April 2008 Grocery Challenge

saveaholic68

Just when I thought I was getting back on track with this challenge, I went into the kitchen last night and realised I hadn't shut my freezer door properly:eek: I could seriously cry at the thought of it! It was only slightly ajar, but I think it must have been like that for around 4 hours. I'm really gutted because there was loads of meat in there. I'm not taking any chances with the meat, I'll throw it out, but I had quite a few bags of veg in there - does anyone know if it's OK to re-freeze it, or will it all have to go in the bin?

razra

saveaholic68 wrote: »

Just when I thought I was getting back on track with this challenge, I went into the kitchen last night and realised I hadn't shut my freezer door properly:eek: I could seriously cry at the thought of it! It was only slightly ajar, but I think it must have been like that for around 4 hours. I'm really gutted because there was loads of meat in there. I'm not taking any chances with the meat, I'll throw it out, but I had quite a few bags of veg in there - does anyone know if it's OK to re-freeze it, or will it all have to go in the bin?

To be honest if everything was still frozen then it should all be fine so no need to throw it out. Ive done it before and had left it overnight at least before I realised and everything was still frozen solid but I had a huge build up of ice and snow on the freezer:rotfl:so I had to run down the stocks and defrost the freezer to get rid of it but all the food was fine. If it had of defrosted the food then I may have been a bit wary. But you could always cook all the meat and then freeze it again. 4 hours should not have made that much difference I would have thought unless your house is super warm

MRSMCAWBER

Hi there Saveaholic

Is there anyway you can have a big cook up...so you can re-freeze it rather than throw it all away?
Even if it means huge vats of stew in the slow cooker etc...

kippers

My DH has done this three times now over night...things had started to defrost so i cooked as much meat as possible and used for sandwiches for the next three days and froze some of the cooked meat to make pies, curries etc.

It is heart breaking i know, my heart goes out to you.

MrDT

sandy2 wrote: »

bit late but 4oz plain flour needs 1 level teaspoon of baking powder.

Not late at all, will be baking the cake this morning Thanks for the info, the recipe calls for 8oz plain flour and one tsp of baking powder, from what you say above I reckon it's close enough for me to have a go at least. If it's a disaster who cares, can always make a trifle or something lol!:rotfl:

So, orange cake with strawberry compote to top... aaaaand I think a little spiced rum might be added to the cake mixture cos it just seems 'right' to me Will let you know how I get on thanks for all the help :beer:

cg1982 as weezl said, f+v don't have to be 'fresh' for you to get the benefit. I buy very little fresh as I hate waste, pretty much just buy a couple of bags of apples, oranges, pears or something similar a week (these tend to keep well for a fortnight stored in the fridge so can help if you want to shop less often - not being in a shop helps save money, paying for one taxi not two saves a lot more!)

Remember that pure fruit juice can count as one of your five a day (pure juice from concentrate is fine, not a mixed fruit 'drink' or squash though). It only counts once, drinking a whole carton doesn't mean you're covered for the day!

Bearing this info in mind the kiddies should easily get their 5 a day. As an example maybe add a handful of chopped banana or raisins to their cereal (you can use dried banana if you like, lasts ages) and a glass of juice on the side. That's two servings for very little money. An apple as a snack or after lunch, also dirt cheap. Then dinner seems to be meals that could easily work well with a tin of beans or some peas on the side, baked beans count, as do tinned or frozen peas (and value items are just as nutritious as the branded products). If using frozen peas you could maybe add frozen sweetcorn to the mix, or some frozen carrots? Bags of frozen carrots/broccoli/cauliflower/greenbeans are versitile and worth keeping in the freezer too. These are all cheap and imo just as good as 'fresh' as far as nutrients are concerned (frozen same day to lock in the goodness, 'fresh' could be sitting in a shop storeroom for a week...). You could have a tinned fruit salad after dinner with some evaporated milk maybe?

Do you make your own chili can carne? If so, grate a couple of carrots into the mix, and maybe an extra tin of beans, tastes great and is a sneaky way to pump up the vege count for the day

edit: just wanted to add that '5 a day' is a minimum guideline, ideally we'd all be eating more f+v than the minimum, but for me, and a lot of others it's a good target. Some days I only get the basic 5 (maybe even less if it's a particularly piggy weekend ), other days I get about 10 (think as an example day - 2 fruit breakfast (2 portions), vege pasta lunch (2 portions), apple+orange+fruitflapjack snacks (3 portions), bacon casserole (3 portions)) so I figure it balances out

Sunnyday

Morning everyone,

i meant to update the sig of shame again yesterday as i did end up at MrA later in the afternoon:o

I stocked up on tinned dog food and catfood as both were on offer and got loads of the Doves wholemeal flour at 55p so really i`ve saved myself a decent amount of moolah for next month.

Now that i`ve made a mess of things this month i can`t wait for next month to start so that i can feel that little bit better:rolleyes:

I`ll sort out the sig over the next couple of days.

Good luck everyone, the final stretch is here, hope you all romp home quids in.
SD

victory

Morning, have baked the oat biscuits, the fala whatever they were called:rotfl: kids love the biscuits am now going to make the orange cake, need to go and get some eggs from iceland because put back the Tesco ones yesterday as they were 6 for 88p and thought no, too much so put them back, hopefully Iceland will have some. Noticed the WW meals have gone up a lot also but iceland used to sell them for £1, there were some in Tescos 2 for £4.50 when they were £2.39 anyway each:rotfl:

I saw loads of men with hteir wives last night totting up, helping out, everyone is in it trying to cut the cost:D

weezl74

Hiya, I said I'd find the malt loaf recipe, click here for it.

Weezl x

MRSMCAWBER

Afternoon everyone

My 2nd NSD today :j .... hubby is golfing..should be back soon -so for lunch i had leftover moussaka thingy i concocted the otherday using grated potato and feta yumyum... there was only 4oz mince but i did hubby a "man size portion" with loads of onions, peppers, aubergine and mushrooms and split the other half into 2 smaller dishes -saves on spends and cals -so have had the 2nd one for lunch mmmmmmmm

And dinner is in the oven for when hubby gets in and i will have mine later... threw hm sausages, chunks of carrot, onion, parsnips(for me) and baby potatoes(for hubby)in my tagine and whacked it in the oven and they are roasting off nicely.... will make hubby some gravy for his and have ith with broccoli and peas .... think there will be too much for 2 -so guess what i will be having for lunch tomorrow :rotfl:

Have a bowl of bread dough just about to go in its tin... and hubby is taking pasta salad for lunch tomorrow -so i will get that made soon....

Have set some more potatoes today, and some more tomato seeds ... can't wait to reap the benefits ...lots of free food...without any chemicals :j

Right.. i had better get back to rumaging through my recipes.. and plan some new ways of using up the hods of stuff i have in the freezer and cupboards...
Want some "snacky" recipes for hubby as now he is coming of soups n hm bread for lunch thought i would come up with some sweet and savoury biccies he can stick in his drawer for his naffi breaks
hope everyone is having a good weekend..

oh before i forget.. WEEMISSY i have PMd you..let me know if you don't get it

Moniker

Afternoon everyone. The beef roulades I did last night were fine- OH said 'delish' - but I wasn't entirely happy with the stuffing. I think I over processed it so it was too smooth. Anyway there's another portion in the freezer for those days when I am too tired to cook!

I remembered this morning that we have a 'bring and share' supper at our church tomorrow night and I hadn't planned for it. So I had a rummage in the freezer and found some frozen spinach which I have defrosted and is now in a quiche which is cooking as we speak. I made up the recipe so I hope it's ok! I always bake my pastry case 'blind' before putting in the filling and nine times out of ten it develops cracks and the quiche contents leak out if I don't take care! Anyone got any idea why this happens? I use butter and Trex (veg fat) half and half and usually make the pastry in the food processor as I have quite warm hands and my mum says you need cold hands to make good pastry! Any suggestions for improving mine welcome! I'll let you know how it goes.

Am also cooking a chicken and roasties for lunch and we'll have the remains of yesterday's bread pudding after. I'm also planning to do a batch of Twink's hob-nobs while I have the oven on. It's back to work for me tomorrow, so I have to make the most of my time for baking.

Hope you all enjoy the rest of the day.

Love Moniker