Tag Archives: cooking

Inspired

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I have been inspired by reading the series of blog posts this week by Frugal Queen.  They are refresher posts on frugality and Froogs could certainly teach us all a thing or two.  If you do not read this blog it is worth popping in to see what be achieved on very little funds with a bit of creativity.

I have a single bed which was one of the ones my father made over 50 years ago.  However, with Miss O and Belle both needing beds to sleep in when they are here I needed to think laterally.  The single bed is in the room which I use for my sewing room and since I was not prepared to give up the whole room Belle suggested a trundle bed.

I looked on Gumtree on Friday evening and found one advertised not too far from where we live.  We went and collected it yesterday.  $55 for a white tubular steel single bed and trundle in new perfect condition.  We then bought 2 new foam mattresses for $50 each (on special).

Here are the 2 beds made up and ready for use.

2011-07-10 01The top sheet on the trundle is about 20 years old, the last of 2 sets that I had when my girls were young and the blankets on the beds are at least 50 years old.  They were mine when I was was a child and continue to be well-used.

2011-07-10 02Once the trundle bed is rolled away there is plenty of space in the room.  The doona and cover belonged to Missy when she was young.  I made the cover about 15 years ago and it is still as good as the day it was new.

The previous single bed is going to get a new life as a day-bed on the verandah.  I am thinking of making a slip cover for the mattress and also re-fashioning the frame slightly by adding a head and foot board to it.  That will be in another post.

Then there is frugal food.  On Friday I brought home 3 Granny Smith apples from the fruit basket at work as they would only get left there over the weekend and then discarded on  Monday when the new fruit is delivered.

I peeled and sliced them ready to stew.

2011-07-10 03I retrieved some rosella pulp from the freezer.  This was left from when I strained the cordial that I made.

2011-07-10 04Once the apple was stewed I mixed the fruit together and added a crumble topping.

2011-07-10 05So that was dessert.

2011-07-10 06Be sure to check out the blogs I have listed on the sidebar.  There is a wealth of interesting information.  I keep adding more blogs as I stumble upon them.

Organise and Sustain

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Tonight I have been organised by preparing meals to sustain us.  I used 1kg of mince  and made bolognaise sauce which yielded 17 individual serves.  It is now all packed up ready to go in the freezer.  On the weekend I soaked some haricot (navy) beans with a view to making my own baked beans.  Last night I cooked the beans in the slow-cooker and this evening I made up the sauce and added the beans.  They taste great and are so useful to take for lunches.  I made 10 single serves from 2 cups of dried beans.

I will add the recipes one day soon.  In the meantime the freezer is replenished and I know that when we arrive home and don’t feel like cooking too much that I have a choice of easy, nutritious meals at my fingertips.

I made another batch of spreadable butter mixture, too.  As an aside, I cooked risotto for dinner tonight with enough left over for 1 lunch tomorrow.

Tale of Two Bowls

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Did you see the photo of the bowl of rosellas in yesterday’s post?  This is the larger of 2 mixing bowls which I have inherited from my maternal grandmother.  Although I have an assortment of other bowls – glass, ceramic, plastic and metal – none are quite as good as these.  What makes them special?  Is it the weight, the sense of history, the intrinsic link to my grandmother and her kitchen?  I don’t know.

While you are unlikely to ever find me creaming butter and sugar by hand there is a certain pleasure in tucking this bowl on my hip and thoroughly combining the ingredients for a batch of muffins with a wooden spoon.

I have a wonderful Kitchen Aid stand mixer and a Kenwood food processor and they are fantastically useful but I can never imagine myself loving them like I love my mixing bowls.  It is also gratifying to know that I can still create a wonderful array of wholesome food with nothing more sophisticated than a bowl and a wooden spoon.

Apart from the muffins, I also make zucchini quiche, banana cake, muesli slice, tuna patties and tuna roll using nothing more than my bowl and a wooden spoon.  I am sure there are others that I cannot think of at the moment.  What are yours?