From Frugal Foundations to Fortified Family Future

Greying_Pilgrim

So lunch is munched - LG was disappointed that soup was on offer ☹️ But then asked for seconds 🙄Anyhoo, it filled us all up and there was a splodge left over, that could be used either as soup, but more likely as dhal - it had all the same ingredients and had thickened up.  

I made chocolate chip chocolate buns this morning, and realised that I didn't have much flour 🙄 So, I just made them, and used the last of the flour to make a blueberry steamed pudding in the SC this afternoon.  I have pizza dough proving and will make wedges with the AB red r00ster tatties.  I think we might have sausage pizza and cheese and tommie pizza.  Keep your fingers crossed for us that the dough second rises enough to make detroit style pizza, although with no plain flour in the dough, that may not occur.  

DH & LG went for a pootle on the bikes after lunch.  

We're currently watching the British Moto GP - not live, obvs.  EEK, I cannae imagine crashing on a motorbike at whatever speed they are going 😬

Fingers crossed the washing has dried.  We did have one really sharp shower - it lasted about 10 minutes ☹️but hopefully the strength of the breeze is enough to counteract the wetting.  

Right, wedges to set going.  

Greying X

edinburgher

If you have any N3ctar points left Mr S has some nice strawberries for £1. Seemed churlish not to at that price

Greying_Pilgrim

Aw ed - that's good to know.  At present, I have just over £1 (cash) left of my budget, and the £3.50 MrT voucher.  I don't have sufficient nectar points (currently) to make a £2.50 block.  But we'll see how this week goes, and I will certainly bear the fruit in MrS in mind, as it would be nice to have some strawberries😁

Tea was tasty.  I made 2 pizzas.  I didn't quite get the dough portions right, and one was 'true Detroit', the other was a little more on the basics/valoo/smartyprice side of pizza making 🫤  However, the smaller pizza was actually very nice - I think in part as the HM tommie sauce was reasonably flavourful.  We all had a slice of each flavour and some of the red r00ster tatties, and there were 7 slices of pizza over to put in the freezer for another day.  I only used 10 of the qu0rn cocktail sausages chopped up, so there are sausages left over for adding to another meal.  Pud was blueberry steamed pudding with a ball of vanilla flavour ice-cream.  There is steam pudding left over for tomorrow.  I only had cornflour left to dust the blueberries in, so i was quite pleased that they didn't all sink to the bottom, and had sort of been suspended throughout the sponge mix.  The pudding used up the last of the plain flour.  



No money spent today.  But we've fed and variously entertained ourselves.  Plus there has been food made, eaten, plus stashed for another day.  The washing dried - although it's yet to be folded and put away.  

An all-round good day.  

Greying X

rtandon27

Another glorious meal GP! I'm mighty envious of pizza & wedges, though I did have to check the calendar to make sure it was not Friday! 😂

If only you were closer - I'd have come by bearing cheap strawberries & free cream for pud - and a pack of 28p custard creams that OH seems to have picked up at MrS.  We know how to live it up! 🤣

Greying_Pilgrim

rt - you are so kind 🥰 

Panic not though.  We have food, and certainly, if I'm around MrS this week, I shall look out the fruit.  Thinking about it logically, I could 'cash in' the collection of tuppences and pennies etc, as LG is no longer participating in a club excursion that we were saving for, so I do have them available.  And even if my grocery budget total goes up a few pounds, £170-ish for a month is still a low spend, so I don't feel bad about it - a few pennies/pounds/vouchers added here and there is just the equivalent of a YS haul, or being in the area when the food waste diversion scheme is open.  In theory we could be spending 'holiday' budgets this week, but in reality, that budget has taken a beating since February half-term, and it could do with a little respite - so that we're not scratting around for pennies come the Summer hols.  Also, we need to let the dust settle a little once the car payment is made, to see what the damage is and what 'saving pot topping up' takes priority, because certainly in the short-term, a little borrowing from one pot to another is having to take place.  

Clearly May's grocery budget was super-tight, but I went into it with my eyes open, and my goal was clear.  I don't have to cope like this all the time.  But one thing that has occurred to me this past 6 months or so, is that I can trim the budget.  It does mean that we have more 'pedestrian' options, and given that we don't eat out, or have takeaways, that can sometimes appear to be a bit mean.  My intention is never to be 'sack cloth and ashes'.  But the flip side is that sometimes when we have 'nice things' - particularly if they are seasonal or fully ripe, is that we savour them much more.  A stick of UK asparagus will always be a treat for me - as will be a perfectly ripe strawberry or Scottish Raspberry.  And I think rt highlight's something important too - food can taste all the better when shared............🥰

The weather can't make it's mind up with us, but I've optimistically put a line of washing out.  'Normal' day wear and the last bit of school uniform.  

Lunch will definitely be egg sangers as I didn't use up the last 2 (bb today) eggs in baking yesterday.  When LG was moaning about it being soup for lunch yesterday, I did say that they would moan if I'd have put out egg sangers - and they stated "I wouldn't, I ❤️ egg sandwiches".  Shall we take bets on what the response will be today..........

Right, can't think of owt else MSE, so I'll push orf.

Greying X

kayannie

I'm with you on seasonal foods, especially asparagus. We moved from an area where it was grown - we used to visit the farm shop regularly during asparagus time & would purchase the bags of what they called soup bags. I never wasted it on soup, we ate it over several days, thoroughly enjoying it! I refuse to buy it when it's imported from Peru, Mexico etc, it's more of a treat when we've waited  12 months for it.  Although the shops are stocking the British grown at the moment, it doesn't seem to have the same taste as the freshly picked.

I realise that if we want to eat things like bananas, oranges etc then we have to buy imports, but I do make an effort to purchase home grown as much as possible.

The garden will be providing some fruit & veg before long, we're enjoying the rhubarb at the moment. I can't remember if you've mentioned if you have a garden & are able to grow some food? 

KA

Greying_Pilgrim

Hi kayannie - we used to occasionally get given 'seconds' of British asparagus by a rellie who lived near to a market garden that grew asparagus (they got it legitimately - didn't go in under the cover of darkness 😉) and that tasted completely different to anything I have ever bought.   They've moved now ☹️  I only purchase asparagus in the UK season (unless some is in a waste box - I'll use it, but not buy the imported produce). But our only asparagus this year has been from the MrS box - but we made good use of it, and still have a couple of pieces of asparagus pizza left in the freezer.

We do have an outdoor space, but currently we can't cultivate straight in the soil - it's rock hard clay, and we've nowhere that pots/tubs/growbags could easily be set up.  I did look wistfully at a tomato plant at the greengrocers the other day, but realistically anything that grew would end up being about £1 per fruit..... 🙄 Renovating the garden isn't the priority as there was so much to do with the house.  However, the first thing we will HAVE to do is replace fencing panels, as they won't survive another stormy autumn - and are, most likely, like everything else, original to the time the house was built 🙄That has to take priority over any 'nice to have' landscaping ☹️If access and money were no problem, I'd get the landscapers in with a mini-digger, it'd be levelled within a morning.  

Greying X

rtandon27

@Greying_Pilgrim - taking a page out of your book, we had pizza for dinner today (and it's not even Friday!) - no wedges as we could not summon the energy to make them!

We seem to have gone over our grocery budget for the month by almost 9 pounds (just bought our normal everything this has got to be inflation creep) so this last week of the month will be eating from what's in the house - we have enough in the stores and the freezer to last until June so will have to take that extra 9 out of next month's budget!

Greying_Pilgrim

Oh rt - that £9 is annoying isn't it when it's not down to "frippery", just buying the same things, but they've gone up in price.  For sure we're going through another time of rising prices - it's noticeable on a number of products each week, and not just by tuppence, but 10, 15, 20 pence ☹️

Well, we've had a good day.  I did use the last 2 eggs to make eggs sandwiches at lunchtime and LG did not complain.  I made a small saucepan of carrot and coriander soup to go with.  The last MrS box I bought had carrots in it - alot of snapped off pieces (perfectly fine, just not whole carrots) - so I figured I had better make soup with them.  I also put in the very last white potato that I had - I think it was a 'Melody' from the 2kg bag that was in the MrL box a couple of weeks ago.  I was a little heavy handed with the 'fresh' coriander, so I don't think LG was as enamoured with it as they have been previously.  But it wasn't a huge bowlful, so it did all get eaten.  

For tea tonight, I utilised the last of the qu0rn sausages, and made a 'sort of' mediterranean style pasta.  There was onion, the last of the celery, garlic, mixed peppers, the last of the sausages chopped up, tomato paste, white wine vinegar and some Italian seasoning.  I used fusilli pasta.  It worked ok, and LG loves anything with pasta, so it was 'clean plates' without even trying.  For dessert we finished off the blueberry steam pudding and had a ball of vanilla icecream with it again.  I was going to put yoghurt, but we're running low on that - I'll have to buy more before the month is out.  My fault for putting some in the soup yesterday 🙄 But it felt like we were eating 'what we had' today, and certainly used things up - no waste 😁which is always important to me.  LG and DH had a hot chocolate this afternoon - and whilst I don't think there is all that much powder left, it did also finish up the last of the mini marshmallows that were in the cupboard.  

No money spent today.  And another day closer to pay day 😁

I counted up the loose change - I have £6 available to bank, which is more than I expected.  We may yet have Strawberries before the end of May - thanks for the idea ed!  Certainly as we are on HT I shall try to tiptoe the line between what we really will need, and what might be nice to have.  If I use all the £6 - which will give me freedom to shop in MrS, MrL or wherever, I may not use the MrT voucher.  We'll see - it would still be a low spend month if I spent the whole £9.50 - but that wasn't really the object of the exercise - but neither was wearing sack cloth and ashes.

Greying X

Greying_Pilgrim

Good Afternoon MFW'rs

Late post from me, but then we did get out and about this morn, intending to miss the rain, but we didn't quite manage that ☹️ The rain started about 1hr before the forecast said it would, so we got damp walking into Greying Town, and even wetter walking out - although we did miss the heaviest rainfall, which came, as scheduled after 11am.

I have moved some cash about so that DD's going out at the end of the month will be met.   LG deposited the coinage I'd counted up in their bank account and I have transferred £6 to my card, so that I can buy groceries this week.  It was quite a 'moment' in the bank when LG said that they wanted to check their balance, and they bowled up to the cashpoint - with only a brief reminder from me of their pin - and proceeded to look about 30, getting some moolah out for a night of drinks and disco dancing 🤣DH and I were looking on - a place, increasingly, I think we are going to find ourselves; as LG continues to grow and blossom 😥

DH needed to check something at his bank, so we trooped in there and found that they were having a bake sale for a local charity.  So we bought 3 cakes - there was HM or bought, and we went for HM.  I was - hopefully - generous with our donation, as we do support that particular charity anyway, and we brought the cakes home to have at elevenses.  The cake tasted very nice, so I was glad that we'd supported the charity and had a nice treat.  

One of the food waste outlets was open today, so we called in on the way home.  They appear to have changed how they operate, and a volunteer was busy bagging everything into brown paper bags (not something that has previously been done), like you'd get at the greengrocers.  I heard the volunteer snap something about donation and wave the collecting tin, to an older person perusing the bread.  Another older person came for a browse, but left empty-handed, which prompted a snippy comment from the volunteer, and when I had a browse, I spotted that the charity was now....... "anticipating" a (defined) monetary contribution 'per bag'.  What was not clear - because this is surplus/waste produce - was whether the charge was per paper bag, or whether it was for all that you put into your bag to take away.  As you can imagine, 2 out of date baps, or a handful of in pod peas - constituted a bag.........  If the charge was per paper bag, you'd end up paying the equivalent of shopping at Ha**0ds for a bit of bread and veg.  As I walked away empty-handed, the volunteer aimed a very clipped comment at me too 😱  There were things on offer we could have used, but I'm afraid if the charity thinks that they can start charging "full price" for stuff, they are going to alienate the very people that need them the most.  I appreciate that the service can be useful to anyone who tries to live 'lightly' and along 'green principles' - and people may be generous with their contribution, but anticipating that "everyone" will donate for out of date food, that they have no choice over, and for which the unit price is above general supermarket prices, seems a little out of whack to me.  I hope I read the sign incorrectly and misunderstood the definition of 'bag'......... 

Lunch was soup - as we were all a bit soggy when we got home.  It was tomato, pasta and bean, and it all got eaten.  I think we'll probably need something 'light' for tea, as other than a walk into Greying Town, we won't be up to much today, because of the weather.  

Greying X