Thursday, 12-01-23: Low spend/no spend January and a soup

Good morning, everyone.

I have broccoli stems to use up today.  These often get thrown away but they are packed with flavour and so nutritious, it's a crying shame not to use them sometimes.  My favourite is soup - I absolutely love a home made soup.

I'm going to use:

broccoli stems (obviously), with the woodiest bit at the bottom trimmed off

leek - I could use onion but I have leek to use up

carrot and celery - just a bit because they are the basis of many a tasty soup

a can of butterbeans - a lot of recipes use potato as a thickener but I have found butterbeans add creaminess and a lovely smooth texture to the soup without any need for milk or cream.  I'm probably going to add the whole can plus some of the liquid; I've always drained them before but why not try and use everything?

stock - it will probably be chicken

seasonings - the usual salt, pepper and garlic granules and, maybe, some lemon zest seeing as I have lemons left over from Christmas.  I'm also thinking about nutmeg.  Do lemon and nutmeg go together?

With a Thermomix, it's easy - chuck in all the veg chunks, give it a quick zizz, add butterbeans, stock and seasonings plus water if needed and cook for about twenty minutes.  Blend smooth and, if you want (I will), push through a sieve.  Taste, adjust seasonings, add a splash of lemon juice and a grating of zest and enjoy, reheat if necessary.

A soup maker will do something similar or use a saucepan on the hob and a blender.

Yesterday's meals:

A very scrappy, thrown together breakfast in the middle of sorting out and defrosting the upright freezer.  The fruit was blackberries, blueberries and easy peelers plus 150g 0% Greek yogurt and some Sugarly - and it was great

Well, doing the eggs together in the Ninja worked.  I had the poached egg first so by the time I got to the boiled egg, it was not dippy.  I never thought of that!  
However, as it was a try out, it's not a problem; I am unlikely to want to poach and boil eggs at the same time usually.

Eggs are very filling - this saw me through an energetic personal training session nicely.

I had an apple when I got home afterwards.

Dinner was the second portion of the Vietnamese pork.  It was really tasty and the broccoli went well with it.
I finished off with a Mullerlight.

Today's plans:

B:  fruit and yogurt
Some fresh fruit and some from the freezer

SW:  this will be syn free

L:  broccoli and butterbean soup, croutons; fruit
I'm hoping to make the soup as described above and use my B choice for the croutons

SW:  one healthy extra B for the croutons

D:  beef stroganoff, rice, sprouts; yogurt

The stroganoff is a Simply Cook portion from the freezer while the rest is fresh or fresh cooked (apart from the yogurt)

SW:  five syns for the stroganoff and half a syn for yogurt

E:  Shimmy Snippet - fifteen minutes of the Strike class.

Summary:

no healthy extra As (but that's OK because I am taking calcium and vitamin D at the moment)

one healthy extra B

five and a half syns

What is low spend, no spend?

All I will buy through January is essentials - and by that I mean food such as fresh fruit, veg and dairy/eggs.  All other foods will come out of my existing supplies and, to be honest, that may not be much of a challenge.  Also included in any low spend essentials are cleaning products and toiletries although I think I am fine for the latter.  
Also anything else essential that I won't think of until it lands!
That is the low spend part.

Everything else, unless it is either a regular bill/payment/commitment, will not happen.  No sneaky little Amazon purchases, no 'bargains' from the supermarket, certainly no clothes . . .
That's the no spend part.