Frugal Food

Thrifty tips, ideas, news & experiences on anything around the home to shopping to re-cycling etc.
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LittleBrownFrog
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Re: Frugal Food

Post by LittleBrownFrog »

I came across this blog recently - lots of very cheap recipes:
http://agirlcalledjack.com/
"Happiness is like a butterfly; the more you chase it, the more it will elude you, but if you turn your attention to other things, it will come and sit softly on your shoulder..." Thoreau.
GailC
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Re: Frugal Food

Post by GailC »

My best frugal recipe would be roasted vegetables with pasta. You can use any vegetables in season, a good slosh of olive oil and while the vegetables are roasting, boil the pasta. Mix together and the results are very tasty, especially if you roast whole cloves of garlic in their skins. Being in Portugal, we also add linguiça which is a very thin smoked sausage, this gives the dish an extra depth. All in all a very tasty meal, and I think frugal :-D
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Stef
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Re: Frugal Food

Post by Stef »

Well, so much for frugal - our fridge decided to just switch off, and smell horrid when turned back on again.

Freezers have been emptied and cleaned. Oddly we found something with a 2009 date - how?? I clear them both out every summer.... I just can't have missed it for that long, can I?

1 freezer is back on the other is being left off for a while. We will be making a list... after we have read the recipes.... after we have decided we can be bothered in this heat :-D

We are planning meals based on what is left in there. So far we have used up the chicken and some frozen chorizo type sausage that was in the freezer to make Andalucian chicken (sort of). Garlic and potatoes and a tin of toms finished it off. It makes 4 quite big meals and probably cost less than £3 all in.

There is enough frozen veg in there to make a decent frittata or three and lots of frozen berries, so pud is sorted for a while.

Back to planning....
1 dumbo rat still without a name; 2 top eared rats Octavia and Ursula
1 Rhode Rock, 1 Sussex Star, 1 Blue Ranger - The New Monochrome Set

My crafty blog, it's Frugal too http://relovedremnants.blogspot.co.uk/
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lancashire lass
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Re: Frugal Food

Post by lancashire lass »

I find that the cost of using gas and electricity is starting outweigh the cost of food, so my frugal idea is minimise the cooking time.

1) I tend to have an all in one pan kind of cooking (my spaggy bol isn't made with spagetti but something like fusilli or penne which I pop a small handful into the sauce as it is cooking - it also absorbs the water from the sauce and helps to thicken it too. More like a thick pasta soup than a proper spaggy bol)
2) cut stuff into smaller pieces so they cook quicker (when cooking potatoes especially for mash, they get cut into slices to increase surface area so take less time on the hob)
3) when using the oven, make more than one meal at a time
4) I'm not a great fan of microwaving but you can cut cooking times down if some food are pre-cooked in the microwave oven then grilled/baked for the latter stage to give it colour and more authentic flavour
5) Try to have a non cook day eg salads (better still if the produce is home grown) or something cold from a previous cook eg quiche/pie, cold meat
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Stef
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Re: Frugal Food

Post by Stef »

That's a good thing to add to the list. Thinking it through I'd guess we do a lot of it...

Batch cooking is something we do a lot of, there are only the 2 of us so it is quite necessary.

We have indoor picnic type teas, picky bits as he calls it.

Jacket potatoes are definitely pinged before baking, they take far too long otherwise. And I have never understood why SIL insists that chopped up potato makes soggy mash. Not mine!

But to set out to consider cutting down cooking time for every meal..... that might be fun/cost effective.
1 dumbo rat still without a name; 2 top eared rats Octavia and Ursula
1 Rhode Rock, 1 Sussex Star, 1 Blue Ranger - The New Monochrome Set

My crafty blog, it's Frugal too http://relovedremnants.blogspot.co.uk/
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Meanqueen
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Re: Frugal Food

Post by Meanqueen »

Hello. I haven't used my gas oven in many years, it's not worth putting it on for one person. I don't want to stand in the kitchen batch cooking and freezing a weeks worth of food either. A lot of my meals are steamed vegetables all done in the one pan, this takes about six minutes. Sometimes I might grill a veggie sausage to go with it. My baked potatoes get five minutes in the microwave, then they are done. The other day I chopped and grated my veg and ate it raw.

Cooking in the winter is a bit different, I make three day veggie stews in one pan. Don't bother freezing it, just put it in the fridge and eat over three consecutive days.
Ilona
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HedgeHugger
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Re: Frugal Food

Post by HedgeHugger »

LittleBrownFrog wrote:I came across this blog recently - lots of very cheap recipes:
http://agirlcalledjack.com/" onclick="window.open(this.href);return false;


I made her bean burger recipe a couple of months ago.
Needs a bit of tweaking, but will try it again.
bmpsands
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Re: Frugal Food

Post by bmpsands »

I like my spuds to take a little while to boil. The reason is that they are in a pan with a double steamer above. So that's potatoes on the bottom, a fairly solid veg (eg carrots) in the next layer up and something leafy in the top.

My nod to frugality, even more extreme frugality I should say, is trying to eliminate waste. Now that we have very little income I've realised how much I was either throwing away, composting or giving to the dogs and/or hens. I'm trying to be more careful about the amounts that I cook and if, for example, a cauli is too big for one meal and too small for two then some gets frozen down and put into a mixed veg bag. Eventually these oddments make up some very interesting mealtimes.

The last bulk buy of chicken breasts must have come from ostriches. The last two gave generous portions for dinner and the bits I cut off formed the basis of a stirfry (using mixed veg of course).

Bonkers, or what?
Bea; 19 hens (most of whom I intended to get); 6 bantams (which I never intended to have); old Benji dog and young Toby dog (who I definitely wanted). Three years into country living and loving it.
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Stef
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Re: Frugal Food

Post by Stef »

Double steamer..... must put that on the carboot list :-D

As for waste - eurgh! We used to laugh at the size of the food waste box we got from the council. Now it takes us about a week to fill it up - and it all goes on the compost. We Freegled another box and use that for meat scraps, again it seems daft putting that out weekly (but we do).

Today's feast will be 'rashers' of belly pork and a jacket potato - see what all that talking about them did? He has ideas about glazing the belly pork and cooking it to a lovely frazzle. It was lovely last time he did it and should be very, very cheap from the local pig specialist butcher.

There will be bits left so I'll make potato cake thingies and freeze them back for next time we have some cabbage leftovers.

That should mean 4 meals for about £1.20 a portion - oops, a bit extravagent. I am aiming for a pound a pop!
1 dumbo rat still without a name; 2 top eared rats Octavia and Ursula
1 Rhode Rock, 1 Sussex Star, 1 Blue Ranger - The New Monochrome Set

My crafty blog, it's Frugal too http://relovedremnants.blogspot.co.uk/
Freeranger
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Re: Frugal Food

Post by Freeranger »

I agree that there's nothing so frugal as making meals from what you've already got - a great Frugal Feb idea. I'd really recommend A Girl Called Jack (Munroe)'s recipes as well - the ones in the link - because she combines cheap, nutritious and tasty with expert shopping. She truly understands the word 'breadline'.
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Meanqueen
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Re: Frugal Food

Post by Meanqueen »

I had a clear out of my fridge freezer before I went on hols, ate everything in it, switched it off, then started afresh when I came back. It's interesting to cook up a meal from whatever you have in. Now restocked, all my food is frugal. I aim to stretch a weeks shop to two weeks, with just a small top up of fresh fruit and veg, eggs and yogurt, in between. Now I am eating veg from the garden I can stretch it even further. Yesterday I bought bananas, grapes, broccoli, nectarines, and eggs from Al-di, £4. And found some reduced yogurt, carrots, spinach, and crumpets in As-da, £1.49. That will do nicely. Should take me to the end of next week.
Ilona
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saint-spoon
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Re: Frugal Food

Post by saint-spoon »

Meanqueen wrote:I had a clear out of my fridge freezer before I went on hols,..... Yesterday I bought bananas, grapes, broccoli, nectarines, and eggs from Al-di, £4. And found some reduced yogurt, carrots, spinach, and crumpets in As-da, £1.49. That will do nicely. Should take me to the end of next week.
Ilona

I tend not to waste money on fuel going around all of the supermarkets, but maybe that is why I can't afford to go off on so many holibobs.
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Meanqueen
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Re: Frugal Food

Post by Meanqueen »

I don't waste fuel going around all the supermarkets either. I went to town on the bus, Aldi and the small Asda are within walking distance of the bus station. I also went to B & M and the market. I wait till I have several places to go to and do them all in one visit. I don't do Morrisons or the big Asda because they are too far out of town. Sainsbury's is local but I don't go there because they tend to be more expensive. Lidl is in the town but I have never found anything in there when I have looked. I sometimes visit an Asian shop just off the High Street, they are good for rice, pasta, and tins of tomatoes, beans and chick peas. My main shop comes from Tesco, usually at 8 - 9pm at night when stuff is reduced on the last date. It is worth me driving the five miles each way once a fortnight to get 90% off. I am also in the habit of calling in shops as I am passing, therefore not incurring any extra costs.
Ilona
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lancashire lass
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Re: Frugal Food

Post by lancashire lass »

Yesterday I had an appointment in the city so I did a flying trip to the supermarket beforehand so that I could get back and out again to the bus stop for 8.00am. I had a set list of what I had to get so I marched in with the trolley and grabbed them and was out again within 10 minutes

... the morale of this story is that my weekly shop seemed to be a good £15 cheaper than usual because I didn't dawdle

{rofwl}
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Stef
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Re: Frugal Food

Post by Stef »

I'm having a baking day. I want to use up some panettone, dried fruit, puff pastry and LOTS of eggs.

Bread and butter pudding, Portuguese egg tarts, meringues, biscuits. I've blogged about it - and I didn't think I'd use that blog again. It is my weight loss blog and fairly unused. But I decided I'll use it for frugal cooking and Up Day and Down Day recipes!

It may get more use that way so I am off to redesign it a bit :-D
1 dumbo rat still without a name; 2 top eared rats Octavia and Ursula
1 Rhode Rock, 1 Sussex Star, 1 Blue Ranger - The New Monochrome Set

My crafty blog, it's Frugal too http://relovedremnants.blogspot.co.uk/
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