Getting back in the Swing and The Plan

 

Waitrose - Total Spend £15.97

 

 

Now the holiday is over and it's time to get back in the swing.  I spent all my saved spends last week and a little bit more besides, but I had a great time and it was worth it.  Now I am back to my Frugal October but there was some things that I just had to buy. 

 

Lovely Hubby forgot to water my herbs while I was away so an emergency restock was in order.  Once you get used to cooking with lots of herbs you just can't go back to not using them, although all the outdoor ones are fine my selection on kitchen window sill herbs had died a very sad death.  They have all been trimmed right back to soil level and there are already signs of regrowth so all is not lost and I can make do with just some Basil and Parsley until they are usable again.

 

 

 

In town - Total Spend - £7.57

 

Housekeeping left - £ 26.46

 

 

Although I nipped to Waitrose for the shopping I did call to town for a new washing line, the days may be cooler and shorter but I still like to make full use of outdoor drying whenever I can and although I already have a line between the trees near the house, now the sun has shifted in the sky it does not get the sun for very long, so LH has said I can stretch a line from his Man Shed to the climbing frame where the sun shines for much more of the day.  It will be great for drying those big items, sheets etc, that can be stretched out to get the full benefit of the suns weaker rays and even the slightest breeze.

 

While I was there habit lured me into the charity shop and I'm glad I called, I got this brilliant recipe book for just 99p and a lovely pudding bowl for £1.99.  I see lots of frugal winter puds coming up.  I love reading about the way rationing made people really work magic in the kitchen.  I did it myself for real for years and it stands you in good stead for feeding your family in the future on a limited income whenever you need to.

 

And I need to because of The Plan - I'm on a mission to save every penny possible over the next two years, now there's a challenge and a half!! 

 

 We have made the big decision that we will move back 'up North' rather than buying in this area. We will get so much more for our money there, at the moment we live in one of the most expensive areas of the country.  Currently we rent a 1930's two bed bungalow that is believe it or not (with it's 4 acres of land) valued on the open market at almost £800,000, there's no way on this planet that we could ever afford to buy anything even remotely similar if we stay in this area.  Even better we will be closer to our roots and much nearer to all our family.  It does mean that we have to get as much money together while we can, while we live here.  LH's job is really based here and it's here that we can milk the 'cash-cow' for all it's worth and hopefully save enough to almost buy a place for cash.  Any shortfall will have to be made up by LH continuing to work down here and commuting back to our new place for weekends, so my challenge to save every penny matters........really matters, we don't want to be apart for too long.

 

 

 

So I've already started earning pennies and pounds where I can, and yesterday I listed my first 10 items for sale, books on Amazon and other things on Ebay, and good news, one book has already sold, so I'm just off to package it up and get it ready for posting.  Although I will hang on until I have to go into town for something else, saving petrol matters too.

 

 

I'll try and get a link in the sidebar to my Amazon and Ebay pages so you can see what I sell.  After that I'll be looking out ten more things ready for listing next week.  I'm doing the listing every Tuesday so that the 5 day auction ends on a Sunday evening, I've been told by a very good authority (thanks Froogs) that this is the way to maximise earnings.

 

 

Sue xx

Dodging the Rain

 

 

Yesterday was spent dodging the rain.  One minute there was sunshine and a relative warmth and the next, well look at the picture.  Our world turned grey and wet within seconds.

 

 

 

As rain cascaded off the gutters and spooked the dogs, I was busy tipping these beauties, that I'd grabbed between showers into Lovely Hubby's big tray of windfalls ready for the next batch of cider and apple juice making next week.

 

I must have dashed out over to the chickens 3 or 4 times yesterday alternatively opening and closing their paddling pool (which is full of sieved soil for dust bathing purposes). I gave up in the end and left it closed.  The temperatures plummeted and the best thing to do, in between showers of course, was to fill the log basket ready for a cosy night in front of the log burner.

 

 

Today started with a layer of frost over the patio, but now the sun is shining and the steam is rising as everything warms up in its welcome rays, and yes the paddling pool is open to the sunshine to dry off after yesterdays intermittent wetting and I feel the need to use some of the apples for myself.

 

 

 

Ready for my Frugal in October challenge,  last week I decided to use a voucher that I've had tucked away for ages, it was a freebie with my last order and I thought I would use it to get some more foil containers from Lakeland to prepare a batch of crumbles, some for Lovely Hubby to eat next week and the rest to stay in the freezer to preserve some of these lovely apples for later in the year.  Let's hope they arrive today because I feel a warm kitchen coming on this afternoon filled with the aroma of cooking apples and rhubarb, maybe one crumble won't even make it into the freezer and then there'll be Apple Crumble for supper.

 

 

Mmmm .... now there's a warming thought.

 

Sue xx

Making the Most of What You Buy

 

 

I'm still concentrating on using up the contents of the freezers and cupboards, so most of what I bought this week has been fresh items and things we had run out of, oh and a couple of treats for Lovely Hubby for while I'm away next week (the Shreddies and Nuts and Raisins).

 

I did quite well, the salady stuff that I bought to go with what we still have growing here was all so ridiculously cheap.  I guess it's not selling that well at the moment with the weather being so cold.

 

Here's what I bought.

 

 

2 Bottles of Sparkling Water - 34p

3 Bags of Onions - £2.50

1 bag of Potatoes - £2

An Iceberg Lettuce - 80p

2 Cucumbers - £1

Pack of 3 Peppers - £1

Pack of 8 Tomatoes - £1

Four Individual Sized Pizzas - £1.50

Block of Cheddar Cheese - £6.01

Pack of Honey Shreddies - £1

Bag of Jumbo Nuts and Raisins - £2

Bag of Cinnamon and Raisin Bagels - £1 (not pictured)

 

Total Spend £20.15

 

(The food you can see lurking in the background is from my Approved Food order received on Saturday, I'll post about that tomorrow.)



 

 

 

To make room for all the lovely fresh veggies I emptied my veggie drawers in the big fridge and chopped everything I had into chunky sized pieces.  These were roasted in the oven with herbs, garlic and oil and served for tea on Monday with Salmon fillets from the freezer and Cous Cous from an AF order last year.

 

The leftovers, and there were quite a lot, were already earmarked for my little bit of batch preparation yesterday.

 

 

 

Why did I buy those little pizzas you may be wondering?  Well they cost me not much more than making my own from scratch, they are simply a  medium thick pizza base with tomato paste and a sprinkling of cheese, they saved me some time and they meant that I could use some nice fresh toppings and leftovers to make them come to life easily and cheaply.

 

 

 

Firstly my cheese is always grated, it goes so much further that way.  The food processor is put into use for 5 minutes and the whole block is grated and loosely packed into freezer proof boxes.  It flows freely if you give it a shake a couple of hours after freezing and you know then that there is always cheese on hand for sandwiches, toppings for dishes, cheese on toast etc etc  It never goes stale on you and thaws within minutes of removing from the freezer in the portion size you want.

 

 

 

So out of the fridge I then pulled the veggie leftovers, some meatballs that Lovely Hubby enjoys and a pack of ham nearing it's sell by date.

 

 

 

The pizzas were placed in my open freezing trays on greaseproof paper, I use this quite a few times before it gets thrown away, this had the scones on it at weekend.

 

 

 

Then the toppings were added, a Meat Feast style pizza with Meatballs and Ham, a Meatball pizza and two Veggie pizzas (just in case there are any left when I get back from my holiday).

 

 

 

Sprinkled generously with cheese (about a £1s worth of my big block).

 

 

 

And then stacked, with the freezer stickers loose in the tray ready for wrapping and labelling when they are frozen.  Then they and the box of leftover cheese were popped into the chest freezer.

 

This morning they were individually wrapped, labelled and then placed in a large box to keep unsquashed and perfect until we need an all instant meal, or have the urge for a 'takeaway'.

 

So four pizzas that cost me about £1 each to make, including all the toppings and they are big enough to have either one each for a meal, or a half each with a jacket potato, salad or handful of chips.

 

Good tasting simply made food, that's a brilliant standby in the freezer. 

 

 

Even the Bagels have been split and frozen, this way you can just have half a Bagel whenever you fancy it and they don't go stale if you freeze them this way on the day you buy them.  No wastage at all.  Frozen they can be popped straight into the toaster (or under the grill) and take only seconds longer than if they were toasted from fresh.

 

 

 

The bag of Jumbo Nuts and Raisins that I bought was tipped into a bowl and added to.   Some Almonds, dried Goji Berries and the last of my jar of Cashew Nuts and then popped into a large jar to keep nice and fresh.  So now Lovely Hubby has a luxury nut mix for dipping into next week while I am away, just in case he gets the nibbles .... and he does!!  So much cheaper than actually buying a bag of 'Luxury Nut Mix' that are usually padded out with the cheaper nuts with just a couple of the big favourites.

 

I hope these examples of what I do with some of my shopping when I get it home give you some ideas or at the very least make you stop and think, 'I do that too', and give yourself a pat on the back for saving the pennies and pounds that would otherwise be spent on buying foods that someone else has prepared for you.  Where you are paying for the labour and not the quantity or quality of the foods.

 

Sue xx

Frugal in October

There's lots of us in Blog world on a mission to keep spending either at zero, low or at least lower than normal all through the month of October.   Although some of it is purely coincidental Froogs, over at her Blog Frugal Queen started the ball rolling magnificently with her Blog posts of the last couple of days and her 'Stoptober' post today.

 

I had already made plans to see if I could continue my 'No Spending in September Challenge', there are still plenty of foods in my cupboards and in fact my freezers are fuller than ever, but the contents have changed.  It's that time of year when every time I harvest somethng for tea I don't just pick a couple of things I pick the entire crop and blanch and freeze everything surplus to that days requirements.  We never know when that first hard frost will come, and with our weather being so erratic this year I'm taking no chances.

 



 

However yesterday's freezer filling task was a tad more enjoyable.  I decided to use up an entire bag of Approved Food scone mix.  Now I am no scone snob, a scone is a scone is a scone!!  As long as it is light and fluffy and tasty to boot it has my vote anyday.  If it's homemade, either completely or with a mix, fresh as fresh can be and with little additions of yumminess then it gets all my votes.

 

 

 

So for the morning the kitchen turned into' Scone Central' and a wonderful production line was put into place.  A wonderfully simple production line, weigh out 1kg of mix into my food mixer, add 2 teaspoons of baking powder (as the mix is past is sell by date it's usually the raising agent that needs a hand to keep your scones fluffy), add enough water to bring it all together and then choose the added ingredient.  Mix for the minimum time needed and then lightly roll out and cut.  Place scones into open trays ready for freezing and then repeat.

 

A tip worth noting - don't use flour for rolling out purposes, use some of the dry scone mix from the bag, then you do not interfere with the proportions of the mix.

 

 

 

The first batch were left plain, the second had sultanas and cinnamon added, and the last batch had grated Parmesan style cheese and paprika.  With the oven already on cooking a Chicken Casserole for lunch some plain scones were popped in for a late morning snack and then the final batch of scones with Parmesan Cheese (and extra sprinkled on top) were added, these were to have with the Casserole in place of either dumplings or toast, which we would usually have.

 

 

 

The mix I use.

 

 3.5KG of mix cost me £2.99  (they currently have a different brand although the same weight for the same price...see HERE). Mine is much older and still tastes wonderful so don't be afraid of the dates!!

 

The pack says it makes 87 scones which would bring them out at a cost of 3p each, but I tend to make around 60 from each bag as we like them bigger and deeper, but that is still an unbelievable 5p each ... a total bargain.

 

(Edited in to add - in Tesco today a pack of 4 scones (smaller than mine) cost £1.49, that's 37p a scone, so by making these myself I have saved 32p for each scone or for the entire bag a massive saving of £19.20....not to be sneezed at!)

 

 

 

The final rolling out of the scone mix never makes me perfect round scones.   I always shape whatever dough is left into one large circle and then quarter it before cooking.  No wastage here at all.

 

I freeze the scones in the open freezing trays first and then as soon as they are firm I transfer them all into air tight boxes.  Now whenever we want a scone or two we can take out the exact number we want and then pop them into the oven, they take just a couple of minutes longer than usual to cook from frozen and each and every time you get a perfectly 'just made' scone.

 

And Lovely Hubby can treat himself  to a scone or two whenever he fancies while I am away on holiday next week.

 

 

 

 

Althrough October I am going to be doing blog posts on saving money, keeping costs down and generally just NOT SPENDING.  I usually join in with money saving tips near to Christmas but this year I have decided that what better way to start saving money for your Christmas than by getting into the not spending habit three months early ... so I'm doing it now instead.

 

*** *** ***

 

My Not Spending in September went really well, up until the last couple of days I had only spent less than half my usual housekeeping money, then Approved Foods sent me an email saying they had something reduced that I decided was too good an offer to miss, so I splashed out £53 and lost some of my advantage, but I have lots in stock now to keep me going all through this month and beyond!

 

 

  For more information see the 'Not Spending in September' page at the top of the Blog.

 

 

Sue xx