Make Do, Mend & Minimise in 2025 (and 2024)

Katiehound

Delia's red cabbage recipe is 2 parts red cabbage: 1 part apple : 1 part onion

Dutch apple cake: just one of the many recipes: https://thestaffoflifeblog.wordpress.com/2018/04/20/dutch-apple-cake-appelkoek-from-the-hairy-bikers/

pastry flan with apple & marzipan
https://www.potterscookshop.co.uk/blogs/news/easy-apple-marzipan-tart. I have a recipe from Home freezer digest where you grate the marzipan... the above looks fine

use apple to extend other fruit- apple & damsons, apple & apricots etc

bakewell tart with apple puree  instead of jam under the sponge
Eve's pudding
apple tart with meringue topping

Green_hopeful

@katiehound thank you so much. I am going to try all the fab recommendations as I still have about 20 apples. I ended up making apple crumble tonight. I used 7 cooking apples and Nigel Slater’s crumble from his green gage crumble recipe. I added some muesli from our lovely refill shop. We add lots of dried fruit and nuts to her normal muesli so it’s like mixed fruit and nut with a few oats. Our refill shop is often cheaper than the supermarkets and you only get what you need. 

London_1

Mended 
Jumper shoulder seam repaired, been on my too -do list, and finally on the been-done one  
DDs small tear in a pair of her summer trousers mended, took about ten minutes and saved her from throwing them out.

Made do
Made some HM biscuits with some odds and ends from the cupboard added the last bit of some chocolate drops to the mix and chopped up the end bit of a pot of place cherries and added them as well 

Minimised 
Took the left over meat from tonights half  leg of lamb (it fed myself, DD and son-in-law) and cut every bit off I could from the bone, now its in the fridge now covered over and will be turned into a shepherds pie tomorrow for the freezer. It will easily make enough for another meal for us three. The £10.90 half leg of lamb will have fed three on us two dinners each so I', pretty pleased with that, squeezing an extra dinner for us three.

streetching the meat out helps with the household budget I find, I hate wasting left overs, old habits die hard  

Cherryfudge

Make do - I'm trying to use up all the fresh stuff from the fridge so some gammon stock, leeks, carrot and potato have been soupified and put in the freezer, two jars of jam have been finished along with the last of a batch of porridge and half a punnet of mushrooms are drying in paper bags in the airing cupboard to save freezer space. Finished some cold meat, broccoli and roast potatoes for tea.

Mend: nothing recently though I have a pile of items I hope to get done soon.

Minimise: donated a surplus houseplant to my son in law, which also means space on a windowsill which will soon be filled with something else. We moved the freezer the other day, resulting in a couple of breakages and uncovering a couple of too-far-out-of-date larder items. Very slowly, the unlikely-to-be-used food is decreasing.

Moorviews

@Floss - thank you those look like great sites for future purchases. As I have prime I had already bought it that way. 

@Nelliegrace - I do the same and only half fill bottles. The top half goes down so much faster than the bottom half I find!

Nelliegrace

@London_1 Have you simmered the lamb bone with a bit of pearl barley and vegetables for Scotch broth? I save a bit of the lamb dripping to sauté the vegetables. 

London_1

Nelliegrace said:

@London_1 Have you simmered the lamb bone with a bit of pearl barley and vegetables for Scotch broth? I save a bit of the lamb dripping to sauté the vegetables. 

No  I would have done if I had been living on my own but as I now live with my DD and son-in-law and they have three dogs I'm afraid to bone went to the dogs :0 so it wasn't wasted

Made a decent sized shepherds pie with the remainder of the meat though and looking in the fridge discovered some Philly cheese so used the rest of that up to make the mash with, then popped some grated cheese on top and once cold its now in the freezer for an extra meal for the three of us later this week

Minimised
Tonights was Chicken Kiev and new potatoes and peas , My son-in-law always makes too many spuds so the few left over are now cold, and will be sliced and put into an omelette with some sliced mushroom stalks (also left over in the fridge, and a couple of sliced cherry tomatoes that need using up. That's tomorrows lunch for my son in law and I sorted and nothing wasted

Mended

a tiny hole in a favourite tee shirt of mine I think it got caught on something but a quick darn soon sorted it out also I darned a small hole in one of son-in-laws winter boots sock He's dug them out as when he walks the three dogs in the bad weather in the local woods it stay pretty boggy underfoot so boots are a necessity 

Made do.

Didn't bother with my daily paper this morning, still wading through Saturdays one with the giant crossword. Main reason I buy Saturdays one (£1.50 so its a treat for me) and it usually takes me until Wednesday or Thursday to finish it I keep it by my chair in the conservatory then do it a bit at a time with my morning coffee

Gosh I sound a real skinflint don't I  

JackieO xx

Cherryfudge

Good to have you back Jackie @London_1! How did your move go?

London_1

Cherryfudge .We picked the wettest day in July to move, and the M25 was horrendous, and I drove for a living for over 20 years and have never seen it so bad to be honest.
Cars were hurtling round with limited vision because of the teeming rain, it was so bad I came off at the leathered turn off and went through Bagshot to pick up the A3 which was safer

Finally arrived at Southampton for the ferry and DDs and my son-in-laws car was so delayed by the dreadful weather they had to divert to Portsmouth. We eventually got there and the chaps mover enough beds for them to sleep in, and returned in the morning to unload the rest of the stuff.
 I stayed in a local B&B just down the road and I just fell into bed I was so tired .
But next morning we got stuck in and got more or less sorted, but it's been a long slow progress as it was two households knocked into one, so still got a few boxes to sort out first.

The builder is coming tomorrow morning, as we are having the kitchen renovated, and the garage turned into a second sitting room for me. Hopefully he will be starting it by the end of the month. My bedroom is crammed with stuff to go into my sitting room and I can't wait t get straight and get all my bits and pieces around me

But apart from that alls well and the dogs love the freedom of the beaches and woods nearby and we like the peace and quiet of the island. 

DD and I are going up to the mainland to see my great granddaughter this weekend, silly sausage fell out of bed last night and broke her elbow so is in plaster at the moment . She's a tough little cookie though at four, she asked her Mum if she could play on her scooter after school today a determined little lass who never lets anything get her down  

We're staying at my sis-in-law Jan's in Faversham for a couple of nights and will also be going to see my other sis-in-law Val  in Bromley on Sunday as she's just finished her second round of chemo, and its not feeling to well bless her, she has lung cancer and we are not too sure how long she has left bless here.She's one of my oldest friends and I've known her well over 50 odd years.

Life can be so cruel at times she is one of the kindest nicest ladies you could imagine and its hard to see someone in pain and suffering but I know its possibly the last time I'll see her  I'd love to just pack her in the car and bring her home with us but she has a DD and two granddaughters who need her as well

Oh well I guess its time for bed as Zeberdee would say 

Night night God bless all here

JackieO xx

YorksLass

DH was finally discharged from hospital yesterday (Monday) rather than Saturday, even though the equipment he needs was delivered on Saturday lunchtime.  I think there was a communication breakdown between the first ward he was on and the one he was moved to.  Still, at least he's home now and had a peaceful first night.  He's on palliative end of care life at home and I'm finding the amount of support we're getting so welcome, but overwhelming at the same time.  The top of my sideboard looks like the inside of a chemist's shop   and I think I've just about managed to get my head around what he needs to take and when.  

In the meantime, I've defrosted the freezer (at last) so it's all clean and tidy.  It looks a bit empty but I bet I could still make another week's meals from what's left.  I left out two pork shoulder steaks to defrost and we're having those tonight in BBQ sauce with jacket potatoes and butter beans.  DH probably won't eat all his but I can either freeze the leftovers for another meal at some time or chop and stuff them in a soft tortilla for lunch tomorrow.  Tortillas aren't something I normally buy but the Co-op had them on clearance for 75p a box instead of the usual £4.20 so I bought two boxes.  I also got a nacho kit (£1.80 down from £3.95), a jar of crunchy peanut butter (normally £3.00 reduced to 56p) and a couple of jars of madras sauce (were £1.75, now 44p).  All well dated into May next year.

I had a grocery delivery this morning, all P&C, on time and with a very helpful delivery driver.  I didn't order anything for the freezer as I wanted to make sure it was all in working order first.  I will next week though as we're seriously short of fish-y things.  I also got some tins of soup and packs of microwave sponge puddings.  Again, not usual buys for us but, with things being as they are, they're useful to have in for when DH fancies something to eat.  I have to be quick with prepping otherwise he'd go off the idea!

The surplus to requirements bed and drawers are still in the hallway so tomorrow I'll ring around some of the charity shops to see if they want them and can collect.

Nice to see you back Jackie.  Best wishes for your sis-in-law Val, I wish we all had magic wands.