Good morning! How's frugality going for you? I'm quite pleased so far as gaps continue to appear in my clogged up freezer while the fridge looks positively pristine compared to last week!
Mind you, I intend to clog it up a bit as I am right out of salad stuff and Aldi's Super Six are all salad veg. I do like a bit of side salad so I will pop down there this morning and take a look.
Today's frugal planning:
B: porridge, marmalade and yogurt (ever so nice)
L: home made chicken and veg soup
D: home made veggie burger and a salad with maybe a very small jacket potato and the last scrapings from the jar of balsamic onion marmalade; grape juice jelly
Ss: (snacks) orange and apple
From the freezer.
The chicken and stock for the soup. Last time I had a roast chicken, I pulled off all the remaining meat, boiled up the carcass and froze it all in portions. It's about time I started using them; I had forgotten about them until I did the sort out and audit just before Christmas! Bad me. If I make it a chicken and leek soup, the leeks will also come from the freezer.
I will make up the veggie burger with some pulses from the freezer, probably a mixture of chick peas and kidney beans and I might also add some leeks too, rather than onion (or as well as!).
The frugal factor
The marmalades (both sweet and balsamic) are home made and the porridge remains just about the most frugal thing I ever have.
I will use the saved egg from yesterday to help bind the veggie burger and if I add breadcrumbs, ditto. In a burger it won't matter if they are slightly fishy but, in fact, I don't think they are.
I'm looking forward to my chives and oregano regrowing because they would be lovely in the burger - for now it will have to be dried herbs whicg are better value than buying fresh herbs at this time of year.
I soaked and cooked whole bags of pulses before draining, cooling and open freezing them. Consequently, I have bags of 'freeflow' kidney beans, chick peas and butter beans from which I can grab a handful of this and a handful of that as needed. It means I don't have to open and then use a whole tin's-worth or thaw a whole lump with maybe more than I want. I've never done this before but from now on I always will.
If the soup and the burger work OK, I'll post about what I did.
That's a great reminder about freezing cooked pulses like that - and something I really need to get back into the habit of doing. Breadcrumbs always get frozen in plastic tubs - I just whip them out two or three times during the freezing process and give them a good old shake about to keep them separated and that works well. Handy to have them to sprinkle on top of a pasta bake, shepherds pie etc.
ReplyDeleteHi, Robyn. Yes, breadcrumbs are such a useful thing to freeze. I don't because I take bread from the freezer as I need it so there's rarely going stale. :-)
ReplyDeleteJ x