Doing The Post-Christmas/Pre-New Year Limbo Dance...

The 'tween days have a truly surreal feel this year. 

The snow has melted away to nothing, to be replaced by overcast pale grey skies and an all-enveloping mist.

Just the weather to be curled up in front of a log fire reading A Study In Scarlet...
It is strangely difficult to do ordinary things, as it feels so extraordinary at the moment. I have no wish or need to hit the Sales, and it is hardly the weather for walking, so I am indoors wishing we had the energy or inclination to carry on working on the sitting room (so I can curl up in front of the fire and re-acquaint myself with the lean, ascetic gentleman), but I suspect that time is a little way off yet!
This period between Yule and the beginning of 2011 will feel like treading water, I suspect.

Joke of the Season:
"I was tempted by the Cheryl Cole Calendar, but I think I'll go with the Gregorian as usual."

Any old Iron?

This is no ancient and venerable chimney of course, but we were alert to the possibility of falling Witch Bottles - old customs live on in the most unexpected of places! Being hit on the head by an old Whisky bottle filled with bits of red flannel, nail clippings and bent pins, all generously topped up with urine, can put a serious crimp in your DIY plans!

What we did find however, was a bent iron nail driven into the back of the fireplace attached to which was a length of wire. It must have served some practical purpose during the life of the fireplace, but in deference to the house-builders of the 1930s (and a healthy respect for deliberately bent iron pins of all sizes!) Dave decided to leave it in situ!

Any Old Iron?

Having swept the chimney, we began to line it with mortar to stabilse the surface, filling in gaps with part bricks and generally strengthening the structure.

Once the space had been lined, Dave set to work adding insulation (soundproofing) and a backboard of plasterboard, which is awaiting a final skim of plaster.

What we have at present is a nice little display area for our beeswax tealight shells, but you can make out the new and improved backdrop-

The next steps will be to insulate the flue, while allowing ventilation (we have a cunning plan!) and add a detachable tray above the opening to collect the odd bit of soot which will probably continue to fall, especially if we get any more earth tremors!

Further Adventures In The Hole with Potential, Or "Carry On Up The Chimney"

The fireplace is well on the way to being finished, and before being swept and lined served as a perfect place to display my birthday flowers.

At this point, as you can see, the hole still needed to be widened out.
Work on this commenced in mid-November...

 

 

Oh, the joy of power tools...!

The final push...

Then we had the fun of trying to sweep the chimney with  a remarkable home-made brush on a long bamboo cane. The brush itself had to be attached to a length of line just in case it got stuck...!

The view up the flue!

                                                                                                                                                                                                              

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Away In a Manger, No Room For A Tree...

As our sitting room is still a bit of a building site we haven't been able to put our Christmas tree up this year, although dave has managed to assemble some makeshift tables to hold the myriad cards we have received this year.
However, our dear neighbour Valerie gave us some beautiful holly boughs which I arranged in vases with cotton wool snow and micro glitter, dressed up with some tiny gold baubles. At least our windowsills look suitably festive!

The holly is absolutely laden with berries - I wonder if it would be possible to plant some in pots and grow a couple of bushes ourselves? It is one of those mysterious and sacred plants that suits itself, so it may not be that easy!

Another project for the Feastive season was to make some wax shells to hold tealights. This was very exciting as it involved balloons filled with water, melting beeswax in a double boiler, some leaves collected from Arrowthwaite woods in Arctic conditions and a certain amount of bad language...!
The  first step was to grate the beeswax, which was in a 700g block. As the weather has been so cold it had become like rock, and took quite a lot of brute force - luckily I have a husband who comes in very handy for this sort of thing, and he succesfully beat it into submission eventually!
Once grated and melted, the water-filled balloons were dipped, and dipped, and dipped. Lastly, the leaves were applied.
They looked really good with tealights burning in them, and I love the natural effect and the sweet smell of the beeswax.

This picture of them in The Hole With Potential doesn't really do them justice, but you get the general idea!

All Over Bar The Washing-Up...

Well, actually, the washing up's done...
A very quiet Christmas has been and gone, and very nice it was too!
We have both got a virus which has left us with asthmaticky coughs and slight temperatures (saves on heating!) so it was grand to just take things easy and suit ourselves, although we did have a nice traditional Christmas Lunch, and we managed to make some sausage rolls and mince pies so were quite pleased with ourselves at the end of the day!
The continuing saga of the fireplace aka The Hole with Potential meant that our sitting room is still a fantasy, and our Christmas has been celebrated in the kitchen, which currently doubles as a dining area, or lolling on the bed watching DVDs as we don't currently have 'live' television available due to the ongoing work in the sitting room.
But it has all been very lovely, and largely home-made, and we were surprisingly organised before the festive season arrived and got everything packed and posted in good time, leaving us time to relax and enjoy the weather(!) and pick up a virus or two!
Hopefully some updates and pictures will follow soon!

Half a Century...

Yesterday was my 50th birthday...I don't set much store by birthdays and don't tend to celebrate in any big way. I'm just grateful to still be here, one way and another, and tend to take life very much one day at a time.

A few weeks ago, when I came home from changing my library books, David announced that my daughter had phoned and was in a bit of a quandary...apparently, on my birthday, she and her husband  were due to go to a Very Important Meeting in the Mess and needed someone to look after little Freya. David told me that Lizz had been very apologetic about 'lumbering' us with baby-sitting on my birthday, but no-one on the camp was allowed to take their children and baby-sitters were at a premium etc. etc....David had taken a unilateral decision, knowing I'd rather play with Freya than anything else, and said that of course we'd go over, as we had no particular plans for my birthday.

So we left home after breakfast yesterday and got to Lizz's around noon. When we walked in, it was to a chorus of 'Happy Birthday', and not only had Lizz laid on banners and decorations and a lovely spread, but she had arranged for my son, his fiancee and their little boy to be there as well!

It transpired that David had been in on it from the start and is worryingly good at keeping secrets...!

We had a lovely time, just being together and enjoying each other's company, and eating the gorgeous food and playing with the grandchildren.

Then there were presents; wonderful warm gloves, slippers and scarf, and fun toys (which we enjoyed amusing the grandchildren with!) and a very novel lavender-filled owl micro-hottie, and some beautiful flowers, and a gift box of Lush bathtime treats (I adore Lush!), and a mug with an illustration from the Ladybird  book 'The Party' (you have to be over 50 and British to really appreciate Ladybird books!) and even a curl from my granddaughter's first haircut! I can honestly say it was probably the most enjoyable birthday I've ever had.

I am so blessed!

Unfortunately, because I had no idea what was going on, I didn't take my camera so I can't show you pictures of my miraculous little bright-eyed grandson who was born so prematurely and is now just beginning to take his tentative first steps, or his beautiful mummy whom we adore as she is so very good for my darling son, or my gorgeous son-in-law who humours us ageing lunatics so patiently, or my amazing and crafty daughter who arranged it all, or my sweet little granddaughter with her blonde curls and her pretty party dress, or my beloved (deceitful!) husband, who is the light of my life!

In future my camera will live in my handbag!

The Hole With Potential Presents....Hallowe'en Lanterns

Inspired by the clever lady at Blueberry Heart (I would add a link if I wasn't a technoclutz!) I decided to have a go at making some Pumpkin tealight holders for Hallowe'en. They were very simple to make, just a spare jar covered with orange tissue paper stuck on with watered down PVA glue, and with pumpkin features added. The Hole with Potential offered them a suitable home...

My dear friend Jayne then sent me a little plastic pumpkin with a flickering LED inside which took pride of place in the middle of the collection ...

Here they are with the tealights lit after dark...and the Hole with Potential has begun to seduce us with its usefulness...

Boo! Buns and a Rant!

The cooking bug got me last week and I decided to make sure we had a supply of Boo! Buns in for the little darlings should they come a-Trick or Treating. Any excuse to make sure there are sweet things in the house to mark the turning of the year...!

Boo buns!

Erupting Pustules

 The Boo! Buns were made in conventional  bun cases, and the Erupting Pustules (I consider that if the Ancestors come visiting they may not look pretty any more...) in bargain priced bat print cake cases from Morrisons. These were of the size that seems to be so popular these days, ie enormous! 
For heaven's sake people, if you're into dainty old-fashioned tea parties, could you really see Jane Austen or our own dear Queen (God bless 'er!) getting her gnashers round one of these vast American-style monsters? No, she would nibble on a proper English fairy cake baked in a bun case, not a juggernaut of a muffin!  Also, from the point of view of tea-time etiquette, you can conceivably get away with having two (or three!) small buns in different delicious flavours, whereas you'd look a complete gannet if you scoffed more than one Monster Muffin!  Ipso Fatso!

The Unexpected Fireplace...

Last December we had a chap in to help David fit insulation and plasterboard to the worst of the walls, and then to skim over with plaster. The job ran over by a day or two, and we were due to travel South for a few days, so it was agreed that Mark would have the keys and complete the job while we were away. The night before we were due to leave, I was overcome with panic in that we didn't know what lurked behind the blocked up fireplace in the sitting room, which would be plaster-boarded over and plastered by the time we got back...

My total paranoia about the old fireplace being full of rubble, soot and dampness got the better of me, and we knocked a small hole through into the cavity which revealed...rubble and damp soot. We cleared it out as best we could, and sure enough it was duly boarded over and plastered while we were away.

A year has passed. When the wind is in a certain direction you can hear the soot fall down the chimney. And we cleared out such a lot of rubble and soot from a very small hole...

We are fast approaching the last leg of our great renovation project, and the long-awaited doing up of the sitting room which has had bare walls and a bare concrete floor since we moved in.

The paranoia returns...

If there is still rubbish in the cavity it will encourage damp and once we have decorated it will be there FOREVER...

So David put on his mask and rigger gloves and plugged in his hammer drill and angle-grinder and cut a hole. A great big hole. a hole the size of a fireplace. And we cleared out all the rubble and all the soot and made certain that the marks on the floor in front of the chimney breast were oil marks and not creeping damp. And we looked into the hole and saw that it was good...

 
Of course, we were going to cut a piece of plasterboard and fit it and skim it, but this hole is calling to us.
"I may not be functional as a fireplace since I don't have a chimney, " it purrs, seductively. "You need a focal point," it insists.
.
And we keep on looking at the hole, and discussing the hole, and it begins to look more and more like a hole with Potential.

Watch This Space...

All shopped out, or Everything's Coming Up Lemons!

Well, I have fallen seriously behind with my bargain-hunter's reports since we haven't done a proper shop for a fortnight owing to health problems etc.  Because we have been so lucky with bargains in the last couple of months, we have a well-stocked pantry, so we haven't had to worry too much except for the odd loaf of bread or half-dozen eggs. Perfect!

 A chance find by David of some cut-price lemon and sultana pancakes in Morrisons has rekindled my love affair with lemons. He has promised to bake me a lemon cake for my upcoming birthday (Oh yes, he cooks as well as everything else! What a guy!), so I had to set to and  make some Lemon Curd for the the filling. The only ingredients were unwaxed lemons (juice and zest), sugar, eggs and butter, and it was not as complicated as I had always believed. Also, my mixing bowl fitted perfectly into the the top of the stockpot I use for jam-making, creating a perfect double boiler! The result was wonderful, possibly the best preserve I have made so far, and so far removed from the commercial version as to be on another planet! It isn't a long keeper of course, so one jar got opened almost immediately so I could make some lemon curd tarts which also failed to keep very long...!

Chrismanukkah comes but once a year...

Hallowe'en will be upon us in no time now, and then the year turns towards midwinter and its attendant festivals, Yule, Hanukkah, Christmas etc. depending on your own tradition. 
Diwali comes earlier, on 5th November this year, so hardly a midwinter celebration although the nights will be dark enough for a Festival of Lights to be very uplifting!

We have what can only be described as a mixed tradition here, and celebrate 'Chrismanukkah' while recognising that Yule and its variants are the original midwinter festivals. 

It seems that Mankind has always felt the need to look forward to a celebration that recognises that the darkness of winter will not last forever, and so many of the festivals take place around the time of the Winter Solstice when, at last, the hours of daylight begin to stretch out little by little as the hours of darkness recede and Spring approaches.

 These pictures come from 2008, our first winter in our new home.
In my wilder fantasies I like to think that the house renovations will be completed by mid-winter 2010! Since the pictures were taken, most of the rest of the house has been finished, but in the sitting room nothing much has changed except that the room is newly plastered! I guess we've saved the most enjoyable project until last, but whether we will eat Christmas Dinner from our dining table or the camping table we currently use is open for discussion!

We bought the Hanukkiya (Hanukkah menorah) in Golders Green before we were married - David decided on the modern design though given a free rein I might have been inclined to go for a more traditional one. This one has however grown on me over the years, and I really enjoy seeing it every year now and think he chose wisely.


Every family has its own midwinter festival traditions and there are no rights and wrongs about how to celebrate the festive season, so long as it's all about love, sharing and charity rather than greed, extravagance and showing off. 

I hope that, as the current move towards living in simplicity and sincerity increases, the emphasis will once more be on home-made gifts created with love, and on valuing what we already have rather than spending on a load of new stuff to decorate our homes in whatever the marketing gurus have decided will be this year's 'key look'. 

They can't sell you priceless memories, and you probably already have a boxful of those in the attic just waiting to be brought down, dusted off and hung on the tree!

Your Christmas won't be any better just because you obeyed the stylists' edict to spend, spend, spend - guaranteed to come from the chain stores, and from the glossy magazines! 

But it might be a whole heap better if you spent time rather than money, and gave love rather than lucre!




 

Time To Stock The Pantry!

Time to stock the Pantry with useful long-life products in case the Winter closes in unexpectedly!

Morrisons has some Batchelor's favourites on offer at the moment.
Batchelor's Condensed Soup (used to be Campbell's) 50p per tin,  Buy 1, Get 1 Free. These are a great quality soup anyway, but have a second contribution to the store cupboard as they also have the potential, if only slightly thinned with liquid, to become a really good sauce for pasta (especially the Mushroom variety) or the stock for a casserole or stew.

Batchelor's Savoury Rice and Pasta'n'Sauce sachets are also on offer in a slightly crafty variation on a BOGOF. Basically, to take advantage of the offer you have to buy three items in order to get another three free, but since they are useful standbys with a long shelf life, it is worthwhile.
Batchelor's Savoury Rice, 58p per sachet. Buy 3, get 3 free.
Batchelor's Pasta'n'Sauce, 82p per sachet, Buy 3 get 3 free.
These items don't just have to be served on the side of the plate. They can form the heart of a dish, or add bulk to an otherwise bland or mean dish. They can certainly help to stretch the meat ration! (Thank you, Lord Woolton!)


Morrison's has also gone mad on pies this week - 
Any 2 Fray Bentos tinned pies for £2. (Worth buying a Halogen oven just to watch the strangely irresistible  puff pastry rise like something extra-terrestrial.)
'It's pastry, Jim, but not as we know it!' 
Our branch had Steak and Kidney, Chicken and Mushroom, Just Steak, and Minced Beef and Onion.


And McDougalls Upper Crust Pies (frozen) Pack of two individual pies £2.42, are Buy One Get Two Free - so you get 6 very good quality pies for just £2.42. That's great value. Our branch had Chicken and Bacon, and Peppered Steak varieties.


I have to say that Morrisons is winning hands-down over its competitors just lately where offers on traditional products are concerned - I haven't troubled Mr Tesco at all for a few weeks now.
Aldi still has the edge on bread, breakfast cereals and jams (assuming you don't have a larder full of home-made!) but Tesco loss-leaders have not been sufficiently tempting or relevent to us to lure me in. We don't have a Sainsbury or an Asda here, so they just don't figure in the equation - we would spend any potential savings on the petrol to get there, so ya boo sucks to them!

Shopping Day Again!

It's remarkable how quickly Shopping Day rolls around again!
It really is noticeable how much easier it is to manage on a tight budget if you get into the routine of doing a regular shop on a particular day, rather than going out for just a few bits every few days...it's remarkable how often those 'few bits' turn into quite a lot of bits as you succumb to impulse buying, or buying without a list!
I'm certain that our shopping bill is getting smaller and smaller as we get better at spotting real bargains and at recognising the so-called savings that just don't add up. 
Anyway, on to today's money-savers!

ALDI 
 A pack of 7 small bananas from the Dominican Republic is 99p.
Large Farmhouse Multigrain Batch Loaf  is 85p, and among the best-tasting loaves of this type on the market, we reckon.
Among the 39p fruit and veg bargains are pointed cabbage, beetroot, and salad potatoes (Charlotte).
Their own-brand Swiss Style Muesli is 99p
And a big tray of Minced Beef  was just £2.49. (Divided up and frozen for bolognese, cottage pie etc. Plenty for 3 meals for two people, maybe 4 if padded out with plenty of seasonal veg etc)


ICELAND
Still have bags of Frozen Veg of various kinds for £1. Weights vary, but most knock the supermarkets into a cocked hat for price. When they are this cheap you can buy a variety of veg where you might only be able to afford two or even one at supermarket prices.
They also still have tinned Fray Bentos Steak and Kidney Pie for £1.

MORRISONS
Moy Park Chicken Kievs Packs of two, £1.99 are on BOGOF again. Cheap and cheerful, a useful freezer standby.
Black Farmer Sausages/Chipolatas are 39p off, so £2. Really good quality, these sausages should be the star of a meal, not a limp excuse that you have to combine with bacon, eggs, tomatoes, beans and black pudding to take attention away from the fact that it's pig's squeak and bread in a skin!
Premier Deli Ham, the good stuff, any 2 for £2.
I Can't Believe It's Not Butter, Regular or Light versions,  60p.
Shippams Small Pastes (Beef, Crab, Salmon) 3 for £1.
Morrisons Simmer Soups (ie dried packet soup) 3 for 80p. Useful for adding to stews etc, and much cheaper than fancy casserole mixes or jars in sauces. 
Morrisons Value Instant Custard Powder just 6p. Yes, 6p!Great to have in the cupboard for when you're too short of milk to make 'real' custard!
Morrisons also has a great range of British Grown apples, including my all-time favourite, the Egremont Russet!

Fortunately, we did pretty well today and have money left over for tomorrow when we go down to the market to see the Egg Man, and to BM  and Aldi to pick up a few bits that were definitely cheaper there now we've had a chance to compare prices elsewhere!

The Obsession Continues...

Yet again, the kitchen has been fruity and steamy (ooh er, missus...) as  I am determined to get my money's worth out of my jam-making kit!
Last Sunday we took a walk along to the ruins of the old Newhouses slums, and went foraging along the path to Arrowthwaithe Woods. We found plenty of rosehips and hawthorn berries, but the crab apples were out of reach and, disappointingly, there are no elderberry bushes in the area at all that we could find. We collected some hips and haws, and on Monday morning I set about combining them with our foraged blackberries (gathered before the 1st October when the Devil spits on them!) and yet more of next doors' apples to produce a few jars of Hedgerow Jelly.
And yesterday Dave went out into the garden and brought in the final harvest - some (mostly green) tomatoes, and a couple of peppers which I combined with apples and onions to make 'Last Pickings' Chutney. It was lovely to smell the fruits and the spices and the onions mingling with Aspall Cider Vinegar (from Suffolk, close to my roots!) and I would recommended chutney-making to anyone suffering from congestion - I don't think my sinuses knew what had hit them!
In all there are 14 jars of jams, jellies marmalades and chutneys in the pantry and my husband is muttering about needing to put up more shelves...! 

Bargains for Cheese Addicts Only!

Because of my current obsession with jam-making, my husband ended up going shopping alone this week...!
We are well stocked up on most things so he only had to do a basic shop - hence no more attention than necessary was spent looking for bargains. David has yet to embrace shopping as a sport akin to Big Game Hunting, but rather as a necessary evil, to be done and recovered from as soon as possible!
But he did turn up a rather good bargain in the Cheese department at Morrisons, where their own 380g  Mature Cheddar costing £3.49 is on a BOGOF. That's a whole lot of cheese for your money!

The big discovery this week was Dairyfine Chocolate at 79p per bar at Aldi. Unfortunately there is nothing left to check the weight of the bars (hem hem!) but they are a good size. 
In our taste tests ( oh yes, very scientific...) we found that the Dark Chocolate bar was not bad at all for the price, good and chocolately and rich enough to be (relatively) long lasting.
The Milk Chocolate, on the other hand, was a real surprise. it doesn't pretend to be anything like the well-known market leaders, and instead has a hint of vanilla and caramel about it, slightly reminiscent of Caramac bars. Unusual, very pleasant, and unbelievably more-ish. And no, there isn't any more, ish or otherwise. Sorry.

Jam Session

TThis week I decided to make use of the 4lb of blackberries that David gathered from the clifftops the other week and, after collecting some of  our neighbours' windfall apples, I had a go at making Bramble Jelly.

It was quite an adventure - household alchemy at its best as the juices dripped slowly through a jelly bag before being cooked with sugar and brought to that slightly terrifying violent boil that raises it to setting point, while the whole kitchen smells tantalisingly fruity!
 
The Bramble Jelly having proved succesful and the windfall apples being so plentiful I decided to try out a very frugal recipe for Apple and Orange Jam. I have a feeling that this may be a wartime recipe for a marmalade substitute, based as it is on apple puree and orange rinds. I have it written in my precious 'Recipes I Might Get Round To Trying One Day' notebook without a source, so I cannot be sure where it came from. It produced a lovely light golden 'mock marmalade' and I was delighted to see the peel evenly distributed throughout. Yes, sugar was severely rationed during the war, but an extra amount was allowed at jam-making time in order to help preserve some of the results of all that Digging for Victory with Mr. Middleton!

It was nice to be able to pass on a jar of each variety to our lovely neighbours, whose apples had been an essential part of the process, and of the celebration of the Late Harvest, Mabon, and the Equinox as the year slows down towards the Autumn, and the changing colours and the darkening evenings bring their own pleasures and treasures.

As the above picture shows, I have caught the bug, as the following day I made Three Fruit Marmalade, and Compost Heap Jelly (which uses all those pectin-rich apple cores and peelings, plus citrus peelings, which would normally go on the compost heap!)

The Three Fruit Marmalade recipe came from the back of a bag of T*** and L***'s Preserving sugar. To my taste it's over-sweet, advocating as it does a whole kilo of the said sugar. Surely T*** and L*** wouldn't encourage us to use more than necessary of their excellent product...?

The Compost Heap Jelly recipe came from the excellent River Cottage Handbook 2 - Preserves by Pam Corbin, which I would thoroughly recommend to anyone planning to try their hand at jam making. It also covers chutneys and pickles, bottling, etc and I am going to have to get myself a copy soon. I have added my own sticky fingermarks to the existing ones in the copy I've borrowed from the local library.....frugal as ever!

Apologies

Deepest apologies for not bringing you an update on frugal bargains this week, but after a trip to catch up with friends and family it has taken a while to setle back into anything resembling a routine! 
Here then are the highlights of this weeks bargains, though they may have expired by now - sorry!

ARGOS has an offer on a small, budget DAB radio (the old-fashioned Woolworths transistor radio of the digital age) at £24.99, but if you take them an old analogue radio in any condition they will knock a fiver off the price! The Item number is 500/5914 and the 'Radio Amnesty' discount code when taking them an old radio is 926/2533. Perfectly portable and saves you computer megabyte thingies if it costs you money to stream BBC Radio 7!


B & M has 2x1kg bags of granulated sugar for £1 - perfect for jam-making!
Also 200g Skinny Cow Mint Choc drink for 79p.


NETTO has a pack of 24 Cushelle (the artist formerly known as Charmin) loo rolls for £7;that's under 30p a roll.
Also a budget range swivel office chair at 11.99, but be warned, this is quite a low chair and is best suited to those of us who have have trouble reaching the ground even when we're standing up...!
They also have a box of 48 packs of Golden Wonder crisps for £3.49
John West Corned Beef just £1 a tin. Perfect for hash!


MORRISONS has a 3-pack of 170g cans of flaked tuna for £1. Fine for sandwiches etc.
Flora Buttery 500g is 84p.


ICELAND still has frozen veg  for £1 and
Fray Bentos pies £1.


Hope this helps save a penny here and there!

Poor Man's Tuna Pasta Bake

This is a very fast and easy 'student' version of the classic recipe. 
It can  quickly be knocked up from store cupboard standbys, yet looks presentable and makes a great hot lunch or snack. 
It can also serve as the basis of an ultra-fast dinner with the addition of a some vegetables or salad and some crusty  bread (warmed, with garlic butter if you like).
Serves 2 as a lunch or supper dish, or up to 4 if served  with plenty of veg etc.


Ingredients:
A tin of Tuna, drained. A standard 185g tin is plenty.
A cheap tin of Macaroni Cheese. A Value brand is fine.
A couple of Tablespoons of Sweetcorn, tinned or frozen.
A heaped Tablespoon or so of Breadcrumbs. Just grate a crust!
A little grated cheese, any variety, incuding goatsmilk. A level Tablespoon is plenty.


Method:
Empty the tuna and macaroni cheese into a saucepan and heat gently, adding the sweetcorn. Stir well to combine. Heat thoroughly.
Pour into an oven-proof casserole dish.
Top with the breadcrumbs and sprinkle the cheese over the top.
Pop in the oven, or halogen oven, (or under the grill if your dish will withstand it) at 200°C, 390°F, or Gas Regulo 6, for about 15 minutes or until the breadcrumbs have crisped and browned and the cheese has melted. 
You could probably get away with using a cook's blowtorch at a push, provided the original mixture has been heated thoroughly beforehand!
Serve and enjoy.

 

Nigella? Is that you?

Is it just me, or does Nigella seem to have finally morphed into the Ronni Ancona caricature of herself just lately?

Today's Bargains, and a Nutella note or two...!

A few bits worth looking for today...

ALDI

A generous 150g wedge of speciality cheese for just 99p
Our local branch had three varieties to choose from: White Stilton with Apricots, Smokey Cheddar or Wensleydale with Chives and Onions.

10" Stonebaked Pizza for £1.49. Pepperoni or Ham and Pineapple were available, but others may be available.

150g of Marinated Smoked Salmon currently on promotion, so a 33% discount brings the price down to £2.29. This is the good stuff, fit for offering to vicars or prospective Mothers-In-Law!

 Fresh Chicken Leg Quarters just 99p for a pack of two. Ok, it's not going to be organic or free-range for that price, but if it's bog standard chicken you want, it's pretty good value especially if you plan to smother it with a sauce.

Bread: White Square Sandwich Loaf is still only 30p. Not the most exciting bread in the world perhaps, but ideal for comforting tea-time toast, or for making bread pudding, or even for filling up the freezer to keep it running economically, and at least it's edible unlike scrunched up newspaper!
Slightly more exciting is the Farmhouse Multigrain Batch Loaf  at 85p.

And a quick reminder that Aldi Grandessa Jams and Marmalades  have been winning awards for taste and quality, and are among the best value anywhere! Prices start at 59p

 ICELAND

Still have a variety  of 1kg bags of frozen veg for £1.
They also have a number of Young's products such as Admiral's Pie for £1 while their own individual ready meals start at 75p. Always a useful standby for a cold-weather lunch or supper.

MORRISONS

Shreddies 750g are on a BOGOF. At £2.39 they are not the cheapest cereal, but nothing beats the taste of the original version, and the less expensive copy-cat products usually come in a  much smaller 500g box.

Simpson's Tinned Sponge Puddings (similar to H***z) are currently 2 for £1. Available flavours locally were Sticky Toffee, Strawberry and Chocolate.

Lancaster Corned Beef at £1.20 per 340g tin is a good quality product at a very reasonable price. Put it in the fridge for a few hours before opening for ease of slicing. This size tin comfortably makes a couple of rounds of sandwiches plus a good quantity of Corned Beef Hash without any trouble. Remember to save any fat from the can for frying your Hash. Ah, those good old Ministry of Food leaflets!

Alpro 1l Soya Drink is still only 83p.

4 pints 1% Fat Milk (Purple Top) is back on offer at just 50p. Perfectly good for tea and coffee and custards etc, even if you prefer a less skimmed milk on your cereal! I think this works out cheaper than buying dried milk!

Danepak Bacon, 6 Thick Cut Rashers (220g) £1.45. Normally £3, so this is better than half-price. 

POUNDLAND

Nutella 200g in the plain drinking glass! A classic! Don't ask the price...

I used to buy this gorgeous goo when my children were young and it used to come in a decorated glass that featuered the cultural icons (for the under 10s!) of the era. Occasionally they brought out the product in a plain but elegant drinking glass as well, and that is the version Poundland has. I liked them too because they were fairly small (for my little hands, never mind the kids'!) I still have my Scooby Doo glass, but Bart Simpson went the way of all glassware a few months ago. 
I shall buy the odd jar of this whilst thay have it in stock just so I can add to my supply of dinky glasses. I know I could probably buy the bigger screw-top jars at a lower-per-gram price elsewhere, but I shall kid myself that I'm doing my bit for the planet by re-using the glass instead of recycling a jar. Oh and I shall enjoy emptying it too...!


 

A Very Domestic Day!

I have had a wonderfully domestic day today catching up on my housework and, to my surprise, I actually enjoyed it! 

I suppose it is an indication of just how far the house has progressed in its journey towards the completion of its renovation and refurbishment that it is actually possible to get it looking like something approaching respectable these days, although I am aware that we still have a long way to go. For example, we currently have an open-plan bathroom...the door would have been fitted by now except that I changed my mind about having the door opening inwards and now want it to open outwards. This obviously entails modifications to the doorframe (sorry David!) and because of a peculiarity of the floorboards outside the bathroom requires the fitting of rising butt hinges which can't be got locally, it seems.

It would be acting very much against our frugal instincts to make a special journey just for rising butt hinges, so the door won't get fitted for a week or two yet - I just hope the vicar doesn't call while I'm in the bath...!

Anyway, I tidied and sorted and polished and mopped and vacuumed for all I was worth today, and scrubbed the bathroom vinyl on my hands and knees to make the white squares white and the black squares black, as well as doing a couple of loads of washing and getting them pegged out, dried and put away (okay, I haven't ironed the T-shirts and trousers yet) as it has been such a gorgeous drying day.

The sun is now an orange disc lowering towards the horizon, and the sky is a multi-layered candy floss sandwich of pinks and oranges, purples and mauves, reflected  in a dead calm sea - impossible to photograph with my unsophisticated point-and-shoot, so you'll just have to imagine unfortunately...

 The dinner is bubbling away in anticipation of David coming home and I've even remembered to put the beans to soak for tomorrow's meal! 

I can't remember the last time I had such a satisfying day, and it makes me feel very contented even though I know the tidiness won't last long unless I follow David around picking up and cleaning up after him as he works on the house! 

God willing, once the house is all done, there will be more days like today, and it will be less of a marathon job to keep the house looking more like a home and less like a building site!

The Need for Speed? I Don't Think So!

I have a proper, traditional Pantry of which I am very fond. It has open shelves for tins and packets and jars, hooks for hanging bags of fresh vegetables, wide shelves for the largest stock pots and the gadgets that don't get used every day, plus a space for the recycling bags and boxes for plastic, paper, cardboard, glass and cans and tinfoil, with enough room left over to store my rotary clothes dryer, airers, mop bucket etc.
It stays relatively cool all the year round. The only drawback is the window, which catches just enough sunlight to fade herbs and spices before your very eyes! 

So, time to make a curtain!

I had a rummage in my fabric stash and hauled out the piece of heavyweight sage-green gingham I had bought for the very purpose - over two years ago! Then I went to the bedroom cupboard and brought down the Mini Stitch Sewing Machine we bought from Woolworths (how I miss Woolworths!) also about two years ago, and which had never seen the light of day before.


What a feat of miniature engineering! Just threading the blessed needle was like performing micro-surgery, and was not an easy task for someone whose eyes probably need testing again and whose fingers appear to be thumbs! Anyway, I had measured (twice) and cut (once), and pinned and tacked. Now all I had to do was sew. 

And then I remembered why I have never had an electric sewing machine before - they terrify me! This one has two speeds, Formula One and Rocket, and I just cannot master the feeding in of the fabric, the pressing the pedal and squinting to check that the machine is sewing in a straight line.  This inability to push, pull , press, see and operate is why I can't drive a car!


Needless to say, it didn't sew in a straight line, and I ended up unpicking the stitches and sewing the curtain by hand. Thankfully the pantry window is a very small one...!


The curtain got finished, ironed and hung. 
Eventually.
The Mini Stitch, after its mini outing, has been consigned to the back of the cupboard.


I doubt that I shall ever summon sufficient courage to try to beat it into submission, so a plaintive request will be posted on Freecycle before long  for a good old-fashioned hand operated sewing machine. Now don't get the impression that I'm a Luddite - I can just manage a treadle, if anyone has one going begging...!

Thin Pickings

The bargains were a bit thin on the ground this week!

Morrisons: 
Still has its 1% fat milk (4 Pints) for 50p. This keeps really well in the fridge without going off.
Original Alpro Soya Drink is still shelf-priced at 83p, but is dearer on the website.
 Moy Park Chicken Kievs, (Garlic or Cheese and Bacon) which are £1.99 each, and BOGOF.
Shippams small pastes (Beef, Salmon,Crab) are 3 for £1. 
Lotus 'Toy Story' Kitchen Roll Twinpack, £1
Morrisons Value Passata 25p (Ideal for Lasagne, Bolognese etc)

Other than that it was the usual plunder of short-date but still ok reduced trays of meat - Pig's Liver for 35p, a huge Smoked Coley for £1.25 etc


Aldi:
200g sliced Gouda or Edam for 99p - cheaper than 200g unsliced.
Square Sandwich Loaf, (thin white slices, ideal for cucumber sandwiches when the vicar comes for tea, hem hem!) just 30p.
Also, their own brand ('Belmont' ) Ginger Biscuits, just as good as the leading brand, but only 34p.
And Grandessa speciality Marmalade, (Blood Orange, Grapefriut, Tangerine) is 59p a jar, and really great flavour and texture.

Iceland:
Has a selection of frozen vegetables (peas, sweetcorn, brussels sprouts etc) for £1 a bag, which beats many of the supermarkets at the moment.