Thankyou for popping in to read my latest blog post. I'm sorry I haven't posted anything over the last couple of weeks. I came down with a bad cold 2 days after Mother's Day. I took a week off from work as soon as I felt sick thinking this would knock it on the head. Unfortunately it didn't and I dragged myself to my cleaning jobs in the second week, came home each time and sat until dinner. I've almost recovered and now Darren has a bit of a cold.
I'm grateful I didn't get a chest infection this time and extremely grateful for freezer meals to keep us fed. Darren helped get the meals reheated on the days I couldn't.
Here's what we've been up to over the last 2 weeks -
* I bought 2 bulk trays of chicken drumsticks and made 10 dump bags to freeze for future meals. Dump bags are when you place meat, seasonings and sauces into a snap lock bag to freeze for easy meals in the slow cooker. I've watched many YouTube videos about this and usually they use lots of beans, tinned soups, packets and ready made sauces with little or no veggies added. I made up my own meals by adding lots of veggies, seasonings and sauces from scratch. I defrost the bag overnight in the fridge and place in a casserole dish for cooking in the oven. The only other thing I need to cook is either rice or potatoes. We've already had 2 meals and they've been delicious and easy.
* I made a second batch of muesli bars and adjusted the recipe I originally found. They turned out even better than the batch I made 2 weeks earlier. I'll share the recipe in the next week or so.
* I made up a big batch of pita chips from pita bread. We enjoy them with a slices of cheese or dip if we have visitors.
* Over the last 2 weeks I've made wholemeal bread with extra goodness twice ( 2 weeks apart ). I always reuse old bread bags to store the sliced bread in the freezer.
* I made 2 lemon slices for a catering order.
* I've been reusing our last menu plan. We loved it so much there was no need to rework another one.
* I gratefully received free lemons and mandarins from 2 cleaning clients. Our lemon tree has been struggling the last couple of years so the free lemons are a real blessing.
* I made bread rolls for Darren's work lunches.
* Darren gratefully received a garden chipper ( mulcher ) from a couple of friends who no longer needed it. Darren has started chopping up the pruned raspberry canes from our garden. Then he'll be moving onto the other plants I've pruned. He plans to put all the clippings into the compost bin.
* I gratefully received paper supermarket bags from a couple of people. They make wonderful rubbish bags in the kitchen.
* Megan and I made a trip to Savers op shop. I found a couple of Winter tops and a long coat. I used a 20% off voucher and the coat ( Witchery brand probably worth close to $200 ) came down to $10. A bargain and I need it too.
* We fed grass, weeds and bread crusts to our chicken.
* We picked a few lemons, feijoas ( the last of them for this year ) and beans.
* I made a big pot of chunky chicken and veggie soup. We had it for dinner that night and the rest went into the freezer.
* Our grandson Bryson and I baked ANZAC biscuits. Some were for Jessica's birthday present and the others were to help with her afternoon tea.
* Darren filled up both our cars while petrol is cheap. He used 3 different apps and stacked them to get an extra 12 cents a litre off.
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| Gifted lemons |
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| Homemade muesli bars |
How have you saved time, money or energy this week ?
How lovely to be gifted lemons, Wendy. I received some limes recently and made good use of them. At our place:
ReplyDelete* made large pan butter chicken and large pot pasta sauce with lentils, zucchini and carrot. These two things gave us meals for most of the week, with spaghetti and brown rice.
* used up half tub sour cream in butter chicken
* made sweet potato brownies with ingredients from my pantry
* picked spinach and herbs from my garden for quiche. This went in lunches for few days.
* bought packets of dark choc chips on special
* drying washing on racks as weather is showery; being organised with this as we don't have a dryer
* watching free shows on ABC iview
* put flanellette sheets on beds which is enough warmth for now; we'll use hot water bottles when it gets colder.
* received a bottle of a lovely shampoo from a friend. Very kind!
Hope you have a happy, frugal week.
Meg
Happy to hear that you are feeling better.:)
ReplyDeleteThanks, Wendy. Looking forward to the modified muesli bar recipe. Your recipes are always great 🙂
ReplyDeleteGlad you are feeling better! There is every type of virus around at the moment, the grandchildren seem to perpetually have something. I am making a concerted effort to replenish our pantry, and menu plan ahead, as our petrol costs are high, I froze lemon juice in ice block trays and planted silver beet and spring onions in my very tiny garden as these last for a long time when you only cut of what you need and they reshoot. May I ask what type of flour you use for bread baking? Thank you for all your help and advice, stay warm, winter has arrived.
ReplyDeleteJenny I work in childcare and am always sick.
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