Minimal Reading, Lots of Watching

 

Artwork by Cozy Creatures Artwork

It's not been a brilliant week for reading this week, but I have been sitting down each day, when the light allows with a coffee to relax into my current book, which is proving very good.  With the grey, rainy days that we have had nearly all week, the light in my small home is terrible and while I have a light behind my chair I really have to be in the mood for reading to read for any length of time under it, and perhaps I just haven't been.

So there has been quite a bit of YouTube watching as well, which can be just as relaxing and usually very interesting if I choose carefully.

This week I have been watching:

https://youtu.be/37AF3wm976w?si=bedeUTtX9e4WmFsJ

Family Freedom ... and their Christmas dinner challenge.

https://youtu.be/caDnRRLBAXw?si=leuIp4U6IgOYJip6

Ben, and the gang at Flawless Cleaning Services

https://youtu.be/_XYilWMswEM?si=HO9G6zDY9GeQFOUp

Someone that I found on YouTube quite recently is Kezia at The Whole Home.  

Happily, watching her videos reminded me that I still have £100 worth of Riverford Fruit and Veg box vouchers to spend.  Definitely something for the New Year to help me keep the food bill costs down.

https://youtu.be/PsKdsAV9j3U?si=QJXSWvUn_xL8It1k

And of course with the weather being so bad just recently it's been the perfect weather for soup, so Weary Wolf's weekly soup recipes have been lovely to watch.  Karl is turning into a really good cook.

https://youtu.be/QpOooOXQ02s?si=m8twH9zYx-pbxU2H

And of course I just had to watch Sam Wilder and his seven days of eating just Greggs foods.

What have you been reading or watching this week?

Hope you have a lovely weekend.

Sue xx

They say never shop when you're ...

 

They say never shop when you are hungry, you will spend too much, buy too much crap, buy what you  fancy in the moment ... and then when you get home eat a banana.

What they don't say is never shop when you are hungry and desperately sad.

I have to stand up and admit to being absolutely heartbroken when we came out from visiting Mum at her care home at the start of the week.  I knew for a fact that if I just let Alan drive us all the way home without doing some thing different I would be sobbing for an hour and putting him under additional stress to concentrate on the road.

So, at my suggestion and fully admitting why, we went to Marks & Spencer ... for a look at their Christmas offerings.  I thought that being in public and in a brightly lit store I would have to pull myself together and who knows maybe even have a little fun.  As you can see from the slightly blurry photo, we may have done a little bit more than look.

We spent just over £95, Alan's half being the larger as it is very meat, seafood and cheese orientated.  Mine was a few treats for Christmas and some day to day foods that I am currently working my way through in date order as my freezer is full to capacity.

Did it work?

I have to admit that in the moment it did, but halfway home the lump was back in my throat, the ache was back in my heart ... and I had the added guilt of a spend that I knew I didn't need to feel guilty about, but did anyway.

This year has just about broken me and I am not ashamed to admit it.

Sue xx

Happy Thanksgiving

 

Happy Thanksgiving to all my readers who live in the countries that celebrate this day.  

I hope you have a lovely day with family, friends, or by simply choosing to mark the day in the way that suits you best.

'Reading by the Firelight' ... Unknown Artist

Sue xx

Logs ... Past and Future

 

It's funny what pops up in your Facebook Memories.  The other day this photo appeared and the one below, it made me go back and read the blog post that they were originally on.

It's HERE if you're interested.

I read a few of the other posts around it, and I had to laugh because only a couple of days earlier I had been saying how good I was getting at chopping wood with an axe!!

A post all about logs and kindling ... which seems very apt at the moment as we hope to be able to have a log burner in our new bungalow.  Although we won't have a barn to store all the logs and kindling in, so we will have to be a lot neater.

We are going to be all electric with solar panels, so with the rise of power cuts over the last few years we think it might be a bit prudent to have an alternative heat source as well ... and of course a log burner is lovely to sit in front of and to look at on a cold Winter's night.

I might not be writing so romantically about it once I have to actually chop wood, or even just keep getting up and down to put another log on the fire.  😄

Sue xx

Sausage Roll ... and Slaw

 

Remember THIS post when I held my hands up to, and showed you the evidence of, me accidentally cremating a poor lonely sausage roll?

  Well I thought I would keep my wits about me this time and cook the other one yesterday.

Review ... they taste exactly the same as they used to when they were slightly smaller and there were four in a box.  The thing is I think my taste buds have changed a bit and I am no longer a fan.  

On my plate in the photo is a side of a simple cabbage slaw which is simply, 1/4 of a cabbage shredded, a couple of slices of white onion and a dollop of mayonnaise, all stirred together and enjoyed with ... perhaps even more than ... the sausage roll. 

Perhaps I have been seduced by the Greggs vegan sausage roll, which currently due to all the travelling seems to be at the very least a weekly event.  These are ten times tastier than the Aldi cook at home offerings.

I doubt I will be buying the Aldi version on a regular basis anymore.  

Sue xx

Shopping ... and Cynical Festiveness

 

This weeks shopping array ... is that a better word than 'haul' I really don't know!! 😄

I shockingly spent £42.48, that just goes to show what wine, fish, a couple of toiletry items and a little bit of stocking up on a few things does to the bill.  Oh well, it was all needed.  I was very happy with the lemons which were on the Super 6 just as I needed them ... I was down to my last slice in the freezer!

I was also very happy with the 75% off 'Smash Burgers' ... they cost me just 19p.  Will they taste nice, I have no idea but for that price and knowing that I have some buns in the freezer they will provide me with two meals, and you have to try new things occasionally don't you.

The receipt for posterity.

I remembered to write the dates on the the things that were destined for longer term storage ... only I have a feeling that the Stackz won't last that long, and the weetabix will be opened tomorrow as I am down to my last one in the tin.  Oh, well it's good to keep in the habit, it all helps with rotation.  It was all somehow squeezed into the bottom cupboard, one day it will explode and all the food will burst out.  

Yes, we had a cup of coffee and also shared a plate of scrambled eggs in Booths before we went to Aldi, at the front of the photo are my freebies.

Booths café, there are lots of decorations around the place, including a couple of lovely Christmas trees and Santa's fireplace just as you come up the stairs.

Looking down at the store from the café ... we were there very early when I took this photo.  

It's not looking quite as festive in this photo as it was taken last week, but already they are really starting to ramp everything up now.  Soon it is going to be a Christmassy wonderland in a bid to make us spend as much money as possible.

Gosh I'm a cynic ... I better go and get another cup of coffee.  

Sue xx

Chickpea, Quinoa and Turmeric Curry

 

Over the past couple of weeks I have been eating through all the bought-in components of meals and almost 'ready meal' style things in the freezer ... garlic Kyiv's, fish portions and the like ... so I have now made some space to be able to make up batches of the meals that I want to eat on a regular basis.  

The first one that I chose to cook up was a batch of Deliciously Ella's Chickpea, Quinoa and Turmeric Curry.  It's a recipe that I've used for years and is always a favourite. It also made a good dent in my stash of out of date tins in the top cupboard.

I added another tin of potatoes to the mix after taking the photo as I do like the potatoes in this curry, and using up the tins meant that I didn't have to do the peeling, chopping and cooking potatoes part of the recipe to start me off.  😀

It's a really simple recipe, and once everything is in the pan it can just be left to it's own devices while you get on with something else.  I do add the chickpeas right at the start of cooking, not later like the recipe suggests, as I like them to get a bit softer, and I also use frozen pellets of spinach to cut costs a bit.

It makes a huge pan full of curry, so I had one portion straight away, cooking enough rice for another meal after this one.

Once the curry was completely cooled I made up a 'homemade ready meal' with the rest of the rice to pop into the fridge, and portioned the rest of the curry out between four takeaway style containers which all went into the freezer.

Now I'm pondering on the next batch of ready meals ... I think it will be a lentil Bolognese style mix.  This could be eaten on pasta, on a baked potato or used as the base for a shepherds pie.   Having some tasty home-cooked meals all ready to go will make for easy cooking evenings when we have to get busy with new home renovations in the coming months.  While I don't mind an occasional 'real' takeaway, this will really help to keep costs down.

Sue xx

Soaking Pasta

 

On a blog post I did the other week about me eating pasta when I 'Cooked Once and Ate Twice', Happy Introvert commented on a way of preparing pasta that I had never heard of before.  So I decided that I would give it a go for myself.

You literally just put however much pasta you want to cook in a bowl, and then leave it to soak well covered in water for a couple of hours.  The amount of starch that comes out of the pasta is amazing, and I found myself giving it a rinse in fresh cold water before I actually put it on to cook.

Doing this shortens the cooking time by a few minutes, so as well as making the pasta more easily digestible and slightly healthier, and you are also saving money on fuel.

While it was cooking I found that the pasta didn't clump together at all, and once cooked I tasted it before adding any sauce to the pan and found it to be a better texture and slightly tastier.

Yes, this particular pasta meal looks boring, I was concentrating so much on the pasta that I forgot to drop my peas into the cooking water like I usually do.  It was a nice cheese sauce though.  😄

A few days later I decided to try it again with wholewheat spaghetti this time.

At first I was wondering what to put it into to soak, and then I realised it could just go into the central section of the sink.  It worked a treat.

Not as much starch seemed to come out of the brown pasta during soaking, but once cooked it was a still a better texture and somehow tastier.  I'll definitely be doing this from now on.

Thanks for the tip Happy Introvert.

Sue xx

Dinosaurs for Christmas?

These dinosaurs seem to be in all the garden centres and lots of gift shops this year.  

Sue (in Suffolk) mentioned them a couple of weeks ago on one of her posts.  This month in Dobbie's they have been added to, and now we have leather jacket, sunglasses wearing guitar playing dinosaurs too. 

Will I be buying one, absolutely not, I won't even be buying a cute Highland Cow ... these are also appearing everywhere once again.

But each to their own, and if you want to rush out and buy one while  they are on the Black Friday/Week/Month offer, knock your socks off and enjoy your prehistoric Christmas.

Sue xx

Stodge, Dry Crusts and Fresh Bread

 

I've been concentrating on not buying anymore bread for as long as possible and using up what I had in the freezer instead, mostly because my last loaf was used up very quickly and the last couple of slices went into the freezer when they were only suitable for toast, and I knew there were so many other bits and bobs in there too.  So for this past week or so I have been taking all the random single buns etc out of the freezer and using them instead.

Yesterday I found this pack of breakfast muffins with two left in the bag, so that was breakfast sorted.

Two halves with just spread and two with a tiny bit of spread and marmalade.  Gosh they were stodgy, and I won't be buying them again, even if I do spot some with yellow stickers.

Late last night just before I went to bed, there was a knock on my living room doors and Alan was stood there asking if I had any bread, he was hungry and fancied some toast.  Aww poor thing ... we laughed about it this morning!!  I gave him the last of the loaf from the freezer, knowing that I would be having weetabix and fruit for breakfast.

As he was going to Booths to get himself a new loaf, he suggested that we have breakfast there and both buy some bread ... so we did.  Well he had a bacon bun and a coffee, and I just had a coffee.  Then he paid for my bread and crisps along with his shopping and gave me the tomato sauce that he didn't use in the café.  

I did quite well out of giving him my dry crusts didn't I.

Sue xx

Compromise

 

I really only needed a couple of things this week, so my shopping was very minimal.  Somehow though I spent £10.15.  The shopping did also include another packet of cough sweets, but we tipped these out into the little pocket in Alan's car, as that's where we mostly eat them.

When I took this photo I really had a thought about the cost of the various items.  Should I be buying cheaper eggs, should I have bought some more of the cheaper washing up liquid that I have been using and not really liking?

And then I saw what it said on the bottle of washing up liquid ... 'Cleaning Without Compromise', and that made me realise that while I do want to be saving money, I want to do so without making too many compromises on the things that I buy.  

To achieve this in a sensible way I have decided to really narrow down what I buy, not having a cupboard full of all sorts of different things that I have perhaps bought on a bit of a whim.  But buying a core stock of the things that I enjoy eating regularly and purchasing new packs etc when things are on offer or when I really have to.  Of course I can't really remember what is at the back of the lower part of my food cupboard yet, so that could be a nice surprise and one that hopefully feeds into this way of keeping myself stocked with food on a budget. 

It's funny how such a small shopping 'haul' can get me thinking so much isn't it, but nice that it helped me to make a decision.

The reason we were in Booths was that Alan wanted a bacon butty and a coffee from there, so while he was in the queue to place our order I browsed the upstairs book table and while tidying it up I managed to find myself what looks to be a really interesting book.

(Yes, I came home with a tomato ketchup and a spare serviette too.)

That's what it's called, as the title is only written on the spine of the book.  It was originally published in 1947 and then reprinted a year later.  So all the wartime information should be fresh in the writer's memory.  After a bit of research I found that The McFlannels was a Scottish radio series in the 30s, 40s and 50s.  I've not read it yet, but I'm thinking The Archers, but set in a Glasgow tenement building.

It was when I saw the chapter headings that I decided that even though I'm saving money, I would spare a whole pound for a book.  It's actually the first one that I have bought for quite a long time, I've been very good recently.  😁

Sue xx

What Is a Good Jar, Food in the Bin ... and Big, Big News

 

What is a good jar ... well in my opinion it is one that releases it's label without a fight or a second thought. 😃

It's also nice and big, with a lovely wide opening and if it has a 'pop-up' button, just in case I want to use it for jam in the future, this is the absolute cherry on the jar lottery.  

I do love a good jar.  🫙

I bought a box of the now 2 in a pack Jumbo Sausage Rolls from Aldi last month and I had promised that I would do a food review of them when I got around to cooking them.

I put them on to bake in the Remoska, which for the record, is the way that I always cook sausage rolls, got on with writing a blog post, reading my way around blogland etc etc and only when I got up to go to let Ginger out did I feel the heat of the Remoska and realise that I hadn't set the timer.  Just one of the downsides to having absolutely no sense of smell ... there are perks too, but not as many!

I don't know how long I had left them cooking for, but obviously just enough time for a half-cremation.

In a bid to not waste too much I scalped the sausage roll of all it's burnt bits, and had the smallest lunch ever.  Luckily I still have the other one in the freezer, so I will try to do the asked for food review on another day.  A day in which I put it to cook, set the timer and keep my wits about me.

I didn't put the burnt bits out for the birds as I wasn't sure if birds can actually eat charcoal, so on this very rare occasion I actually put some food in the bin.  😐

In other news, much bigger news in fact, we've done something pretty amazing this week, scary yes but also amazing.  Alan won't be wondering what to do with all this spare time in his retirement for the next eighteen months anyway, and I've been coppering up as I cannot afford to dip into any more of my savings in the run up to me eventually getting my state pension next May.

Happily my little money box had a grand total of £13.40, enough to go towards this weeks shopping.

I can't go into too much detail yet, but we bidded for and won a property at auction this week.  Homes Under the Hammer eat your heart out, we think we have our future-proof forever home ... well the shell of it anyway.  🏠

Sue xx

Lunch at Booths, and a Comparison

 

When Alan was feeling a bit better by Friday lunchtime last week and he said he fancied a bacon bun, so we drove round to Booths as they do an all day breakfast sandwich there.  

He really enjoyed it and I kept him company with a bowl of chips, and of course the obligatory cup of coffee.  There's not actually much that I can eat on the Booths menu, so chips with mayo is a good standby.

I sat looking at the receipt, and thought to myself I'll check out what I could buy for that amount once I'm home.  Well of course I didn't do it straight away, but yesterday spotting the café receipt on the worktop I pulled up the Sainsbury's website and filled my shopping trolley with everything I would need to make the exact things that we had eaten and drunk for lunch.

It was a bit of an eye opener. 😐

So if I made the lunches that we had both eaten, I would have left over - virtually all of the spread, most of the mayo, three quarters of a bottle of dandelion and burdock, three quarters of a bag of frozen chips, six slices of bacon, three bread rolls and virtually all of a jar of coffee.

I do love a good comparison.

But it's also nice to go out for a simple bowl of chips every now and then, and Booths is looking very festive with all their garlands across the main door and all around the store and café.  The front door is looking even better now with stands of wreaths and Christmas trees on the left hand side.  🎄🎄🎄

Sue xx

Cook Once, Eat Twice ... and Then Make Cake

 

I have a pack of salmon fillets in the freezer ... proper posh ones from M&S ... I must have picked them up when we went house-hunting to Cleveleys.  

We thought it might be a good town to live in with it's bustling high street and a good selection of well known shops, including an M&S Food Hall.  Also with it being by the sea but nowhere near as overrun and touristy as Blackpool which is just down the coast, it looked very promising.  Anyway after viewing the property and having a good look around town we decided it was too busy for us, which is ironic really as my son might be moving there from Blackpool as it seems so very quiet to them.  

But anyway, we shopped in M&S and Alan paid.  Now and then I seem to have a tendency not to always post photos of the purchases when Alan pays, and as these went straight into the freezer no doubt they were 'out of sight and out of mind', so they were a happy find.

I'm cutting right back on fish these days so I made one salmon portion last over two meals, with lots of fusilli pasta in a lovely homemade sauce. 

Cook once, eat twice ... and this is actually nice hot or cold, but with it being so chilly recently the second portion was also heated up in the microwave the next day.

Hobbit breakfasts continue, with fruit and a single weetabix followed an hour later by toast or something on toast.

While I had a dish of peaches in the fridge I decided to treat us to a Peach Cake.  It was just my usual recipe -

2 eggs

+

their weight in:

SR Flour

Spread or Butter

Sugar*

+

1 tsp Vanilla Extract

Mix everything together in a bowl and then pour into a lined or well greased cake tin.  Top with sliced tinned peaches ... or any fruit of your choice.  Cook for around 20-25 minutes in a medium hot oven.

*I emptied out all the demerara sugar sachets from my stash for this cake and it made for a lovely crunchy texture.

Absolutely delicious with a coffee mid afternoon.  

We had two slices each, over two days ... well I have to repay Alan in some way for all the food he's been buying me in dribs and drabs on our outings.  😄

Sue xx

Remembrance Day

 

Today we will remember all those who gave their lives during the two World Wars.  All those who fought and returned, men, women and animals.

We will remember all who in any way were changed by any of the wars that man has brought on this world, and we will honour them.  Each of us in our own way.

We will give thanks for those that returned, whether they be family, friends or townspeople and show our respect for what they did.

My husband.

My son.

Our town remembers.

They shall not grow old, as we that are left grow old:

Age shall not weary them, nor the years condemn.

At the going down of the sun and in the morning,

We will remember them.  🌹

And we will pray that all this killing will stop ... will man ever learn. 💔

Sue xx