Resourcefulness: The budgeter's friend

foxgloves

@rtandon27 - Yes, everyone to whom I could donate courgettes either lives too far away or are inundated with the fiends themselves.

@Suffolk_lass - I like your idea of soup ingredient bags. If I had more freezer space, I think I'd defo do that, but I think space-wise, for us, it would be about the same as making the soup & freezing it in stackable containers. We could do with a chest freezer for stuff we grow but absolutely nowhere to put one. We have an under counter freezer with 3 deep pull-out drawers & the 2 shelves in our fridge freezer. That isn't really enough for a batch-cooking veggie gardener.
F

foxgloves

@Kantankrus_Mare - We do like stilton, though only tend to buy it on high days & holidays as Mr F can be a cheese hoover & tbh, I have form for that myself. I think swapping out the cheddar for stilton would feel like quite a festive soup so I think I will aim to do a batch for freezing & eating in December. 
We do both like courgettes as a side veg, but stir-fried, not steamed. I do them in the wok with a couple of cloves of garlic. Browning them a bit adds flavour. I find the oil needs to be really hot before tipping them in so that the heat sort of seals them, otherwise they put out quite a lot of liquid & end up steaming anyway.
I think all the rain has kicked up production.
F

foxgloves

@Cheery_Daff - No, I haven't as I don't have a dehydrator. I did think about buying one some years ago but talked myself out of it as some of the reviews back then suggested that the trays didn't hold that much. There were very few domestic models around then so I expect  choice is much better now. I only really dry herbs, chillies & occasional seeds such as fennel.
F

foxgloves

And now for today's post, which is something of nothing really as haven't been up to much.
*Not a no-spend day as have had my piano tuned & will need to pay the tuner. This was budgeted for in August's budget though so isn't an unforeseen bill.
*Picked a week's worth of meals from the August master meal list.
*Wrote shopping list & Mr F is picking up the Waitbl00m portion tonight on his drive past. He had a decent choice of loyalty money off offers this week. Last week was a bit heavy on ready made sandwiches & stuff we don't buy.
*Made tomorrow's packed lunch & breakfast.
*Today's garden pickings: Hot green chillies (fuego), jalapenos, 6 courgettes & a cucumber.
*Very easy meal tonight....pasta with home made pesto & courgette batons topped with grated cheese.
*Feel I've had a good free stretching session as I took advantage of the sunshine to start cutting back one of my big flower borders. I'm cutting back straggly stuff hard as good chance we'll get a few more flowers at the end of this month & into next.
I'm off upstairs with the vacuum now. Friday is my cleaning day & if I've already done upstairs, I shall get off to a good start.
Then I shall be back outside for a couple of chapters of my book.
F x

milann

I’ve had yet another rubbish year with courgettes. The flowers are just falling off again. Ds gave me the baby plants he started and his are going great guns. In fact I have a lot of his that I’m using. I love courgette omelette for breakfast and also sliced thinly covered in cheese and roasted. 

foxgloves

Sounds as though your courgettes are failing to pollinate, @milann. I haven't put any in an omelette yet, so that's another possibility. I also have a veggie moussaka recipe somewhere, which uses aubergines or courgettes & I:ve made that with both. I could look that out & get it onto the meal plans at some point too.
F

weenancyinAmerica

Here we can dehydrate courgettes on a tray in the back window of the car - it is hot enough. When I lived in Utah, we dehydrated a lot and put it in jars to make muffins and cakes during the winter. Love the muffins made that way.

foxgloves

@weenancyinAmerica - I can see a few uses for a dehydrator if I were to buy one, but I think I'm very unlikely to do so. I don't have any free cupboard space & don't really want any more appliances out on the work surface. I have my kitchenaid, coffee machine, toaster & crock-pot slow cooker out all the time, plus scales & a big plate rack & that leaves sufficient worktop space free for cooking, etc. 
Our hot weather has disappeared! We have had rain for days & temperatures have been more like early autumn.
F

Debsnewbudget

I kept an eye on dehydrators on F’book mkt place
managed to pick one up from a woman who was buying an even bigger one
I don’t keep it in the kitchen though

Cheery_Daff

I love mine, but I really don't use it as often as I'd like to. Mostly I've dried reduced mushrooms and orange slices for Christmas decorations 😂 I have grand delusions about making fruit leather etc but never actually got round to it. Definitely not something to bother with if you don't have the space to store it (space isn't something we struggle with here - but energy and time to clean said space sadly is 😂)