Reverse Meal Planning

rtandon27

Mmmmm - your fakeaway sounds lovely joedenise - do you actually fry the chicken, or is it baked?

We'll be having fake-away pizza for dinner tonight - store-bought crust complete with tomato & cheese and then loaded with our own toppings - probably olives, pepperoni & pineapple, some dried Italian herbs and an extra sprinkling of grated cheese!

Our use it up store cupboard lunch both yesterday and today was stir-fried noodles - a yakitori kit yesterday & egg noodles today.  The yakitori kit is something we will buy again as it is shelf stable & remarkably filling comfort food using up litlle bits of veggies and meat.

joedenise

I bake the chicken, along with the chips!  I don't do deep fat frying at all.  I try to eat healthily as much of the time as I can.

Even my fry ups are done with spray oil rather than poured oil!

Suffolk_lass

I also got chicken thighs out of the freezer, along with a pair of duck breasts and some chipolatas. I think DH wants duck this evening, we will just dry fry them on their skin and have them with green veg as I still have plenty. 

Last night was omelette and oven chips. No veg!!!

Suffolk_lass

DH ended up doing the chipolatas with some remnants of salad. I felt stuffed and lazy all day yesterday and CBA. He has gone off to an artisan bakery for a one day course today, to help his bread-making - it was his birthday gift from me last November! I hope he has a lovely day. I'm going back to painting cupboard doors today!

joedenise

Got a shoulder of lamb out of the freezer last night for dinner today.  I'm using a Jamie Oliver recipe to slow cook it with dried chickpeas so that will use up most of the pack of chickpeas that are in the cupboard so will need to buy some more as haven't got a spare pack.  Also uses some of the jar of preserved lemons from the cupboard.  Only thing I had to buy to the dish was some tomatoes as I only have a few of the home grown ones left.  I'm really looking forward to it as it's something completely different to anything I've cooked before.  The recipe is from his Quick and Easy book, the one where all the recipes are only 5 ingredients.  I haven't got the book but his series is running on The Food Network channel.

Hope your DH enjoys his bread making course.  That's a lovely present!  I think my DH would enjoy something like that.  He makes his own bread, usually sour dough but I still buy mine as I only eat wholemeal which always turns out too heavy when it's made at home.

Baileys_Babe

joedenise said:

I still buy mine as I only eat wholemeal which always turns out too heavy when it's made at home.

We have been making our bread at home for 20+ plus years, mostly we make wholemeal and it isn't heavy. Looks like OH needs to try other recipes to find one that makes the type of bread you like.

StickyTheStickInsect

@Suffolk_lass, I finally got around to making the chicken pie ! I used puff pastry instead of shortcrust and had leftover chicken, leftover gammon, chicken stock, chicken soup, peas and sweetcorn. We had it with mash and baked beans. It was even more successful than I'd hoped and DS1 aged 7 ate an adult portion and seconds. DD wouldn't eat the pastry but ate everything else. So thank you very much for the idea !!   

Suffolk_lass

Here is his bread haul from the course - three large leaven sourdough loaves, three focaccia, one ciabatta stick, one rye loaf, and two malt loaves (he didn't bake the malt loaves but he did make the rest - all sourdough!

Just to add, I am painting in the kitchen and yesterday I was doing the washing while he was out - so of course he got everything out of the bread-sack to put among the dust and detritus of my work in progress (hence the laundry detergent and sandpaper to the right with all the tools to the left!!) - of course he did! 

joedenise

That's an amazing haul for one day.  Did they give him a sour dough starter or has he got to make himself one?  My DH has been making his own starter and he's finally got one that keep going!  It's taken about 8 or 9 attempts to get one that keeps going and not "dying".  This one has been going for about 4 months now, including a month in the fridge while we were on holiday in September!  That's the point his previous starters have died and he's had to start again.

Going to use up some wonky carrots this morning to make a carrot & ginger soup for lunch - there will probably be enough for another lunch as well; ginger will come out of the freezer.

ruby_eskimo

That's an amazing bread haul Suffolk_lass!  I need to see if my sourdough starter will resurrect itself after being in the fridge for a while.  If not then I'll just make a regular loaf this week when we've finished our last loaf from the freezer.

Dinner tonight is Chicken Katsu Curry using a loan chicken breast and a portion of chinese style curry sauce that were laying around in the freezer.  Combining with some panko breadcrumbs that were lurking in the cupboard a bit of rice and some salad and all should be good.