Reverse Meal Planning

EssexHebridean

Hey all - hope everyone had a good weekend!

Freezer audit finally done here yesterday - so I now have a base of ingredients I will be focusing on including in meals over the next few weeks. We also have a parsnip mountain so I'll be making soup at some stage - probably our usual curried parsnip variant. The week's meal plan will also need to be changed to incorporate the salad we got in the veg box but that's easy enough.

Savoury rice this evening - using a veg base and some roasted veg from the freezer, plus some frozen lamb leftovers from a previous roast dinner. 

MissRikkiC

Well done for getting in the freezer @EssexHebridean it’s my worst job. My daughter emptied a kilo bag of peas into one of the freezer drawers at the weekend and I had to turf everything out to clean it all out. That counts as part of my inventory work 🤣🤦🏼‍♀️

EssexHebridean

Aargh to the peas MissRikkiC - nightmare! 

Savoury rice was lovely - and all the more so for the fact that I suddenly realised because it would have lots of added flavours with it I could sneak brown rice in there - MrEH didn't even notice so I shall remember that trick for the future! 

Tonight's planned soup is being switched out for salad as we have veg box salad ingredients to be used up. So a tin of tuna each from the storecupboard will also come into the mix. I suspect we'll still be left with cucumber to use (got two in the box!) but it'll see off the leaves, the spare tomatoes and another couple of the small red peppers anyway. 

I've got purple sprouting broccoli needing attention so I think I'm going to switch tomorrow night out for a risotto which can then take care of most of that, plus a good amount of the mushrooms that came in the box too. I need to ask MrEH to get the tub of poultry stock out of the freezer to use with that, and I'll probably use a little chorizo to give the illusion of it definitely having meat in it. I love having chorizo about to use almost as a seasoning, that's a trick that works well for me. 

I also need to consider what I fancy for tea on Friday as I'm on my own - he's got a rugby club do to go to.  Frankly I may just end up doing a big bowl of cheesy chips, mind you!  

rtandon27

EssexHebridean said:

...I'll probably use a little chorizo to give the illusion of it definitely having meat in it. I love having chorizo about to use almost as a seasoning, that's a trick that works well for me. 

Now that is a trick worth remembering! - we've always got some of this in the freezer, more as an ingredient for a few favourite dishes, but next time I buy some will be sure to cube and store separately to replicate the illusion!

Brambling

EssexHebridean said:

I'll probably use a little chorizo to give the illusion of it definitely having meat in it. I love having chorizo about to use almost as a seasoning, that's a trick that works well for me. 

i also do this with cubed pancetta, I buy the small double packs of cubed when i see it on offer or YS and freeze.  I find some are more fatty than other so do check before buying but one of the small packs will add enough meaty / bacon favour for 3 or 4 portions of a rice or pasta dish.  I have added both chorizo and pancetta to dish

zafiro1984

EssexHebridean said:

 I'll probably use a little chorizo to give the illusion of it definitely having meat in it. I love having chorizo about to use almost as a seasoning, that's a trick that works well for me. 

Great idea, I also seem to be using more cooking bacon than I used to. I use it on the top of soups,   as a crunchy garnish with salad to mention but two. I used to cut up rashers but now have moved over to the cheaper cooking sort. 

Last nights meal was precooked casserole teamed with mash and sweetcorn all from the freezer. However I had some frozen LO rice pudding that was a bit on the thick side. I added a bit of milk and cream covered it with demerara sugar and caramelised the top a bit like crème brulee; went down well.   

Tonight - again all LO and precooked from the freezer - a quiche using turkey, gammon, sweetcorn plus mushrooms from the fridge, no doubt I'll add some spices/herbs. Pudding? I'll have a rummage in the freezer and hopefully be inspired - good job we don't eat until about 8.30pm

happydenial

I often use a good teaspoon or two of smoked paprika if I haven’t got any chorizo, gives a similar flavour. I like to try and keep some in the freezer though, as you say it’s a really useful ingredient.

Lots of reverse planning and using up going on here - last night I made the Hairy Bikers yummy sausage casserole using the last of a bag of Mediterranean veg instead of fresh peppers, and served it with leftover mash and green veg from Monday night. There’s one large portion left which will do DH and I for lunch tomorrow with a bread roll each.

Today at lunchtime we finished off the chickpea curry from Tuesday night between us 😁 And as it’s shopping day tomorrow, I made fridge gravel veg peanut noodles for dinner (one spring onion, half a red pepper, two scraggy carrots, a few spears of asparagus, some leftover cooked green beans and two chicken breasts stretched between four of us), and finished off a few spring rolls I found in the freezer.

Tomorrow I need to do something with a small cauliflower which is looking decidedly past its best, and a bag of peas-in-their-pods which I had bought for snacks and then forgotten about 😬 The kids won’t eat cauliflower (why? It’s just like broccoli, sigh) so need to find something else it will work with for DH and I. 

Suffolk_lass

Ooh cauliflower, lovely. We had cauliflower cheese this week but I often add other stuff to it; broccoli, macaroni, bits of bacon for example.

I kept three big florets back to have with some grilled meat but my friend whizzes it in her food processor and subs it for rice.

I also like it in the onion, chickpea and butternut squash curry I make, sometimes instead of frozen spinach, often in addition. It goes well with a fenugreek spice mix but equally with a jar of sauce, if that is your thing - we have tried Patak's jalfrezi and butter chicken jars and both work well (with some extra green chillies from my freezer) when I can't be bothered. This and a jar of tomato and chilli ready-made pasta sauce are our store-cupboard take-away avoidance measures!

Here it was garden and SM salad with a jacket potato last night (much too late for me really, but we were just running late!)

joedenise

Got a couple of TGTG bags this evening and there were a couple of boxes of chestnut mushrooms and I'd already got some in the fridge so tomorrow night's dinner is now going to be mushroom stroganoff.

I still have about half a large cauliflower left which will do at least another 4 portions as a veg with whatever we're having.  There was also a cabbage, spring greens, sliced kale and Chinese leaves in the bags so plenty of veg to have with meals this week without using frozen!

rtandon27

Mmmm - lovely veggie haul @joedenise - our last 2gtg veg box (bag) was mostly potatoes but they are super tasty as from a local greengrocer!