Eating for £3.50 a Day?

 

Yesterday morning I was watching WearyWolf's latest YouTube video about eating for 50p a day and of course it immediately brought back memories of me doing exactly the same thing back in April 2023 on my Challenge blog.  

I just had to go back and have a look to see what I bought with my £3.50, I really couldn't remember at all.  We did it so differently, and to be honest I think he did it so much better.  I doubt he could have managed the week on my tiny portions compared to the really good ones that he made for himself.

https://youtu.be/FADYSUh8zCQ?si=DCZw1jDwvHiM4r-0

I wonder how I would do it if I had to do it again.  I briefly thought of having another go at the challenge ... and then talked myself out of it almost immediately.  😄

To read my version of the challenge just click HERE, and then as you get to the bottom of each post click on 'Newer Post' and you will go straight to the next days blog post.

Sue xx

Too Many Notebooks ... and Old Challenges

 

I was sorting through my stationery drawers the other day, and NO in great big letters I do not need any more notebooks of any description until I reach at least 100 years of age.  Nor do I need any pens or pencils if all the ones in the drawer are in good working order.

Anyway one notebook really caught my attention, it was full of loose bits of paper alongside many, many filled pages.  It turned out to be the one I kept while I was doing a number of my Challenges on my other blog.  

Eat for £25 a week, eat for one pound a day, two pounds a day etc etc.  But the most interesting challenge was the Eat for £3.50 a Week Challenge, that I actually only did back in April of 2023.  I ended up dropping everything else that I was doing and reading through all of my notes.

Sorry that the photos are so blurry, but I'm sure that you get the gist of it.

It really got me wondering if that would be possible right now.  I honestly think not, but I think I will go onto the Sainsbury's website and see how the prices compare with this months prices.

Now while the paper exercise of the challenge looked very promising, with lots of food being able to be bought for the budget, the actual Challenge itself panned out more like this.

The Eat for £3.50 a Week Challenge

Sue xx

Four Salmon Fillets, Four Meals

I bought a pack of four salmon fillets from Aldi at the start of the month, on THIS shopping trip and I decided to give myself the mini-challenge of using them in different meals over the course of the following week.

It's nothing wildly imaginative, but I found it interesting.

I cooked all four together while I had the oven on for some banana and walnut muffins.

The first fillet was eaten with boiled potatoes and peas, and the other three were put in a dish to cool down before being refrigerated.  As you can see I did extra boiled potatoes, I always think why cook just enough for one meal when you might as well make enough for at least three!!  I kept the cooking water from the potatoes to add to a pot of soup and saved the salmon skin to give to Ginger.

The next day I had a salmon and mayo bun for my tea, there were more homegrown tomatoes on my plate as the bun was being made, but I kept eating them ... I managed to save three for the photo.  😄

A couple of days later I had one of the remaining fillets with rice, peas and spinach.  It was very tasty and very filling.  I do like a lot of rice, but maybe I should switch to brown rice a bit more often. I do love white Basmati though.

Two more days later and I decided to have the final fillet with some noodles.  It is a really easy, and very lazy meal.  But sometimes those sort of meals just hit the spot.  I should have made some peas to go with it, but I thought of this far too late.  So it was a nice simple meal, with no green to be seen.

I had more ideas on what I wanted to do with the fillets, but I will possibly be saving them for next time as this time I was in the mood for really simple things.

What four things would you have done with four salmon fillets?

Sue xx 

 

My Back to Basics plan is going quite well.  

True I have spent a bit more than I meant to already this month, and on things that I really didn't need.  But just having the plan on the back of my mind is making me do so much better.

It's oh so easy to let things slide isn't it, you start by not always writing shopping lists or menu plans, and maybe eating slightly too much because you have cooked too much, and then not saving the leftovers for the start of another meal.  So I have been thinking a bit more about things this week, and using my purposeful leftovers.  The remaining two portions of baked beans after this breakfast the other day were incorporated into lunches.

The top photo simply adding two hash browns from the freezer to the plate.

Then a nice baked potato with the final pot of beans and a sprinkle of cheese.

While I have been a bit remiss about making out shopping lists, well I only needed two items so I decided not to write them down, even if I did come away with a couple more ... I have been good about following the menu plan.  

As you can see from this photo taken at the end of last week, I ate all bar two days meals directly off the menu plan.

So they were added straight to the top of the next menu plan.

The burger was delicious, with added onion, homegrown tomatoes and cheese.

And the 'Wrap Pizza' was delicious and very satisfying.  It made good use of a small tub of pasta sauce and half of a small tub of Mediterranean vegetables from the freezer

I switched around the fish fillets and new potatoes instead of the pie, that was destined for last night as it was just far too hot for pie and gravy, but apart from that I have been just as good at following my plan this past week.  

Will I make the soup tomorrow ... perhaps not for the same reason, but the beauty of a menu plan is that it gives you ideas when you just cannot think straight at the end of a long and perhaps busy day.  It doesn't have to be written in stone and rigidly adhered to, and sometimes it can simply be beans on toast again.  😁

Sue xx

First Job - Count the Cash

 

I was going to go through the freezer drawers and make an inventory of what I had in there, but then I decided to count the cash that I've got available to me first.

These are the three places that I usually have some money.  My bag, I don't have a purse I use the card and zipper section of my handbag instead, the little drawer in the middle is where I have been putting the cash that I have made from my recent Facebook Marketplace sales, and finally my little change box.  This is where I dump any loose change when it gets too heavy to carry around in my bag and I have been using bits and bobs from it just recently to keep the contents at a manageable level.

I was pleasantly surprised at the contents.  I have almost a hundred pounds ... £97.09 in fact.  😀

That's quite a useful amount to have.  I am putting no time limit on how long this has to last me, just as long as possible.  If I only spend cash, I won't be paying for my shopping with my credit card and then next months bill will be a lot lower, well that's the plan!!

In a bid to put off doing the freezer inventory for even longer, I decided to use up some of the Mediterranean Vegetables that I roasted a few days ago and make a large pot of pasta bake.

I used the last two thirds of that jar of pasta sauce, the same amount of water was used to rinse out the jar to get every last bit of tomatoey goodness out and then I kept adding handfuls of pasta until it looked about right.

You do need to have more liquid than you think you will need when you are cooking the pasta in the sauce, as it absorbs quite a lot, and this is what makes this sort of pasta bake even more delicious.

I got it just about perfect.

This pan made me one evening meal and two delicious lunches.

The leftover Med Veg was put into two little tubs and popped into the freezer.

Now I have to do the freezer inventory before I put anything else in there, not that there's much space left!!

Sue xx

'New to Me' Blogs ... and Price Increases

I was looking through the sidebars on all my blogs yesterday, both this current one and my old ones ... Our New Life in the Country, A Smaller and Simpler Life, Challenging Myself and My £2 a Day Food Shopping blog, (which was the most recent challenge I think and the shortest lived blog).  

The reason for my searching was to try and find 'new to me' blogs to read or ones that I had previously read regularly but then stopped. Instead I found that I have been quite loyal to the same list of blogs over the years and they nearly all appear over and over again on all of my own blogs.

Then somehow I ended up falling down a rabbit hole on my Challenging Myself blog and read the whole of a challenge I did in 2021.  The £3 a Day Challenge.

 I went out three times a day and spent £1 for each meal.  The prices were an eye-opener, in fact I really doubt I could do the same again.  Of course I lived directly across the road from Sainsbury's when I did this challenge, so nipping over three times a day on foot was not a problem.

While I was very tempted to do this again, I don't live as close to the store now and it would mean getting the car out three times a day.  So I decided a quick online comparison would suffice. 😀

This was my Day One shopping basket, a total spend of 78p.

Pitta breads - 35p, onion - 15p, and tinned tomatoes - 28p.

Todays prices in the same store are -  pitta breads 50p, onion 11p, tomatoes 45p.  This can't be a perfect comparison as the onion was weighed out and the current shopping basket could be showing a lighter one.  But even so at todays prices the same three items would now cost me £1.06, a whole 28p more.

Now this doesn't sound a lot, but if you're living on a tight budget and this was the rise in price for just for one meal, it's a pretty big increase when wages and benefits here in the UK have not risen at anything like this rate.

And I'm still looking for 'new to me' blogs to read, challenge ones if possible ... any ideas?

Sue xx

Counting the Pennies ... and Cutting it Fine

I had a bit of a shock this month, a couple of annual payments came off my credit card.  Nothing too outlandishly expensive compared to years gone by, but added together they took my balance to an amount that has virtually wiped out my current account.

Not too bad a total really for a month with a couple of largish payments and food shopping ... oh and there might have been a couple of books.  😉

The money in the bank before I paid the credit card off in full ... and YES I always pay my credit card off completely each month.  In the years I have owned it I have never paid any interest, M&S Bank must hate me.  😁

Oh well, I have the grand total of £24.21 left until my next £25 repayment from my son and next months little pension payment.  I'm not worried in the slightest, but I am going to be super careful this month and for the next few months to build up the account again.

Although, I have already been shopping and added the following to next months credit card bill.  I meant to use cash, but just didn't get myself organised in time!! 

Booths shopping £11

Just the very basics ... and a treat.  💖

Eggs - £5

Bread - £3

Wine Spritzers - 2 x £1.50 = £3

Sainsbury's shopping £8.51

Some fruit and vegetables ... and a treat.  💖

Tomatoes - £1.90

Apples - £1.70

Beetroot - 2 x 65p = £1.30

Bananas - 31p

Lemon - 30p

Chocolate Bars - 2 x £1.50 = £3

Too many treats?

Nope, but I will be a lot more careful for the rest of the month and use some of the cash in my little wooden box and the notes that I have in my purse.  I also have the back up of a £20 rewards coupon from Booths and over £17 of Nectar points.

And now that I have sorted through the food cupboard, as shown on the last post, I know exactly what I have available to use.  So really there's not much I need to buy at all is there.  😀

We'll see how it goes.

Sue xx

Getting to the Bottom of Things

 

This made me happy.  😀

You'd think that getting right to the bottom of the fridge drawer and having nothing left in there might have been a worrying thing to do, in fact years ago I would have been horrified.  But the way my mind is working at the moment it was actually a relief to use everything up and especially not to waste any of it.

The last three things in the drawer had been most of a kilo of carrots, bought during the 'cheap veg wars' of the Easter weekend, a few sticks of trimmed and chopped celery and the single brown onion that I 'borrowed' off Alan.

The carrots were topped, tailed and peeled and added to a baking tray with some cumin, mixed herbs and olive oil and then roasted in the oven for about thirty minutes or so.

I served some of them with a piece of fish that had been in the freezer for far too long for my lunch.  The fish was awful, but the carrots were delicious.  So basically I had carrots for lunch and Ginger had a surprise fish snack!!

The rest of the carrots, and the onion were whizzed up in the Nutribullet and have made a large portion of soup for a lunch on another day.

 The final bit of that red onion, also cadged the other day, was mixed with the remaining half tin of tuna and a big dollop of mayo and went into the two remaining white bread rolls from M&S.  The white rolls were so insignificant in texture that I managed to eat two of them for my lunch, something I can rarely do with brown bread rolls.

The celery had it's browning ends trimmed off and was served for another lunch, with the last of my Aldi 'Ritz' crackers and a tub of homemade hummus dug from the freezer

And then just like in the top photo ... the bottom drawer of the fridge was empty.  😀

So I celebrated by giving it a good wipe out, a clean tea towel and bought it three new red onions.

Although I didn't need anymore shopping I did need some onions to help me carry on using up the rest of the contents of the fridge, including the cheese drawer, after all what is cheese without onion.  🧀🧅

So my shopping this week was just three red onions for 95p from Booths, and while I was there I picked up this weeks freebie, which was a Meringue Bar, which on getting it home I sadly discovered has milk in it, so it was gifted to Alan to say thank you for the two borrowed onions.

Sue xx

So, What Were My Plans for the Onions?

 

I was asked via email what my plans for the food, specifically the onions were.  Well the red onion was immediately cut into to add to a 'wrap quiche'.

Halfway through preparing it I remembered something I had to tell Alan, so I nipped round to tell him, only to find him sat at his kitchen table tearing up bread for the birds.  Now I knew that particular loaf was only about a week old as we had bought it to take on holiday with us, so I cadged the last two slices and left him tearing up the end crusts.  

Sorry birds, my frugal needs are greater than yours ... anyway you shouldn't be eating too much bread!!

The quiche came out perfectly, well better than my last effort when the eggs seeped under the wrap, effectively gluing some of the wrap to the tin ... now that took some soaking and scrubbing!!

I had a nice sit down watching an episode of Signora Volpe on television and eating my dinner.

The plan I had for my two nabbed slices of bread was a nice simple tuna, onion and cheese toastie, as this would use up the last of this packet of cheese and some more of the onion.

Which seems very similar to the quiche but in fact tasted completely different.

I now have half a tin of tuna and the rest of the onion to use up.  As you can see each meal from the fridge moves me forward using cupboard items which then get added to the fridge and this is why although I have been eating this way for a couple of weeks the fridge has not yet emptied.

I do seem to be very good these days at making things go a long way and last a long time, as this tin of chocolate balls shows.  These were bought HERE just before Christmas and I still have the last four to eat.  Or maybe, because I have now noticed them they will all vanish this week, but even if they do, keeping chocolate in the house for over five months must surely be a new record for me.  😁

Sue xx

Free Food from M&S, and the Non-Challenge Challenge

 

I didn't really need any shopping after our little break away, and I actually said no when Alan asked me if I wanted to join him on a trip to Aldi on Saturday ... as he didn't mention going for a coffee, that made it much easier to say no.  😄

But on our way back from visiting Mum yesterday I decided to ask Alan to do a slight detour on our way back to the motorway, so that I could use the £5 M&S voucher that was burning a whole in my pocket.

As you can see I didn't buy much, in fact I was determined to stay around the value of the voucher.  I did well as my shopping came to £4.88.  Luckily Alan had picked up a pack of yellow-stickered cream scones, that he just couldn't say no to, two M&S cream scones for £2, it simply had to be done.  So that meant that I got the full value of the coupon and all my food was free.

I don't usually buy white buns or bread of any description, but rather weirdly they had absolutely NO brown bread or rolls in the store!!

I made myself a cheese burger for lunch when we got home, and although the bread was beautifully fresh, it just had no substance or flavour.  

It's back to brown for me as soon as I can.

I wasn't hungry at all by teatime so I ended up having a very late supper of a bowl of pesto pasta.  It was tasty and very satisfying, but doesn't green fusilli look a bit weird in photographs ... maybe that's one instance where white would have been better.  😄

I would usually have added some halved cherry tomatoes for a bit of an additional colour pop, but supplies in the fridge are very low now and I didn't have any.  I am determined to use up all the old fridge stock before I buy anything new, and it's going really well.  The only things that get added to the fridge are the opened jars from the cupboard, such as the pesto or things that I purposefully cook too much of.

Something that I had completely run out of before our little holiday jaunt was onions, but that nice man next door asked me if I would like one of his.  So when he asked "red or brown?"  I said "yes" ... and managed to snag one of each.  These should enable to me to make good use of everything that is left in the vegetable drawer and mean that I don't have to go out and buy anything and get tempted by a visit to the shops again.  

The red onion was called in action straight away yesterday, it's leftovers are in the tub on the bottom shelf, and I am about to make good use of the brown onion.

This non-challenge challenge is going really well, better in fact than some of my actual challenges.  😄

Have you ever completely eaten through the contents of your fridge, freezer or cupboards before having a complete restock?  In all my years of blogging I don't think I have ever managed it completely.

Sue xx