I felt SO satisfied today when I opened the fridge and all i had was half a savoy cabbage and three carrots. I had used up EVERYTHING fresh, zero food waste. Off to shops tomorrow to restock, and tonight had steamed cabbage, roasted carrots and some enchiladas from the freezer. LOVE frugal cooking, love zero waste and love your channel!
Lettuce can be made into soup once it’s past its best (lettuce, stock, onion, blitzed up) Slaw made from courgette, carrot, cabbage and yogurt with some spices Tomatoes can be the base of a sauce with the green beans. Great with rice. Broccoli topped with a cheese sauce made with cheese, milk, and some flour. The strawberries can be a compote for topping rice pudding. Chia pudding topped with your peaches Possibilities are endless ❤
Bendy carrotts, put into a bowl with cold water and leave for a few hours, they will firm back up, strawberries also put in cold water and they should perk up again too.
Your frozen food is safe. The freezer is like a pause button. You can ignore the date. It only applied to when it was unfrozen. When you freeze bacon in future, portion it up into bags or small containers so you are not forced to eat everything at once. I see saag aloo, home mead coleslaw,lentil cottage pie, lentil curry, lentil chilli, beef stew, pasties, chicken curry. You have enough for up to 4 weeks with a few bits added.
Agreed, the steaks are fine. The only time I would be worried is if there was a prolonged power cut or the freezer isnt working correctly and the food partially defrosted then re- froze
I love your channel and you are one funny lady and yes, your freezer is in dire need of de-frosting. Listen to the voice of experience. Your freezer will break down working on a sod's law principle in that the moment you get into bed at night, it will break down. In the morning you will awaken to huge puddles of water with quickly de-frosting foods. Those that have totally de-frosted you cannot re-freeze so cook what you can and eat. If some of the foods are still feeling frozen you still have a problem unless you have another freezer somewhere or a friend who could store your small amount of food. Not only is it costing you more money to run but if your freezer breaks, then of course does your fridge. This happened to me 30 years ago and I swore I would never have a fridge/freezer combo - mine are both separate. So sweetheart, be warned.
You could use the bread, one egg, and milk to make french toast. You could also use the strawberries or peaches on top. Use the veggies and lentils/beans to make a minestrone soup. So many options! Love your channel!
I'm a new subscriber I love your channel it's perfect for me 😊. If I have excess carrots I dice them or slice them and then blanch and freeze in little freezer bags ready for soups, casseroles , bolognaise etc. I also do the same with celery and peppers 🙂
You could make a chef salad: Lettuce, shredded carrot, ham slivers, tomato, cheese, and a hard boiled egg sliced up. Top with croutons made from your bread.
What really helped me with my meal planning is keeping a list of what is in my store cupboards, freezer and fridge. It has significantly reduced any food wastage. Before doing my weekly shop, I have a look at it and plan some meals around those and then get the rest to make meals for the week at the store.
Also if you have room in your freezer, keep a plastic container for vegetables that are not a serving and place in the bucket…even any cooked steak, tomatoes etc that will make up a pot of vegetable beef soup. Then by the end of the week or month you will have enough to make up a healthy and delicious pot of soup with all kinds of vegetables. I put butter beans, corn, okra, green peas, carrots, onion, garlic powder, sprinkling of Italian seasoning, beef bouillon, water, cut up cabbage, potatoes and if I have bits of broken pasta it goes in the soup too along with tomatoes. You can then throw it all in a slow cooker and come home on a day you are too tired to think about cooking and have dinner ready to eat. Serve with some crusty bread or my favorite some hot cornbread slathered with butter. Make ahead a cold dessert salad and enjoy. Did you know you can cut up a raw carrot into small cubes and freeze them for when you need them…or make a homemade snack cake with crushed pineapple and raw carrots to form a pineapple-carrot cake with cream cheese icing. You will be able to eat well if you just plan your menu out.
You're so quirky & funny :) I love how much you love your cat. Your conversations with cat are too cute :) Your little fur baby is your number one :) 🙀
Aww thanks for asking rechenda how thoughtful, not too bad thanks, we all have our ups and downs dont we 😅 i enjoyed seeing my young niece and nephew before they went on holiday to france and i enjoyed picking the blackberries some of them i had to really stretch to reach them so i had a bit of a yoga workout as well, i was listening to the slowdive souvelaki album and mac demarco 2 album as i was picking them, very relaxing 😅. And i'm glad we have some nice weather for a few days though i appreciate not everyone likes the sun.🎉🙋♂️
You could make a nice curry and maybe soup too. Courgette lasagne with tomatoes and cheese. Mushroom and steak risotto. Ice-cream with peaches and oats,
Hi you could puree the strawberrys make over night oats layer the oats then strawberry sauce then put your milk on top soak all night for brekky in the morn .could chop carrots then tomatos and put garlic bulbs bake in oven with little lard and your herbs or flavourings and courgette sliced .hope your well x
Don't worry about the engine light warning, it could be something and nothing. It has happened to me a few times 🙄 thinking the worst but it has turned out to be minor(ish) problems. Still costing around £170 each time which I could do without but not as bad as I thought it would be. Take a deep breath, the car and you will be fine 🚘
That's a bummer about the car. Fingerscrossed it won't be too costly. That's a good selection of food for the week. Sure you will be rustling up some lovely grub. Anyway, who else has started saying "fridge of joy" and "hold the line, Caller" 😊 I've even named my hand blender "little mix"😆 Looking forward to more of your culinary delights. Love to Jack/Beanie.....btw how long have you been into your Animal Print themes?
You can make your carrots come back to life by soaking them in cold water. I would make some zucchini bread, some strawberry sauce for the ice cream, turn the peaches into a small amount of jam to serve on some biscuits or scones. All of this should last you for a week or more. The carrots and other vegetables can be made into a stir fry with some of the steak sliced into thin pieces and served over rice. You can make Fish En papillote( on enclosed in paper or foil. Very good and easy. Make steak over crusty bread: cook the steak to your liking, then serve over a slice of buttered, toasted bread and if you have it squeeze some fresh lemon juice over it. Serve with your fresh green beans, (reserving around three of them for another meal)as your side…I would cut off a small piece of the end of the bread to make some seasoned croutons to go on a salad that has some of the cooked steak and vegetables of your choosing with your salad kit. condiments to make a salad dressing. Make a tabouli salad with the pantry ingredients and some of your kale. Use your slaw to serve with your steak dinner and your fish dinner as a side. Slice your steak as thinly as you can to make a barbecued steak sandwich…using ketchup, onion powder, garlic powder and your raw sugar in the pantry a little tiny bit of mustard and hot sauce to make the barbecue sauce…if you have it a dash of Worcestershire sauce. Serve open faced on toasted bread topped with a little bit of the slaw. Use some of the onions peeled and cut into rings to make battered fried onion rings to go with your sandwich. Make a Philly cheesesteak sandwich with a cheese sauce, steak cooked with onion on bread heated to soften then pour some sauce over steak- onion mixture on the bread. Make SOS and serve on bread or rice. Next time you go shopping pick one main ingredient then see how many meals you can make out of it that you would like. Then see what all you would need to make them and add up the cost before you go shopping. Also, defrost your freezer so you can get your food items in it. Always take any protein items out of packaging and place in labeled freezer bags in the quantity you need to fix for a meal you have in mind. This way you will not loose your food to freezer burn and can stack them for more room. Good luck!
You could make strawberry puree and add to porridge in the morning.You could do a stir fry with some veg and add ginger, garlic and soy sauce or any of your herb rack like onion powder, or other herb mixes. You could also make a ham and cheese pasta or make a pea and ham soup. Or you could make chickpea curry or roast chickpeas with the spice mix . You could make green beans and ham with garlic and onion. You could make a mushroom stroganoff. You could slow cook the steaks if you had a slow cooker or cast iron with onion, beef stock and soy sauce. You could put the banana in your porridge or on toast or in a smoothie with the kale. You can also add kale to sweet potatoes or any potatoes and make a hash with onions and paprika and have for breakfast.
Cupboard goals wish mine were that tidy , I think you’re doing great my fridge is relatively empty at the moment because I had a good clear out and I actually prefer it because I think we’re wasting food and we can’t see it.
Looks like your audit was a good idea. Helped you maintain a positive outlook on a difficult day. I always find pancakes either sweet or savoury or good for wrapping up leftover fruit, cooked or raw. And you can batch cook them and reheat when necessary.As you like cabbage so much take a look at Japanese cabbage pancakes, they're tasty, cheap and filling. Have a happy weekend and really looking forward to see what you end up making.
Dont worry about old frozen meat, it doesn't go bad, just not at its best flavourwise and texture. It just may have freezer burn which you can cut off, or if you're stewing it, leave it on.
hello if you still have those ingredients, you can make an italian salad with some bread ( you put some pieces in a dish you ad a little bit of water on it and you melt , you put olive oil ,garlic, tomatoes, and salad if you want , you can also make a green gaspacho with ,bread, water ,garlic, salad cheese , salt pepper, olive oil and you mix it , you can ad herbes from your garden ....enjoy ;-)
Sorry to hear about the car. Next time you buy a meat multipack it's worth freezing the contents individually so you don't have to defrost the whole lot in one go. What do you do with cacao nibs? I have some loitering in my cupboard and I don't have a clue where they came from or what to do with them! I did my homework on the bus so I was never obliged to tidy my room first! 😅
when you carrots start going soft like that, if you put them in cold water they become good as new. You can also cut them up and keep them in fresh water as soon as you buy them and it will help keep them fresh for longer. Just remember to keep changing the water.
You could make amended bruschettas - slice the bread, lightly toast it, brush it with olive oil and top it with a mix of fresh diced tomatoes, a few sliced/diced olives and a little diced onion, and a small splash of balsamic vinegar. Tasty and quick. You could add a little bit of mozarella or vegan cheese too.
@BudgetFoodieUK it's often found in cafes here in Australia, as a vegan/vegetarian light meal. Sometimes diced avocado or herbs added in the mix, or a poached egg on top, or a dip (often hummus or guacamole) spread on the bread. Lots of possibilities to play with it.
With your beef steaks and spinach you could make a sagg ghost ( probably spelt incorrectly) it’s a dry beef and spinach curry it’s very good, lots of recipes online
Just a heads up...if you leave berries, cherry tomatoes, celery or any small or cut up fruit and veg in glass jars, they last for weeks in the fridge. Wash strawberries directly before use if storing them in jars. Have a fab week and good luck with your car. FYI, meat and poultry stay good in the freezer for 12months. I have eaten meat that's been in the freezer up to 5yrs and it's been fine.
For food storage, I find using mason jars really prolongs the life of berries. They last so much longer. When I put the container they come in, in the fridge. I find they are more likely to spoil faster. With larger packages of frozen meats, I’ll divide up. Wrap in plastic wrap then put into freezer bags. They last longer with less freezer burn. They also get eaten faster as I can have just one steak and not have to commit to eating the whole package over the next few days. Hope your car costs aren’t too bad. Looks like you have a lot of options for meals.
Hi! I would do croutons with the bread on top of the salad with a tomato. I like to do french toast or strata with the old bread. For the strata you could mix eggs, cheese, tomato and ham and bake I love that for any meal of the day. Strawberries and oatmeal yummy. Banana pancakes or waffles ❤
Hi chick food stock is looking good . Blanch any veg you think your not going to eat up. Pop it in the freezer .bananas freeze well can use in cake recipe .do a quick kitchen stock take fridge x frozen then work out what your next creations are❤
@@TheBudgetFoodie There probably is a recipe but I tend to just make it up myself. There is a guy on RU-vid, Backyard Chef who has made savoury bread puddings. They are very delicious and it’s a great way to use up stale bread. When my kids were little and we struggled with money, I’d make at least one a week, using up old veg and left over meats etc. if you need a recipe, just let me know and I can send one. They are really easy. Honestly, very delicious. Soft and indulgent in the centre and crispy on the top xx
Bloody cars! They're money pits! I have to put money aside for mine because there's always something. Thankfully i only have 1 more year of finance on the thing! It'll be a new car by the time I've finished with it 😂 I need you to come sort my cupboards please haha. Thanks for existing, and posting ❤
You can preserve the carrots for longer of you put them in a container with water. Carrots wilt because they lose moisture. Also you could give chatgpt a go to suggest you some recipes based on the ingredientes you have :)
Snap re. The freezer ~ mine is iced up too but too much in it I need to eat through before defrosting - I need to do a couple of weeks of freezer food meals. I hope the car works out. It is hard but I hope you can build up a little emergency fund soon for the unexpected. I followed the Dave Ramsey plan a few years ago to do so - he has a You Tube channel you can take a look. Building up an emergency fund worked for me. Channel is growing nicely, hopefully that will bring you some income soon! Xx
You don’t need to eat everything before you defrost a freezer. Put all the food in a box of some sort with a couple of towels or some such over it (keeps it cold) then you can defrost the freezer itself by turning it off and putting trays / bowls of boiling water (from a kettle) inside and closing the door. Replace the water with more as it cools. It shouldn’t take you more than a couple of hours to defrost a freezer using this method - you certainly don’t need to defrost overnight or any of that nonsense - and the food will stay frozen until you’re done, when it can simply be replaced in your newly clean, frost-free freezer.
Compared to your £1 a day palava you are now knee deep in food possibilities. You could make loads of lovely meals and save loads of notes to put in the car maintenance envelope! You do do cash envelopes dont you? It's a life saver 💌
Cash envelopes ❣️ I'd all but forgotten about them. A friend of mine regularly 'hid' cash in her books... years later, she was able to use this as a deposit on a house...
Shred some cabbage, some of the beans, a tomato chopped, some of the courgette, handful of the kale, shred a carrot for a stir-fry with some of the hot sauce in your fidge
I would have messaged tesco customer service about that to good to go bag. They are not allowed to sell out of date goods..you pay for too good to go. Giving for free is slightly different but still not allowed past use by date ( not bbd) and definately no " fresh" items such as dairy etc past their dates
