Wednesday 18 March 2015

Stovies...

...or how to start a riot!!  Just ask any Scottish person of a certain age 'How did your mum make stovies?'  There's loads of ways and your mum always made it the 'right' way!!!
 
Stovies is the classic Scottish leftovers dish.  Traditionally made with the leftover meat from Sunday lunch it's a mixture of meat, gravy, potatoes, onions and any other vegetables.  But it can also be made with sausages or mince.
 
 
I had some yellow stickered premium beef burgers in the freezer so they got roughly broken up and fried in a little oil with some chopped onions.

 
I added some peeled and chopped potatoes and a large chopped organic carrot (both yellow stickered of course!)

 
I had one sachet of GF onion gravy left from my last Approved Food order so that got added too with some water.  Simmer until the potatoes start to go mushy.

 
And here is the finished stovies.  Not the prettiest culinary dish but bloody tasty and frugal as well!!

Sunday 15 March 2015

Sunday Prep

 
I really need to get more Sunday prep done to make my week a lot easier.  I found this fab post on Pinterest.  Not all the suggestions apply to me but the principles apply. 
 
Too late for this week but definitely doing this next Sunday! I'll let you know how it goes :-)

Friday 13 March 2015

Red Nose Day


Here in the UK it is Comic Relief Day (I think it hits the US in a few weeks).  My wee class of 6yos organised a whole day of events for the rest of the school to take part in all day.  We raised just under £400 :-) And the UK government match what schools raise so we've actually raised almost £800!!


This has been our Context for Learning for the last few weeks (topic work/Interdisciplinary learning by other names) and a lot of fabulous teaching and learning has taken place.

But bottom line is I'm so proud that my kids are raising money for others less fortunate than themselves :-)


Sunday 8 March 2015

A wee lightbulb moment

 
Along the way on my frugal journey I have often seen mention of keeping a price book.  I could see the benefits of keeping track of prices but never really GOT the concept. I thought it was useful to see which supermarket had the best price for products I would normally buy.  But it wasn't until I got thinking about how much I was willing to pay for clothes that I wondered the same for food.
 
After reading this blog post it all began to make sense.  By keeping track of prices and pinpointing when things were a good price or on offer, I could build up my store cupboard at the lowest cost.

 
And even better, this blogger has downloadable editable spread sheets too!  So guess what I've been doing over the last week? Maybe that's what you've been doing all along!! But sometimes it takes a wee while for things to click with me.  Lol!
 
And now here's some catch up meals.

 
My crockpot chicken casserole made with apple juice instead of cider (loosely based on this recipe)  OH reckons it's an even better recipe than the original!

 
Chicken risotto made with the last onion in the veg basket, a handful of sweetcorn and a piece of chicken breast saved in the freezer from a yellow stickered chicken. 


Lots of leftovers plus a yellow sticky avocado that was perfectly ripe.  Rice and beans, roast veggies, pork loin pieces and egg mayo.  And very tasty it was too!