Tea for Tonight and for tomorrow

We are having home made stew done in the slow cooker.  Its bubbling away as I am writing this post.  I had a small tray of  stewing beef (located from the depths of the freezer), really not enough for a stew, but once padded out with  dried thyme, marigold bouillon powder, parsnip, swede, carrots, parsnip, red onion, leek, white onion, dried orange peel, a tomato, white pepper, bay leaves and some pearl barley should mean that we have a filling tasty warming meal.   No doubt OH will want his dumplings, but I am not that fussed with them think will give them a miss today.  I am going to serve this with creamy mashed potato.  This should mean that we get our five a day today.

However the naughty side has to come out - its always lurking beneath the surface and I have an inkling for a home made steamed treacle pudding served with home made custard too.  I have been very cold this week and to me this means I need more substantial fuel to keep the old proverbial boiler ticking over.  

Because we need the heat (I seize up if I do not keep warm as I feel the cold very badly) and because I cook (my big cooker is gas) quite a lot of money each week goes on these commodities.  But then at the end of the day we feed well even when there is little money about as I am careful to put up stuff when I do have the funds available.  This week I had £20 for food after paying out for the heating and because I needed milk, oil, something for dinner tomorrow, fabric conditioner, butter, and cheese (2 packs of)  [£11 went on the meat and cheese alone)  I haven't had money available to go to the veg shop this week, and as you all know I love my fresh veg.  But this week nothing doing.  Not all is lost though as I do have some fresh veg left over from the other week (I kept it in the fridge) and so that is what has been used to make the stew.  I also have plenty of veg both fresh and in the freezer to take us through the week, but next week I will have to go to the veg shop and stock up.  I need another sack of potatoes and two trays of eggs; and some fresh onions as the others are starting to go over (but these can be turned into onion marmalade so nothing wasted here) these there latter items might have to wait until pay day when I can do a general stock up and also get meat and other bits and bobs put up in the freezers and also supplies for the pantry and fridges

For dinner tomorrow I have bought a piece of pork for roasting, I acquired this from my local Co-op for £6 something  which not only will give us a good Sunday dinner it will also keep other half going with roast pork sandwiches for the week; will also be nice cold served with bubble and squeak on Monday night for tea and if there is anything left over after that probably in a stir fry.   But no doubt OH will fancy cold pork served with home made chips and pickled beetroot and chutney.

I also want to make some soups, but we will have to wait and see how we get on.

I also have some bread on the go to also accompany the stew and mop up all those juices.

N.B.

At the time of posting I still haven't started the marmalade going as I am having to have a bit of a sort around in the kitchen before I start, namely the cooker has been cleaned as it had got into a bit of a state and I have cleaned the work top down so that I can put my jars on there after sterilising to decant the marmalade into.  When I start which will probably be after tea now I should be able to get at least a couple of batches done.

Catch you all soon

Pattypan

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