Reverse Meal Planning

zafiro1984

Hooray - at long last freedom, from Friday onwards I can go shopping, I can drive up and down the drive without going through any puddles/mud, The contractors started on the 27th Feb laying a drive and have done the last 50m today. All the machinery has gone, we're just left with the barriers onto the road. Looking at the imprints left in the concrete we definitely have badgers, foxes, deer, but I knew about them, possibly ducks of some sort and certainly geese as my ganders chased the contractors on more than one occasion. I shouldn't be cruel and laugh but seeing big burly men shuffling away after saying - 'geese no probs' - made me smile.

back to the food:- I ran out of milk, SR flour and nearly out of fresh fruit and veg, the freezers and batch cooking came in very handy, so there is a 'catchup' small order coming Fri AM 
Yesterday in the morning I made a flan for tea, the left over pastry plus the trimmings was scrunched together, currents added, rolled out, sprinkled with demerara sugar and turned into biscuits, very acceptable after lunch - which was HM pea soup from the freezer. 
Today: lunch out of the fridge, cheese on toast. Tea is pre batched cooked chicken in cola with mash. Pudding jelly- I cheat- I use a sugarfree jelly, with a small amount of  boiling water, then add frozen fruit straight from he freezer - tonight will be raspberries frozen last summer, sometimes I'll add a yogurt as well. It goes straight into the fridge and sets in about 15mins - great when you've forgotten to do a pudding (like tonight)

rtandon27

@zafiro1984 - Congrats on surviving the one month challenge on all fronts!

2Scratters

@zafiro1984 not sure about the last 50m being a drive it sounds like a lane and how nice to have the imprints of your wild life around you to remind you they are there. Welcome to your freedom to roam again. 

2 Scratters xx

Suffolk_lass

gele said:

Good morning lovely people.
I have been lurking on this thread on and off for a while and its amazing what you people can produce from the bottoms of your fridges and freezers! I've decided today to finally ask for help. I'm quite good at finding yellow sticker bargains, I buy them and then I don't know what to do with them. In my fridge at the moment I have, amongst many other things, too many green beans, too many sprouts, and leeks that need using.  Unless something says 'freezable' on the label I'm never quite sure what will freeze well and how best to prepare them for freezing. Can anyone advise what's the best thing to do with these. I'd like to prepare more meals for freezer too so I'm not having to cook every evening, I am making a chicken roast dinner tonight so will use some but not all.
Thanks for reading my ramblings. I expect there might be more. Any help will be greatly appreciated.

Welcome (belatedly!) @gele, I know it's too late to comment for the chicken a week ago but our favourite things with the rest of a small roast chicken are to pick the meat (we normally have one breast and some bone meat for the roast, so there is roughly half left). The breast is thinly sliced to make two good sandwiches for lunch, then the rest of the breast and the chunky meat is chopped and added to a stir-fry, often with a sachet of sauce (the storecupboard, rather than the fridge ones) and fridge-chopped veg. I use the dried egg noodles which take 4 minutes while the base is cooking. Whenever I have a sad pepper I slice and freeze and these get added too. I always have chillies in the freezer too, in a plastic bag. I grow them so there are lots, but before I did, buying a bag of them from Asbo where they have trays of them loose, or your local asian supermarket, they are better chopped from frozen as there is less hotness on fingers, boards and utensils.

The chicken carcass goes in a big pot with a chunked carrot and onion, a stick of celery if I have one, and topped with water until most is submerged. I boil then simmer it for about an hour and then strain and pick all the meat out onto a plate, the veg I chop and add back to the stock. I make soup by using an immersive  (stick) blender on the veg and then add back the chicken. If there's a leek, I slice it in half lengthways, chop it into 2cm lengths then put it in a bowl of water (there is always sand!) and thoroughly clean it. It goes in a covered pan with a bit of oil and butter, melted together then add the leeks (will spatter, but you need the water left on them to steam them, toss them so they are covered and don't burn then lid on for maybe ten minutes. They could be blended with the veg and stock, or cut a bit smaller and just added when the chicken goes in. It will need salt, and any other seasonings but a lump of fresh bread with chicken and leek soup is a good, filling, cheap lunch here! (there are also lots of on-line recipes for !!!!!!-a-leekie soup that is the traditional Scottish version with barley or rice added to thicken (it takes 30 minutes simmering to cook these) and prunes added (could use dates instead but don't tell the Scots). 

joedenise

Had planned on having burgers today but as we hadn't had the peppers which were planned the other day we're having those stuffed with herby couscous and topped with some grated cheese for lunch today.  Just one pepper left in the fridge so I'll roast that this afternoon when I cook dinner.

rtandon27

SL - funny you posted about rubberizing your chicken as we have a chicken roast from yesterday to rubberize! 

We made two roast chicken dinners - one for us & one for the curate at our church who just had her first baby!  I was rather pleased, when the first thing out of her husband's mouth we 'omg that smells amazing!' and we'd not even taken it through the door!  Roast chicken with gravy, steamed carrots & beans, roasted sprouts & potatoes and rolls on the side.  Apple rhubarb crumble for afters.  That amount does us for two full dinners & lots of bits for stir-fries and sandwiches.

I tend to collect up the bones from roast chicken in the freezer until we have 3 or 4 carcasses worth and then make bone broth - an all day job 8-12 hours on the slow back-burner with a bit of apple cider vinegar & mirepoix & a bay leaf for flavour.  Once strained and cooled, it solidifies.  We divvy the jelly up into 300mL tubs that are used in soups, stews and risottos instead of stock cubes or powder. We still used the cubes/powder when making gravies, as I've not yet remembered to make frozen 50mL cubes when we have the bone broth ready!

I'm on leave for the next two weeks, so we are hoping to make inroads into our jam-packed freezer!  Our Friday evening Waitflower date-nights have been yielding so many great bargains that I'm now only getting staples delivered bi-weekly & our farm sourced veg-box is also down to bi-weekly.  It's a fun activity at a time of day/week when there is only staff in the shop, so it is suitable for a leisurely stress-free wander with a basket in hand.  We'd not buy most of our finds at full price, but on yellow sticker fit well into our ever tightening budget & allows us the fun of creative cooking!

rtandon27

Last night's dinner was assemble your own tacos.  We had all the fresh fixings in house - sour cream, avocado, tomato and baby leaves along wit the last of a jar of home-made pickled red onion slices.  Traditionally sized (mini) corn tortillas were bought in bulk last month from the Big River site as they are something we consume approx. once a week so a huge saving was made buying a case & they are shelf stable for a year as they are hermetically sealed.  OH rustled up the filling from some red & yellow pepper & red onion along with Waitflower yellow-stickered turkey mince & fajita seasoning from the cupboard.  Best bit is that there are leftovers that can be made into other meals.

This week and next we will try and do a freshly cooked dinner every evening from the stores and use up the leftovers for lunches or pack them up for cheap workday lunches that can be stashed in the freezer.

Today our broad theme of the day is Meatless Monday, so I'm thinking a cabbage gratin and cauli-mac-cheese would make a dinner appropriate to the manky wet & cold weather!

EssexHebridean

Morning all - congrats on your freedom Zafiro!

My plan for a pasta salad with (christmas) turkey chunks from the freezer was an absolute winner! It ended up with sliced sundried toms and pepperdew peppers, fresh red pepper, cucumber, halved baby plum toms, a massive handful of chopped parsley, lots of blackpepper and some salt, plus some of the tomato oil and a little splash of smoked rapeseed oil for a bit of an extra flavour twist. I cooked up a bit over 275g of pasta and that has made lunch for us both yesterday, tea for us both tonight, and a portion for me for lunch today as well - winner! definitely something I'll be repeating again before all that long - it's a favourite for when we are on holiday as it's such an easy "cook once eat twice" option and we can mix it up by using different protein elements as well. 

I went on a bit of a "using the stuff we have" rampage on Friday - pizzas for tea were entirely from the freezer aside from the mozzarella, and I made a half-batch of lemon curd as well to deal with a couple of lemons which were at peak ripeness and threatening to go over, plus two of the remaining 4 eggs. the other two eggs went into bacon, egg and cheese wraps for Saturday lunch - a quick option that fitted well with our other plans for the day. over the weekend we have also used up two toasting teacakes, 2 fruited bagels and 2 toasting muffins from the freezer as well - so we're getting through it! 

With the bank holiday coming up I want to continue to make good use of freezer stuff - not least as I am still hoping to nab a half price ham or possibly even 2, although that will depend on availability and size/price when I go in. 

rtandon27

EH - you are such a bad influence - LOL - I now will be keeping an eye out for some cut price ham and also a leg of lamb in the sales after reading your post!

Dinner last night was indeed cabbage gratin and mac & cheese - absolutely delicious and another portion of each packed away in the fridge for later - we did add some lardons to the mac & cheese, but I think it was on here many moons ago that we all came to the consensus that lardons didn't count on Meatless Monday 😂

Lunch today will be steamed mussels for me & roast chicken for him with a side of the gratin from yesterday.  We are still trying to figure out if it was the veg box savoy that made it so tasty or if it is just an excellent recipe!

Dinner tonight will be fish something - I'd be happy with fish finger tacos, but the Mr might rebel if I try and make him eat tacos two nights in a week.  We have some white fish in the freezer so perhaps a fish curry or something with a broth might be received well?  Given that it is the Mr who does the majority of the cooking, he has to fancy the recipe or it ends up being subpar!😉

zafiro1984

Just been catching up on all the postings, thanks everyone for your comments.
Thanks EH for your much appreciated  'bad influence'  Sainsbobs have just put some of their common vegetables up at a low price for the Easter. 15p a pk, carrots, swede, potatoes, cabbage, parsnip, I've just ordered several packs most of which will end up in the freezer. Lamb looks to be on at half price in most supermarkets, I may indulge myself and nab a couple. 

I'm afraid we're on Leftovers again. I made some scotch eggs at the weekend, I always make more than needed if we have someone here as sometimes they split if the temperature of the fat is too high and you can't give a guest a split egg so I've a couple of good ones residing in the fridge that need eating - that's tea sorted. Lunch LO pate and toast - nice and easy