Day 26 through to when the (thinner) fat lady sings...

Well it's done.  £30, thirty days.  I have 81p left, but only because the tutor at the quilt class gave me the unused milk to take home, or this would have gone on a couple of pints of milk.

I am slightly thinner, and a much wiser woman as a result of this challenge which has been interesting in a whole raft of ways.  I learned a lot about myself, and my shopping, cooking and eating habits.  I used a number of cookery books I haven't opened for years.  I've been creative in the kitchen and cooked, from scratch, for the whole thirty days (not a morsel of convenience food has passed my lips).  I've rediscovered kitchen equipment that I'd forgotten I'd owned and realised the benefits of planning, batch cooking and sensible use of the freezer, oven and microwave.  I've also begun to realise how easy it is to confuse luxuries with essentials and to take for granted the blessings of an adequate income.

Undertaking this challenge of a few weeks has had its fun moments.  It's been good to try out new recipes and to resurrect old ones.  I haven't been hungry, and for the most part I've not been bored by my food.  I have lost 4.5lbs - and I suspect this has occurred because I've not been eating the hidden sugars and fats found in convenience foods (palm oil, etc) and there has been precious little alcohol (not completely absent however, as chicken-feeding duty provided wee perks!) and no chocolate.  I've also - and rather surprisingly - been more active this month, or so my pedometer tells me.  I imagine this is due to the miles I've walked looking for bargains and comparing prices at different supermarkets. It has also been heart-warming the interest that friends have taken in my challenge, and the generosity of people in both supporting me with windfalls and garden produce (and indeed soup and bread) and in asking after my health and progress.

The rather unexpected downside of the challenge was how much time it actual took up.  Making £30 last for a month and eating reasonably healthy, balanced meals took a lot of time, planning, preparation and cooking.  I found for most of my waking hours I was thinking about food -- not because I was hungry but because I was considering how best to make use of what I had in my store cupboard and what I would have to buy.  How one does this whilst job-seeking, looking after a family, or dealing with a disability or long term illness, I have no idea. Yet the sad fact is that low income households often have these additional stressors.

There have been a couple of low points.  I'd once again offered to help out a friend in her fabric shop this week while she was away at a show.  The last time I did this I took a packed lunch that included poached salmon sandwiches, a peach and chocolate biscuits.  On Monday this week the bread was homemade, the cheese had to be grated as it was too dry to slice and I used the very last of a jar of chutney that had seen many, many days.    The only fresh fruit that I've had since the start of the challenge has come from neighbours' and friends' apple trees.  I ate the last of the apples last weekend and have missed my daily dose of vitamin C.  I found myself slightly resentful and looking forward the the end of the week and the end of the challenge, but it has an end  - the 12% of people in Stirling living in income deprivation are not so lucky.

I pledged to give the difference between £30 what I normally spend on food in a month to the charity (about £180) but I am so pleased that Start-Up Stirling will receive significantly more than this through the generosity of friends.  Your sponsorship has been incredibly motivating and the monies will be put to good use I am sure.  If you haven't yet, but still want to donate, the Virginmoneygiving page remains live for a few weeks yet.  I thank you from the bottom of my heart!

Will the challenge have a lasting effect on me?  I'm not sure.  I would like to think that I will shop, cook and eat in a more canny fashion than previously, but only, I suspect, if it doesn't involve too much thinking.  My home cooked food has been far more enjoyable that most of the convenience food I usually buy, but I am looking forward to Sainsbury's vegetarian sausages, chocolate and a tad more wine.  And on that note, I'm off to pop a cork now in celebration of the end of the challenge.  Cheers!

Day 24 & 25: Just another lazy Saturday/Sunday

Saturday's heavy and continuous rain dried to a cold night and a bright Sunday but it was no hardship to stay home and await the weekend's deliveries.  Unusually the postman arrived early and so, knowing that I am at the end of the Amazon driver's route, I thought it safe to spend an hour or two at the SWI Stirling, Clackmannan and West Perthshire Federation's "Try a craft day".

I was a little late for the 11am start and as a result ended up on the 'book folding' table.  It wouldn't have been my first choice, as I've never really seen the point of folding books.  The resultant objects gather dust and you've lost the use of a book.  I may be a convert.  At the cost of a few pennies I have two Christmas decorations that exactly follow the spirit of my 'budget Christmas'.  Yes of course they will gather dust, but so does everything else at this time of year, and if at the end of the season they are too grimy to store, I can remove the decorations for reuse and them recycle the book without feeling that I am throwing money away.
Each of these designs was made from about half a cheap and surplus-to-requirements paperback.
The covers were removed from the paperback and then the book split into two pieces down the spine.  It is important to have a book that that has been properly glued, you don't want loose pages.  For the yule log each page was folded along its vertical axis twice, with the page edge and then the first fold ending up next to the spine. Half a book will provide a semi-circular log - if you want an entirely round one, use at least 240 pages (and you may get away with only one vertical fold).  Once folded the 'log' is stuck to a piece of card using double sided tape and then decorated.  The holly leaves and robin are little wooden tree ornaments, and the 'berries' are mini pompoms.  You could make your own from modelling clay or carboard, knit yourself a robin, raid your box of tree decorations (as I have done) or decorate with real holly and ivy.  A glue gun provided the adhesive needed.

The Christmas tree used the other half of the book, with each page having three folds.  The first fold takes the top right hand corner of the facing page to the spine to provide a right angled fold. (I've demonstrated the folds in the photo using a single page removed from the book -- but if you want to make the tree all the pages should be folded while still attached to the spine).
For the the second fold, take the right hand edge of the triangle and fold again to the spine. Finally make a small fold in the piece of the page that sticks below the edge of the book so that the 'tree' will be able to stand level.  (This odd page had a piece cut out of the bottom for some unknown reason.) Once all the pages are folded, add a piece of card to give it a flat back and then decorate the tree.  I used some glitzy Christmas parcel string and some of the wooden stars I had left over from last year's advent calendar.  Thank you Jennifer Carruthers, I enjoyed learning about this craft!

 The downside of spending a couple of hours out of the house however, was that I did miss a delivery - and this time it was unexpected.  I returned home to find a bag on my door mat, with a tupperware container of homemade soup, a loaf of wholemeal bread and a packet of Early Grey tea bags.  My good friend Jill (who worked with me for ten years, and survived, relatively unscathed) had made a mercy trip from Edinburgh with some goodies to help me through the last few days of my challenge.  In addition to two avocado from Steph and the eggs from my stint as chicken feeder, I've certainly been well cared-for this week.  In keeping with the spirit of the challenge though, I think I should count this largesse as using up the 'lives' I allowed myself at the beginning of the month.   Of course I could have frozen the soup and the bread until after the end of the challenge, but if you had smelled the aroma wafting from inside that bag, you'd have done exactly as I did and had a bowlful and two slices of bread immediately. Not having to do any cooking added to my sense of this being a very lazy Saturday and Sunday!

If you'd like to sponsor me for this challenge and support  'Start-Up Stirling' you can do so here!

Day 23: November bites

Another morning with a bit of a bite to it and another day of waiting for deliveries.  So time to do more thinking about those £5 presents.  Around this time of year in addition to 'compilation' presents, there is also an upsurge in 'do-it-yourself' kits, especially of the culinary variety.  I confess I am rather keen on these (as a recipient, I mean) as I have reached the age when I have more than enough stuff, and so really appreciate consumables and experiences as presents.  Here are a couple of my suggestions for gifts that come in at about £5.

"Biscuits in a Jar" is a BBC Good Food recipe that you can find here. It would make a great gift for those with a sweet tooth that like to eat, but not really cook.  I had most of the ingredients in my kitchen store cupboard (except for chocolate - who ever stores that? And the Horlicks). You need a large Kilner or other air-tight jar, this one I found in Sainsbury's, but you could use any large clean jar,  with at least one litre volume  - but make sure it is odour free, you wouldn't want the biscuits to taste of pickled onions!  I calculate that the costs come out like this: flour 9p; cranberries £1.20; oats 17p; sugar 23p; chocolate (dessert not cooking, but from Lidl) 76p; Horlicks 15p (I used half of an individual sachet); baking powder 2p and the Kilner jar  £2.50; £5.12 in total.  You could leave out the Horlicks or reduce the amount of chocolate or cranberries to keep in budget. The recipe and instructions are tied to the jar, and explain that the recipient needs to provide their own butter and an egg. This jar won't make it to the Christmas wrapping night, though, I have some birthdays to buy for this month, and suitably wrapped this will make as nice a birthday as a Christmas gift.

This is the make-it-yourself kit for Snowflake biscuits, another BBC Good Food recipe.  A version of this is available in their 'Homemade Christmas' magazine, or here.

The snowflake cutter came from Hobbycraft and my only purchases this time were ready-to-roll fondant icing and silver balls for decoration.  The costs were:

castor sugar (I had white, not golden) 38p; plain flour 12p; fondant icing £1.50: royal icing sugar (it contains egg white already unlike ordinary icing sugar) 22p; silver balls (half a tube) 50p and the cutter was £1.  Total cost £3.72.  all the ingredients are in a recycled cardboard box covered in last year's wrapping paper, and to give as a gift I'd add cellophane and ribbons and cover the lot in more wrapping paper.  Recipients need to add butter and an egg (and a bit of creativity with the decoration).  

Of course I was so busy thinking about Christmas I forgot to take something out of the freezer this morning for dinner tonight, so it will be the last of the pre-prepared pizza bases.  This time, as I'm a bit short on cheese, I shall wilt some spinach and squeeze out the excess liquid before arranging it on top of the still frozen tomato-sauced pizza base, making a neat barrier into which I shall break two eggs.  Baked at about 190C this will provide a tasty meal.  I'm on chicken duty again this weekend, so am hoping the eggs will be replaced if the chickens are kind.  

Needless to say when I popped out to get the chocolate for the jar and the silver decorations for the snowflakes the delivery man arrived with my parcel.  Fortunately my neighbour was home and took it in for me.  The parcel contained a pair of wellington boots and a pair of flip flops.  It reminded me of this challenge a bit.  Prepare for the worst, but hope for the best.  

If you'd like to sponsor me for this challenge and support  'Start-Up Stirling' you can do so here!

Days 21 & 22: counting down (in more ways than one)

As expected I had to do a little shopping this week: milk, red pepper, large mushrooms, spinach, vegetable spread, and yoghurt - so despite my shopping around to find the cheapest available, I am down to only £4.61 left of my budget to see me through the final week.  Let's hope that the power stays on, that the freezer doesn't blow up and that I am not suddenly beset by unexpected visitors!

Now that All Hallows E'en is past it feels as if we are counting down towards Christmas and the turn of the year.  The weather this week has been cold, frosty and misty interspersed with drizzle and grey mornings.  The heating has been turning itself on more frequently and the cats seem a lot less keen on staying out late at night.  My food thoughts dwell increasingly on comfort food. On Wednesday I ate the second portion of sardine fish cakes that I had frozen, along with a large portion of my homemade boston baked beans.  The saucy beans were just what the fishcakes needed.  I finished off the last of the apple 'crumble' for dessert.

Being Halloween, I thought I ought to get to work on my bargain pumpkin.  Not, I fear, to make a jack o'lantern, but to turn it in to something delicious. The Love Food Hate Waste website pointed out this week that Scotland throws away enough pumpkins every year to reach from Edinburgh to Stornaway, which is shocking, given how versatile they are.  So I cut my 99p Lidl pumpkin in half, took out the seeds (and saved them) and roasted both halves.  The first half was then peeled and chopped and added to a saucepan with chopped red onions (thanks Liz!) the chopped red pepper, a chopped chilli, stock cubes, water and seasoning, and then simmered until the veg was soft and pulpy.  In the meantime I cleaned the 'strings' from the pumpkin seeds, gave them a rinse and a bit of a blot with a tea-towel and placed them on a baking tray with a good drizzle of olive oil some sea salt, black pepper and fennel and cumin seeds.  I baked these for about 25 minutes stirring regularly to keep them well coated in oil.  They make a delicious soup topper or snack. Once the soup was cool I blitzed it in my blender (another piece of kit used for the first time in years) and stirred through the smooth puree half a tin of the coconut milk I bought last week, then portioned it up for freezing, leaving two portions (out of ten it provided) in the fridge for Thursday/Friday lunches. Yummy.  The remaining half of the roasted pumpkin I have plans for at the weekend.

Unusually all the deliveries have arrived more or less when scheduled this week, so I was able to get out today to have a mooch around for Christmas presents for under a £5.  One of the things you will have noticed is that at Christmas shops are full of what I refer to as 'compilation gifts'.  These are packs of related things wrapped up in seasonal packaging.  It is generally still cheaper to make these packs up yourself than buy those on offer, here are a couple of examples.

Sainsbury's provided me with a £2.99 novel (Christmas Sisters by Sarah Morgan) a mug for £1.50 and drinking chocolate 'shots' at 30p each, 15 grams of mini marshmallows (from a 180gram bag, £1) about 8p. A total of £5.48 (you could leave out two of the hot chocolate shots to keep in budget or find cheaper versions at bargain supermarkets).  The second collection also came from Sainsbury's.  A £2.75 mug, a £1 tub of Cadbury's drinking chocolate (on special offer as it is the end of a line - but the best before date is 2020), a 'winter edition' chocolate bar (Christmas tree shapes) for £1 and a slightly larger bag of mini marshmallows, 20p: in total £4.95.  I've placed these items in cellophane bags (I keep these in the house to package my handmade socks) and will decorate on the night I set aside for present wrapping. You could use recycled gift bags, party 'treat' bags, a decorated box, handmade wrapping paper or a nice piece of fabric if you preferred, they would all work well. Whether or not you are on a budget for the festive season, these would make nice gifts for someone who enjoys a cosy evening in.

If you'd like to sponsor me for this challenge and support  'Start-Up Stirling' you can do so here!

Day 20: "Chooseday"

Over the years many of my more organised friends have extolled the benefits of bulk buying, batch cooking and a canny use of the freezer, but to be frank I've never really appreciated the attraction or the benefits.    

However I agree there is a certain satisfaction to opening the freezer, while the kettle for the morning tea is boiling, to select something for dinner and to have the choice of a whole range of homemade meals.  Despite the slight increase in temperature today over Monday's early morning -2.8C, stew and dumplings was calling to me and I took these out together with some of the mash potato I had left over from the shepherd's pies. Served with the penultimate portion of my apple crumble and yoghurt, this will be a satisfying choice for a Tuesday.

The most important decision for the day already made, my head was free to think about other things.  This week will be abnormal in that instead of my usual trips to the Needle and Natter and the quilt group, I'll have to stay in to receive parcels and workmen. Despite my best attempts to arrange for everything to arrive on the same day, the notifications tell me to expect knocks on my door every day for the next six.  There are benefits to this.  I'll need to pick up a few food essentials this week - milk and non-dairy spread for example, but the time restraints mean that I'll not be wandering around the supermarket bemoaning the prices of the things I can't add to my basket this month. The downside is that I'll not be able to identify reduced items that might prove useful constituents of £5 Christmas presents.

At this time of year supermarkets, garden centres, gift shops, delicatessens and other places selling what might be described as 'posh' food items are clearing their shelves of end of ranges, odd items of old stock to make way for all those Christmas specialities and packaged-for-Christmas items.  This doesn't mean that the items are out of date, or even close to it, the shops just need the space.  More about this later (when I'm more able to go out 'foraging').

For now, let's continue out discussion of other under a £5 presents.  If you don't think your skills are up to socks, then maybe scarf making is for you.  I am currently addicted to making these scarves - knitted in the round on four 2.75mm double pointed needles from left over sock wool.  Over the years I have made probably made hundreds of pairs of socks, but have never been able to throw away the ends of the skeins.  As a result I have the equivalent of a laundry basket-full of odds and ends.  Being knitted in the round means that one only 'knits' there is no 'purl' stitch needed to produce stocking stitch, all the loose ends from the joins are on the inside, so no sewing in is required, the scarf is double thickness and lies beautifully flat and the only sewing up required is the pom-pom on the ends (which is optional!).  So these scarves haven't actually cost me anything to make but will make lovely gifts.  If you don't happen to have baskets of spare wool lying around the house, each scarf takes about 200 grams of 4ply (about 800 metres, not including the pom-pom) and could easily be made for under £5 if you chose high-percentage acrylic yarn.  Budget supermarkets like Aldi, Lidl, B&M and Home Bargains often have special offers on craft materials, so it is worth checking them out for yarn, but be quick - Aldi's new range of 'Crafty Yarn' sells out the day it goes on-line/on-the-shelves.

Of course knitting isn't your only option for scarves.  I'm a beginner crocheter, but still managed to produce these scarves without too much angst. Again they use about 200 grams of yarn, but in each case here I've used a much finer yarn: 'lace' weight or 'fingering' as it is also known.  Harder to find in shops at reasonable prices, but not impossible.  Good places to look are charity shops which frequently have boxes of yarn the result of house clearances or crafters 'de-stashing'.  Especially useful are specialist organisations like Remake Scotland who specialise in collecting materials for repurposing, up-cycling and crafting.  Also check out free cycle networks like Gumtree and sites like Google marketplace and Ebay.  Someone out there has exactly what you are looking for at the price you can afford.

As my sisters will tell you I have no need to buy new yarn (probably ever) not of course that that would stop me, but I am particularly aware at the moment of my 'survivalist' mentality, a phrase coined by a Facebooker.  I now appreciate that before the start of my challenge my kitchen cupboards were stocked for war, and there is a reason my neighbours bought me this sign for my sewing/craft room.  So in addition to using up odds and ends of left-over yarn, I'm also planning to use up yarn that was bought with intentions lost in the mists of time.


This 400-gram ball of mostly acrylic has moved house with me at least twice, and possible four times.  I have no idea why I bought it and I'd need two balls for the sweater on the ball band, so having finished my latest scrap scarf this is my new project.  Serendipitously I found a pattern for a scarf that uses exactly 400 grams of aran weight yarn.  It's a bit more challenging than my normal plain knitting and I can't knit this and watch DVDs, but a good audio book is just the thing while waiting in for deliveries.  Not possible for £5 you say?  Think again.  Aldi are currently offering 400 grams of aran-weight yarn (only available in brown) for £3.99. Now I'd say that is a good choice for a Tuesday.


If you'd like to sponsor me for this challenge and support  'Start-Up Stirling' you can do so here!

Day 19: Monday morning blues

Well, not so much blue as silver today, the very first heavy frost of the season.  I heard my neighbour leave the house at the crack of sparrows to go to work, followed by that oh so winter sound of ice being scraped from a windscreen.  I rather smugly pulled the duvet up around my ears only to be landed on moments later by several pounds of cat.  I do wish pets would understand the concept of the end of British Summer Time. So cats fed and the daily ablutions completed I decided to try out 

some more of the odd pieces of equipment I have bought over the years.  This time it was a mandolin and a food hydrator.  I bought the hydrator years and years ago after I had a glut of plums and tomatoes, thinking that in future years such an item would help me make the most of the bounty. Needless to say, I have't had a plum glut since and I've not managed to get more than a few handfuls of tomatoes from the plants I've grown annually.  My reason for taking these things out, of course, was the apples.  I carefully peeled, cored and sliced (using that mandolin - the only piece of kitchen equipment I am genuinely nervous about using!) and placed the rings on the drying racks, and left the machine to do its work.  Of course, it would probably have been helpful if I had hunted out the instruction manual first.  It certainly worked, but I sliced the apples too finely and left them in the dryer too long.  The result? Apple crisp pieces! They won't be wasted, they will make a great muesli addition, a topping for porridge or an addition to cakes; but they were a long way from the leathery rings of chewy apple I was hoping for.  Still plenty of apples left and once I've scrubbed the stuck-on bits of apple off the trays I'll have another go.  

I didn't need to do anything other than put my pre-pared shepherd's pie in the oven to heat and brown and steam a few vegetables, so while that was cooking, I did a stock-take of my larder.  While I have plenty of dishes prepared to see me through the rest of the challenge month, stocks on store cupboard/fridge essentials are low or gone completely.  Here's the list as it stands at the moment: white bread flour, whole nuts and ground nuts, coffee beans, tea, dried mushrooms, barley, lentils, parsnips, swede, green fresh veg, lettuce, cucumber, fresh herbs, peppers and chilli, onions, tomato puree, tinned and fresh tomatoes, garlic, olives, anchovies, rolled oats, vegetable spread, milk, frozen peas, kitchen roll, dried yeast, yoghurt. I've also run out of greaseproof paper, light bulbs, bleach, and am down to the last few inches of cooking foil.  Another month on a £30 budget would be very hard. All of which had me thinking about Christmas.

I know, it's not even Halloween yet, but imagine what Christmas would be like on a £30 food budget for December.  And to quote from a favourite childhood book of mine:

“Christmas won't be Christmas without any presents," grumbled Jo, lying on the rug. "It's so dreadful to be poor!" sighed Meg, looking down at her old dress. "I don't think it's fair for some girls to have plenty of pretty things, and other girls nothing at all," added little Amy, with an injured sniff..  

I've heard a lot of people recently talking about the arrangements they are making for Christmas, the agreements they have come to with family about the amount of money to be spent on presents, and whose 'turn' it was to host the Christmas lunch.  By mutual agreement my siblings and I no longer buy each other presents, and the same arrangement occurs with many of my friends, but for those suddenly thrown on hard times who would normally 'do' Christmas to the full, coping with little or no money at Christmas must be very tough.  

So I've decided for the remainder of my challenge blog to include ideas for presents that can be bought (or made) for under a £5.  I know that even this little will be beyond the purses of many on the breadline, but perhaps for the rest of us, it might be time to put a bit more care and a bit less cash into Christmas.  

Not surprisingly, I'm starting with socks.  (I AM the Sock Lady after all).  Each of these pairs of socks was knitted with yarn that cost less than £5.  There's no pure wool here (obvs.) but then if you want your socks to last a little while you want a bit of nylon. The two pairs in the middle of the photo are 75% wool and 25% nylon and those at the top and the bottom have a reasonable proportion of acrylic in them.  They are not hard to make for even the most basic of knitter, and once you handle 'knitting in the round' are quickly completed.  You can find a basic sock pattern here.  Many on-line yarn shops have special offers, you'll need about 100 grams or 400 metres of sock or 4ply yarn for a basic woman's sock and a tad more for a man's (if his feet are bigger than a size 8 or 9).  If you want to make boot socks, double knitting (DK or Sport) works well, you might get a pair out of 100 grams if the skein has plenty of yardage.  You can buy 100g of acrylic yarn for under £2 a ball.  Check out The Wool Warehouse for a wide range of suitable budget yarns, but if you don't do on-line shopping (or can't order enough to get free postage) visit your local Hobbycraft, they offer 'click and collect' too.  If you can't knit, find a local 'knit and natter' group and join it.  I guarantee there will be sock knitters there, and all will be willing to help you learn.  Socks may seem like a deeply boring gift, but once you've worn a pair of handmade socks, it is very hard to go back to shop bought.  You might find yourself with a second career knitting socks.  What would be so bad in that?

If you'd like to sponsor me for this challenge and support  'Start-Up Stirling' you can do so here!

Days 16, 17 & 18: Le Weekend

Despite being retired, the weekend is still, well, the weekend.  I continue to do the things on Friday, Saturday and Sunday that I always have, from meeting up with friends to avoiding doing the ironing. This weekend was much the same, with the exception that I changed my mind about some of my plans.  I had intended on to go to the SEC in Glasgow on Friday for the Christmas craft show, taking a packed lunch with me and using my free bus pass to get me there.  However Thursday night was a restless, sleepless one and I felt disinclined on Friday morning to get myself off to the bus station at any time that would make the SEC visit worthwhile.

So was this sleeplessness the result of a bad conscience (I can hear you ask)?  No.  I was thinking about food, cooking and the remaining tenner in the budget.  Now I know that at any time I could throw in the hat on this challenge and buy anything I need, nonetheless this one sleepless night of mine surely reflects the reality of so many people who are challenged to live on the breadline, without much chance of an end to it. I determined this weekend to prepare enough meals to last me for the rest of the month, so that the remaining £10 can cope with emergencies.  Which is probably a good plan.  This weekend a light bulb blew in the kitchen, I ran out of greaseproof paper, kitchen roll, bleach and washing up liquid.  Now as it happens I had a spare bulb and a bottle of washing up liquid in the cupboard and I can live without greaseproof, bleach and kitchen roll, (we never had kitchen roll in the house as kids, why do I need it now?) but if I had had to go out and buy this stuff, it would have cost me exactly £10 in Sainsbury's.  If £30 had to be used for all the month's household expenditure, I think the budget would be bust by now.

One of the slightly odd side effects of this challenge is that I am using all sorts of kitchen equipment that haven't seen the light of day in a very long time.  Like many women of my generation I have a large collection of Tupperware, most of which had names and purposes once but are now long forgotten.  For the record, this week on the equipment front I have used a zester, a cannelling knife, a potato ricer, American measuring cups, a ginger grater and a lemon juicer plus nearly all of my portion-sized Tupperware, the ice cube trays and cake-keepers.  The other odd thing is how much time I'm spending in the kitchen with an apron on.

Friday was curry night, so I defrosted a portion of sabzi, cauliflower curry, a naan bread and some dahl and while it was the second curry this week, it was none the less enjoyable for that.  Saturday I was out until after 1930, and on returning home I definitely wanted to eat not cook, so out of the freezer came one of the pizza bases and while the oven was heating I loaded it with grated cheese and Italian herbs and a drizzle of olive oil and despite the cheese being mousetrap and the herbs dried, it was as good a Margherita as I've had anywhere. Sunday was a day at home, and in order to save me more sleepless nights, also a day in the kitchen.

Being Sunday, I decided to start with preparing a proper lunch. This time I wanted nut roast, mash and vegetables with lashings of gravy.  I started by sweating chopped onion and garlic in a pan and adding vegetable stock, marmite, tomato puree and seasoning. I added this mixture to a bowl in which I mixed the chopped nuts and breadcrumbs and two beaten eggs.  Once completely  combined, it was turned into a loaf tin and baked for about hour and 15 minutes on 190C (with a foil cap for the first hour to protect the top from browning too fast.  In addition to the cashew nuts I found half full packets of almonds and hazelnuts in the cupboard, and while rather old were still sound so used these in order to save some of the cashews.  The breadcrumbs were made from the heel of the five seed loaf I made last week.  While the nut roast was cooking I peeled and steamed several big potatoes (still using the 'international kidney' from the garden) and when cooked put the lot through the ricer, mixing in some olive oil (no butter in the house), salt and pepper and some milk.  I put a portion aside for my lunch, the remainder to be used on the second dish (prepared while the nut roast was cooking).

 I do love a Shepherds' pie!  250 grams of green lentils soaked for an hour were added to two chopped onions, garlic, all of the finely chopped mushrooms left over from the family pack I bought ten days ago (this dish needs them to be a bit old - not fresh new button mushrooms which have no flavour) plus about two handfuls of pre-cooked cannellini beans crushed to a paste (I'd soaked them overnight and then boiled them up this morning), a tin of tomatoes, the last of the tomato puree, mixed herbs, marmite, the last of the dried mushrooms soaked and then chopped and the soaking liquid from the mushrooms made up to about a pint with a veggie stock cube, and four chopped prunes.  All of this brought to a boil and then simmered until the lentils were tender.  Why the prunes?  Veggie stock cubes aren't the most flavourful, so a couple of prunes finally chopped adds a good dark colour and a rich flavour  - I usually add a bit of extra salt to off set the sweetness.  This made four individual shepherds' pies (can it be called a shepherds' pie if it doesn't have lamb in it?), and two extra portions which can be used as ragu with pasta.  There was also two portions of mash left-over, which might be useful for fish cakes or for gnocchi.  All into the freezer.

The final savoury dish was Boston baked beans.  Great for lunch or breakfast, these are so much tastier (and cheaper) than bought baked beans.  There are six good portions here.  I soaked and boiled until tender the 500 gram packet of beans I bought this week.  All but two handfuls (which were used in the shepherds' pies) were then added to chopped and lightly fried onions, tinned chopped tomatoes, a couple of spoonfuls of molasses, a teaspoon or so of sweet smoked paprika and some salt-free stock and cooked in the oven for about an hour (or until the beans are soft and the sauce thick).  At this point the seasoning is adjusted (don't add salt when cooking beans  as it makes the skins tough).  This lot will be portioned up and added to the freezer stash of ready-prepared meals.

As it is Sunday I also made some dessert.

I still have lots of apples left, so I made my version of apple crumble.  Standard crumble is not a favourite - I so rarely manage to get the crumble cooked properly - it always seems overcooked on top and doughy near the fruit.  So I use muesli.  I use enough muesli to cover the fruit to the depth of about an inch and add it to a frying pan in which I've melted fat (butter is best, coconut oil a reasonable second but today it was sunflower oil as it was all I had), and added honey (or syrup or sugar, or agave nectar or whatever you like) plus spices - for me it is allspice, ground green cardamon and cinnamon - but add what you like.  Turn the heat up once the muesli is added and lightly fry -- you want the flakes toasted and the dried fruit plumb.  Stir it continually and don't leave it, it will only take a few minutes to brown and it burns very easily.  Take it off the heat and keep stirring until the residual heat in the pan is gone.  Use this to cover peeled and slice apples placed in an ovenproof dish.  I like my apples chunky not mushy, so I bake the lot in the oven until the apples are just tender.  You can speed the process up by microwaving the apples until they are the texture you like, adding the topping and then grilling for a minute or two just to finish it off.  It's great served with custard or cream or coconut yogurt - like here.  And yes, I know that this a big portion, but I've been slaving over a hot stove......

So in all there are now six (greedy) portions of beans, three portions of nut roast, two of lentil ragu, two portions of mash and three portions of shepherds' pie to be added the freezer.  The apple 'crumble' won't make it to the freezer - unsurprisingly it is really nice for breakfast, with a cup of coffee mid morning or cold for dessert.  Already in the freezer are two curry meals, four portions of stew and dumplings, sardine fish cakes and a pizza base so to my calculations there is a main meal for every night remaining of my challenge, and I still have a pumpkin, red kidney beans, eggs and potatoes to use up.  That should put paid to the sleepless nights.

If you'd like to sponsor me for this challenge and support  'Start-Up Stirling' you can do so here!

Days 14 and 15: batches and patches

Wednesday (day 14) was another busy one, and apart from catching up on the blog, doing some house-work stuff and driving over to see Marilyn to get my instructions for my next stint helping out, I wanted to do some thinking about my meals for the remaining two weeks of this challenge.

On rising I had a good mooch about in the freezer. Firstly I decided on eating a mid-week curry, so pulled out portions of the cauliflower curry, dahl, sabzi and naan that I made last week and set them aside to defrost.  I also still have a portion of sardine fish cakes (for Thursday), two more portions of each curry dish, four of my stew and dumplings plus two pizza bases.  There is also another portion of veggie soup in the freezer and two more in the fridge - I'd got these out for Wednesday and Thursday but had been too busy on Wednesday for lunch and forgot that on Thursday I'd be at the quilting group.

I think I need to make at least two more large pots of soup, two or three more loaves of bread, several portions of Shepherds pie (maybe) and perhaps a nut roast or a bean chilli.  If possible I'd like to make some cake or dessert, to feed the sweet tooth I seem to have developed and to supplement the several packed lunches that I will need over the next couple of weeks.  So Thursday will need to be a shopping day, and the weekend will involve a fair bit of time in the kitchen.

Thursday is the day I go to the Chryston Quilters' Group.  I've been several times now, but each time I haven't quite managed to get my act together enough to take the projects I actually want to work on with me, so the bag with my crazy quilt has accompanied me, and today I was pleased it did.  There is something very satisfying about working with rich fabrics, embroidery thread, sequins and buttons, especially when all I have been thinking about lately is plain fare.

Anita brought in a bag of trimmings that she thought might be useful as embellishments, and

Morag brought me in a pancake and butter, which felt like an embellishment of an entirely different sort!  (And delicious it was too, Morag, thank you!).

As a result of this unexpected treat I didn't get around to eating my packed lunch (cheese and pickle sandwiches) so decided to have these with a bowl of soup and the last remaining piece of chocolate zucchini cake for dinner tonight.  Which of itself turned out to be serendipitous as what I was defrosting as fish cakes turned out to be more curry!  (Note to self, label containers before they go in the freezer).  I think Friday will be another curry night.  I'm beginning to think that batch cooking is the way forward!

On the way home from the group I stopped off to do some shopping.  One of the real delights of autumn as far as I am concerned is squash: butternut, acorn, crown, patty pans, turban, and of course, pumpkin.  As we approach Halloween shops are beginning to lower their prices, anxious that they will be left with huge containers of unwanted 'lanterns'.  I'd have loved to buy locally-grown, from Arnprior Pumpkins for example, but their £5 for a small pumpkin as against the newly reduced 99p for a similar size from Lidl really doesn't provide a real choice. I also bought nuts - cashews (unbelievably) being the cheapest on offer, dried cannellini beans, tinned tomatoes, carrots, yoghurt and coconut milk.

I'll need ordinary milk by the weekend and probably tea before the end of the challenge.  Just over £11 left.  With these ingredients and what I still have in the kitchen I can see soup, nut roast, and maybe a sweet pie on the weekend cooking list.

The first job on returning home though, was to get some bread on for tomorrow's packed lunch.  Those who know me well and have visited Chez Willis know that I have an enormous collection of cook-books, which is odd for someone who has spent most of the last ten years zapping convenience foods in the microwave, but some are very well used.

I love my bread machine, and I love this cookbook.  Since I retired I've been working my way through all the recipes, writing my comments, amendments and (I hope) improvements on the various recipes as I go.  Tonight the recipe of choice is for the rice loaf, a white loaf enriched with egg (thank you chickens) cooked rice (extra was cooked in anticipation on the mid-week curry night) and with added millet (just because I want to use it up).  I've also started to try the recipes that produce just dough for shaping and cooking in the traditional way rather than in the bread pan, the very successful naan breads from last week are an example.  I also understand that the machine can be used just to bake cakes that have been traditionally mixed, so that might be on the cards this weekend too.  I am not sure if using the bread machine is more economical than putting on the small oven, but it is certainly a time saver.  While it is doing all the hard work, I can be turning more left over sock work into another scarf.

If you'd like to sponsor me for this challenge and support  'Start-Up Stirling' you can do so here!

Days 12 & 13: getting in the swing

Almost halfway through my challenge, and I feel I am finally getting in the swing.  This is making me more aware of a number of things that I wasn't conscious of before, like how much milk I consume, the amount of convenience food I eat, how little I 'cook from scratch' and how much food stuff I buy because 'it looks interesting'.  I also realise how infrequently I use the freezer for anything other than bought frozen food, ice cubes and wine chiller 'vests'!  Now, of course I have a fair amount of ready-prepared food in it and this week I shall be using some of that for meals rather than 'proper' cooking.

I spent much of Monday in my sewing room, making templates for felt Christmas tree decorations for the Tuesday needle and natter group.  My local community centre is home to a daily play-group/nursery as well as the library and various itinerant exercise classes and the playgroup are planning a Christmas Fair on the 17th November to raise funds.  I have been delighted to find that the needle and natter group have a wonderful relationship with the playgroup  (more about this anon) and have asked that we join them to offer a 'drop-in' knitting facility in the tea room for the duration of the fair.  They have also offered us the opportunity to sell a few things of our own, hence the templates.
So having spent the day slaving over cardboard and felt, I didn't want to cook on Monday evening, just eat.  Out of the freezer came one of my pre-prepared pizzas, it was topped with extra cheese and a few sliced mushrooms and into the oven it went.  Normally when I want pizza, I buy it, probably spending around £3.  My homemade one cost pennies to make and was jolly good (even if I do say so myself).  I'm not sure I shall go back to buying them when this challenge is over.

Tuesday (Day 13) dawned bright and dry but decidedly cool.  The forecast is for snow on the hills at the weekend and minus 1C overnight on Sunday, the promise of which is making me hanker after the delights of the sort of dinners they used to serve at my school, mince and tatties, shepherds pie, steak and kidney pudding, and heavy, hot desserts (spotted dick, rice pudding, chocolate sponge).  All of which is a bit strange as 1) I've been a vegetarian for over 30 years and 2) I don't have much of a sweet tooth and rarely eat pudding!  However there was no time to pander to these strange food desires today as I was to be very busy.  The needle and natter runs from 10-12 and the whole group have been invited to share lunch afterwards with the playgroup.  Some weeks ago some of the children had written to our group asking us to make some clothes for their new dolls, all of which had arrived naked 😯! Said clothes duly knitted, sewed and delivered and the playgroup proffered the lunch invitation by way of a thank you, with the menu including soup made from the vegetables from their own garden and sandwiches and cakes.  Needless to say this 'free lunch' was attended and much enjoyed by yours truly. I stayed in the community centre for the afternoon (after popping home to check on the chickens), for a WI session on Hardanger embroidery, something I have seen and admired but never tried.  Anne Muirhead showed us some wonderful work and gave us a super introduction to this beautiful craft.  I am tempted to do a bit more, but such adventures may have to wait until after production of Christmas tree decorations has finished.

Lovely Liz from the needle and natter had brought me another bag of veg from her garden, this time red onions and beetroot.  She apologised that the beetroot were a bit old and might be woody, but I'm not about to turn down any gifts that might be edible, so I'll be having a go at making something yummy with those later in the week.  I took the opportunity (as the wind rose and the temperature fell) to remove the very last of the 'tumbling tigers' tomatoes from the two plants I had in the garden.  The vines died days ago, but the fruit had hung on, but I thought another stormy evening would see the end of them.

I used the tomatoes up for my evening meal, along with an onion and a few olives, a tablespoon of capers, some finely chopped, rather sad kale (sorry chickens, I was going to give it to you), a couple of handfuls of pasta and some frozen beans for another one of my 'chuck it in a pan pasta' dishes.  Fast and tasty, and the combination of legumes and grain provided me with a complete protein, which can normally only be found in meat products.  It's interesting that most cuisines around the world have at least one dish that provides this vegetarian classic combination.  In the Caribbean you'll find 'peas and rice', in India dahl and rice, 'risi e bisi' in Italy, hummus and pita is another and in the UK?  Beans on toast!

However, the weekend's chicken-feeding provided me with a little supply of complete protein, and I'll be using these during the week.  Perhaps it's time for that other classic UK dish, egg and chips!

If you'd like to sponsor me for this challenge and support  'Start-Up Stirling' you can do so here!

Day 11: Sunday, Sunday!

Until I reached my teens, 'dinner' was always eaten at lunchtimes and 'tea' was the meal I had in the evening.  After that I joined my older siblings and my parents and dined at night.  I say joined, we used to eat in shifts, those of us at school ate first, then my Mum and the older ones on their return from work, and finally, my father who as a night-worker ate his main meal for breakfast before he left the house.  However the one meal we always shared was Sunday lunch.  It's a great institution, the British Sunday lunch, and traditionally of course, it is usually a roast.  Since I became a vegetarian, I've mostly given up on Sunday lunch, especially eating it 'out'. I can't begin to tell you how many times I've been offered mushroom risotto, penne arrabbiata, or salmon caesar salad, and it's just not the same.

So today, with heavy rain forecast and the weather due to deteriorate over the next week, I decided it was time to reclaim Sunday lunch and have some proper comfort food. It was a close run thing but in the end, stew and dumplings won out over nut roast!

Half a punnet of mushrooms, onions, garlic, parsnips, carrots and whole chestnuts.  I added dried mushrooms that had been soaked in boiling water, and then made stock with the soaking liquid, a stock cube and strong cup of tea! Normally I'd have added red wine (scary how often I cook with wine), but as that's off the menu, a strong cup of tea helps provide the body and tannin taste.  (Jack Munroe provided this little tip in her book "Cooking on a Bootstrap). The colour wouldn't be right of course, so I also added two rather old beetroots that I microwaved for a few minutes first to soften up.

I made eight dumplings, adding two to the pot about 20 mins before the end of cooking.  The remainder I placed uncooked on a floured tray and put in the freezer.  I served my meal with  potatoes (from the garden), steamed with green beans and cabbage.

The pot of stew made five large portions so four are going into the freezer.  When I next fancy stew, I shall defrost a portion and a dumpling, and roll it out to make a suet pastry top before cooking.  And I'll still have two dumplings left over.

As chestnuts are not a usual store cupboard ingredient for most people (they are for me -- I always buy them whenever I see them, as they tend to be seasonal) I've deducted the cost of the chestnuts (£2.20) from my budget.  In total the dish worked out at 60p a portion which is not bad for a Sunday lunch, and with porridge and apple for breakfast and homemade soup and bread for supper it easily falls within the budget.

All in all a very satisfying meal. My constant companion in the kitchen was less happy though, I think he was hoping for a bit of fish!

If you'd like to sponsor me for this challenge and support  'Start-Up Stirling' you can do so here!

Day 10: A friend in need?

I can remember a disagreement I had with a teacher when I was at primary school.  We had been set the task of explaining a whole raft of proverbs and sayings.  When it came to the end of the exercise and we were reading out our answers there was a definite split in the class over the meaning of "A friend in need is a friend indeed". My teacher supported the view that it meant that a person who wanted something was likely to act in a very obsequious way towards another (I'm not sure she used 'obsequious', and I'm sure we said 'sucking-up').  I was in the camp that thought the saying meant that when one was in need, if a person still helped or supported you, then that person was a true friend.  I still prefer my interpretation.

A third of the way through the challenge and with all my usual treats used up and off the shopping list I am becoming acutely aware of the difference between necessities and luxuries.  Opening my front door to find this half-jar of coffee on my mat was wonderful.  If I were truly 'on my uppers' (Mrs Wright, that one wasn't on your list) random acts of kindness would mean a lot.   I hope the memory of it will make me more aware that some gifts are worth so much more than their value. But for now, I certainly won't be 'looking this gift horse in the mouth'.

I had things to do and places to go on Day 10, so I decided to make the most of what my over-cooking had provided me in the way of frozen left-overs.  It was fish pie I pulled out of the freezer, the remnants of the dinner on the first night of my recent house-guest's visit.  The night I had prepared it, it hadn't seemed particularly special, but oh my, how I enjoyed it!  The remaining £20.20 won't be stretching to salmon, cod, smoked haddock and prawns so I'll need to get my thinking-cap on to come up with something within the budget that tastes this luxurious.

While I peruse the cook books, I think I'll enjoy a cup of coffee.  Thanks Siân!

If you'd like to sponsor me for this challenge and support  'Start-Up Stirling' you can do so here!

Day 9: Weekend treats

Today I needed to shop, cook and do a bit of housework.  So after putting some washing on and with the bread maker doing its stuff,  I set off to Lidl (where else?). This was the list:
Onions
Mushrooms
Red lentils
Green beans
Cheese
Milk
Lime
I discovered that I could buy a kilo of frozen green beans for only 10p more than 200 grams of fresh, that there was an offer on mushrooms - they were reduced from £1.47 to 70p for a kilo, and a single lime was 25p.  All told my little bag of shopping came to £6.26 which leaves me with £20.20 for the rest of the challenge.

For much of the rest of the morning and afternoon I amused myself cooking, producing not just the meal for tonight, but also enough portions for several meals over the next three weeks.  But first up was a little weekend treat.  All week I've had a desire for chocolate, but spending money on that this early in the challenge seems foolish.  I'm on 'chicken duty' this weekend, and my 'wages' for feeding and otherwise taking care of them are the eggs they produce while I'm in charge.  So with the promise of eggs, and with cocoa in the cupboard, some cake was in order.

Half of the chocolate zucchini cake recipe makes a good sized tray bake and in an air tight tin will keep very well.  It's also very ideal for using up those courgettes past their best! I didn't have chocolate chips for the top, so flaked almonds left over from last month's WI baking stood in. Delicious with a cup of tea or coffee.

Friday is 'carry-out' night, but even a couple of dishes would leave me cashless by the end of next week so with store cupboard ingredients, fridge stuff left over from other dishes I made this week, some spuds from the garden and some of my shopping ingredients I set about preparing a curry.  The menu: masoor dahl, aloo gobi, carrot, butter bean and kale Sabzi, raita, naan and plain basmati rice.

I had to make lots of substitutions.  No ghee, so coconut oil until it ran out, then vegetable oil. Red chilli instead of green, Skyr instead of yoghurt, etc.  There was more prep than cooking, but I made the full-size recipes and produced enough not only to serve for this evening but also to freeze for the next three Fridays.

I finished the raita as it won't freeze, and the left-over rice will be a nice treat tomorrow for the chickens (in payment for eggs, I hope). The three main dishes I'll portion up and freeze with the remaining two naan.

So time for me to put my feet up and knit.  I felt the need of a glass of something, so let me introduce you to my newly invented 'mocktail'.  The left over cooking syrup from yesterday's pears, over ice and slices of lime, topped up with Lidl's sparkling Sicilian lemonade (bought by Shirley when she was visiting in case we wanted an alcohol-free night 😂😂).  It probably needs a name.

Cheers!

If you'd like to sponsor me for this challenge and support  'Start-Up Stirling' you can do so here!

Day 8: Making do

I love a pear.  Conference, Williams, Comice, Packham, I'm not fussed. But I never get to eat them raw.  I don't know whether it is me, the kitchen or the house but this is how it usually goes after I buy them: day 1- rock hard, day 2- rock hard, day 3 - mush.  They seem to go from inedible to inedible without passing through perfectly ripe.  So when I have pears (and I rarely buy them) I cook them.  Whether poached or baked they are always delicious, helped along by cooking syrups made with wine and dried fruits and served with lashings of cream.  Obviously there is no wine (and if there were I wouldn't be cooking with it) and no cream - £30 is too little to fritter on such luxuries.  But having planned a dinner tonight of frozen and recooked leftovers I really, really fancied something fresh, sweet and unctuous for dessert.

The lovely Liz from the Tuesday's Needle and Natter group
had given me four pears, and one was a

bit ahead of the game and had already turned to mush, but the other three were still at the rock hard stage.  So while my savoury bread-n-butter pudding was reheating I peeled them and put them in a pan to poach.  I added a 'turmeric gold' tea bag, a few whole cloves and some lemon peel, a tablespoon of sugar and a half a cup of ginger cordial (not having any stem ginger or crystallised ginger in the house).  Real root ginger would have worked as well, but more sugar would have been needed.  I poached them until they were tender (about 20 minutes) and then turned off the heat.  After I ate my main course  I removed them from the pan and reheated and reduced the cooking liquor by about half, checking the sweetness along the way.  The ginger cordial really packs a punch and the turmeric tea and cloves adds a warming spiciness as well as a great colour.  Served with the syrup and a little  'Skyr' the pears were as delicious if not as calorific as those poached in red wine and served with creme fraîche. Sometimes 'making do' is no hardship.

I had two pears for dessert and will have the third with my breakfast porridge. The remaining syrup I have a use for tomorrow evening, once it's been chilled.

Today's visit to the Chryston Quilters' Group was a pleasure, they are a wonderful group of women with a wealth of interesting life experiences.  I am certain to learn a lot from them about quilting too, not least that others share my obsession.  I  also found time today to send off Shirley's scrap sock-wool scarf.  These scarves are very satisfying to make, so another will be started tonight.  Tomorrow is a cooking, cleaning, ironing sort of day so a little treat for dinner might be called for.

If you'd like to sponsor me for this challenge and support  'Start-Up Stirling' you can do so here!