Resourcefulness: The budgeter's friend

marionmgcars

I’m away visiting family over Christmas.  Thought budget was doing well until I had to fill up with petrol for journey back, and a visit to supermarket for a few “essentials”   Back tomorrow, and the budget book will be out, c/cards cleared before year end and a good analysis of money spent in 2023.  

Blackcats

The imaginary turkey eye ball made me smile. As a child I vividly remember biting into a kidney in a homemade steak and kidney pie and being sure that a squirt of wee came out into my mouth.  I still cannot contemplate eating a kidney.   A couple of years ago I asked the butcher if this was possible and he said it could be so I felt vindicated. 

foxgloves

@badmemory - I have never been paid 4-weekly, but I can imagine that it throws up a few challenges. I hope you have got your spreadsheets as straight as they can be now. 
@Blackcats - Oh that did make me laugh about the wee! I can kind of believe it though. Back when I was at school, I remember that the time we were learning about offal for 'Food & Nutrition' O-level, we were also learning about kidneys & the human waterworks in biology. I think those of us studying both subjects listened to our very old-school cookery teacher telling us about the process of soaking kidneys in milk for a while prior to use "to tenderise them" & were all sitting there secretly thinking, "Nope, it's to get rid of the wee!".

Well, the use of the various festive/post-festive resources continues. We decided to have a really good look at our pantry & freezer contents last night before writing a master meal plan for January & selecting next week's meals from it to inform today's shopping list. Apart from all the meals I made from my turkey leftovers batch cook, there is also spare pastry which will make a quiche, oddments of sausages & bacon, loads of nice crackers, wine & various other things from a hamper bag gifted by Mr F's sister, plenty of fruit & at least half of a sack of potatoes. Remaining mince pies & other sweet stuff will do for desserts meaning we can cut down on buying yoghurt ( a saving, as I usually only like the more expensive ones) & Mr F has conceded that he won't starve if he has a nice bowl of home made soup followed by boiled eggs & toast or cheese on toast for dinner now & again. In fact, last night, we had a bowl of my home made turkey soup to which I added a few home made dumplings & it was surprisingly nice - simple, but perfect for a chilly night where we fancied something less rich than recent festive meals. There is sufficient suet left (it was bought for my mincemeat-making) to do the same again. Mr F also volunteered to make macaroni cheese on New Year's Day, using all sorts of cheese leftovers. The turkey slices in gravy I froze can be defrosted along with the frozen surplus stuffing to provide a 'free' Sunday dinner, as we will only need to buy carrots & greens. Other meals on the January master plan are use-it-ups - the last of the homemade pesto pots, ditto the batch cooked tomato pasta sauce I made back when we had the tomato glut. Then we looked at ingredients we have in stock, where we would only need to buy the meat - so added in WW one-pot goulash, as I know there is a chunked-up red pepper in the freezer & we have everything else. An affordable pork shoulder from our local market butcher will provide the rest of our meals. That's all sounding good, as I mentioned yesterday that I have budgeted £50 less than usual for January's groceries & have already sent that money across to the Savings Pots. Today's grocery shop came to under £24, so I like to think we are off to a good start. Mr F has been squirrelling all sorts of leftovers & spare single portions away in microwaveable mugs for winter work lunches, especially on his late & occasionally very late shifts, which of course is beneficial in terms of offering more variety, but also in reducing spend on things like ham, chicken & other stuff to put in sandwiches. I also noted that I have a small jar of mincemeat left so will use that for either a Cranks belgian cake or a small batch of mincemeat muffins. Again, these will do for dessert as well as packed lunches or simply taking out with us with a flask of coffee to avoid coffee shop visits if our Personal Spends start to feel a bit 'end of the month-y'. 
I am determined not to waste anything that will help keep our January grocery budget firmly on track. I'm evangelical about leftovers all year round, but find it even more helpful to re-cast them in my mind's eye as 'resources' because we do, all of us, want to start the new year on a firm footing with our financial goals, do we not?
My Mum, who hated cooking, hated leftovers even more.....she was a wartime child in a family which didn't have much money, so had to eat everything on her plate. Every Christmas when all the grandparents used to come to ours, she used to start clearing the Christmas lunch table asap so as to get leftover sprouts, etc, thrown out for the birds before Nana could round them up for making bubble & squeak. Nana used to see her scuttling down the garden in her Christmas pinny & say "Look at naughty ****** wasting all those lovely vegetables". And the sprouts? Well, they would still be sitting there in February as the birds wouldn't touch them! I think Mum wasn't entirely sure that Nana wouldn't remove them from the bin to make a frugal point, so wanted to make sure they were both muddy & well out of reach!! So many funny little memories of Christmasses past - I have been an 'orphan' since 2018 & especially miss Mum & Dad at this time of year, as they very much enjoyed the festivities & as musicians were heavily involved on that side of things too. 
Well, the headache I have had all day has almost gone since I started chatting to you, so I am hoping I shall feel like our planned New Year's Eve walk tomorrow if the weather decides to be kind. If not, Plan B is my favourite garden centre to see what they are giving away in the sales. Would prefer the walk, so fingers crossed!
F x

Cheery_Daff

Fingers crossed indeed! Lovely to hear your memories of Christmas past 😊

Blackcats

My mum who is probably of a similar era to yours wouldn't touch 3rd day meat.  So our Sunday roast was ok for cold meat and mash on Monday but no more.  

You are right it is a time for missing absent family and friends but also remembering the joy they brought to festivities.  My mum looked forward all year to Christmas pudding and cream for breakfast on Boxing Day.

joedenise

Liked the sound of the WW goulash so looked to see if I could find the recipe on line!  Pleased to say I found it and have saved it on my laptop and that will get added into a menu plan at some point.  Thank you.

ladyholly

I used to love bubble and squeak that my mum made but haven't had it for years. Along with a very long list of other foods mr lh doesn't like it so I don't bother just for me

EssexHebridean

Ooh goodness - cold meat on a Monday, there’s a childhood memory! While any roasting joint we have for a Sunday dinner always does additional meals, it’s very rare for us to have it cold on a Monday these days! 

Glad you were able to work the usual magic with your turkey - I was quite pleased with what ours has provided too - it was a 4.7kg one so one of the smaller ones our supplier does, but equally they very generously don’t charge more for the higher weight (we paid for a straight 4 kilo bird) and like you we buy a free range one. As well as Christmas dinner for 3, and then the remainder of the first breast being sliced off for Mum to portion and freeze for herself, I got 2 further double portions of slices, 4 tubs of chunks, 3 large and one slightly smaller tubs of stock, plus two days Christmas dinner sandwiches from it - that will do nicely! Very glad to have asked for a backbone too as that provided sufficient meat for 2 further meals for the pair of us - not bad at all for free! 

Sun_Addict

By coincidence my mom hated cooking too. If M&S didn’t sell it ready made she wasn’t interested - even mashed potato! Their food hall profits must have taken a nose dive when she passed bless her. Interesting that we both love to cook from scratch. I definitely didn’t inherit this trait from my grandmothers as one died before I was born, sadly, and the other was far too posh to cook 😆

marionmgcars

oh I don’t think I could stomach kidneys in any shape or form now, after reading yr comments.  It did make me giggle tho.  X