Resourcefulness: The budgeter's friend

KajiKita

< slides into seat at @EssexHebridean's table, knife and fork at the ready for the red cabbage ... >

 

KK

foxgloves

@kayannie - I too had an M&S baking book, plus another one in the same series which was called 'Family meals' & yes, the Norwegian Apple cake recipe definitely came from one of those. I did keep the baking book for many years but it went off to the charity shop before we moved here....though not before I'd copied my favourites into my recipe notebook! The apple cake is lovely. I also still make the mince pies with macaroon on top instead of a pastry lid & a bomb-proof chocolate all-in-one-cake, although I have scaled up the quantities on that one to better fit metric tins. Another family favourite from that book was Coffee-soaked gateau. I used to make that for high-days & holidays. My Dad adored it. It involved baking a big sponge, then pouring over a whole jugful of coffee & rum syrup, before letting it stand to absorb then covering it in whipped cream & bashed up chocolate flake. It was sort of a tiramisu vibe in terms of flavour. I prefer it with amaretto rather than rum, but both are very edible. As my Grandad used to say on tasting lovely food or alchohol, "That git in yer mouth!"
Yes, I do use my Cranks recipe book a fair bit. I too have had to replace my original copy because it fell to pieces & had been mended so many times, it was getting ridiculous. I made a batch of the bread pudding (not the dessert one, the cake-type), another of Dad's faves, recently. I added leftover glace cherries to it & with that little extra grating of nutmeg on the top, it was nicely festive. I bake the Country Biscuits quite regularly - somehow they don't feel as unhealthy as other biscuitty offerings. Some of the soups - tomato soup, lentil & tomato, cream of broccoli & watercress are also firm favourites here at Foxgloves Manor. The macro-rice is a regular here too plus the mushroom stroganoff, although I do cut down on what I consider to be the surfeit of celery in it.

Re red cabbage - No, @Makingabobor2, I have never added cranberries - @EssexHebridean, your version sounds nice & a bit different. I have so far stuck to Delia's recipe. The only changes are that I sub half the vinegar with my homemade blackberry vinegar & cook it in my slow cooker. I have done it in the oven too & there is no discernible difference as far as I can tell so I prefer to do it at work-top level without having to (wo)man-handle our heaviest casserole pan in & out of the oven for stirring.

@Blackcats - I wasn't such a sucker for new 'filled on the thighs of a fairy' bottles of cleaning potions back in the day, although I did buy a lot more than I do now. One thing that I really have learned since adopting this debt-free lark is that you really do only need a very few good products to clean everything perfectly well & anything else is just throwing your money into the coffers of enormous multi-nationals. One of my weaknesses was being tempted by clever little gizmos which were supposed to be 'green' but of course, the most environmentally-friendly decision would have been to leave them in the shop!

foxgloves

Budget-friendly stuff today.......
*Felt a bit of a smuggins because I'd remembered to budget for the piano tuner's visit today. So much better than flying by the seat of my pants like I used to do with money back in the day.....in fact, I'm surprised there was any seat left IN my pants, I was so silly with my finances!
*Iced the Christmas cake. I either make royal icing or buy a pack of fondant. This year, I've used fondant. As usual, I used a couple of my festive biscuit cutters to make the shapes for decorating it - mini-stars & Christmas trees this time, with silver balls & some traditional china decorations. As I was going for a retro vibe, I also added a cake frill rather than a ribbon. Naturally, while engaged in a fiddly bit of icing-gluing, I heard the unmistakable sound of a bauble being bounced off the tree & discovered Soot having a bit of a kick-around on the windowsill. For some reason, this started him off on lunch pester 2 hours early so he was one big meow-machine.
*Did a quick fairly cba clean of downstairs, including bathroom - usual minimal products & washable cloths. Changed towels - am intending a big final laundry load before Christmas then I am on laundry-strike until after the festivities.
*More freezer eat-ups tonight - have defrosted 2 portions of the courgette, potato & cheddar soup I batch-cooked during the courgette glut & we will have that with scrambled eggs on toast.
*Did a few surveys.
*Did one minor budget update, mainly because I also wanted to check that Mr F's salary is in (early Dec pay-day.......gosh, how I loved those pre-LBM when I was always broke & dreading my cards being blocked any minute! And yes, of course I knew it would make for a more financially hellish January, but not enough to stop me thinking, "I've been paid a week early, whoooo-hoooooo!"
And that's it for today. As I am NOT the best scrambled egg-maker in the relationship, I shall be doing nothing more energetic than having a bath, sorting my witchy tresses & reading a few more chapters of Elizabeth George.
F x

Sun_Addict

I’m glad my employer doesn’t pay early at Christmas. Although these days it wouldn’t make any difference. We are paid on the last working day of the month and not a day earlier😆

BeachSiren

What a gorgeous Christmas cake 😋😋😋

thriftmonster

The Christmas cake is beautiful. 
We do pay early (23rd) although I offer the option to postpone to the end of the month. No-one has ever taken it.  So then I'll pay January 3-4 days early and it all evens up by the end of Feb

Makingabobor2

Lovely cake.x

Suffolk_lass

thriftmonster said:

The Christmas cake is beautiful. 
We do pay early (23rd) although I offer the option to postpone to the end of the month. No-one has ever taken it.  So then I'll pay January 3-4 days early and it all evens up by the end of Feb

That is kind, flattening out the gap a bit

foxgloves

Hello Christmas Fairies,
Hope everyone has had a decent morning. Very foggy here first thing but the sun has pushed through & it is so uplifting to see some brightness after all the grey & rain. It's been a odds & sods morning here, as we are off out later & staying late to eat with friends. It involves a rather tedious diagonal drive across to the other side of the county, so am hoping we don't meet hideous traffic. We will doubtless meet hideous footfall kind of traffic later, though as we are calling in at a retail park for M of the S & the Blue & Yellow Swedish Emporium. Have heard it was hell yesterday so here's to hoping we can actually get onto the site. Back when petrol prices were going up almost daily, we decided that every time we need to go into the city centre or across the other side of the county, we will try to combine our primary purpose with something else, so as to save on making a 2nd trip. I may be ruing this previously sensible-sounding decision later this afternoon!
Other budget-friendly efforts:
*As he was going out for a paper, Mr F decided to brave Waitbl00m for last (ish) of the festive groceries. He got there at 8.30 & it was already crazy. His free latte apparently helped though! Have had a look at December's grocery budget & we have just over £30 left & only need to buy a couple of french sticks, so it is currently looking like there will be an underspend. We do have to pick up the turkey on the 24th but have already allocated the money for that.
*Entered 4 competitions.
*Noticed conservatory windowsills looking very grubby - the condensation in there doesn't help, so with the help of the de-humidifier & a pile of cloths from the rag bag, I have cleaned all the sills & window frames. Although we often eat on our laps in the winter, our conservatory is our dining room & I shall be setting the table nicely, etc, & it will be much nice eating in there if I am not trying to ignore general grub. Gave my boots a clean too while I was at it.

BTW, thanks for the kind comments about my Christmas cake. I always go for easy icing options. Either I make royal icing & do the traditional rough snowy peaks, or as this time, I buy a pack of fondant & use festive biscuit cutters for the design. I think I did bells with silver ball 'clappers' last year, I can't remember, but it is certainly a VERY easy way to ice & decorate a Christmas cake as doesn't require any innate artistic ability or modelling skills.

Interesting how December pay arrangements differ between employers. Mr F was paid yesterday but it makes no difference at all here because our December budget is set up to run from 27th Nov to 26th Dec, so that money will just sit in our account untouched until I set January's budget, which looks like it will be around 29th. It may be a long time ago now, but I still vividly remember those awful January bills.....huge sigh of relief once January was finally over, then February's finances were even worse because on top of everything else, I'd have made frequent trips to the January sales! Oh my word, I couldn't go back to that!
Right, I shall stop yakking on now & think about getting ready to go out.
Have a good day, everyone,
F x 

daisy_1571

When I first started proper budgeting,  I had a line called January where I used to put £2 a month to give us a little cushion in January.   Gradually it increased a bit but over time like you foxgloves its now unnecessary as each month stands alone so we don't get the peaks and troughs. 

Even £22 might make a difference to some peoples January though if its a helpful idea.  £2 maybe isn't too much to set aside each month

Dxx