Do You Fancy a PROPER Look Through the Freezer ...

I fancied doing something different this month, so instead of taking loads of photos and trying to talk you through them via the key board, below the fridge photos you will find three YouTube videos of me actually talking you through what I have in the freezer, and finding out for myself in the process. 😀

But first the fridge ...

I don't know how worthwhile it is showing the contents of the fridge each month as usually the fresh food is quite a revolving type of thing.  I buy the fresh stuff and eat it, not much sits there for long ... usually!!

That's last months fridge space for instance.

There are a few chocolate bars missing from the door, but there are just the usual condiments ... and a tin of grapefruit that has been in there for far too long.

Cheese and Fruit Drawer Today

The cheese stash has gone down a bit since Christmas, I think I ate about four packs in January and one last month, but I don't have any earlier photos of this drawer open to compare to. I found some!!   I am  very low on fruit now though, hence me opening a tin of peaches this week to eat with my yogurt.

As it was at the beginning of the Challenge.

The vegetable drawer is definitely looked sparse too, so I think this weeks £10 will be spent filling it up ready to have a backbone of foods to help me eat my way through the freezer stash.

The abundant vegetable drawer in January.

And talking of the freezer ... there were no photos to compare to for the freezer as until now there has been no way to see more than the top layer of each drawer as they were packed so tightly and I couldn't be bothered emptying each drawer out ... here are three YouTube videos with me talking you through the contents of the top, middle and bottom drawers.  If you get sick of the sound of my voice I'll revert to photos again next month 😁

If you could click on the Thumbs Up button if you like the video (or the Thumbs Down one if you hate it) I will know if any of you have watched them and if you want to see any more done this way. 

 YouTubers that make a living out of this have absolutely nothing to fear from competition with me ... you have been warned!!  

I've included the actual links below each picture for those of you that read on phones etc, but clicking on the picture itself should take you straight to the clip on most other devices.

Top Drawer 1/3/22 - YouTube

Middle Drawer 1/3/22 - YouTube

Bottom Drawer 1/3/22 - YouTube

So here we are into the third month of the Challenge and I have to say it's going well.  I'm pleased that there is less and less stashed everywhere, just having food where it belongs in the kitchen is the first step, the next step is to make things more logical.  I think I can mostly do this by comparing how I did things to how I want to do things, so these posts are as helpful to me as they are hopefully interesting to you.

Sue xx

Into the Third Month of the Challenge - Comparison Photos

Possibly the biggest difference this month is the sweetie drawer!!

January Photo

Now don't panic and think all my teeth are going to fall out, yes some of these have been eaten but a good selection of them were donated to the Foodbank trolley in Booths half way through that month and a few added to the drawer in the fridge.

I am slowly and surely reducing my sweet tooth and once again enjoying all things savoury.

These top drawers have altered somewhat, with just the two potatoes bought here in the potato bag alongside the Bake at Home Sourdough breads bought here in the left-hand side basket ...

January Photo

... and just a bit less in the  right-hand side.

The bottom two drawers have just altered slightly.  

January Photo

As you can see there are a couple less packs of biscuits, and the crisps that were in here were eaten and replaced with the crisps that had originally been in their box in the bedroom.

Oh it all gets so complicated trying to show the differences, it will be so much easier when there is just  less food!!

Another obvious difference this month is my now empty basket ... although it is currently holding some folded up bubble wrap after I did some unpacking instead of the three large jars of coffee that were in it at the start of the year.

The two jars of Nescafe instant coffee that are left now fit neatly into the main food cupboard, so the contents of this must have gone down a bit, although I find it hard to spot what's gone!!

One jar that has now emptied is the pasta jar on the open shelves, I ate the last portion last night with the Mediterranean veggies that were left in the fridge.  So I am going to have a rummage around in the lower half of the food cupboard for something to pour into there instead of the mixed penne and fusilli.  I do find I get more inspiration to eat the things I can see more clearly.

I'll be back tomorrow with a fridge round-up and for the first time a glimpse into the freezer ... I can actually open the drawers a bit more easily now!!

Sue xx

Shopping ... just for food honest ;-)

 

We called to Mum's yesterday and on the way home we briefly stopped at her local Marks and Spencer food shop.  It may not be the closest branch to us but it's the easiest one for us to get to, just a quick detour, a ten minute stop and then we can hit the motorway for home.

My £5 voucher was burning a hole in my bag and while I was close to a branch I knew I might as well stock up on the Garlic Kievs while I could ... I might have gone mad and bought some little cheesecakes too!!

At first this is what I wrote on the receipt when I got home.  The crossed off item is Alan's milk, obviously not a part of my Challenge.

But then I remembered that this particular voucher was counted as part of my yearly budget when I did the initial calculations, so I altered it to show £12 spent.  I was also able to use a voucher to get £3 worth of points on any food spend towards the next quarters award, plus of course I have just paid for the holiday on my M&S card so I should be in line for bonus vouchers that will be over and above my Challenge budget next time.  (My credit card bill is always paid off in full at the end of every month, so no interest is ever paid ... M&S Bank must hate me. 😂)

So this months total spend is £56.59, which although over the allowed £50 per month is in fact okay as I can take the £6.59 overage out of the money that I had over from last months really low spend of £24.32 ... phew!!

So I still have overage of £19.09 as an emergency back-up, and I can now put my £50 for March into my bag.  😀 

I'll take some photos of the fridge, freezer and cupboards today ready for the new Months Food Stash photos that I will post about tomorrow.  It will be interesting to see if there is much difference ... I think there might be.

Sue xx

Thank You ... and Buying to Copy

Firstly, thank you to everyone who commented yesterday.  

It really helped me to think about the Challenge after reading all your comments and I have decided that my No Spend Challenge should really be a LOW spend Challenge.

My food budget is still the same just £50 per month for the whole of the year, but I will be relaxing my No Spend Challenge rules on some things.  For instance I will allow myself to buy any really necessary things that I need ... something else was purchased yesterday and will be delivered in 6-8 weeks for instance.  So if I was going to say I failed, then I failed again yesterday, but I didn't ... I adapted my Challenge for the sake of my health.  

What I am going to do ... and thanks for the idea Allie Jane ... is to keep a journal note of anything that I buy that I have decided is a real need during the course of the Challenge, if nothing else it will keep me focused and enable me to look back over the year at what I have spent.

My new little £7.50 black planter and the green obelisk that will be for the French Beans to grown up.

Thank you again for all the comments yesterday.

And now ... the post I had planned for today.

A tasty little tea last night, it was just an M&S Melt in the Middle No Fish Cake with the last of the Iceberg lettuce, cherry tomatoes and two spring onions.  Quite tasty and passable  but it was just as it said virtually a fishcake with the fish left out and oozy vegan cheese in the middle ... something I could no doubt do myself much cheaper.

Seemingly it contains:  

Flavourful flakes of rice protein combined with potato filled with a deliciously creamy coconut centre, coated in breadcrumbs. Simply heat the oven for 20 minutes and serve alongside chunky chips. Serves 2. 

But I would just make a mashed potato cake and then place a square of vegan melty cheese in the middle and then coat with breadcrumbs and bake in the Remoska.  Virtually the same outcome just with a cheaper price tag.  But sometimes it's worth buying a product just to see if you can replicate it and this was bought in a pre-Christmas rush of madness to the head when I filled the fridge with M&S goodies.

I think I will call mine simply a Cheesy Mashed Potato Cake 😁

After making up another batch of Apple Pies in the sausage roll maker earlier I had a little strip of pastry over, once again I rolled it out thinly sprinkled it with cheese, rolled again, sprinkled on more cheese and left it in the fridge.

Then while the Remoska was still hot from cooking the Fishless Fishcake I cooked my little Cheese and Cracker All in One dessert and ate it straight after my tea.  Very satisfying.

Is there anything that you have recently bought and then successfully replicated at home ... for a lot less money?

Sue xx

So I Fell at Two Hurdles

 

The first hurdle.

I had a feeling that I would fall at this particular hurdle when I read one of Bovey Belle's blog posts  recently and she spoke about buying plants ... gosh she even called it Temptation at the Garden Centre.   I thought to myself straight away, while I was still reading it ... I didn't really think about that one did I?

Alan loves to go for a coffee and a meal out and of course I had worked that part of it into my No Spend Challenge rules by saying every time that happened I had to repay his paying the bill for both of us by providing either a home-cooked meal for him, done or a sweet treat or snack ... also done, out of my food supplies.

What I had forgotten to consider is that two of the places we regularly go to, one of them where the dogs are welcome even inside on these cold blustery days, are two of the best places for glorious plants, garden accessories and colour ... and boy oh boy have I been missing colour in the garden.

I didn't realise how much until I saw this photo  that I took last week.  It looked so brown and dreary.  Yes the little Tete-a-Tete daffodils in the small pot have opened up now and that has helped enormously, and the Snowdrops look so pretty now that they are all out, but I wanted colour ... no I needed colour!!

So on Wednesday one trip to the Daisy Clough tearooms and garden centre just up the road from us and next to where I had The Van, was all it took for my hurdle to come crashing down, my blinkers to come off and some glorious Spring colour, a black wooden planter that was reduced to £7.50 and a plant support in my shade of green to come home with me.  Fail number one.

The next fail I hadn't even considered ... Alan's need for sunshine and a complete get away from it all holiday.  Because of lockdowns, moving house and my bad health we haven't even been able to consider getting away for the last few years and it's actually over ten years since we jetted off for some proper sunshine.  He's really feeling the need to chill for a good ten days with nothing to do but sleep, eat, drink and bask in the sunshine.  So how could I say no when he's been working so hard with our company for so long.  Being company owners we just don't get fixed holidays, we just take a day here and a day there in amongst all the work days.

 

So as of the start of this week we have a holiday booked for ten days in Alcudia, Spain.  

So officially ... fail number two!!

In everything else I am going to continue trying not to fail, my food money is the same, my not wanting to buy anything unnecessary is the same but I have relaxed my rules somewhat in a bid for this Challenge not to fail completely.  After all it's my Challenge and my rules so if something comes up I must try to adapt and continue rather than just throwing in the towel. 

Now if it would just stop these intermittent and very heavy hailstone showers I could go out and plant the last couple of pretty plants in the apple tree barrel and spread a little bit more joy around our garden.  I'll try and take a better photo once it's all done.

Sue xx

Money Boxes and Savings

We were chatting in the comments on PP's Small Treasures blog a few days ago and I mentioned those long slim divided money boxes that used to be all the rage for managing your cash back in the day.  I remember my parents having one each and the labels being Rent, Electric, Gas, Rates, Spends etc

Anyway with a lull in work proceedings and over a cup of coffee I decided to look on eBay to see if they were still around, and they were ... at a price!!

The one above had a Buy it Now price of £19.99 so I kept looking ...

... then I found this one, just listed with a Buy it Now price of £3.99.

At that top price I don't think I would be tempted even if it wasn't my No Spend Challenge year, I'll stick with my little drawer, my box and my enamel teapot for now.

Oh and I also came across these, once given away completely free of charge if you opened an account for your child.  Now available to buy for £10 the pair ... I always wanted one of those cute little houses, but unfortunately I couldn't afford to open my sons a savings account when they were all the rage.

Sue xx

So Many Storms, So Many Names

• 
  
  Wow, there' s  been so many storms over the past week or so and I am struggling to keep up with the names, seemingly the next one is Gladys, sounds such a lovely innocuous name doesn't it, but is she going to be as crochety as her friend Eunice I wonder?
• I looked up the names of future UK storms and they are already listed at the Met office and awaiting usage.  They are alphabetical and alternate between male and female, and they are chosen from submissions put forward by us.  So if you had a windy old grandad you could volunteer his name for next years submissions.
• 
  
• Arwen
• Barra
• Corrie
• Dudley
• Eunice
• Franklin
• Gladys
• Herman
• Imani
• Jack
• Kim
• Logan
• Méabh
• Nasim
• Olwen
• Pól
• Ruby
• Seán
• Tineke
• Vergil
• Willemien
• 
  
•  Fascinating, well I found it fascinating anyway.

Why the photo of my kitchen at the top I hear you ask, well that's where I'm staying at the moment ...  in the warm, with the radio on,  making my breakfast while the wind blows outside and various objects seem to be blowing past the slightly opaque glass.

Sue xx