Days Five and Six

 This is the food that I 'bought' from my cupboard and fridge at the start of this challenge, and looking at what I have left now there's a lot less, but then I am well into the week so it's to be expected.  It's funny I don't see less available food and panic, instead I'm looking at it as a well thought out challenge that is completely on track.  And that is very satisfying. 😀

I should even come out of the week  with leftovers, which I am now wondering if I should turn into the start of a second week.  Which could be interesting if I made a good effort not to repeat too many of the same meals, although I might have to buy a couple of things to enable it to work. 

Anyway here are the meals from day five and day six.

Day Five Breakfast

Just a simple slice of toast with peanut butter, I even shared a little bit of the edges with the dogs, they do love peanut butter.

Now this is something that I rarely do, have bread twice in a day, but I was really fancying some more toast ... so I topped it with beans. 

I mustn't have shared the beans out very equally because this is what I thought was a third of a can and it definitely looks more than that.  I obviously short-changed the two baked potato meals!!

My evening meal on day five was a pasta bake.

For the pasta bake I used one tin of tomatoes, one onion and a sprinkle each of garlic granules, onion powder and mixed herbs, and made a very simple sauce which I left to simmer away for a long time.  The flavour was amazing on the final sauce, I had added two thirds of a can of water as well when I rinsed out the can to get every last little bit of the tomatoes out, but there was no wateriness to the finished sauce.

I then poured it over four big handfuls of the dried pasta in my ovenproof pan, stirred it all through and with the lid on, left it to cook for around 45 minutes in the oven.  It gave me the two portions of pasta bake that you can see above.  The one with the cheese was my meal and the one without was my leftovers ready for the final day.

What is it about pasta that two hours after eating it even with a really good sauce you find yourself peckish again.  So I had a small bowl of salad for supper.  

Breakfast on day six was another bowl of porridge and peanut butter, my third and final one of the week.

Lunch was another fish finger butty, using the last of my fish fingers.  If I do decide to do another week, I must be strong and not buy another box of fish fingers, it makes for a lazy lunch that I could eat every day ... but shouldn't really!

I did follow it with a large bowl of salad ... a nod to health and freshness.  😁

For my tea on day six I had the large Shepherdess Pie.  Gosh that was so filling!!  My appetite has definitely shrunk these days, I'm glad I didn't serve it with anything else, as it was I had to sit still for an hour to let it slowly digest.  But gosh it was tasty.  😃

The final dish of pie filling will be carried over to next week, as I want to eat the other half of my pasta bake tomorrow.  I will be back tomorrow with my final days food and a photo of what I have left at the end of the week.  There's not much, but there is enough to give me a starter for a second week if I do decide to do it.

Sue xx

Days Three and Four

 

Day Three Breakfast.

Yes, it's the same breakfast as on Monday morning, so I'm using the same photo.  It's delicious, warming on these chilly mornings that we are still having, and keeps me full for most of the morning.  I had my second banana mid-morning with a cup of coffee, I wasn't overly hungry but I just fancied something to eat.

Lunch on day three was a cheese salad sandwich.  

I got a bit carried away with the lettuce, too much lettuce and not enough cheese.  My mind obviously wasn't on the preparation.

My tea on the third day of this little challenge was a nice simple one using up some of my leftovers.  The leftover mashed potato from making the Shepherdess Pies on day two, and the little bit of grated carrot and onion also leftover from the pie filling was turned into a basic coleslaw with a dollop of mayonnaise.  

This was a really tasty meal and I thoroughly enjoyed it, and it just goes to show that a tasty meal does not have to be complicated in any way.

I do love leftovers.  😀

Breakfast on day four was two of my eggs scrambled and served on one slice of toast.  I haven't got any spread of any description for this week, so I used a small smearing of mayonnaise to moisten the toast a bit, it worked well.  

Simple, but again delicious.

My lunch was another of the Shepherdess pies, and again I'm using the same photo as I used the other day.  I have one large pie topped with mash left and the one that I left un-topped.  

Another duplicated photo, but my tea on day four was the same as my tea on day one.  Cheesy beans on a couple of small baked potatoes.  That's it, all my potatoes have been used up now.

Another good, and very filling couple of days.  

I realise I may seem to be low on fruit this week, but I just don't eat a lot of fruit as I much prefer vegetables.  I worked out the macros at the start of this when I sat and did my menu plan and everything was pretty healthy.  I'm averaging four of my five a day and getting around 50g of protein per day ... which is the recommended amount for women.

I'm feeling great and I'm very happy with my choices, which I think when it boils down to it is the main thing for me.

Sue xx

Days One and Two - Shopping from Home for £25

 

Day One Breakfast

Just a nice simple bowl of porridge with a large dollop of peanut butter.  There's more peanut butter than there looks on this photo, as this particular brand is very 'claggy' and clings to the spoon.  So I plunge it deep into my porridge to hopefully let it start melting a bit. It's the best peanut butter I have ever had though, so I will persevere with the clagginess ... there, that's another word added to my computer dictionary!! 😀

Lunch was a plain and simple fish finger butty, you can't beat it every now and then can you.  I was still quite full after breakfast so this was a good lunch to have on this busy work day.

For tea I had two small baked potatoes topped with a third of a tin of beans and a good sprinkle of cheese.

Breakfast day two was a single slice of toast with peanut butter.  It looks like nothing but I find this a very adequate breakfast, especially for a day when I'm going to be sat at my desk space all morning.  A mid morning black coffee and a big glass of water was all the extras I had.

Before I sat down though, I started the prep for my lunch.

All the ingredients for the filling of my Shepherdess Pies.

Chopped up, sprinkled out and poured in.  This was left to putter away all morning.

I saved half a tin of the beans, some grated carrot and a couple of onion slices for a future meal.

Two small and two large pies, waiting for the mashed potatoes to cook.

An hour later I had one of the smaller ones for my lunch.  Gosh that was more filling than I expected it to be!!  I topped the other small and one of the large pies with mash and saved a serving of mash in a dish on it's own for the next day.

I couldn't resist taking this photo of my eggs in the pan ... what were they looking at? 😄

My tea on day two, fried eggs on toast.  I slightly overcooked the eggs but it was still delicious.

So that was day one and two of this buying my shopping from the cupboard and fridge week, and I think it went rather well.  It was all very tasty that's for sure.

Sue xx

Twenty Five Pounds ... and Shopping from Home Challenge - Part One

Twenty five pounds, that's what in my head I am allocating myself for each week of this year for my shopping.  It includes all my food, toiletry items and cleaning products.  There are a few things that have fallen outside this budget, such as Gingers food which I buy once a month from 'Untamed' and my 'smol' washing capsules that I buy once every three or so months.  But by and large this is my budget and one that because of having a massive amount of food already in my food cupboard, I have been able to stick to really well.

So well in fact that I am not finding this to be particularly 'challenging' at all.  Don't forget I have been setting myself various challenges for years now and it was only quite recently that I stopped my challenge blog Challenging Myself ... I just checked and it was last April.

Well at the end of this April I decided to go on the Sainsbury's online shopping website and price up what food I would be able to buy for my full £25 per week budget ... and challenge myself to shop my cupboards instead of spending any money at all, and live on just that food for a full week.  Unfortunately, I couldn't do it straight away and I didn't have the time to re-check all the prices this week, but I am happy to go with the figures that I got on 22nd April. 

(Actually I have just checked and my shopping basket is still there ... and 4p cheaper, the potatoes have gone down in price!!)

Below is my online shopping basket.

I decided to include a jar of coffee in my £25 budget as that is a larger purchase but I had given myself permission to use salt, pepper, oil and any of the herbs and spices from my drawer.  With the total of this 'online shop' only coming to £24.52 I decided to spend some of the change on a couple of bananas and a carrot.  

This brought my total to £24.95.

The Home Shopping

Although I had shopped for some of the cheaper end items in my online shop I was not concerned about just using what I actually had in the cupboard.  So for instance 'Stamford St.' baked beans have been replaced with my Heinz.  This sort of gets balanced out by me using what I already had open from my cupboards and the fridge ... half a jar of mayo, 3/4 of a loaf of bread for instance instead of a new item. 

 I wasn't being pedantic about anything.

Once I had the food out on the worktop I could start to properly plan my meals.  I had a loose meal plan in my head when I chose my shopping but it was just that 'loose'.  For instance I knew I would have a curry, a pasta dish ... and I had been fancying a Shepherdess Pie for a while.

The Menu Plan

The menu plan wasn't written in stone but more of something to aim for.  Obviously all the meals could be inter-changeable as could the days.  It's no good waking up to scrambled eggs on the menu when you desperately fancying some peanut butter.  😄  

I'll be back soon with some photos of the meals that I actually make.

Sue xx

Happy Birthday Sweet Potatoes ... and Two More Shopping Trips

 

I was pondering what to have for lunch yesterday and looked through the cupboards and then the little basket drawers of the small unit, and guess what I found ... two sweet potatoes.  

I don't remember buying these I thought, how old can they be?  Anyway, although they were tired and dry looking I gave them a quick wash, peeled and chopped them and gave them ten minutes in the air fryer after tossing them with some oil, salt, pepper and dried parsley.

They were delicious and made me a nice light lunch.

They were also just under four months old as I have just found out by scrolling through all the posts marked 'Shopping' on this blog.  See this blog post for when I bought them.

Happy almost four month Birthday sweet potatoes, sorry for leaving you for so long!!

To round off this week I thought I would show you the rest of my little shopping trips.

On Tuesday evening Alan was going to Aldi and asked if I wanted to join him, so even though I had been to Sainsbury's that morning I said 'yes' ... well it would have been rude not too.  😁

I needed a sliced loaf to go into the freezer, but the rest of the things, except for the paracetamol, were just treaty things that I fancied.  I have been wanting to try these brioche burger buns for a long time and there they were for the first time in our Aldi.

Along with wine, crisps and cornetto's, it's a tasty little shop for sure.

A total cost of £13.88.

Then on Wednesday morning it was another freebie day at Booths.  

As I was passing to go to the hairdressers and needed some Pontefract Cakes for Mum it would have been mad not to go in and claim my little freebie.  This week a small bottle of tonic water, I don't drink gin ... but I do like tonic.

The Pontefract Cakes were £1.75 a bag or two bags for £3, so as I like them too I bought two bags, one to go in with my budget and one as a gift for Mum.

I forgot to leave the pack of six bottles of S. Pellegrino out on the worktop, so it didn't make it into the photo ... but it looked a lot like this.

I buy these about every six months to have in the car when we are travelling, once I have drunk the original contents I refill and refill, over and over again with cheap Aldi sparkling water.  At six two litre bottles for just £1.99, this way it's better for my pocket and better for the environment than lots of little 'posh' bottles.  I used to drink a LOT of sparkling water, but now when I'm at home it's nearly always tap water, which I store in a litre sized glass bottle in the fridge.  But tap water when out and about and it gets tepid is not quite so tasty.

So this week's Total Spend is £28.36 ... and one freebie worth £1.

And now it's time for coffee.

I hope you all have a lovely weekend.

Sue xx

What I'm Currently Reading ...

 

Nope, I cannot for the life of me think of anything more luxurious!  💖

I'm currently reading this book, and it's everything that I want in a book.  Good writing, a subject that I know a little about, an autobiography with a little bit of timeline jumping ... and recipes.  Lots of lovely recipes.  

Oh, and it has two of it's own built-in ribbon style book marks ... not many books have that these days!!

The food is so well described that I keep finding my self hungry and wanting to jump up and make something fresh and tasty.  I think my next read will have to be a diet book.  😄

What are you reading at the moment?

Sue xx

Minimal Shopping Continues ...

 

Another week, another low, low spend.

Just buying what I need or really want, to compliment what I already have in has really highlighted just how much I actually had in at the start of the year.  Food is gradually going down in the cupboards and the little basket drawers now, and even the little 'treat' drawer is looking sparser by the day, but there is still a lot of food available.

This week the only real need was the flour, I have only a couple of ounces of flour left in the big jar and I have been fancying making some pastry.  I only have to read about someone making a pie and I want one!!   The Spring onions and tomatoes were bought for their freshness, and the peas I bought as they were on a slight offer.  I still have about a quarter of a bag in the freezer but buying them while they were even 15p off means that I am saving a little bit of money.

And it all adds up doesn't it.  😀

My receipt.  As you can just about see at the bottom of it, I had to pay by card as I accidently used the 'Card Only' self service till.  This highlighted to me just how much I am enjoying paying by cash while I am watching my pennies, it was just annoying having to pay by card.

The flour is now having it's 24 hours in the freezer before being tipped into my largest jar.

And the Spring onions were trimmed and checked over and are in their pint pot, which now resides in the fridge.

It doesn't take me long to put the shopping away these days.

Sue xx

The Books That I Read in April

 

The Wild Year by Jen Benson

I started the month by finishing the book that I was about a quarter of the way into it at the end of March, and I thoroughly enjoyed it.

Wartime Recipes - A Collection

Next I picked this little book from the shelf to look for a specific recipe ... and ended up reading it all.  The recipe I wanted wasn't even in there after all.  😄

It's a good little book and currently only available second-hand.

Home Economics by Jane Ashley

Next I read this book, I just wanted to read something about food and tight budgets for a change and this fitted the bill nicely.

I particularly liked comparing the prices from 2018 to now, there are a lot of differences!!  It was a pity when she brought her second book out that she didn't list the prices in this way again.  But this is an interesting book, again one that is currently only available second-hand.

Small Things Like These by Claire Keegan

After a couple of recommendations for this book last month when I posted about reading another of Claire Keegan's books, I decided to treat myself to some more more of her works.  I'm glad I did, this is a wonderful little book.  Her books are written well, no flowery, excessively descriptive paragraphs, just neat and to the point.  Getting over all that needs conveying to make the story really good in as few words as possible.

An enjoyable read.

Barging Free by Alan Denman

My final read of April, and with a chapter or two still to read now that we are into May, was this very funny book by Alan Denman.  To be honest his is a style of writing that took me a while to get into, but it's a nice easy read and one that I am really enjoying.  It's divided into chapters and paragraphs that are very self-contained and this means you can pick it up when you have just a few minutes to spare, and in the busy month of April that came in very handy.

All these books will be staying on my bookshelves, well I never know when I might want to have a re-read in the future.  Sometimes it's nice to have another read of something that you have enjoyed before isn't it.  It's like re-watching a favourite film so that you can drink in more of the details, or maybe spot the clues to the crime before you did last time.

Is this something that you do, or are you ruthless and give away or donate all books once you have read them?

Sue xx