The Last Shop ........

Pictures from Google Images

 

This is how I felt when I left the supermarket this morning. 

 

In truth I didn't even have a trolley full, but I'm so used to shopping on a small scale that it felt like this.  I was on a mission to get some meat for the freezer for my Lovely Hubby.  My man is a true carnivore and chomps his way through the animal kingdom at an alarming rate (well it seems like that to me anyway.....lol), I guess in reality he's just a normal guy but against my zero meat consumption it seems a lot.

 

I spend a total of £84 from my rapidly diminishing budget but I did manage to get quite a lot of meaty things for my money and most of next weeks fresh stuff too, I am now on a mission to stretch it as far as possible.  All the meat has been individually wrapped and popped into labelled boxes in the freezer.  I want to get around to doing another freezer inventory so I can see exactly what I have got and see how many weeks worth of meals I can make from the supplies.

 

It had better last a while as this is a HUGE chunk out of my £2 House Keeping Challenge money.

 

 

 

Do you always use your own bags now or are you still a carrier bag addict? 

 

I always use my own, I keep them in the boot of the car at all times and have a nifty little fold up one in my handbag for emergencies.  I ask because the guy behind me in the supermarket had loaded all his shopping onto the conveyor belt and then realised he had left his bags in the boot of his car, so just as I was paying he said "excuse me" and squeezed past me to go and get them.  Now I smiled thinking how conscientious of him, but the lady behind him in the queue did not look quite so pleased !!

 

When I've done this in the past I have simply put all the food back into the trolley after paying for it and then filled my bags back at the car, I think it took some guts on his part to actually go and fetch his bags.  I wonder how long the lady behind had to wait?

 

I'm hoping this will be my last big shop for quite a while, just a bit of salady stuff each week now until the growing season kicks in and I have £16 worth of Nectar points that I can use for the next fresh shop, so fingers crossed my housekeeping tin will stay unraided for a couple of weeks.  I may have to resurrect the 'How Low Can You Go Challenge' with the cupboards and freezers being stripped back to the bare bones.

 

This weekend we are off on a very exciting jaunt, to visit a couple of properties that we are hoping to bid for at auction in a couple of weeks.   One of which may, just may be our forever home, one of them would be a 'fixy up' and the other a complete build, both look very good to us on paper, but until you see them in real life it's hard to judge.

 

 Fingers crossed that this time we are lucky :-)

 

Have a good weekend everyone, lets hope the weather is as they say it is going to be .... warmer and a little bit more Springlike.

 

 

Sue xx

One Saving and Three Treats

We are starting to scrape the bottom of the fresh foods 'barrel' now and I'm using up whatever I find lurking in the salad drawers of the fridge.  On Friday morning some of the tiredest carrots, the limp centre of the oldest bunch of celery along with a couple of onions and a whole bag of 'Country Vegetable Mixture' (25p from Approved Foods) along with some tomato puree, the last of the Veggie Stock Pots and a couple of pints of water all went into my large stock pot and made us a wonderful pot of Vegetable Soup.  I worked out, rounding figures up in every case, that it cost me just one pound to make.  So that's ten good portions of lovely homemade vegetable soup for just 10p each.  A bargain .... we have eaten two portions each and there are three more two portion packs in the freezer (and yes, I remembered to add it to my freezer inventory).

So that was a 'saving', lovely soup for pennies a portion and this photo shows my only shopping for last week including a couple of 'treats'. 

I bought plain flour, because I had run out completely, a single yogurt to act as a starter for some homemade yogurt tomorrow, two packs of biscuits for just £2.50 to take with us when we went up the motorway to Manchester on Saturday, the first treat (you can pay that per biscuit at Costa Coffee).  So it works out much cheaper than buying biscuits or cakes to go with our Lattes when we stop for a break, yes, before you jump in, we do buy Lattes sometimes when we are travelling, we both absolutely love them and no matter how frugal we get in some areas, a treat of just what you fancy does you the world of good now and then.  Something we both agree on.

The second 'treat' was some ready made Quiche bases, I know I could have made them sooooo much cheaper, especially using the flour I'd bought, but we like to have a ready meal lurking in the cupboard for emergencies and if I have a little stack of these tucked in the cupboard I can take a couple of our own hens eggs and a handful of cheese or leftovers and we have a healthy meal in around 30 minutes anytime we don't feel like really cooking.  As they cost just 65p each I can make up a quiche for around a pound, which gives us three portions, one each for an evening meal and then usually one for Lovely Hubby to take to work the next day for his lunch.  So although I see it as a bit of an extravagance in reality it is still a real money saver, especially if you look at the cost of a fully made bought quiche, which would not have the same quality ingredients that one of our homemade ones has.



The final treat was the Christmas edition of the Sainsb**ys Magazine.  Bought because traditionally I always used to buy lots of Christmas magazines, but last year I decided to knock this little extravagance on the head and now I just buy one.  This one came with a free Calender, so already a saving as we use two calenders in the kitchen, one on the wall for reminders of general things (bins, cat and dog flea treatments, appointments etc) and one for dating our egg boxes each day which lives with the boxes and stickers ready for use.  (We will get our other calender free as well hopefully, as we usually get given one at the Farm Supply shop when we pick up chicken food in December.)

This magazine turned out to be excellent value as lurking inside were a sample pack of Bisto and also a sachet of Baking Powder.  There was also a 50p coupon off something, I forget what it was, as it was something we do like, but not something we needed, so I threw it away before temptation took over!!

So my total spend for last week including all these extravagances was -

Plain Flour - 52p

5 Quiche Bases @ 65p = £3.25

Yogurt - 58p

2 Tubs Biscuits/Flapjacks - £2.50

Magazine - £1.60

Total Spend - £8.45

and 4 Lattes at services (2 journeys x 2 of us) - £11.96

Grand Total of Spending for the Week = £ 20.41

It just goes to show that it's the treats that add up to the big spends!  Good job we don't do it every week, but then if we did it wouldn't be a treat!!

Now I'm off to make up the meal plan for this week, I think I'll do it sat at the kitchen table as the kitchen is a lovely toasty, aromatic place at the moment as there is a tray of Chocolate Muffins cooking alongside the Mediterranean Veggies for tea and you can't beat a warm kitchen complete with yummy cooking smells on a cold November evening.

What do you see as extravagances but enjoy having anyway?

Sue xx

No- November

 

The day started very promising with a weak sun burning through the mist that was lying low on the paddock.  I rushed to put on a load of washing to make best use of this rare sighting of the yellow orb in the sky, but by the time the machine had finished it's quick economy wash the sun had gone. 

 

 Debating the merits of indoor drying or risking the washing on the line I decided to combine the two and put the airer out on the patio.  This has been the safest way of drying for months now.  At the first hint of rain falling I can quickly snatch the whole thing in and not too much drying time is lost.

 

 

It is the first day of November, I am amazed at how quickly this year gone, only two months left and then we are once again at a fresh beginning.  At the moment we are still working our way through the supplies in the freezers and cupboards so this November is going to be a No-November.

 

No Spending - on unnecessary things.

 

No Shopping - unless absolutely vital.

 

No Stopping - on the clutter busting.

 

No Stopping - on the 10 items a week put on Ebay or Amazon.

 

No Cards - in my purse to tempt me in this season of spending.

 

No Christmas Spending - at all.

 

and

 

No Money - I'm determined to pay off the cards in full and leave ourselves back on track.

(I take out in my purse only enough money for the things I am actually going out for.)

 

*** *** ***

 

The bread is rising under it's tea towel cover and tonights tea is a simple one, Beans on Toast.  We so very rarely have this so when we do it's always a treat, a simple treat but a treat.  Homemade Cheese and Onion bread, lightly toasted then spread with butter and generously topped with Heinz Baked Beans (I have four tins to use up, so tonight I may be generous and we will have two of them, a sprinkle of Parmesan style cheese will add another depth of flavour.

 

For our pudding there is tinned peaches with the last of the bought yogurts.  I will need to shop later in the week to buy a small carton of yogurt so I can start a batch of homemade yogurt off.  I have lots of sachets of Easi-yo to use, more than I thought I had, so there will be tasty homemade yogurt in the fridge for next week.

 

I have this months finances to work out yet, I am holding off from doing the final budget until we get the credit card bills and I can see exactly what I do have left.  I know for a fact there is not a lot, but I don't know yet how little.  A nice surprise today was the Tesco vouchers falling through the letterbox, we have £15.50 this time.  So if I'm a little crafty and turn two of them into 'frozen food' vouchers this will double their worth and mean that I can shop for £20 of frozen food and £5.50 of necessary fresh fruit or veg and not spend a penny!!

 

Happy No-November folks.  What do you have planned for this month?

 

Sue xx

Freezer Stocktake

I had just started to do the usual weekly menu plan on Monday, when I realised that rummaging about in the freezers to see what we had was making my poor little hands freezing cold AND more importantly letting all the nice cold air out of said freezers.  So I hatched a plan.

 

 

Or rather I made a plan!!

 

 

 

It was of course a lot rougher than this until I sat down at the computer yesterday and neatly typed it all out.  Now whenever I am making up my weekly menu or even thinking about what else we might want to eat I have it all there in black and white. 

 

Well green, black and white  ....but you know what I mean.

 

 



 

And of course a good side of this was that now all the freezers are nice and neat and everything is well organised, so when I do go in there for the food for each evening meal I should be able to find exactly what I want within seconds and then close the door again.

 

 

But, of course I must remember to cross things off my list as we use them or we will be very disappointed when I next make up a menu!

 

 



 

What shocked me the most was the sheer amount of food that we have in stock and it has made me resolve to eat our way through all this food before we do anymore shopping. 

 

It is a good job we have all this though as we have seriously gone into 'saving mode' now, and the plan this month is to pay off our credit cards.  We usually do this in full every month but last month our spend was pretty high due to unexpected bills and we only paid off half of one of them so the other half, added to some spending after we paid the bill means that this one is pretty high again and we are simply biting the bullet and paying off the lot, which will take away most of my housekeeping money.

 

You may ask why we have credit cards when we are living simply and frugally, well it's simple the cards we have M&S and T*sco give you points for every purchase in every shop, and when we buy petrol.   They reward you with vouchers every quarter that you can use for shopping or double up for treats, so we tend to put everything on the cards and pay them off each month so we have lots of voucher pounds at the end of each quarter.

 

Well for the next six weeks it's going to be cash all the way, as I want to watch every penny.  I have to sit down and work out how much cash I will actually have, but I know now there's not a lot!!

 

Still it will get me practising for next year and my £2 Challenge.

 

Sue xx

And now it really starts......

 

And now - TODAY - it really starts .... the truly frugal living. 

 

Once again my cupboards are full, not purposefully filled up, things have just crept up on me as usual.  Before I went away on holiday I placed an Approved Foods order with that weeks housekeeping money, they had tempted me with Ryvita of all things, but at 33p a pack who was I, nay how was I to say no!!  We both love them, all the different flavours, with butter with jam, with spread, with pate etc etc etc.  Of course I totally forgot I was still doing the Dukan diet and they are totally carbalicious!!  I will be able to re-introduce them soon though as long as I stick to my diet a little bit better and get to my target weight by the end of November.  It really won't matter if they are a little bit more out of date!!

 

 

 

 

The stash in this cupboard has gone down quite a bit and more room is now taken up with home produced stuff, pickles beetroot etc.

 

 

 

This cupboard is looking much clearer too now, you don't have to be ready to catch falling contents anymore as you open the door!

 

 

 

This cupboard has all the bottles of juice and olive oil bought when they were on offer, the juices make for a much cheaper drink for Lovely Hubby instead of the flavoured waters he used to drink.  The big mixes are all from Approved Foods and save us a fortune.

 

 

 

Although this one came as a bit of a shock. 

 

 When I spoke to LH while I was on holiday he said "what have you ordered from Approved Foods this time,the box weighs a ton" and I honestly couldn't think of anything that would be that heavy.  Then I came home and saw this, it is 12.5 kg of Chocolate Sponge Mix and not the 2.5 kg bag I thought it was!!  But at just £4.99 for the bag it was a real bargain.   LH will be enjoying chocolate sponge in many many guises for months to come, I may even have to help him a little bit, even though I'm not that keen on chocolate cake I can eat it with custard now and then.

 

 

This weekend I'm going through the household expenses with a fine toothcomb and whittling away at anything not totally necessary.  Our lovely little red Fiat 500 went back to the lease company yesterday, it was simply one car too many and now that we live so close to where LH works we have no need for this little fuel economiser.  So although we loved it we didn't need it anymore and with that gone we have almost £200 extra to add to our savings each month, it was sad to see it being driven away though.

 

Now it's time to get back to the arithmatic, I need to be so strict next month with the housekeeping that it is a good job we are so stocked up, we will be living off the stores for at least the next six weeks looking at my rough figures.  I guess it will be another How Low Can You Go type challenge.

 

Have a nice weekend everyone.

 

Sue xx

 



Simple Food

Sticking to our Not Spending in September Challenge when we ran out of bread in the freezer this morning I decided to have a quick baking session and make some homemade bread.  And with the oven on it's always making enough of something to really fill it to capacity.



Our  central heating isn't working at the moment and the earliest date a plumber can get to us to fix it a couple of weeks away the house so the house is pretty cold, but believe it or not I found the warmest spot to leave the bread to rise, even though it's not working properly, is still on top of the central heating boiler, so there is sat for the first rise, covered in clingfilm and then draped with a tea towel.

After the second kneading I shaped the loaves and decided a few buns would be nice to go with lunch, once they had risen sufficiently to be cooked they were all brushed with milk and then sprinkled with an assortment of seeds and oats.



Fresh out of the oven and looking very tasty.

As I am doing the Dukan Diet at the moment, I made myself a loaf of 'Dukan friendly' bread, made with oatbran, wheatbran and eggs instead of flour. 

 It's a very dense bread but brilliant with soup.

And that's what was on the menu for lunch.......vegetable soup for me .....

... and Beef and Vegetable soup for Lovely Hubby.  He likes his 'with bits' and I like mine whizzed up, so we each had our favourite.

Nice simple food and the house warmed up nicely with the oven being on for a while.

Sue xx

The Last of the Toms and Batch Cooking

 

 

Here they are in order of size, the very last homegrown tomatoes of Summer.  I've had a poor tomato year this year, as have many folk.  The weather, combined with me trying to get used to a draughty greenhouse has scuppered my plans on filling the cupboards with jars and jars of tomatoey goodness.  The few we have managed to get have been added to various dishes as and when we've cooked them to enjoy them at their best.

 

 



 

I had a bit of a batch cooking session on Sunday while Lovely Hubby was 'playing' with the computer.  I had some packs of mince in the freezer that had been there for well over a year so I decided to turn them into something for tea and a few future meals.

 

 

 

I always think it's as easy to cook in bulk as it is to make each and every meal when you need it.  The Mince and veggie Quorn Mince was cooked with onions, tomatoes and all the odds and end of veggies that were lurking in the fridge and freezer, with lots of tomato puree and some garlic puree for good measure, Worcestershire sauce and sprinkles of this and that the kitchen was soon smelling very good.

 

Needless to say the portions destined for tea were eaten at lunchtime instead, just popped into the oven for the tops to brown before we tucked in.

 

 

 

The rest were left to go cold, one portion with a potato topping and a sprinkle of cheese for LH to tuck into while I am on holiday with my Mum in a couple of weeks and the others left with just mince, so we can decide on a topping when we thaw them out.

 

It's always satisfying to get a few homemade 'ready meals' tucked into the freezer ready for those nights when inspiration is thin on the ground or there simply is no time to cook from scratch.

 

Sue xx



Not Spending in September

The not spending in September is going pretty well, last week I spent £32 out of my housekeeping budget, so that's the £18 saved straight over into the £2012 in 2012 fund, which is also doing pretty well. (Added in - I just remembered I also spent £2.69  on a coffee at the motorway services at the start of last week, so that's a bit less to the fund!!)

 

I had a voucher for Sainsburys so decided to top up the fresh stuff from there.  The cheapo mince is for the dogs, two packs mixed with the other cheapo ingredients for homemade dogfood keeps them in food for 6 days at a cost of just 23p per meal, a bargain and I know they are getting good food.  On alternate days they both love cheapo tins of tuna mixed with either a slice of bread or their usual dog mixer.

 

The freezer is starting to look bare, but I think we should be able to see this month out and maybe even into October before we run out of meal ideas.

 

I love the feel of not shopping so much and of course it gives me more chance to actually have a sit down and read through some Blogs........ when my computer will let me!!

 

Everything seems to be working at the moment, thanks to Lovely Hubby spending virtually all of yesterday fixing things, it's a good job it was raining or he would have been sulking, he's halfway through painting his man shed..... that lovely shade of green that we both love so much, and rain unfortunately had stopped play yesterday just before the computers went on the blink.

 

Sue xx

Menu Planning

 

I find the best way of saving money and running down the cupboards and freezers in a logical way is to menu plan.  Thirty minutes on a Monday morning gives me time to check out what I have lurking in all the cupboards and freezers and write down a basic menu plan.

 

It saves time on the other days as I don't have to stop what I am doing and start rummaging for what I fancy eating or making for that nights tea.  I can also defrost the main component of the meal during the day rather than worrying it might not thaw out in time or having to zap it in the microwave. 

 

 It also means that if I do have to nip to the shops I can have a shopping list of any necessary items needed to add to a recipe or meal for the week ahead.  I always have a list on the side of the fridge and the minute I notice I need something I write it down (not that I always remember to take the blasted thing with me....I am only human!!).  If you don't write what you need down when you think of it, you can guarantee you'll walk round the shops to try and jog your memory and buy all those tempting 'must have' bargains that you don't really need instead.

 

This week however, I am trying very hard not to buy anything and so our meals are coming exclusively from the cupboards and freezers.  I purposely planned all the meals to make use of everything we have already in stock.

 

*** *** ***

 

Menu Plan for this Week.

 

Monday

 

Steak Burgers/Veggie Fingers with Buttered Cabbage and Pine Nuts, served with Onion Marmalade

 

Tuesday

 

Garlic Kiev/Spicy Lentil Wedge with Brown Rice and Sweetcorn and Mixed Leaves

 

Wednesday

 

'Linda Mc' Cheese, Leek and Red Onion Plaits with Cheese and Tomato Orzo Pasta and Mixed Leaves

 

Thursday

 

Meat/Veggie Bangers and Mash with Onion Gravy

 

Friday

 

Quorn Chicken Style Pieces in Tikka Masala Sauce served with Brown Rice and Naan Breads

 

Saturday

 

Meat/Veggie Shepherds Pie served with Sweetcorn, Carrots and Gravy

 

Sunday

 

Salmon, Rice and Vegetable Parcels

 

*** *** ***

 

This should all leave a nice sized gap in the freezer as most things are from there, the veggies we have grown ourselves, both last year and this and blanched and open frozen as I talked about the other day.

 

All these meals are Harcombe friendly for me with the exception of the Salmon and Rice which is mixing, but I'm not being terribly strict at the moment while we are running stocks down. 

 

 

One plus side of running down the freezer is that you find packets of things you had forgotten all about, so last night Lovely Hubby had a tasty little starter before his tea of Prawns.  He likes them just as they are with a little dollop of mayo on the side, and I'm not telling him yet but there are two more bags lurking in the depths of the big chest freezer!

 

 

Do you menu plan on a regular basis, and what forgotten treasures have you found lurking in the depths of the freezer?

 

Sue xx

Not Spending in September

Last month I was going to challenge myself not to spend ..... it fizzled out through lack of keeping track and circumstances.  I decided to begin again for September and this time I've been keeping tabs on myself properly.

 

 

The Challenge is purely to spend as little as possible from my housekeeping budget for the month and to put all the money I have managed to save towards my other Challenge ....  £2012 in 2012.  Both Pages are at the top of the Blog under the Blog title if you want to follow my progress.

 

 

My Housekeeping Allowance is £50 a week, this is used for food for the two of us and dogs, (I buy them supermarket cheapo mince and tins of tuna, we are trying to wean both of them off  'dogfoods' as such, as Rosy doesn't like them much and always leaves some which Suky then eats ... and she is supposed to be on a diet!!).

 

 



 

So I have £200 for the month of September and my weeks are running Saturday to Saturday as this is when the month started.

 

 

 

I have lots of food in stock as you can see from these photos, tins, jars, packets and lots of dried foods in jars.

 

 

 

There is also lots in the freezers, both of them.  And dried herbs and seasonings to compliment the ones that are still growing happily away.

 

 

  We also still have crops growing in the Veggie Patch, including Spinach, Kale, Courgettes and Cabbages, so there is absolutely no chance of us going hungry.

 

I am trying not to go to the supermarket too much even though that particular Challenge has now ended, (all Jokers were played by 5th September) I still love my High Street shops way to much to just abandon them.  But in an effort to keep costs as low as possible I will be using up all my vouchers and Nect*r points to help pay for my shopping while I am doing this Challenge.

 

The food in the picture at the top was last weeks additional necessities, I spent £22.25 and a voucher at Mr Sainsb**ys.  The small bottles of water are a rare buy for me, we have them in to use for when we are travelling and once emptied they are filled from our big cheap bottles or with diluted squash.  The biscuits were for travelling too, to save us money at the services, (own drinks, own nibbles equals pennies staying in pockets), I could have made some but I ran out of time last week, so they were a compromise.

 

I am going to run this for as long as possible, but the main push is through the month of September, I would actually like to run all supplies right down, I wonder how long it will actually take me.

 

 

 

 

After all not spending at all is the best way to save. So for the foreseeable future I am shopping from my cupboards and freezers and putting the money saved into the Bank of Sue.

 

 

Sue xx

Picking up the pieces/Cheats Crumble Mix

We're picking up the pieces of life on the farm, Lovely Hubby is out 'tinkering' with his tractor (assembling from scratch a front loader actually, but I call it tinkering.... much to his dismay...lol), I have been going through the fridges and seeing what foodstuffs we still have to use up as part of our 'How Low Can You Go' Challenge.

Lurking in the salad drawer of the fridge were some very sad looking pears and apples, all wrinkly and tactile, at first I thought of  just chucking them to the chickens, but they have all the windfalls from the old apple tree to eat and I decided that I would use these wrinkly specimens for us.

Still being quite poorly and not in the mood for much time in the kitchen I decided against a pie so I made up a batch of 'Cheats Crumble Mix'.  Simply lots of scoops of Approved Foods 'Scone Mix' (it was just £1.49 for that HUGE bag), some brown sugar and some mixed oats thrown in for added texture, all mixed together in a tub, which can go in the freezer so I always have crumble mix to hand.

The apples and pears were peeled, refreshed in some cold water and then thinly sliced and layered in my litle enamel baking dish, with crumble mix spooned thickly over the top and then popped in the oven for just 20 minutes, it was a lovely warming pudding last night while we tucked ourselves up in front of the tv with a roaring log fire to keep away the cold October night.  The icecream that melted creamily in the apples really was the 'icing on the cake'.

How are you keeping warm on these suddenly chilly nights.

Sue xx



The Last Strawberries of Summer......

The last strawberries of Summer......that's what we thought on Tuesday when we shared these as a little treat fresh from the polytunnel, but when I went in there this morning to gather some salady bits for my lunch there they were..... four more .... already turning red and looking like we will have some more in a couple of days.  I shall have to think of a suitable dessert that they can grace.

Also picked from the polytunnel on Tuesday were the last of the Chillis and Peppers with a few Aubergines and Tomatoes.

Some Chillis were popped in the bottom oven of the Aga for the day to dry out slowly and are now residing in a jar ready to be used in recipes through the Winter.

The rest have been added to this little hotch potch of ingredients all now cooking away in the Aga to make a rich and concentrated tomato/pepper/chilli/marrow/onion/tomato puree/garlic sauce, now I'll never fit all that on the label when I put it in the jars later!!

These herbs have just been added, Rosemary and Thyme.  I always start my sauces in the top oven, the hottest one, this gives everything a quick blast of heat and starts the flavour mingling and the juices flowing, then I add the herbs and give everything a really good stir to mingle the flavours and then let the heat of the bottom oven, which is much milder, nurture and bring out the flavours for a good few hours.

The 'How Low Can You Go Challenge' is starting to make life interesting now.  In the dish above I had to use garlic from a jar Very Lazy Garlic something I've never used before, so we'll see what happens with the flavour when it comes out of the oven later.  As it is, after moving the dish between ovens the house smells absolutely divine, very garlicky and fresh smelling.

The cupboards are slow to empty because at the moment we are still eating predominately from the Kitchen Garden and using up all the fresh stuff, but the Challenge is just starting to kick in.  I'm amazed at the number of you who are popping by the How Low Can You Go Diary blog to have a peek at what we're chomping threw on a day to day basis.  You're very welcome but I hope you don't find it too boring, yes I DO have the same breakfast nearly every day!!  Spending is being kept to an absolute minimum, but it feels like as soon as I make space in the freezer it is being filled with home grown and homemade foods that I am harvesting for Winter, so gaps are not really appearing as fast as I thought they would.  This is the reason I have not bothered to photograph the cupboards or freezers for a comparison shot yet, it would be too much like a very difficult 'spot the difference' game!

What we have already learnt from this Challenge is how simply we like to eat, and that bodes well for next years main Challenge which will be revealed on the 1st January.......now there's a teaser for you...haha !!

Sue xx