Sneaky ways to save the pennies

consultant31

Primrose wrote: »

We experimented today with our latest acquisition. Our Lancashire Hotpot,instead of being cooked in the oven in our Le Creuset caserole and heating a large wasteful space, was cooked over the lowest possible simmer flame on our gas hob, using an Aris metal Simmer Mat (bought from Lakeland). I've found in the past that meat caseroles in Le Creuset pans cooked on a hob often cause the meat and vegetables at the bottom of the pan to stick and burn. This mat was brilliant. No burning and I'm sure we used far less fuel that we would have done heating a whole oven. None none of the liquid evaporated and needed topping up either, as it has done previously in the oven, It also saves the lugging of a hot heavy pot in and out of the oven to check on progress.

The easiest (and I'm sure, most frugal) way is to buy a slow cooker. It's one of my best buys and is used almost daily. I can just throw everything in before leaving the house and it's cooked to perfection for our evening meal. Oh, and the aroma of the food is wonderful as you come in from a long day!

Primrose

Yes, we are still thinking about a slow cooker but are quite short of storage space and wanted to make the best use of the cooking containers we've already got. Although I'm sure that if somebody were to treat us to one we'd use it. This would have been ideal when we were working but now we're retired and home all day, we're lucky enough to have more time to cook things without the need for such forward planning. But everybody on this site raves about their sc's so I'm sure we will get one eventually.

exlibris

Can't remember if this has been said before but here goes.

There are only 2 of us now so when we have things like chicken legs in sauce I buy as many legs as I can get into the dish (6-8 depending on how big they are) and cook them all at once. When cooked, we eat 2 and I box the rest up in 1kilo marge boxes with their own sauce and freeze. When thawed the can be heated in the microwave in a small Pyrex dish for a ready meal. I also find I can get more chicken thighs in the dish with the same results.

Aril

When serving roast beef try the traditional method- serve a big piece of Yorkshire pud with gravy on its own first...the theory being that then people will need less meat to eat afterwards
Aril

caz128

Aril wrote: »

When serving roast beef try the traditional method- serve a big piece of Yorkshire pud with gravy on its own first...the theory being that then people will need less meat to eat afterwards
Aril

...and taken a step further, during the war my husband's great aunt and uncle would have
their dessert of fruit and bread and butter before the cooked meal for the same reason!

Uniscots97

Use soap in the shower or bath rather than shower gel or bodywash. Also put the soap in the airing cupboard for at least a couple of weeks before you use it. For some reason it makes it last longer!

Also use up anything you have. After having a clear out, I was amazed just how much 'stuff' I have hidden away (8 bottles of body lotion alone!). I'm determined to use all this up before buying anything else.

Gigervamp

The trouble with things like body lotions, is that they do have a shelf life (usually about 6-12 months after opening). This is because the preservative only lasts for a certain amount of time, after that the risk of pathogens (which are naked to the eye, and usually don't smell either) in the lotion increases. So please, for your own safety, don't use old lotions.

Uniscots97

Gigervamp wrote: »

The trouble with things like body lotions, is that they do have a shelf life (usually about 6-12 months after opening). This is because the preservative only lasts for a certain amount of time, after that the risk of pathogens (which are naked to the eye, and usually don't smell either) in the lotion increases. So please, for your own safety, don't use old lotions.

Thanks GV, none are opened and have been kept out of sunlight and moisture (i.e. not kept in the bathroom). Anything that was opened I've binned (I should have said that though). Although name suggests otherwise I'm a biochemist to trade.

keld

Aril wrote: »

When serving roast beef try the traditional method- serve a big piece of Yorkshire pud with gravy on its own first...the theory being that then people will need less meat to eat afterwards
Aril

When we were little we always had, yorkshires and gravy first, then vegetables, then meat and gravy last. I haven't thought about that for ages.:rotfl:

Gigervamp

unixgirluk wrote: »

Thanks GV, none are opened and have been kept out of sunlight and moisture (i.e. not kept in the bathroom). Anything that was opened I've binned (I should have said that though). Although name suggests otherwise I'm a biochemist to trade.

Oh cool! It does worry me when I see what some people do in the interests of saving money, not realising they're putting their health at risk by doing so.