Put away your purse & become debt-averse

foxgloves

Kantankrus - Thanks. Everything seemed OK. I've kept things very simple, really, for the month ahead. Campsite already paid for & cattery fees put aside, so I've prioritised disposable income on general holiday expenses. While we don't intend to go mad with spending, I feel it makes sense to budget adequately rather than allow insufficient funds which end up resulting in lots of frequent little dips into our bank account. That sort of thing soon adds up, as well as being difficult to track when one is away from routines.
So I'm done with household accounts for the day. Time to go & finish making pizza, then off down the garden to gather tomatoes, courgettes, etc.
F

foxgloves

Ah, well here I am talking to you again, this time from the garden bench on our back courtyard, a big cup of coffee by my side. I've just ironed & re-sewn the hem on my kitchen door curtain & it occurred to me what a fantastic example of 'shopping from home' this now almost vintage curtain is. So I'm going to tell you about it. If you (quite understandably!) feel unable to muster sufficient interest in somebody's old soft furnishings to stay awake, then do feel free to go & do something more exciting..... I shan't be offended.
Now I've mentioned before that my Mum was a super keen crafter. Her church craft stalls & Christmas market displays were known all over the village & people often left their unwanted craft supplies outside on the front doorstep for her to use. One such donation back in the early1980s was a bin liner full of those big fabric sample books. One of these contained big square swatches of really expensive William Morris furnishing fabrics in lots of different designs. Mum removed them & patchworked them together to make a double bedspread which she used for years. By the mid-90s, she'd grown tired of it & rather than see it go in the bin, I said I'd have it myself. So it then became my bedspread & when I wanted a change, I used it as a throw over the sofa. Then it sat in the linen cupboard for a while until I decided to replace our utterly loathsome kitchen door curtain (impulse buy) with a new one. I was still very spendy back then, but what saved me from going & buying one was the fact that I liked Mum's patchwork bedspread. So I cut a piece off the end, which I used to make the tabs & made it into a door curtain! I lined it with a cream throw which I'd bought in a bit of a frenzy of impulse shopping at the Swedish emporium which wasn't even a quarter as useful as I convinced myself it would be. So voila! One vintage style hand crafted very warmly lined door curtain! That is definitely a good example of shopping from home, I think. I expect the person who gave those sample books to Mum got them free from work. Mum, then I got a bedspread & throw for free & I'm still using & liking my free door curtain.
Just got to nobble Mr F to hang it back up for me when he gets back tonight as it's tricky for a shorta*se to do neatly.
Pizza already made for tonight. I only need to mix up some carrot mayonnaise & chop a bit of salad, so I think I'll have an extra bit of time outside with my book.
Cheers all,
F xx

foxgloves

Hello from a very rainy part of Frugal Land,
Have washed two coats this morning, which were drying perfectly until the sky turned black & the garden started getting watered without me having to put in any effort.
Now despite me just having got annoyed at a company I like emailing me today to flag up the availability of their expensive product filled Advent calendars, I'm going to mention the 'Festive C-word' in August too. Last year, as Dec 25th drew closer, one or two people became rather exasperated with me because I couldn't think of anything to put on a presents list. I had everything I needed, nothing sprung to mind, etc, & I know that Mr F in particular found this infuriating. So today I've started jotting down in my notebook any little thing I see which would make a nice gift..... a new face scrub I want to try and a new copy of the Cranks cookbook for starters. I've mentioned in my diary previously that I've used this book constantly since first buying it in the 1980s when the paperback edition was first published. I've made the tomato soup recipe this morning. I'd got so many lovely big ripe tomatoes picked & I've already done a batch of chutney & pasta sauce. So as I'd easily got a kilo of spare tomatoes, I've made soup & divided it into 6 containers for freezing. We both really like it & my oldest nephew used to ask for it when he was small. The kitchen smelled so inviting, as I'd got bread in the oven too, but it doesn't LOOK inviting...... there seems to be muesli, bits of French beans & random cat biscuits all over the floor. I think I'll have to break my 'only one housework session a week' rule & wo(man) handle the Dyson downstairs, grrrr. I know they're effective, but why must they weigh approximately the same as a bus?
Anyway, back to my little list of potential Festive gifts......yes, I've started it off with the facemask I saw & added a replacement copy of Cranks. Mine is two loose covers with almost entirely loose pages inside, all heavily annotated with things like calorie content, alterations, who's favourite it is, etc, it's been used till it is barely able to stand upright on the cookbook shelf on my kitchen dresser.
I think Mr F will just about faint if I'm able to supply an actual list first time of asking!
Cat has just come to tell me that it's his tummy time (basically anytime he's awake).
F x

PurpleFairy26

Ooh, can you let me know the name or link of the cookbook please? I did a quick search but could only find Cranks Bible from 1961 is this your original? I'm looking for a decent vegetarian cookbook rather than one that just has vegetable side dishes in (iyswim) I too could be Uber organised and start my Christmas list then too. TIA

crazy_cat_lady

Funnily enough I am now also thinking (worrying) about Christmas now that exam season is over and the money is spent... my flavoured gin went down well last year so I think I'm going to do that again this year.
I am also a DM wearer - worth every single penny.

Blackcats

Ah Foxgloves - you raise me up to new levels yet again!
Your story of the quilt to curtains and repaired curtains made me realise a foolish, non money saving mistake I was about to make. I have a very nice red long sleeved cotton top. I've had it a while. It had a small tear at the side seam. This prompted me to put it in the charity shop bag! What the heck. I've taken it out and will sew up the 1inch tear at the weekend. As I previously confessed I seriously contemplated buying a new car because mine needed 2 new tyres and some brake "whatchamacallits" (not sure if shoes or pads or even if they are the same thing)).
I had the same email I think about advent calendars. Oh yes indeed, I opened that email and very nearly talked myself into buying an advent calendar in August!

foxgloves

Purps - No, the Cranks Bible is a different book. There were a few, as the Cranks vegetarian/wholefood restaurants were quite trendy in their day. I only ever ate there once, in the 1980s at the Covent Garden branch. The book I'm talking about is just called 'The Cranks Recipe Book' by David Canter et al. Mine is the paperback edition published by Grafton Books, 1985. ISBN no is 0-586-06090-1.
I think it was out of print for a long time but there is a newer edition around with a much more modern cover. I can't say whether it's exactly the same as I haven't seen a physical copy to look at.
I bought mine when it first came out. I haven't cooked everything in it, but there are recipes Ive used regularly for years, including
Tomato soup, tomato & lentil soup, cream of watercress soup, mushrooms a la greque, apple & ginger chutney, sliced bread pudding, luscious lemon cake, falafel, cheesy lentil wedges, mushroom stroganoff, Belgian cake, fresh lemonade, cheesejacks, carrot cake, etc.
It's hearty solid food rather than the fancypants 'two spears of asparagus balancing on a poached quail's egg with a smear of parsnip puree & a salsify glaze' type of fare, iyswim.
Anyway, hope this info is useful.
F x

foxgloves

Blackcats - I do like the company from whence the email originated, but I'm not really drawn to these overblown advent calendars. We always had advent calendars as children & you know what? In the simpler times of the 1970s, we were excited about coming downstairs every morning, opening our daily window, & seeing........ a tiny festive picture!! I don't even recalling any of them having chocolate in until much later, never mind a 'luxury mini mani', a nail polish, face mask, lipstick or....... & I honestly kid you not, as I saw this advertised last year, a mini pack of pork scratchings behind every magical door every day right up to Christmas Eve!! I do think some of them look lovely, & I would have been very tempted back in the day. Not now though. It's too much. £50+ for an advent calendar (& some are well in excess of £100) is a ridiculous cave-in to commercialism in an already very expensive month of the year. I think I might start thinking of an alternative tradition for this December & you can bet it will be free!
But good for you on getting that top out of the charity bag for mending. I do a lot more mending these days in my rejection of our increasingly throwaway society. It's quite satisfying in a vaguely tedious kind of way.
F x

foxgloves

CCL - Well, you do need to think ahead a bit for getting fruit liqueurs, etc, done in time for Christmas. I've saved enough blackberries in the fridge for blackberry gin, but we saw lots of sloes while we were berry-picking in the water meadows at the weekend. I might go back to pick some of those to make sloe gin, then use my saved blackberries & a pear from our tree in the garden to make blackberry & pear vodka.
Also, I found this in a really old magazine. I'm not keen on whisky, but I quite fancy having a go at this:

Coffee cream liqueur

50g coffee beans
550ml whisky
400g tinned sweetened condensed milk
40g dark chocolate, broken into pieces
You put the coffee beans in a bowl, pour the whisky over them, cover & leave overnight. Next day, heat condensed milk & chocolate together gently to melt them together. Stir.
Then you strain the whisky into a blender & add the choc/condensed milk mixture. Zizz it up for a minute or two, pour into a bowl & chill overnight. If any skin has formed during chilling, remove it & decant into sterilised bottles.
Says it will keep for up to a month in the fridge.
Hmmmm, I'm quite tempted to have a go at this. Sounds like it can be done fairly last minute too.
What d'you think, CCL?
F x

Greying_Pilgrim

foxgloves wrote: »

.......there are recipes Ive used regularly for years, including
Tomato soup, tomato & lentil soup, cream of watercress soup, mushrooms a la greque, apple & ginger chutney, .......


Anyway, hope this info is useful.
F x

foxgloves - Thank you! You have just saved me some money I happened to click on your diary and noticed the reference to 'Cranks' - and read on a bit (i'm mostly veggie, like to cook and am of the 'right vintage' to know all about the original 'Cranks' - but never ate there ). Your listing of chutney reminded me that I have a jar of English Pr0v3nder caramelised onion chutney stashed away in the back of the cupboard. We're all out of chutney (DH's staple with cheese for work snap), and as it's the end of the month, we're nearly out of money. I was debating whether to use part of my mrT coupon to get DH some more chutney. Now I don't have to, and I'm delighted that it frees up the voucher to buy something else, and that I got the onion chutney from £stretcher for something like 50p - bargain! AND it's still in date until 'C' mas next year :j


Cheers :T


Greying X