Reverse Meal Planning

Suffolk_lass

I also made a curry - a cashew nut and prawn curry, but I forgot to add spinach (all gone in one sitting with garlic flat bread).This week we will have a leek and cheese dish, a beef pie, a cauliflower dish and a pasta bake. I am down to a single tin of baked beans so I need to get some of these soon, but hopefully not the early part of the week. I am a bit mia because I have an exam looming and it is in my head!

EssexHebridean

Good luck for the exam SL!  In true DFW parlance - fcfcfcfcfcfc! 

We're still reverse planning our way through the freezer, although it's got a little less space than it did since MrEH nabbed three YS'd loaves of various types yesterday afternoon - total cost for all three was 89p - so that is a distinct win, and means that we won't have to make bread for a while. Well worth losing some freezer space to for a while, and we will go through them relatively fast too. 

Friday night's curry used the marinaded chicken pieces from the freezer - another YS purchase but probably not something we'd got for again - they weren't great. I also made enough of the veg base to take out two portions before the chicken was added in - one of them did me for lunch on Saturday and the other has been frozen for future use. 

Some ends of loaves got whizzed up and converted to breadcrumbs so those are also now in the freezer. 

And after a late-ish breakfast yesterday morning we decided neither of us were hungry enough for a full lunch, so had toasted cheese sarnies instead, with the planned burgers and chips being bumped through to yesterday evening when they were most welcome! 

Plans for this week include more freezer stuff - starting with sausage, mash & beans this evening. Two spare sausages will make sausage and butternut squash pasta later in the week. Tomorrow evening's couscous will use lamb chunks from the freezer too - I must remember to get those out to defrost this evening. 

rtandon27

Oh dear - looks like I've 'lost' a couple of posts to this thread hitting 'save draft' and not 'post comment'! Looking back at them, I have no clue what day/week they were so I'll just cut my losses and post afresh

So my win this week was to use up an item in the 'been hanging around too long' category.  Almost a whole bag of quinoa with seeds was turned into a risotto and topped with a Brussels sprout & almond mixture.  Did well for meatless Monday - very tasty and a recipe we'd not used since 2017!  It made 4 portions, but we did not dish up evenly so there is rather less quinoa left for the remaining 2 portions.  To remedy this, we will cook up the remainder of the bag and mix it into the risotto  & then pair it with some chargrilled chicken pieces for dinner tonight.  Plenty of sprout & almond topping left as well so that's an instant dinner made.

We also made up a batch of apple/berry crumble with assorted apples, some from the veg box, some foraged wild, and some from Mr. S.  The berries were whatever was left in the freezer from our summer smoothie kick so that's another couple of bits used up.  OH was hankering after some cream & did well to source a pot on yellow sticker.

Our frugal use it up November has not been a complete success, even though the grocery budget is fairly intact, the treats/eating out budget has taken a hit due to some crazy commutes last week & odd hours.  We did keep those meals healthy though and have discovered two new places to choose from should we have to resort to late evening meals again.

Today we made cheats wonton soup for lunch using a cheats broth recipe from t'internet & some convenience momos lurking in the freezer.  Another thing used up which may have resulted in all of four square inches of room in there!

joedenise

I'd got smoked haddock out for kedgeree yesterday but needed to go to the hospital for DH so decided to use it today instead and I made a mushroom omelette for breakfast instead.

Today popped out to get more fruit as getting short and was late back so needed to change lunch!  Was going to be stuffed peppers but we'll have those tomorrow.  Just knocked up some scrambled eggs and spinach with toast instead.

Suffolk_lass

Right, back to posting on here now. I used the chicken that had been languishing in the fridge since Sunday to make a Butter Chicken Curry and brown rice last night. Needless to say I padded it out with half a big carrot, an onion, two small potatoes, a sprinkle of frozen sweetcorn and four frozen spinach cubes.  I used a spice kit from Spice Tailor that I have had for many months, if not years. Apart from the bit of bark in the mix (which I "won") it was really nice, although I will add a bit of chopped chilli next time

rtandon27

It's been a while since we had any semblance of meal planning in this house reverse or otherwise!
Today has been a success so far - bf was houmous on toast with pickled onions and a fried egg on top and lunch was noodles with veg & melted cheese & sriacha.  This evening for dinner will be a spicy baked rice with herby feta, all meals from what is already lurking in the house.
Rest of the week to be written on a piece of paper for sticking on the fridge door - so no excuse for OH to say ooooo - do you fancy a burger which then means we overspend the treats budget!

ruby_eskimo

I am once again trying to work through my freezer in order to make room for Christmas and defrost it at some point in the new year.  Freezer surprise for lunch was some sweet potato soup (honestly thought it was carrot and coriander to start with...) and dinner tonight is mac and cheese to use up some pasta, open cheese and a few leeks that DH brought home with him from someone at work.

Primrose

freezer use and defrosting is a difficult conundrum this time of year with lots of home grown veg to use up and trying to free up  space for Christmas stuff and bad weather contingencies.  I don't think we ever really solve the problem.  I suppose if houses and garages were bigger we'd all have a spare empty freezer available for contingency use.

I gather two dishwasher kitchens are all the rage now.  One dishwasher from which to retrieve all the nicely washed dishes without the hassle of having to store them away in cupboards and a second dishwasher in which to pack all the dirty stuff.    In my dreams !     

ruby_eskimo

Someone I went to school with was the focus of one of the articles about 2 dishwashers @Primrose - was absolutely flabbergasted as some of us don't even have one dishwasher 😆

Freezer surprise for lunch today looks like a curry rather than the goulash I thought it was but it will be ok, and a valuable lesson that I need to LABEL things in future!

Primrose

Surprisingly most kitchens in modern houses seem to be getting smaller despite the fact that it's the one room in whixh most activity takes place and where most equipment needs to be located.  One wonders hoe many of them were designed by men.  I suspect most women, who still do the majority of the domestic work would prefer them to be more spacious and certainly better planned.