ok, I needed cheap, nutritious and quick and easy. I also seemed to have 4 tins of basics baked beans taking up space on my flarder. Also a lot of Abel and Cole bags of spuds in the dark box I store them in.
So I grabbed a bag, scrubbed the squds, and sliced them into discs about half a centimetre thick. Then I cooked them in the microwave for 7 or 8 minutes. Once cooked, I tipped them into a pyrex baking dish, and spread in a thick layer. Then I seasoned them with salt and pepper and poured over a slosh of organic single cream.
Leaving that to soak in, I opened a tin of the aforementioned beans and tipped it over the squds, and spread them over. This was all then liberally covered in grated organic medium cheddar.
This was then baked in a moderate oven til the cheese was melted and crispy at the edges.
I served this up with torn up organic iceberg lettuce which the kids LOVED! Papa was not convinced by the idea of the meal when I described it, but admitted at table that it was much yummier than he imagined, and he did end up having 3rd helpings.
All in all a very successful and frugal put together!
Monday, 16 May 2011
Friday, 13 May 2011
next week then
Sat: oriental beef with dumplings, stir fried chard and rice.
Sun: hopefully we will go out for the day with a picnic, and come home to throw some peanutty noodles together for supper.
Mon: sliced squds baked with cheese and baked beans and some spice.
Tues: home made ham and chicken creamy pasta bake
Weds: oven baked bacon & cherry tomato risotto + salad.
Thurs: spicy sausagemeat patties in pitta bread with lettuce & crunchy veg.
Fri: haddock chowder.
I shopped with Ocado this week, and even with the wonderfully easy to use Ocado on the go Android app helping me add those things i'd forgotten, the shop still only came to just over £50. I decided to go for the reduced priced Delivery Pass and aim to shop online twice a month.
Watch this space to see how it goes and feel free to apply for any recipes from these weeks that might tickle your fancy.!
Sun: hopefully we will go out for the day with a picnic, and come home to throw some peanutty noodles together for supper.
Mon: sliced squds baked with cheese and baked beans and some spice.
Tues: home made ham and chicken creamy pasta bake
Weds: oven baked bacon & cherry tomato risotto + salad.
Thurs: spicy sausagemeat patties in pitta bread with lettuce & crunchy veg.
Fri: haddock chowder.
I shopped with Ocado this week, and even with the wonderfully easy to use Ocado on the go Android app helping me add those things i'd forgotten, the shop still only came to just over £50. I decided to go for the reduced priced Delivery Pass and aim to shop online twice a month.
Watch this space to see how it goes and feel free to apply for any recipes from these weeks that might tickle your fancy.!
3 good frugal weeks
I've had a good run of luck and planning with my menus, but not with my computer, so haven't had the ability or time to blog them. So, as a catch up, first here are the last 2 weeks' plans followed by the upcoming week's plan.
Sat: chilli con carne, rice, sour cream and salad
Sun: blackened chicken in wraps and shredded veg.
Mon: veggie pizzas (chopped veg & let kids make these)
Tues: sausages, (basics instant)mash & broccoli
Wed: jacket squds with home made egg mayo (using boiled eggs from orthodox easter gifts and cress from sunday school easter gardens)
Thurs: home made rolls with ham and rest of egg mayo and crudites.
Fri: tuna pasta and veg
This was a week where both kids ate all food put before them and asked for more, and the shopping bill was under £30!
The following week was really pretty good too:
Sat: bacon pasta with peas & corn and fried cubes of bread (had less pasta than I thought and an extra person to feed, so I improvised) Papa also brought some spicyish prawns to oven cook and I had grabbed some cheap doughballs to add some fun.
Sun: jerk chicken, coconut rice & plantain (Godpapa cooked this for us, really yum!)
Mon: mac and cheese with sweetcorn and peas
Tues: homemade meatballs with pulao rice. Ikea style cream sauce and spinach. Littl'Un had double helpings of this, and ate more than I did!
Wed: spaghetti lentilese
Thurs: baked beans on cheese on toast
Fri: homemade smoked mackerel & cream cheese pate on home made rye bread, asparagus
The kids didn't really love the mackerel, but otherwise the week was very successful and shopping cost about £60.
Sat: chilli con carne, rice, sour cream and salad
Sun: blackened chicken in wraps and shredded veg.
Mon: veggie pizzas (chopped veg & let kids make these)
Tues: sausages, (basics instant)mash & broccoli
Wed: jacket squds with home made egg mayo (using boiled eggs from orthodox easter gifts and cress from sunday school easter gardens)
Thurs: home made rolls with ham and rest of egg mayo and crudites.
Fri: tuna pasta and veg
This was a week where both kids ate all food put before them and asked for more, and the shopping bill was under £30!
The following week was really pretty good too:
Sat: bacon pasta with peas & corn and fried cubes of bread (had less pasta than I thought and an extra person to feed, so I improvised) Papa also brought some spicyish prawns to oven cook and I had grabbed some cheap doughballs to add some fun.
Sun: jerk chicken, coconut rice & plantain (Godpapa cooked this for us, really yum!)
Mon: mac and cheese with sweetcorn and peas
Tues: homemade meatballs with pulao rice. Ikea style cream sauce and spinach. Littl'Un had double helpings of this, and ate more than I did!
Wed: spaghetti lentilese
Thurs: baked beans on cheese on toast
Fri: homemade smoked mackerel & cream cheese pate on home made rye bread, asparagus
The kids didn't really love the mackerel, but otherwise the week was very successful and shopping cost about £60.
Wednesday, 13 April 2011
My antidote to aubergine-phobia
Ah, spring is sprung and the Abel & Cole boxes have completely changed character. We got our first aubergine of the year and the obligatory clutch of courgettes this week. They make Papa's heart sink, but this early in the year, they constitute a challenge to me! I decided I'd do something curry-ish with the aubergine, but then started to worry that the kids wouldn't eat it, but I countered that by deciding it would be a naan bread meal, and that might swing the balance, and if not, then naan bread and yoghurt is kind of nutritious... Well, Littl'Un asked for seconds, and even Big'Un ate all her portion up. They both loved mopping this up with their bread, and so I have got to make a note of how I did this, as when Papa came home even he ate it and said it was bearable and edible, albeit with a hefty dollop of mango chutney alongside! Ingredients: 1 (small) aubergine 1 smallish onion (red in this case) 1 medium to large potato 2 or 3 tomatoes a teaspoon of "panch phoron" - Bengali 5 spice a teaspoon of ground cumin a tablespoon or 2 of yoghurt salt to taste. some oil Heat the oil in a saucepan and cube up the aubergine. Fry the cubes off on a medium high heat, until browning at edges. Add the spices and stir to mix well. Finely chop the onion and add, and mix, on a slightly lower heat. Now cube up and add the potato. When the onion is soft, (about 3 - 5 minutes) roughly chop the tomatoes and add those too. Cover, lower the heat, and allow to stew down. After 10 or 15 mins, remove the lid, and let some of the liquid boil off. Add salt to taste after this point. Just before it is done, stir through the yoghurt. If you prefer your potatoes not mushy, then use a handful of small waxy potatoes instead. This is very flavourful and unctuous and the hot fresh naan will be glorious to mop up the gravy and melty aubergine, be prepared for this, and make extra naan dough!
Thursday, 10 March 2011
picnic yellow potatoes with mustard seeds
When I was little, whenever my family was driving a long way, we packed a picnic to eat in the car, en route. Our picnics were not like the picnics in the picture books I loved from the library; we had no checked cloth, no wicker basket, no jam sandwiches 0r fizzy pop.
We had boiled eggs and boiled potatoes with little sachets of salt and pepper. We had "loli", a Sindhi flatbread made with dried pomegranate seeds, chillies, chopped onions and coriander leaves. We also had puris (deep fried wholewheat flat breads) with cooled yellow potatoes fried with turmeric and mustard seeds. We would lay a puri on one hand, and spoon a few potatoes onto the centre, then roll it up, and devour. This has always been one of my favourite foods, I would ask for "puri and potato with the little black things" but obviously, I needed to be able to feed this to my kids, and to be able to make this for myself too. So a few months ago I perfected the puris, but I still had to get the potatoes right.
I sat down with an Aunty, and asked her to tell me how she made it, because hers are the closest to the way my grandmother made them. My mother makes them, but they're not quite right.
As my aunty described her method, I scribbled down what she was saying, and I've tried it out a few times since then. Her instructions are not like recipes in books, with precise amounts, or exact timings, so they are harder to follow to get the taste just right...
A few days ago, I was making dry chickpea curry and naan bread anyway, so decided to experiment with this potato dish again, and by Jove, I got it right!
So, here is the process, hopefully slightly less imprecise, because obviously most of you have no idea what flavour you are aiming for, but I urge you to try it, it's SO simple, and SO delicious, and you are bound to find a version you like.
A quick tip: I used limes, not lemons, because Indian lemons are much more like our limes, but if you can actually get Indian lemons, smaller than limes but yellow, and with quite thin skins, then use those. Or just squirt the juice out of a bottle or a plastic lemon shaped receptacle, obviously!
Picnic aloo.
Peel, wash and dry 2 or 3 medium potatoes. Chop them into 1cm dice.
Heat a tablespoon of oil in a small lidded pan.
Add a teaspoon of mustard seeds. When they start popping, (this releases their fragrance and flavour) add the potato and fry on a medium flame for 2-3 minutes. Add a teaspoon of salt, and half to 1 teaspoon of turmeric.
Cover and lower the flame and cook for about 10 minutes. If they are not fully cooked, add a teaspoon of water, stir, and cook for another few minutes.
When cooked through, add 1 or 2 teaspoons lemon juice , and stir.
Serve with puris ideally.
We had boiled eggs and boiled potatoes with little sachets of salt and pepper. We had "loli", a Sindhi flatbread made with dried pomegranate seeds, chillies, chopped onions and coriander leaves. We also had puris (deep fried wholewheat flat breads) with cooled yellow potatoes fried with turmeric and mustard seeds. We would lay a puri on one hand, and spoon a few potatoes onto the centre, then roll it up, and devour. This has always been one of my favourite foods, I would ask for "puri and potato with the little black things" but obviously, I needed to be able to feed this to my kids, and to be able to make this for myself too. So a few months ago I perfected the puris, but I still had to get the potatoes right.
I sat down with an Aunty, and asked her to tell me how she made it, because hers are the closest to the way my grandmother made them. My mother makes them, but they're not quite right.
As my aunty described her method, I scribbled down what she was saying, and I've tried it out a few times since then. Her instructions are not like recipes in books, with precise amounts, or exact timings, so they are harder to follow to get the taste just right...
A few days ago, I was making dry chickpea curry and naan bread anyway, so decided to experiment with this potato dish again, and by Jove, I got it right!
So, here is the process, hopefully slightly less imprecise, because obviously most of you have no idea what flavour you are aiming for, but I urge you to try it, it's SO simple, and SO delicious, and you are bound to find a version you like.
A quick tip: I used limes, not lemons, because Indian lemons are much more like our limes, but if you can actually get Indian lemons, smaller than limes but yellow, and with quite thin skins, then use those. Or just squirt the juice out of a bottle or a plastic lemon shaped receptacle, obviously!
Picnic aloo.
Peel, wash and dry 2 or 3 medium potatoes. Chop them into 1cm dice.
Heat a tablespoon of oil in a small lidded pan.
Add a teaspoon of mustard seeds. When they start popping, (this releases their fragrance and flavour) add the potato and fry on a medium flame for 2-3 minutes. Add a teaspoon of salt, and half to 1 teaspoon of turmeric.
Cover and lower the flame and cook for about 10 minutes. If they are not fully cooked, add a teaspoon of water, stir, and cook for another few minutes.
When cooked through, add 1 or 2 teaspoons lemon juice , and stir.
Serve with puris ideally.
Thursday, 10 February 2011
Tom Yum soup from Lemon Piri Piri Mussels
A couple of weeks ago, Papa brought home a bag of mussels. I love fresh mussels, and my appetite had been whetted in Cafe Rouge when someone else had some and I'd pinched one. I had never cooked them myself before, tho we've had them at home, but cooked by GodPapa. I found I was a tiny bit squeamish about cleaning them, but Papa was fine, tho I did realise this is the fiddly bit and I'm sure it took as long to prep them as it took to EAT them!
Anyway, Papa prepped them, and I fried onions, fennel seeds, and added a few tablespoons of a Sainsbury's Taste the Difference Lemon Piri Piri sauce we'd had in the cupboard for ages (probably since barbeque season.) Then I poured in some coconut milk and got it simmering. I seasoned the stock with some soy & fish sauces and a teaspoon of brown sugar.
Now we put the mussels into the pan and stirred the whole thing, covered it, and let it steam for 4 minutes.
After that time they were all open and looking glorious.
It was a Brownies night, so the kids had theoretically already eaten, but Littl'Un came nosily up to table, spotted the bivalves and got herself a plate...:D
They were spicy, lemony, full of flavour and VERY yummy! The actual mussels were WAY nicer than the ones in Cafe Rouge, which had been a tiny bit too fishy tasting for me, without that sweetness. These were perfectly cooked and really fresh and juicy. Littl'Un left us some, and Papa mopped up the gravy in his bowl with bread. I was kinda wishing for rice, as the effect was far more Far East than Portugese!
At the end of the meal, Littl'Un chose a few shells that we washed and she loves playing with them, tho the cat seems to find them very interesting too...
I then asked around and googled and found I could save the cooking liquor, so we froze that in a stock bag.
So this week, I bought some lovely raw prawns, and decided to capitalise on the flavour of the broth and try to bring it to a sort of tom yum soup.
So this time some snipped up spring onions and a stick of lemon grass I had in the freezer, and then once the flavours were released of those, the stock went in.
Pausing to taste, I found it had a real stab of heat, but the flavours needed building, so I added water and started compiling the flavours.
I added fish sauce, soy sauce, brown sugar, ginger, garlic and finally a shot of lime juice. There, I had it - zing: hot, sweet, sour! Perfect. So in went some mange tout, some snapped baby corn, pak choi stems, and then the prawns (deveined, which is a VERY annoying task) and a leaf of rice noodles, and then the pak choi leaves on top. Then I covered the pan and switched off the heat after 2 minutes. I wanted to put in some oriental mushrooms but couldn't get any I liked at the time.
I put out a bowl of coriander leaves to garnish and I have to say the bowl of soup looked and tasted really authentic. We used to go to a lovely place in Golders Green called Tiger Under the Table, and I remember their laksa and tom tum soups so well, and this was midway between both, so I was happy.
Just a shame I won't really be able to replicate the meals!!!
Anyway, Papa prepped them, and I fried onions, fennel seeds, and added a few tablespoons of a Sainsbury's Taste the Difference Lemon Piri Piri sauce we'd had in the cupboard for ages (probably since barbeque season.) Then I poured in some coconut milk and got it simmering. I seasoned the stock with some soy & fish sauces and a teaspoon of brown sugar.
Now we put the mussels into the pan and stirred the whole thing, covered it, and let it steam for 4 minutes.
After that time they were all open and looking glorious.
It was a Brownies night, so the kids had theoretically already eaten, but Littl'Un came nosily up to table, spotted the bivalves and got herself a plate...:D
They were spicy, lemony, full of flavour and VERY yummy! The actual mussels were WAY nicer than the ones in Cafe Rouge, which had been a tiny bit too fishy tasting for me, without that sweetness. These were perfectly cooked and really fresh and juicy. Littl'Un left us some, and Papa mopped up the gravy in his bowl with bread. I was kinda wishing for rice, as the effect was far more Far East than Portugese!
At the end of the meal, Littl'Un chose a few shells that we washed and she loves playing with them, tho the cat seems to find them very interesting too...
I then asked around and googled and found I could save the cooking liquor, so we froze that in a stock bag.
So this week, I bought some lovely raw prawns, and decided to capitalise on the flavour of the broth and try to bring it to a sort of tom yum soup.
So this time some snipped up spring onions and a stick of lemon grass I had in the freezer, and then once the flavours were released of those, the stock went in.
Pausing to taste, I found it had a real stab of heat, but the flavours needed building, so I added water and started compiling the flavours.
I added fish sauce, soy sauce, brown sugar, ginger, garlic and finally a shot of lime juice. There, I had it - zing: hot, sweet, sour! Perfect. So in went some mange tout, some snapped baby corn, pak choi stems, and then the prawns (deveined, which is a VERY annoying task) and a leaf of rice noodles, and then the pak choi leaves on top. Then I covered the pan and switched off the heat after 2 minutes. I wanted to put in some oriental mushrooms but couldn't get any I liked at the time.
I put out a bowl of coriander leaves to garnish and I have to say the bowl of soup looked and tasted really authentic. We used to go to a lovely place in Golders Green called Tiger Under the Table, and I remember their laksa and tom tum soups so well, and this was midway between both, so I was happy.
Just a shame I won't really be able to replicate the meals!!!
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