Reverse Meal Planning

joedenise

rtandon27 said:

@happydenial - have you tried mashed potato 'hockey pucks' - we don't often have leftover potatoes but when we do, they get mashed & seasoned, then frozen in muffin trays then popped out and stored in a plastic baggie - each one is good as a side with other veg when we are in a hurry and need an instant freezer meal (this method works well with homemade pesto as well)

I use muffin trays to freeze leftover coconut milk as only ever use 100ml at a time so each puck is approximately 100ml.  I do the same with passatta as rarely use a full box.

Soontobeoap

@joedenise thanks. Its worth knowing with coconut milk. Use it in df cooking but never a whole carton. 

happydenial

Thanks for that @rtandon27 - these were boiled new potatoes in their skin, it hadn’t occurred to me to freeze them! I had planned to stick them in the airfryer and have them for weekend brunch, oh well.

Also, has anyone else had any issues with carrots recently? I buy a bag (Aldi usually) and they seem to dissolve into mush within a week 🤔 I do all the usual stuff - take them out of the plastic bag, dry them, put them in the salad drawer with kitchen roll at the bottom, all to no avail (they are almost slimy in the bag?). Might have to start buying loose ones…..

rtandon27

@happydenial - yes definitely - carrot quality has been an issue for at least the past 4 weeks - after the first mushy disaster, we ate the rest of that bag grated & raw in salads or roasted in batons - they were flavourless & quite horrid - we've now switched to a smaller quantity from Waitbloom instead of MrS for the time being - hate paying that much for carrots, but they are definitely better & a vegetable should taste like something!

Our dinner last nights was steamed tofu with a mushroom sauce & jasmine rice - I had reverse planned it based on mushrooms & tofu that needed using up, only to discover that OH had fried the 'shrooms down for an omelette!  We had to pick up three other items from the store so ended up buying more mushrooms - LOL - so much for reverse planning

Suffolk_lass

MIA for ages as have not had time to be on the forum. 

I certainly agree about carrots, and the ones we bought in Aldo in Scotland in April all end rotted within 5 days, which was the first time I noticed it. I have been chopping them and bagging them in the freezer to add to ragu and soups but now have two large zip lock bags full. I will grate some next as they take up less space (although they tend to freeze in a lump).

We only ever have leftover potatoes if I tell DH I want them for potato salad. Otherwise he pinkers them in the evening, after I have gone to bed!

rtandon27

👋 Hello SL - good to 'see' you!

Have never frozen grated carrots before, but I wonder if they might benefit from the same treatment as berries, frozen in a layer on a tray then bagged up so that they are free-flowing?  Have used that method for zucchini before and it worked quite well - we used for soup & cake and it was super easy to measure out in cups.

Last night's reverse planned dinner - the last of the bargainous battered fish mountain! - Really enjoyed it as was crispy & crunchy - OH cooked everything for 45 instead of 25 minutes as it seems our oven just does not come to temp quick enough.  It's gas (came with the house) and I feel that the sooner we replace it the better! (especially after a long day in the city when a timely dinner is needed!) Homemade seasoned wedges on the side made with potatoes from the larder & courgette coins for veg.  We sat outside at the bistro table to eat and enjoyed the long summer evening!

EssexHebridean

Hello all - we are back from our travels and now starting to give thought towards using thing up ahead of the impending (although still don't know when) house move. Also thanks to a very busy few weeks coming up here,  I am focusing fully on some really healthy balanced eating over the next few weeks as I know that will help to balance what might be generally a quite stressful time. 

I shopped on Monday for the week (a day of "getting myself together" time after holiday and before heading back to work, which happened yesterday). £34.87 in Al's - mostly fruit and veg, plus a whole FR chicken and some of the usual odds and ends as needed. Monday night's dinner was chicken salad with boiled Jersey Royals, last night I dragged a couple of portions of soup out of the freezer to have with part-baked rolls as a nice quick easy option for our first day back to the commute. This evening will be some more of the chicken - this time as part of a pasta salad with sundried tommies and the remaining salad veg I bought - I use some of the tomato oil as a dressing for the pasta and throw some fresh cherry toms in while it is still hot too. Ooh - just thought - I have some blocks of wild garlic pesto in the freezer that I might also throw in - that will help it cool faster too! 

I took the time to prep a box of fruit last night too - half a Galia melon, two thirds of a punnet pf strawberries and half a punnet of grapes - so we have fresh fruit salad standing by for puddings as an alternative to yogurts.

In terms of "needing used" foods, we will be continuing to attack freezer 1 now - although it won't be critical to have it empty ahead of moving as we are buying the fridge freezer that is currently in the new kitchen so will be able to take well-wrapped frozen stuff straight there hopefully, but we do want to work through some of our existing storecupboard stuff, and obviously won't be restocking stores much at the moment either. We ended up bringing half a block of cheddar cheese back from holiday with us - and as we already had a fairly sizeable unopened block in the fridge cheese & chutney rolls will be making an appearance on the lunchtime rota for the next few weeks I think. 

The chicken will do one more main meal yet too - and I may separate some of the meat for MrEH to have for his lunch roll on Friday as I will be out and I'm not convinced we have many "single person" fillings in the freezer at the moment. I'll probably do a coronation chicken style potato salad on Friday night I think to use the remaining Jersey Royals (so tasty!). 

happydenial

I actually got some decent carrots in the SM this week - I spent a while looking through the box and got a packet which looked dry inside and they are not mushy at all 👌

Had to tweak the meal plan today as DH came back from the big city with an M&S TGTG bag (our local store gives their excess food to the food bank) which was really good - £5 and he got 2 beef lasagnes, smoked salmon pate, 2 bags of mixed salad leaves, a sandwich (which he ate on the train!) and a pack of three gut health shots (which I know are expensive!). The lasagne and pate went into the freezer but we now need to eat our way through 2 1/2 bags of salad, and we’re all away this weekend! Big salad for lunch and fully loaded burgers with salad for dinner. Any that is left I will transfer into a kitchen paper lined tupperware and cross my fingers it will last until Monday!

rtandon27

Dinner yesterday ended up being an antipasto platter inspired by an amazing 2gtg bag we picked up from our local shell-little waitflower & a few yellow sticker bargains from MrS.  Amazing bag included an italian meat selection, sun-dried tomato pasta salad, mango smoothies & ciabatta rolls that we sliced up.  MrS produced a couple of tasty dips/spreads, a mozza ball, strawberries & baby rocket and our home stores the butter, olives & 'no dairy' cheeze.  We were absolutely stuffed - such a nice unusual feeling these days as we stick to our portion sizes as much as possible. (Portion sizes both health & budget induced.)

Last night's planned fakeaway pizza ended up as tonight's dinner as the heat of today has wiped us out and we really needed a low effort meal.  We decided at the last minute to supplement with duck spring rolls from the 2gtg bag - wow these are a real treat - so crispy and flavourful! Sounds an odd combo but will do us for today.  We've gorged on own brand ice creams today, so afters will be a healthy one of chopped fruit and yogurt.

Suffolk_lass

I stuck the slow cooker on with an all together ragu padded out with frozen chopped carrots. Hmm, the carrots are great is soups but retain an almost chewy quality when cooked from frozen, because of course, I don't blanch them first.

Anyway, we had it (too late again, at nearly 9pm) with tagliatelle and a little grated cheese on top, and there is plenty left for me to make a pasta bake for Monday.

We had freshly picked strawberries from our garden for dessert; ours had cream on. The dog's single chopped strawberry did not.