Monday 9 January 2023

Menu Plan Monday ... Gosh I'm So Organised

 

I want to start the first couple of weeks of this year really using up what I have in my freezer.

When I sorted through it all the other day I found foods that I had forgotten I even had, including a nut roast from Christmas 2021!!  Well now is the time to work my way through all this older stuff and try not to put anything into the freezer until I have cleared it.

I was aiming to have at least two things from the freezer every day and it was with this idea in mind that I put together this first weeks menu plan ... although in the end when I look at it now I have actually managed to incorporate three things each day.  It will be interesting to see how this first week alone impacts on the state of the freezer drawers.

If things in life come up that mean a days meals don't get used, I will simply move that whole day forward to begin next weeks menu plan and fill in the rest of the week from that day forward.

And rather than working from my paper scribblings and eventually getting confused, I sat and typed all the contents of the drawers out so that I can see more clearly what have and be more easily able to tick off what I use.

Here's to week one of slow but steady freezer emptying.


Sue xx


25 comments:

  1. You are organised! Funnily enough, we shared a nut roast last week that Jon had bought in 2020! xxx

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    1. What is it about nut roasts and their ability to hide in plain sight!!

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  2. I would be lost without my typed freezer list. Do still occasionally forget to cross things off:(

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    1. This won't be a permanent thing, hopefully once I restock it will be with things that I will immediately put onto a menu plan and work my way through, and I only have three drawers so I should be able to to rotate things nicely. Last time I tried to keep an ongoing freezer list it just didn't work.

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  3. I had to give up on a freezer list years ago. I just forgot to cross things off or I kept the list with the freezer out in the garage and it would get damp, or I'd forget to take a pen out side with me to add things when I'd been shopping or a pen left in the garage would stop working - hopeless. Now I just look regularly and try and know whats where.

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    1. I was exactly the same when we had the big chest freezer in Alan's workshop back in Wales. Here I should be able to keep tabs on things once I restock ... perhaps famous last words!!

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  4. As I started to read this, my phone pinged. My 6 year old granddaughter has just written out a family meal plan for the week. Tonight they are having flafls. I do like flafls, don't you?!

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    1. I love flafls, especially with hummus or on a sandwich with hummus. You even found a Christmas decoration that mentioned them didn't you. ;-)

      (Spellcheck doesn't like flafs though.)

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  5. My word you ARE organised! It's good to use up bits of this and that to clear some freezer space. I seem to have accumulated a lot of small boxes in the small kitchen freezer which I need to use up this week. I'm hoping for quite a small shopping trip at Iceland this week but G is coming with me so heaven knows what we'll come home with! The freezer in the garage is not too bad but I keep forgetting to write things down as I add them to it.
    Have a great week Sue.

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    1. I think that's why my freezer seems so full, there are lots of little round pots of things taking up far too much space. I need to snaffle a few of Alan's nice rectangular takeaway plastic tubs instead, they do stack nicely in a small freezer drawer. Good luck taking G to Iceland, you will be coming home with all sorts of new things.

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  6. Thanks for the reminder! This has been on my list for a week now and I still haven't done it! But today's the day...I think :)

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    1. Just go for it.
      I always think the thinking about doing something like this is so much worse than the actual doing of it and getting it out of the way.

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  7. I don't tend to keep an awful lot in my freezer. Mostly it's stuff we get through very quickly, like ice cream lollies and chicken nuggets. I have started to meal plan again though, which makes me far more focussed during the weekly grocery shop and less likely to over spend. Lovely pug in the side bar by the way, I have a pug too, Thelma. :)

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    1. With it being mostly just me eating through the contents of the freezer, I do seem to acquire more than I actually eat. This year is all about curing myself of that.

      Suky says THANK YOU, she's not bad for an old lady is she. :-)

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  8. It's one step forward two back with my freezer at the moment - I've a feeling that because a year or so back we upgraded to a much larger frost free version I'm taking the extra space for granted, a bit like all the storage space we have here, filled up with mainly rubbish!
    Alison in Wales x

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    1. Perhaps that's one of the reasons I just seem to fill and fill. In the old days when freezers needed defrosting regularly it was easy to run them down ready for emptying wasn't it. Now we are all frost-free it's easy to keep things in there for far too long.

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    2. Absolutely
      Alison x

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  9. I don't keep much in my freezer as it isn't very large and I can see everything in there when I open the door. You are organized and will do a great job of cleaning yours out. You are good at setting your mind on something and carrying through, Sue.

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    1. I'm sorry that I didn't buy the SMEG fridge freezer that I originally wanted as it had a much smaller freezer on top, that would have been so much easier for me to rotate the contents of ... and it wouldn't have been so tall in my small kitchen. We do have to live and learn don't we.

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  10. Good for you. I'm in the middle of a similar process myself. It's crazy how quickly this stuff accumulates, isn't it? xx

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    1. It really is, I don't feel like I've done a 'big shop' for years but obviously all my 'little shops' have added up!!

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  11. Great job and I did a similar inventory last week which has produced some interesting meals😂Catriona

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    1. I love it when random meals start appearing. :-)

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  12. That is pretty much what I am doing the next while. Mind you there are a few meals from the big freezer downstairs cause that needs using as well.

    God bless.

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    1. It's nice to have a good supply of food in at this time of year isn't it, but it's also nice to begin working our way through them all, I am already enjoying this process. xx

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