From Frugal Foundations to Fortified Family Future

themadvix

Belated hooray to the holiday booking GP! You work so hard to manage the budget, it's good to know there's room allowed for a trip away. Will there be caves nearby?

I was offered mangoes the other day and declined - regretting that now as (*stops to check Olio*) mango chutney levels are getting lower (it makes the sweetcorn dhansak) and a mango dhal sounds nice too... Oh well, next time!

Greying_Pilgrim

tmv - I don't know on the caves - but I will research!  Thanks for the prompt.  Mmmm, if I'm being honest, the holiday is not (currently) fully budgeted for - especially after coming so 'soon' after our previous little getaway. I've paid the deposit and have a couple of weeks to get the balance (which will probably rely on borrowing a bit from another budget, but I will find the money!)   I'm hopeful that we can save here and there, and combine visits to one or two places I've had my eye on, either on the trip out, or on the way back home. They are smaller museums/attractions, so are less likely to be included in any discounter schemes, so I may only be able to get reduced admission by pre-booking online, but again, with planning, I could make that happen.  

The accommodation is the same price for 3 nights as it is for 4 (over a weekend or not over a weekend).  It's SC, so there are savings to be made on food, doing what we normally do.  And anything that I can save as 'spending' money, will either go towards paid entry to somewhere, or some form of 'eating out', even if that's just an ice-cream or a bag o' chips.  I actually don't mind if this holiday is a little bit more 'reading/eating/sleeping/relaxing' - as long as none of us get bored.  But neither do I want it to be scheduled within an inch of each daylight hour.  

There are several EngH options - although they are pretty much 'free to roam' and no gift shop on exit..... not a  problem for me, but LG prefers membership entry and a gift shop to meander through 😂  I'm pretty sure it's low on NT places, so there will probably be no value in scraping together the membership fee for that.  I'm pretty sure we've been to most of the houses/gardens before, and there is nothing that I can think of that would either absolutely light LG's fire or would be of relevance to some school work or something.  Although we don't know what curriculum subjects cover what, so there's no way I can plan anything anyway.  

I wouldn't buy a mango routinely, but I have to say we have enjoyed the ones we've had in the boxes.  LG isn't overly keen - I think it's the slight 'slimeness' that puts them off, but fingers crossed, cooked, that issue may not arise.  I am wondering whether I'll get away with 'similar' teas, two nights on the trot, but it doesn't happen very often.  If push came to shove and the mango only yields a small dhal quantitiy, I could always give LG some lentil bolognese that is in the freezer.  Thank heavens I have options!

Greying X

themadvix

I am kind of with LG 😂 - it's nice to have a browse (even with no intention of purchasing) and it feels like more of a 'thing' if you've had to pay to get in (getting more for your money too, I guess!).

I have no doubt whatsoever that you'll find the money to cover all the costs.

pennywisepoundstupid

Fab that you have booked a break away, always lovely to have something to look forward to.

Hopefully with it being half term there will be quite a few free events on, I live in Lancashire and frequently look at the visit Lancashire site to see what events are coming up, we have already pencilled in the big free firework display that will be on in Blackpool in the coming weeks (well a bag of chips will be bought).Might be worth having a look at whatever county you are visiting website to see what free events are on. You probably already know this as you are so on it GP, but just thought i would mention it.

Greying_Pilgrim

tmv - the one thing about the places that have receptions at EngH, is that they often have the audio guides to loan out - which are really good.  And even a ditch, or a motte and bailey, or bronze age settlement could do with a bit of expert commentary - it's not always easy to work out what you're looking at.   Or is that just me 🤔😂

Greying X

themadvix

Greying_Pilgrim said:

tmv - the one thing about the places that have receptions at EngH, is that they often have the audio guides to loan out - which are really good.  And even a ditch, or a motte and bailey, or bronze age settlement could do with a bit of expert commentary - it's not always easy to work out what you're looking at.   Or is that just me 🤔😂

Greying X

Definitely not just you! I can see why that makes it much more interesting for LG too!

rtandon27

@Greying_Pilgrim - there are also 400 downloadable tracks here that could be of interest to use alongside your adventures!

...and free virtual guides are available on the EH site itself which is very MSE

Greying_Pilgrim

Thanks rt - that listing looks spiffy, and I bet one of the EH sites that we'd be 'daft' not to go visit, has it's own little podcasty thing.  If we go there, we can make a day of it, visiting a nearby town too, reminiscing about our wedding day and all soppy stuff like that 🥰😂  But it will knit together to form an interesting, but low-cost day, so thanks hun 😁

Right, I'm back from my little pootle to the metropolitan town across the way - well, a retail park on the outskirts of it.  I didn't get what I was after ☹️  But I did pop into the huge MrT, and noticed that they have their special offer on world food items again.  I didn't get any of the lentils, as I have plenty, but they were CC price £2 a kg.  There was channa dhal, chick peas and......mung beans too I think.  I did, however, pick up a big bag of EE Garam Masla for £2.80, and it smells heavenly.  It reminds me instantly of weezl74 and her budget recipes that used garam masala as the only spice for sweet or savoury.  I tell you, some of this garam masala in a fruit/apple cake will transport you into autumn cosiness in a nano-second!  I also purchased some of the growersharvest microwave rice in ordinary and wholegrain versions.  We don't routinely use them, but I find they are handy on holiday, if there's a microwave in the kitchen, as it's less mess to make, to accompany a curry or whatever.  I was going to buy some from the world foods aisle, but the brand.....is is something like basharti?  was actually only 5p cheaper than the hB product I've bought in the past, and it was only dated until the start of Nov, so I passed on that.  I did also pick up a pack of paprika (oh - get me making up tongue twisters! 😂), and 3 packs of YS'd wholemeal baps.  The reduction was only a third, but better than nowt, and they've immediately gone in the freezer for another day.  

I did also pick up a few bits in hB.  

Coming back I took the rural route, and called into a little car park for a EH site and drank a coffee from my thermal mug.  I then set off again, and had to laugh, as I was thinking of you dear folk.  The farmers were obviously bringing in the tattie harvest and on one road, there were stray 'road kill' tatties all along the carriageway.  Unfortunately, they were single tatties, maybe 300 - 500m apart.  But it did cross my mind, "what would the gang do?" 🤣 Unfortunately, it probably wasn't worth stopping and gathering each tattie, as the road, although not too narrow, and not overly twisty-turny, is a rat run that cuts out a congested A route, and folk do tend to put their foot down.  

I will need to do some totting up, as part of what I bought is from 'bulk' purchases, and some is from grocery budget.  I think I will count the stuff for our holiday in this month's grocery budget, as it'll all help to keeping things affordable - and encourages me not to bust the budget this month!

Ta for popping in.  

EDIT:  Whoop!  Found the relevant audio guide for the EH site, thanks again rt!

Greying X

kayannie

GP -- I'd forgotten all about roadkill potatoes! Until 5 years ago, we lived in.a potato farming area & at this time of year there were always plenty on the roads to collect. There was one sharp bend in the road in particular where you could guarantee to find them as they fell off the overloaded trailer.

Luckily it was a quiet country road !

KA

Greying_Pilgrim

👋 to kayannie - long time no "see" is everything OK in your neck of the woods - is your hubby recovered?

So Mango Dal was a bit hit and miss.  I made it mostly as per recipe - although because i was using masoor dal rather than toor dal, I didn't bother making it in the PrC.  I did stick a tin of black eyed beans in the mix, and I used some garam masala too.  When it came to adding the mango at the end of cooking, I hit a snag, as when I cut into the mango, I discovered it was busy going rotten from the inside out ☹️ By the time the stone was taken into consideration, I suppose there was little more than 10% flesh to use ☹️ Most disappointing.  There was so little, it was not obvious it was even in the dal - which was OK from LG's point of view I guess.  So I took a suggestion from the recipe and popped some spinach in there.  I then promptly forgot to add coriander as I got distracted when I was warming up the mini naans I'd bought today, and managed to burn them to a cinder ☹️ We could have had the dal on it's own, but I dug out a couple of sachets of microwave rice and zapped them.  

The dal was ok, and got eaten up.  Had I thought it thru a bit better, i could have avoided spending/wasting 99p and used some wholemeal wraps instead. bums. 

Yoghurt and banana for pud.  frugal re-set.

Sometimes I think I try a bit too hard, and overthink things.  Simple would have been the way forward with this tea.  

Today has been a bit of a 'not achieved much' coz it's gone wrong.  But I'm still here.  I've got a new recipe that I would make again.  The fam. didn't outright reject the principle of just having dal for tea - even if I didn't actually present that as a final dish. And I had a bit of a change of scene this morning.  All good.

Greying X