Well if this is going to be a Challenge I thought I had better take a photo of the fridge contents at the start of it. I have nine days until the end of the month and I am really going to try not to be tempted to get any shopping ... although I have my emergency £3.70 if things get tough. 😄
Yesterdays food:
Breakfast - Two slices of Quorn Smoked Ham ... which I use instead of bacon ... on toast and topped with one egg. Yes, that is one egg cut in half, and two small slices of bread from the freezer.
Lunch - I was hungry at lunch time so I used one of my three remaining potatoes to make some boiled potatoes to go with one of the fish fillets I bought last weekend, and a nice portion of peas. I think peas are my favourite vegetable, luckily I think I have about half a bag of them left in the freezer.
Tea - For my nibbly tea while I watched a couple of episodes of Waking the Dead to finish the weekend off, I had the second half of my garlic bread, a salmon fillet and a rather large dollop of coleslaw, all from last weekends shopping trip to Morrisons. I cooked both the salmon fillets so the other one is ready for another meal, although sadly all the garlic bread is now gone.
A good first day with a mix of fridge and freezer items eaten and rather weirdly nothing from the cupboard. I wonder if this is why my store-cupboard supplies last for so long ... I eat from the fridge and freezer as a preference?
Sue xx
You ate well yesterday, and good luck with the remaining 8 days.
ReplyDeleteI read your last paragraph with an “ah ha” moment. Like you I have a well-stocked store cupboard but realised recently that apart from tins of legumes and jars of UPF-free curry sauces (yes, I am too lazy to do my own) I use very little of what is on the shelves. Think I need to have a bit of a re-assessment of what we keep on hand.
Thank you. ❤️ Yes it was an 'aha moment' for sure, it was literally as I was looking at these photos that I realised that I don't meal plan from the store cupboard as a first port of call. I need to make an effort to mix and match from fridge AND cupboard more to make better use of what I have in store, especially this week. 😀
DeleteYour meals look very tasty, I love peas too and they are so quick and easy. We have a cupboard full of tins etc I really should do a stock check 😀Looking forward to seeing the rest of this challenge
ReplyDeleteAlison in Wales x
I might do a full stock check myself at the end of this week, once I've used some things up. I keep starting one and then life gets in the way. 😄
DeleteI've never thought to use Quorn ham instead of bacon. The bacon always seems expensive for what it is.
ReplyDeleteYour meals look delicious. X
It was a revelation I started making 'bacon butties' with Quorn Smoked Ham. It cooks in minutes and is so much cheaper than all the fake meat-free 'bacon'. And of course being dual purpose it means you have 'ham' in the fridge to go on salad sandwiches too. 😀
DeleteLovely meals and it all looks very satisfying too. xx
ReplyDeleteIt was a good days food for sure. I think the fridge will empty quite quickly this week. 🙂
DeleteYour meals look delicious. I’ve started writing the use by dates on the tops of tins so I can see at a glance what needs using first. Although I put new cans in at the back, I can’t always see what there is in my rather dark cupboard area. A recent audit produced 5 cans of red kidney beans, I must make a chocolate cake with some of them!
ReplyDeleteDating the tins is a really good idea, as is stock rotation and that's something I try to do, although I have a bad habit of just putting things in the cupboard when I get back from shopping, hence me having to do regular sort outs to get everything back in order. After all there's no point in having a decent store-cupboard if things risk getting wasted is there.
DeleteChocolate cake made with some of the red kidney beans sounds like a VERY good use of them. :-)
We had hoped to have a couple of days eating left after our family buffet but sadly they all enjoyed it so much that they took lots of leftovers home with them. Think it will be a mix and match week here too especially as we are having our new windows and door fitted on Wednesday and Thursday. Catriona
ReplyDeleteWhat a family you have ... snaffling and running off with all the lovely leftovers. ;-) Lovely news doors and windows to look forward to will make a mix and match week fly by.
DeleteWith all the dried, canned, and frozen food there is in the house, I think we could probably last more than a month. Meals after the 25th day might be uninspiring, but we wouldn't starve.
ReplyDeleteThat's the beauty of a good store-cupboard isn't it, the knowledge that you would survive for quite a while, AND have some surprise meals to look forward to. :-)
DeleteYou've hit the nail on the head with the cupboard stocks, ours always seem like the last to be used up, too.
ReplyDeleteTalking of Waking the Dead, I know we've got similar taste in crime dramas - have you seen Mindhunter? It's a Netflix series from a few years ago about the how FBI introduced profiling to catch killers in the 1970s. The Guardian described it as Mad Men with Serial Killers! xxx
I hadn't realised how often I completely by-pass the cupboard in favour of the fresh stuff.
DeleteI might look out for something else to watch soon, Boyd (Trevor Eve) is starting to get on my nerves with his stroppy quick temper ... he's worse than Vera!!
A challenge! Yay! Your food looks delicious, Sue, as always. I'm trying to end the month by spending as little as possible on food, using up cupboard/ fridge freezer stocks and spending accumulated reward vouchers instead of cash. Our household bank account needs a boost and this is the easiest way to do it.
ReplyDeleteBTW I finally got my £52.80 tax refund on my Election Day earnings from May 2023 this week!! It only took 14 months :/ Now I'm waiting for payment from the General Election. There will be a little tax to pay and another 14 months to get it back I expect! One of these days I'll be dead and buried before it's refunded ...lol...;0)
Hoping you, Alan & mum are all well xx
Haha, yes ... it seems a Challenge popped up out of nowhere. 😄
DeleteOoh, you've given me an idea, I have just over £15 of Nectar points available to spend. That would give me an ongoing budget for the start of August. 🤔
Wow, they weren't quick to pay up were they, if everyone has had to wait that long the taxman had made a lot of interest on the money. Fingers crossed your General Election money arrives a bit quicker, but I wouldn't hold your breath!!
Me and Alan are okay, Mum is sort of on the mend but relapsing in some ways and still in the assessment centre for the foreseeable future.
Glad to inspire you Sue! It's usually the other way round 😉
ReplyDeleteRe HMRC: lots of people suggested I ask for interest on my money. If I owed it them I'm sure they would want it 🤔
So sorry to hear that your mum is still struggling. It must make your life difficult with too-ing and fro-ing so often.....
You can ask, but I doubt you would succeed! Yes the journeying backwards and forwards is definitely taking it's toll on us both.
DeleteSounds like a fun challenge and I know you will do well. I, too, tend to eat what's in my fridge and freezer before I eat what's in my cupboards; I look upon those as long-term storage items which don't require refrigeration or freezing. Yesterday, for example, the power went out for just over 3 hours and I was glad that it didn't last longer and cause the things in my fridge to spoil.
ReplyDeletePower outtages are such a worry aren't they. Luckily we don't get many where we live now but we used to in Wales. Store cupboard food is a happy fallback for such emergencies. 🙂
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ReplyDeleteVery tasty looking meals and peas are my favourite veg as well:)
They are really good for us too, which is a bonus for such an easy addition to a meal. 😀
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