculiar way British housing is bought/sold based on number of bedrooms.  
There was a nice little flat that appeared yesterday.  Private garden, conservatory - looked at the location and it's directly under a bypass and is at a dead end with a footpath leading down to a stream/valley area... the whole place screams "drugs deals will go on here + odd things outside in the layby".... £300k, so that's out of the question! 

PasturesNew

Later today, I hope ... I'll find the motivation to go to storage to swap some stuff out.  I've got/kept two empty boxes from the crisps from the OOD warehouse + I've gone through my jeans and bagged up "needs a button; too big; too snug", so will deposit those in there... and I've a short list of items to see if I can easily find/dig out for cooking (a plastic chopping mat + a microwave systema bowl).  I've got a little list here somewhere of what's to go into storage and what to get out.  I've got about 6 bottles of bleach in there and a couple of packs of loo roll that can come here with me... that'll free up a little space.  

So much stuff in there, "packed", but not with this lifestyle in mind.  It was all packed on the basis "few months in storage then the whole lot out in one go", so not very coherent.  Plus, there are some things that are simply not practical to box as such... and then the limitations of how stackable any container is.  I've some plastic/lidded storage boxes, for example, where, if stacked/loaded wrongly cause the bottom lid to bow/start to crush.  So it's all a bit overwhelming, so "little and often" is key.  Just pop in every few weeks with 2-3 boxes and see if I can do a little something in there for now. 

So many things, too, that I'd like to have the use of, but it's not practical to get them out and up here (30 stairs)... e.g. I've a whole summer collection of things like an electric fan (heatwave coming, but only 1 day of it), little beach tent, beach towels, flasks, more sandwich containers, shopping trolley ... all stuff that if I were living here in my own home I'd have available to use - and be able to plan a little walk to the beach to set up camp with sandwiches and drinks.  "Stuff" ... that might come in handy, that I'd like the use of now, but CBA to get it all out, get it back here, have it cluttering up the room "in case I do that" .... 

Farway

Bright & breezy day outside. PN, Thanks for reminder of he heat wave due on Friday

I may need to get a cuc & a lettuce in, plenty of my own toms now but I don't bother growing the other salad items

I've got a loaf brewing in the Panny, a proper flour, yeast, water one, not empty a packet out one

When I started it I thought it would be ready for lunchtime, but timing was wrong.

Lunch is therefore LO cold pasta thingy, eaten right out of the Tupperware pot

Dinner, will be a very late lunch, fresh loaf for a sarnie.

Not sure of the filling yet but I'll get a couple of the tasty bangers out just in case, otherwise I expect it'll be cheese & onion filling

Could be fig time soon, I noticed some of mine are now a much paler green.

Some folks on line have ripe ones already, and looking back at my pictures I have had ripe ones this time of year

Meanwhile more runners are running every time I look, could be a meal for the weekend

PasturesNew

Don't quote, will delete.  Just waffling. 

Did the storage run.  Took the two empty crisp boxes, but didn't fill them ... having them in there is one step forward.  It's difficult to "pack" what I've got loose in there to be honest... lots of it is vacuum bags (not sucked up) of clothes + linens + curtains ... then there's a BFL* full of cleaning materials for example.  So lots of bottles/sprays and sponges and j-cloths and all sorts of things kept for cleaning.  They will be one of the first bags out though as I'll need those + it's handy now to pop in and grab a spray or microcloth or something, so I don't really want to find a box that they might all fit into and box them up as such.  

I did make a mistake, which is bl00dy annoying.  2-3 weeks ago I removed from storage a pop up tent.  Bought at a car boot for £4 I popped it up in the garden and struggled to get it re-twisted into its bag.  I then set time aside to achieve that one day and got it into the bag and into the shed.  That ended up in storage, I didn't really want it, but hadn't got round to giving it away.  So, 2-3 weeks ago I thought "if I take that from here and give it away on FB it'll be gone" and I popped it in the boot of the car, trouble is, it's round and large.... and then I decided it'd be a faff, here, to give it away on FB as I'd then have to pop it outside for somebody to collect and "it's not my house" so went off the idea.  Today I decided to return it to storage, something to be sorted/given away when I move into my own home.  But, while there, I forgot it and only realised when I was a mile up the road... so had to go back and this is how it goes: 
Arrive, line up car carefully so you don't have to get out of the car to swipe the keyring.  Sit/wait while the automatic gate opens veeerrry sloooowly ... drive inside and stop/wait until the automatic gate has closed, having first waited a minute or so for it to decide it'll close.  Park outside unit, get keys, undo lock, undo two big metals bars to pull the door open.  Put the tent inside.  Close the door, lock the lock. Check it all. Drive to the gate, swipe the key, wait for the gate to open sloooowwwly, drive outside/stop and wait for the gate to close sloowwwlly .... it's done now though. 



*BFL Bag for Life, I have/use a lot of these for sorting, carrying - and a lot went into storage.

Drive By. While out I did a drive by of a flat.  I don't really want it, but it's worth a drive by.  It's reduced to £240k today.  It's just not ideally placed and it's "nothing special" and the road's not brilliant.... just too many "not quite rights" stacked up against it.  It wins for: 2 garages, south facing private garden, price. condition.  If bought I'd want to knock a wall down to make the LR/kitchen open plan with a wide breakfast bar.... take a window/wall out and pop a conservatory on....  but the walk from the garages to the front door is something that can't be changed and is about 50 metres... not ideal if you're trying to load/unload a car and/or bring in several heavy bags of shopping in the rain. 

I also did a drive by of the "drugs corner" flat... car park entrance said "CCTV in operation", which you don't do unless there's trouble...

PasturesNew

Tesco, £2.30 6 sausage/herb patties in a box.... don't add them to your list. 
I did nuke them, which isn't ideal, but they are "unwrapped" in the box, so it's just 2x3 separated by a bit of square paper.... and I had a helluva job prising just one out (as I'd not taken a knife to the kitchen as I didn't think I needed one).  Burgers in a box are typically loose, not welded together, in a plastic bag.  
The juices running out were a bit watery.  Taste wise they're a bit heavy on the herbs, have no great texture and so you wonder what the herbs are covering up  

Trouble is .... five more to go  

caronc

Good afternoon everyone, 
Hope you find a suitable place soon PN. 
Raining again today but not nearly as wild as yesterday. I had some errands needing done in town so my son kindly chauffeured me about. In return I treated him to eggs benedict for brunch in a local lovely but very hipster café. Like you Brambling I have mixed feelings about the Eat Out scheme but it does seem to be giving the small local places a good boost. I'm not sure why the big fast food chains have been included but I suppose they do employ lots of people. As the cafe is across the road from the fishmongers, I popped in a bought some salmon, herring and scampi. We'll have some of the salmon for dinner tonight with new potatoes, broccoli, green beans and spinach.
Yesterday I spent a good couple of hours cleaning and prepping prawns and octopus for the freezer. The prawns have been open frozen then bagged and I've a bag of heads and claws frozen to make stock. I ran out of oomph so the cleaned octopuses were  popped in the fridge and I'll vac pack them later. As we had been out for lunch we only wanted a light meal in the evening. My son made a small batch of chicken and sweetcorn soup from a recipe card he had picked up at the Chinese supermarket. It was lovely, only took a few minutes to put together and cook and tasted just like the soup from takeaways. 

Farway

I've found a lot of meat / herb stuff over herbed, and not limited to cheaper items either, hand made super bangers suffered same heavy herbing

I suppose frying them would reduce the water content by splashing / spitting it all over the stove top as it did with my mini sausages the other day

The Panny loaf has turned out well risen & looking good.

Tasty sausages defrosting, I'll oven cook them & it's a sausage sarnie for dinner

Should I be peckish later it's another fresh slice of bread with some @sda special strawberry jam on.

The jam was in the YS box, sub for the Smart Price one