Put away your purse & become debt-averse

CRANKY40

If our parents didn't want or couldn't afford whatever we were making in domestic science at school there was a list of teachers who would supply the ingredients in return for whatever we were making, Now I'm older I realise how brave or desperate those teachers must have been.  By the time my sister started school cookery things were getting a little more "exotic". We had a labrador that would eat almost anything so we devised the dog test. We'd offer the dog a spoonful of whatever my sister had made and if the dog ate it then we judged it safe (ish). The stuffed peppers went in the bin because the dog test said no. 

I hope that you find your candle. 

walkers60

When I was 16 and about to leave school with a few average GCEs they introduced a one year secretarial course.  It was the best thing for me as the typing skills have served me well over the years. 

Domestic Science was the name in my time.  One lesson was how to make custard!  After I left school I went to evening classes in cake decorating.  I really enjoyed this course and, again, I have used that skill ever since. 

 

foxgloves

@ladyholly - I can't even begin to imagine what 'brown sauce' was, if it wasn't gravy.....I'm wondering if it was similar to brown windsor soup, which I think could be of ingredients of somewhat dubious origin. I like liver & bacon too. We did have that at home because my Mum could/would do meals which just needed bunging in a dish, then into the oven.

@EssexHebridean - I think making a real jelly from gelatine at school was a session kind of set up to fail......insufficient time to set properly, plus most people apart from real foodie households back then would have made orange jelly from a pack. We mostly did sensible things - stuff we could take home for meals or baking. I always tell people I left school with 8 O-levels, 3 A-levels & the ability to make 5 different types of pastry! My Mum didn't mind buying the ingredients for school cookery lessons, but she was less than impressed when I'd announce the day before that I needed to take in a list of stuff. As she had very little interest in cooking, we didn't have a very well-stocked store cupboard at home.

@CRANKY40 - Love the 'dog test'! My Mum & sister were very fussy eaters so were really only interested in the cakes & biscuits, etc, that I brought home. I often did half quantities (our cookery teacher was very old-school & abhorred food waste) just for myself & Dad.

@walker60 - We never actually made custard at school. I don't know why. I can't make it to this day! I'm a good cook & confident, but any past attempts to make proper custard from eggs, milk, etc, instead of custard powder has been a fail. I can't make a decent omelette either!

@Baileys_Babe - YES!! You are right. I did post about saving that big scented candle until this Christmas rather than buying another one. I'm glad you remembered that too & that it isn't me going doolally! I still haven't found it. Mr F reckoned he had located it in our big glass storm lantern which is currently stashed in his TV unit next to a speaker, but when I went to look, it was a spare white pillar candle. I'm going to have a proper look on Monday.
F

foxgloves

Hello Campers!
Absolutely frozen start this morning - garden still frosted totally white, plus car & street (minus 5 again) Late this afternoon before the light faded, I looked out of the window & noticed that the lawn had melted, so temperatures must have got up to a balmy at-least-a-bit-above-zero at some point. 
Anyway, onto the moneysaving........
Has there been any? Ummmm.......well, not a no-spend day. We drove to a local-ish lakeside park to meet our best friends for coffee & to exchange Christmas cards & presents. £5 to park because our annual pass has expired but I haven't budgeted to replace it this month (£50 for the year) as we want to have a proper think about whether we do still actually go there 10 times a year. I think we do, but it's worth revisiting these things, isn't it, & not just renewing out of habit. We bought a coffee each but shared a warm mince pie as they were big. That's from our Personal Spends, so 'budget-neutral'. Also from Personal Spends (mine), a little string of rechargeable battery operated lights which go inside a bottle. I'd saved a pretty gin bottle in the summer but apart from using it as a sweet-pea vase for a couple of weeks, I hadn't done anything with it. It looks lovely with the tiny white lights in it & so I'm happy with this low (also budget-neutral) spend. Things I didn't buy: Earrings, local gin, very diva-ish hair slides, stacking cat lunch boxes, bird table, nice tin.
Started talking ourselves into stopping off somewhere for lunch on our way home. Resisted this as luckily remembered something in fridge we might fancy so we had that instead. 
Lazy afternoon. Mr F is watching some geeky vintage sci-fi & I've done a couple of surveys, chatted to you on here & am now planning to read. No cooking required for tonight's nosebag as Mr F made sufficient lasagne last night to feed us twice. 
Am hoping we are not under the snow map tomorrow morning as we are visiting s-in-law who lives not that far across the nearby county border - only about 17 miles, but feels like the back of beyond. Let's hope it is a route known to the gritters!
Wishing everyone a peaceful evening. May your halls be decked & your bells jingle!
F x

milann

I remember the post about the candle too. Hope you find it.
It was Home Economics in my day - I used to love it. No boys were allowed to take it (or needlework)  but one named Brian protested as he wanted to be a chef. He was allowed to take O level….he loved being the only boy in a class of girls. I often wonder if he made it to be a chef. No girls were allowed to take woodwork or metal work. It was quite groundbreaking and the following year either sex could do any subject. I went on to catering college (Brian didn’t go to my college)  but the novelty of cooking at work and coming home to cook soon wore off. I used to do quite a lot of wedding cakes for people but I got to the stage where I either needed premises as my kitchen was being taken over or needed to stop. I decided to stop, as if you charged for the hours involved people wouldn’t buy them. I struggle with delicate icing of cakes now though since I had surgery on my arm.
I am going to marzipan and ice my Christmas cakes ready for Dh to take one into work by Tuesday - but it will be a fairly simple design…..I need some inspiration though.

foxgloves

Hi MIlann -Interesting that you used to do wedding cakes. Yes, I can imagine all the different stages of those would require a fair bit of both space & time. I've never learned icing/sugarcraft, except for what we had to do at school, but I enjoy having a go in an amateur way. My cookery teacher was very keen on feather icing & piped cream rosettes so I can do those very neatly! There's a little cake decorating specialist shop in town where the owner sometimes does courses on making sugar flowers or fondant Christmas cake toppers & so the participants come away with something they've made that they can use. I might think about booking a place on one of these sessions at some as I think it could be useful & fun.
At my school, both boys & girls took needlework, cookery, woodwork & metalwork in the 1st year. It was obligatory. Interestingly though, Mr F (who is younger than me by 5 school years) didn't have this opportunity. He liked cooking, but at his school, boys could only do woodwork/metalwork & the girls only needlework & home economics. This really surprised me as 5 years is pretty much a whole school 'generation' & you'd have thought equalities of opportunity might have progressed nationally by then. On a different measure, however, the difference in our ages really demonstrates just how quickly IT developed. When I was at school there were no computers there at all. Five years on, Mr F did O-level Computer Studies. 
F

foxgloves

@milann - P.S I'm sure you will soon find some inspiration for decorating your Christmas cake. I don't have particularly developed icing skills, but usually prefer the results when I've gone with a simple idea. One year, I covered my marzipanned cake with plain white fondant & got a nice smooth finish, then I rolled out the rest of the fondant & cut out white snowflakes with my smallest snowflake biscuit cutter. I stuck them on the top & overlapping a little down the sides just randomly & then used a teensy blob of water icing to stick silver balls around the edge of each snowflake (on the sticky-out bits). Then I tied a wide silver wired ribbon (pound shop) around the cake in a bow. Because it was easy & within my skills, it actually looked a lot more professional than if I'd gone for something more difficult. & kind of taught me that 'less is more' also applies to cakes where I'm concerned! Not sure what I'm doing this year. I might just rough ice it with royal icing & add my little china snowman & other bits & pieces, I'll see how I feel on the day. I do have a nice festive ribbon ready for it though.
F

ladyholly

Foxgloves I cant remeber exctly what the brown sauce was but probably similar to gravy.

My BiL originally started an apprenticeship in bakery and confectionery but never completed it due to having to do his national service and he never went back to the bakery when he finished. He was however a cook rising to chef (dependant on rank) in the merchant navy and then the RAF until he retired. He did make his own wedding cake in 1966. All marzipan and royal icing with piping, lattice work etc. Quite spectacular.

Deni_debt-free_dreamer

Morning foxgloves and friends

Just catching up as RL has been very busy. 
I'm the same age as you foxgloves and still haven't got over the disappointment of not being able to study woodwork to O level. I choose Art as was rubbish and uninterested in the other options available to me of sewing and cooking. My sister did sewing (can't remember it's proper name) and is so creative - she makes most of her xmas presents, own clothes etc. My CSE grade 3 in art has never been any use to me! After uni i went to night school to learn touch typing which has been invaluable in my career as I write many, many sets of minutes and reports
love Deni

Hope you find your candle! I too remember you talking about it

Tescodealqueen

I remember you talking about the candle and Assumed (probably incorrectly) that you would have stored it with your Christmas decorations. This from the woman who bought bought some nice chocolates as a gift on Tuesday then spent 2 hours on Saturday searching for where I had put them before finding them in the most obscure place possible after making my OH search even the recycling bins believing he had thrown out (he has form in throwing out five and ten pound notes with shop till receipts)