Working with Others

We live down a gravel track which needs topping up with stones regularly. We've recently agreed with the neighbours that we will buy some stones together this month but before we do that all the potholes need smoothing out. Doing this means that we won't have to buy so many stones !

So yesterday and today everybody who could was out on the track with shovels, pickaxes, rakes, wheelbarrows and spades digging out the stones which had become impacted along the edges of the potholes. Once the stones were dug out then they were used to start filling in the potholes.

Working together we were able to do such a good job that I don't think we will have to order very many stones at all. So, a nice way to catch up with the neighbours and a way of saving money together!

Just as well that we might save some money on the stones as the microwave died yesterday ! We don't use it very much, but it is so useful for re-heating meals when people come in at odd times, for instance when MissShoestring is late. I've ordered a new one, so we get a guarantee and it was reduced from £39 to £32 at Asda. I don't have to pay delivery charges as I'll collect it tomorrow on the way home from a job ! However, January is turning into a bit of an expensive month !

Movie Night

One of our other favourite ways to spend a January Saturday night is to have an 'at-home' movie night. We will pop our own popcorn, which is great fun and then settle down under some blankets on the sofa to watch either an old favourite or something new.

Old favourites include all the 'Back to the Future' films for the boys and all the episodes of 'Dad's Army' for everyone else. MissShoestring likes light romantic comedies and everyone likes a good action movie, even if the story is a bit predictable.

MissShoestring has a subscription to Netflix and Amazon Prime so whilst she is still at home we are enjoying watching some of what is on offer there. Recently we saw "La-la Land" and "Wonderwoman", both of which were fine for a movie night at home but I'm not sure that I would have been happy if I'd paid to see them ! So not only do we have a good time we also have a chance to critique the film as we're watching, so that's a lot of fun too !

Do you watch films at home ? What are some of your favourites ?

Frugal Friday

Plenty of frugal stuff going on this week but also plenty of spending, what with the tree surgery and an unexpected parking ticket ! So we definitely need to keep on stretching those pennies !

The first thing we did was make sure that every meal was cooked from scratch and when I ran out of one ingredient I substituted it one another to make sure that I did not go shopping more than once a week. We made roasted vegetables, yoghurt, vegetable stock, quiche, pasta bake, pizza, soup and tortillas, as well as bread, a crumble and pancakes. Also, a rather fancy iced sponge to use up the last of the icing from the holidays.

I washed out some plastic bags for re-use, reused foil and started some new celery plants from the ends of old celery, I've got 3 new plants now ! I used a click and collect service for a new pillow for MrShoestring to save the petrol I would have used driving into town for just 1 item.

I went to a free book club and got free magazines and books from the library and online. I got £5 worth of free shopping at Sainsburys using my Nectar points and used up some past their best satsumas and plums by juicing and zesting the satsumas and stewing the plums. They have been frozen and will come in handy for cakes over the next couple of weeks.

I decluttered the bookshelves in the study again and sent off another parcel to Ziffit, so that should mean a few more pounds in the gift spending column once they are accepted. We notified the HMRC that MrShoestring is earning more this year than we expected, so now all the tax credits have stopped. They have said that they will claim back the overpayment from next year's tax credits. I am glad that we told them as soon as we could so the amount we owe isn't any larger !

All in all not a bad week but all the unexpected expenses and changes have made me glad that we know how to pull in the belt a bit as that is definitely what we shall be doing !

Kitchen in the Hills. The Hovel Cookbook.

My copy of "Kitchen in the Hills" arrived from the library and I have very much enjoyed looking through it, so much so that I thought about buying a copy. However, when I had a look at second-hand prices I was horrified, this is clearly a valuable little gem! The most expensive price I saw was £89.99 and the cheapest £10.25, well I know thrifty recipes are a good thing but is the book really worth that much ?

The recipes are all ones that Elizabeth West used when she and her husband were living up at Hafod in Snowdonia. They were on a very tight budget and got used to making the most of what they had, whether that was greens from the hedgerow in Spring, a pig's head or a few crusts of bread, Elizabeth learned to make something tasty from it.

The book is organised into ten sections with the conventional titles of Soup, Puddings etc. and each section is introduced with a couple of pages of observations and comments about their life in a primitive cottage. These little snippets and anecdotes are one of the things I enjoyed most about the book, those and the section entitled Biscuits and Bonk Bars. Bonk bars apparently are what cyclists eat when they are getting too tired to cycle up the next hill ! I think I could make a few of those for when MasterShoestring gets too hungry to wait for the next meal !

There are no pictures in the book so you have no idea about what the dish is supposed to look like and the instructions are full of vague phrases such as 'bake in a moderately hot oven', these are explained at the front of the book in a piece called 'Some Facts and Figures'. Unless you cook with a solid fuel stove it might be a bit tiresome to have to keep turning to the front of the book to discover what temperature the recipe needs.

I think this book would definitely come in handy if you are watching the grocery pennies and if I saw a copy at a cheap price I would buy it, it even tells you how to make Rosehip Syrup. However, at £10.25 a copy I'll enjoy the copy from the library and then use my existing 1940s cookbooks for frugal, tasty recipes !

Parsnip Soup

We've got quite a few of those discount parsnips which MrShoestring picked up before Christmas which are starting to look past their best, this soup is an ideal way to use them up.

8oz parsnips

1 carrot

1 potato

1 onion

1 bay leaf

bit of oil

15fl oz stock

15fl oz water

mace 

pepper

Chop the onion, potato, carrot and parsnips into small pieces and fry in oil to brown. Add the stock, water, bay leaf, shake of mace and some freshly ground pepper and bring to the boil, simmer for 30 minutes. Remove the bay leaf and liquids using that great little hand blender I was singing the virtues of yesterday ! Add salt if you like and serve with croutons or french bread !

Just right for the chilly, grey weather we are having !

In Praise of the Hand Blender

This little hand blender is the cheapest you can get from Tesco. It doesn't do anything fancy, just blends in a pan and I've had it now for over 9 years. It cost under £10, so that makes an annual cost of just over a pound, which has been a bargain.

I use it on average twice a week as it is ideal for blending homemade soup and tomato sauce for pasta or pizza. Before I bought it I had to pour whatever I was making into the big blender and since I was rather impatient and often busy, I cracked a lot of blender goblets by pouring in liquids which were too hot !

All that changed when I bought this little gadget. All I do now is take the pan off the heat and plug in the hand blender. I make sure that it is well immersed in the mixture and then blend away to taste. If I want some chunky bits left I don't blend so long, if I want it completely smooth then I move the blender around until it is all done. Couldn't be easier and no cracked goblets to be seen.

Afterwards it is easy to unplug and rinse under the tap. Then it is dried and popped in the drawer for the next time. This is one little appliance that I wouldn't be without in a frugal kitchen and I think it is much easier and safer to use than a big blender. I only use the big one now for making hummus and felafel, both cold mixtures so the big blender seems to be lasting a bit longer these days !

Which little kitchen appliance has served you well ?

January Challenge 1

So how are we getting on with our first challenge, the one to keep grocery spending as low as possible? At the moment we seem to be doing quite well, I have bought only things we needed, plus a bit of stocking up for next Christmas and have paid for MasterShoestring's lunches. The total at the moment comes to under £50, so that is quite good.

There are two and a half more weeks left in the month when I will have to pay for school lunches, so that makes another £25 and I'll have to pick up a few things that we are running out of, like matches and golden syrup, but I'm hoping that I can maybe keep the total to under £120. This would mean £50 saved compared to what we usually spend.

Last week we ate well, with quite a few leftovers and bargains being featured in the menu. Breakfasts were generic weetabix , pancakes or granola and yoghurt. Lunches were soup and bread, toasties, leftovers or eaten at school and for the dinner menu we had soup, bread and cake, a pasta dish, slow cooker curry and rice. homemade pizza, homemade tortillas and refried beans and a bargain beef joint. All of it was delicious and don't think anybody noticed at all that I'm watching the grocery budget. In fact, we had biscuits to spare to give to the tree surgeon people on Saturday !

I hope that your January is going well too !