Hello there ...
hope you've had a good day.
We've had a day at home today ... we earmarked today as a 'sorting out' and 'tidying up' sort of day.
Firstly ... a nice cleansing bonfire ...
The place was beginning to look like a junkyard .. a gypsy camp ... old boxes and rubbish piled around the woodshed ..
we needed a good sort out and clean up.
Its what happens when we are too busy to sort as we go along ... stuff gets put aside for chopping up for the fire etc.
Anyway .. Hubby P sorted ... and chopped .. and filled recycling bins ... and I ...
well ... I was in charge of the bonfire.
I burned all the old boxes that were hanging around ... and all the documents with information etc on them ... you just can't be too careful these days .. so anything unwanted .. not needed to be kept ... goes up in smoke.
It must be said ... it gets a bit boring watching a fire .. no treacle toffee or toffee apples ..
so I had a mooch around the garden .. still lots of colour.
Kale is doing well ... almost too pretty to pick.
And roses ... trying their best to give a good show.
The roses looked so pretty next to their .. so red... Christmas-y red ... rose hips ..all on the same bush.
We've had no real frost yet ... all the seed heads are still standing ... giving shape and form amongst the slowly fading leaves.
How pretty is this jewel red of the Sedum..
Leeks are doing well considering they were put in very late ... and very much left to get on with it.
They will be much valued in the coming weeks .. isn't veg such a price ?
Speaking of prices and food ... I bagged myself a couple of tins of corned beef this week.
I haven't bought any for months ... what happened ?
It use to be a good cheap standby .. a Girl could make a good few cheap nutritious meals from a tin of corned beef ..
then the price rocketed!
Tesco had it on offer for £1.53p ... cheapest I could find it for a while .. so I pushed the boat out and bought two.
Mind you .. I only used it sparingly ... chopped in two and put one half in the freezer .. who'd have thought .. cheap bully beef being so expensive.
At one time we would open a tin just to put on a sandwich .... now it has to be stretched ...
You know how Hubby P likes a pie ... so we had a meat and potato pie for tea .. lots of potatoes, an onion, bit of swede and half a tin of corned beef ... it made a large pie for us .. and a smaller one for a friend up the road.
No pic's of the pie .. Hubby P came in complaining his 'belly was touching his backbone' ..
he was so very hungry (very dramatic)
...you would think he was never fed!
... so I forgot the 'after pic' .. mind you .. you have seen a pie before ... pretty hum drum..
Whilst the oven was on I scrabbled around in the fridge and found all the odd bits of cheese that needed eating up ... grated them up and turned them into cheese scones.
They will do for lunch tomorrow at work ... and I made a loaf of soda bread .. quick and easy.
I was just thinking as I stood peeling potatoes ... its a bit worrying that the basics.. the staples that we took for granted .. basic veg, potatoes ... bread even .... has become so expensive.
It use to be a case of fill up on the cheaper foods .. basic wholesome foods ... but no more.
Its come to a pretty pass when a girl has to weigh up the pros and cons of switching the oven on !
Anyone found any bargains this week ... anything on offer that we can make filling meals with?
xx
I've never thought of using corned beef in a tin for this, what a great idea, the only thing we use it for is sandwiches and you are right, it is pricey, its a treat when we buy it! who would have thought that would happen, corned beef in a can, it is almost five Canadian dollars a tin, I'm not sure what that would be in pounds, it cost us one dollar and sixty three cents to buy one British pound, another thing I didn't know you could freeze it! I made a chicken do for three meals, baked, then a chicken pie and then soup, everything has become so pricey here, we eat less meat, gas has gone way up, and winter has hit.I enjoyed your garden photos, beautiful rose hips,
ReplyDeleteKnow what you mean about corned beef,it's shot up in price. I like a nice corned beef hash. We picked a sack of spuds and wait for it....25 pumpkins and squash off our allotment,so we are using them a lot at the moment. The slow cooker is being used a lot too for stew and dumplings and homemde soup. My advice about eating cheaply is get to your local market and stock up on cheap veg,if you go on a sSaturday,later in the afternoon there are lots of veg and meat bargains to be had.
ReplyDeleteLove to you both.
Twiggy xx
I'd say the same as Twiggy. We get most of our fruit and veg from a wholesaler on the edge of town (Carmarthen) who used to have a very busy market stall. Now he sells from home and is even busier. Our best buys there are the £1 boxes of fruit and veg which are damaged or getting close (or past!) their use-by date. You get about 8 lbs of fruit for your £1 and a box full of tomatoes or peppers or whatever. I generally cook it up quickly and then of course, once made into something else it can be frozen and used at leisure.
ReplyDeleteI agree with you about the price of corned beef. In fact, all the cheap staples are becoming as pricey as gold dust these days. The supermarkets try to milk every last penny out of you. Fortunately we grew up in an age when mental arithmetic was taught in schools, so we go round and work out the real "bargains" to be had.
T*sco has a 3 for 2 on all its baking stuff at the moment, so I have stocked up on bread and baking flours whilst I can. I'll let you know what Morrisons has on offer today as it's grocery shopping this afternoon.
Meanwhile, have you ever come across the Hovel in the Hills books? Her (Elizabeth West that is) Kitchen in the Hills is the ultimate book in cooking frugally!
I don't buy corned beef any more either Victoria, but that's not a bad price! Just watching on tv how the average family throws away the equivalent of 6 full meals a week ... not in this house they don't and certainly not in yours either! Makes my blood boil ... xx
ReplyDeleteWoo Hoo I am off to see Mr T about a load of bread flour.
ReplyDeleteI make a corned beef and veg pie with lots of thick gravy, we have it with green veg.I freeze half or make double the pies and freeze 1 in slices. Just lately i have bought brisket at RTC prices, cooked in the slow cooker I chop of half and use that in place of the corned beef. If I am really lucky it can work out at half the price of a tin. That is what we are having tonight, with a cauli cheese from the freezer and cabbage.
Loved the photos of the colour in your garden, November and I picked the last pink rose yesterday!
ReplyDeleteI should grow more veg, you are so right it is so expensive now, no filling up with it any more. Your bread does look good...good enough to eat! Xxx
there used to be a recipe for 'scotch eggs' using corned beef and a small cube of 'mouse trap' as the egg. Strikes me a small bit of corned beef mixed up with a packet of el cheapo stuffing would make quick a few of these delicacies. Think the cube of cheese was covered in ketchup or brown sauce first. Might be worth an experiment.
ReplyDelete