Plastic Free July

 

It's been Plastic Free July for a whole month and I've not managed to mention it once ... yup, I admit it I am a bad blogger  😄

Most of you know me well enough by now to know that I recycle, I reuse, I most definintely re-purpose and I basically do the very best I can.  Hardly any of the plastic that I do get is single use plastic and the few things that I do get are recycled wherever possible to the correct place.

Something that I switched to at the start of last year when it became increasingly difficult to get washing powder tablets in cardboard boxes, was the smol range of products. 

 I started with a free trial of the washing capsules, which come through your letterbox in a sturdy cardboard box.  The trial proved to me that they did everything that I needed them to do and I signed up for a regular subscription after a week of using them.

The box is so childproof that it drove me to distraction, but if you have children this is a good thing.

There are instructions on how to open it and information on everything else that you need to know.

But I cheat, and for ease of use as soon as mine arrive I tip them into my little enamel pan ...

... and store them next to the little enamel bucket that holds the pegs.

A few months after starting with the washing capsules and when I had used up my supply of fabric conditioner I added bottles of the smol fabric conditioner to my order and trialled that.  It's very good and does exactly what it's supposed to but without leaving you scented like a pine forest or a rose garden.

You can choose how many laundry capsules you want to receive and also how often you want to receive them, ditto with the fabric conditioner and any of the other cleaning supplies that you might want to try.  There are also dishwasher tablets and surface sprays, (neither of which I use) so you could get all your cleaning supplies from one place and through the post

But the most important thing for me is that it gets the washing clean, smelling fresh and not synthetic and everything arrives just when I need it and if my needs change I can update how often I want to receive something.

If you would like a free trial like I did, just click HERE to go to the smol website and choose the item you would like to sample, and for just £1 towards the postage you will have enough of the product you choose to get a good idea of if it's right for you.

This is not in any way a sponsored post, just something that I use regularly and highly recommend.

Sue xx

Not Just Sausage Rolls

 

Three rolls made in the sausage roll maker that I confessed to buying yesterday, thank goodness I had enough cash left over this month to be able to get it.  Only there are no sausages or sausage meat inside these ones,  inside one there is pate and inside the other two is apple from a tin of apple pie filling that I had in the cupboard.  Yes, the sausage roll maker makes four, but they are so good the other one containing some pate didn't even last long enough to be photographed.

They are a doddle to make using this ready rolled puff or shortcrust pastry.  I have tried both now, this one that I bought yesterday and one of my other shortcrust pastry rolls from the freezer thawed out.  You get three pieces from each ready rolled roll that fit into the maker (two at a time obviously 😁) so one of my sets of four 'sausage rolls' was a puff pastry bottom and a shortcrust pastry top ... it worked perfectly with no discernible difference between to two types of pastry,  I think the lid pressing down stops the puff pastry from rising but makes it super crispy at the same time.

As each roll is sealed by the machine while it cooks drippy fillings can't escape until you bite into your roll, so these would be brilliant for school lunches or picnics etc ... or simply sitting on the sofa watching scary movies like I did yesterday.

Up to now we have tried:

Linda McCartney Sausage and Sage and Onion stuffing x 4

Pate x 2

Tinned Apple Pie Filling x 2

And for lunch today I am going to try making some potato, cheese and onion rolls.  The world is my oyster and if it can be cooked in ten minutes, fits neatly into the indentations and sounds like it might be tasty wrapped in pastry it will be being tried.  I see a lot of leftovers being turned into very tasty little sausage roll shaped pies over the course of this No Spend Challenge.

Of course one of my main reasons for buying this ... as well as an addiction to sausage rolls and all things pastry ... was to save on having to put my oven on.  My Remoska can cook some pastry items, so it already saves me a fortune with not turning on the oven but but it does seem to cook pastry slightly erratically, so this little gadget is the perfect accompaniment to the Remoska to save me money on the electric bill.  I can use them covering most dishes and leaving my oven switched off except for larger batch cooking sessions or cakes.

And I intend to make up a big batch of homemade pastry and have the right sized pieces stored in the freezer ready for use to make this even more economical.  And I know I have at least three boxes of these sausages in the freezer, which tasted wonderful when thawed and added to some sage and onion stuffing before being trialled as my very first batch in the sausage roll maker.

Winner, winner sausage roll ... and other things ... dinner.  😄

Sue xx