Monthly Archives: January 2015

Salmon and Prawns with Lemon and Mint

frugal food
Hello Dear Reader,
Thanks for your concerns, the chest infection has improved but I had to take myself straight to bed when I got home last night as I had a migraine. It was 24 hours before I could stand upright without either vomiting or screaming in pain. I just have to lie still in a dark cool room, leaving only to periodically throw up. It passes and has done so. Most ilnesses come and go in their own time and require nothing more than a bit of tenacity to cope with it.
The side effect of twenty four hours without food means I’m famished this evening and needed a hearty plateful of fish and veggies.
I needed some food inspiration to put a meal plan together this week and have found a selection of recipes, which I will adapt to suit us, from the BBC Food website. I add ingredients, change them or omit them according to our budget.
This week’s main meals will be:
Salmon and Prawns with lemon and mint,
Cauliflower and Spinach Bake,
Chilli hotspot,
Beef Stroganoff,
Chicken and Bacon Stew,
Slow cooked Brisket with roasted veggies,
Rarebit Pork Chops.
As I know you’ll ask here’s the recipe for tonight’s supper
2 salmon fillets £2.49 - Aldi
Handful of prawns - I had some to use up - 20p - Aldi
Zest and juice of one lemon - 20p - Aldi
Handful of fresh mint - finely chopped - from my garden
2 tablespoons of olive oil
Mix the oil, lemon zest, juice and chopped fresh mint.
Plus, six salad potatoes (part of the super six deal this week) runner beans ( bit of an indulgence at 75p a bag) and some frozen pea.
Steam the potatoes and veggies.
Heat a pan and add the salmon and frozen prawns, after one minute add half the lemon and mint and almost poach the salmon, spooning the lemon and mint over whilst cooking.
Stir the rest of the lemon and mint through the veggies and potatoes. The result is a really fresh zesty supper.
Dearly Beloved really loved it too.
Over to you Dear Reader, what’s on your menus this week?
Until tomorrow,
Love Froogs xxxxx

Keema with potatoes and peas 66p per portion

frugal food

Hello Dear Reader,

This is a can’t be bothered to cook recipe. I really didn’t want to cook when I got home, this cold has gone to my chest and standing up AND breathing is flippin’ hard work right now. To be honest, if there had been a tin of tomato soup in the house, I would have had that instead but there wasn’t!

I think everyone knows of Keema, it’s just spicy minced meat and add something else so that exactly what I did. This will create six portions, so if I can’t breath tomorrow, they we’ll have a repeat performance of this again and we’ll take some for lunch too. As I said, I really don’t feel like standing in the kitchen and this is a eat with a spoon, out of a bowl easy meal that reheats well for other lazy days.

Serves 6


I had a pack of lean mince £2.09
6 medium potatoes, cut into large cubes - I used 2 baking potatoes 30p
2 small onions, finely chopped 14p
1 cup of frozen peas 9p
6 medium carrots, chopped into small cubes 30p
1 deseeded chilli - finely diced 12p
4 cloves of garlic, - finely diced 8p
1 heaped tablespoon of cumin 5p
2 tablespoons of corriander 10p
1 tablespoon of mild curry powder 5p
2 tins of chopped tomatoes - 62p
Fresh mint - out of the tub in the garden - we have mild weather.
Salt to taste - I added a teaspoon.

£3.94 - 66p per portion

(I bought all my ingredients in my local Aldi and that’s how I’ve priced this)

1. Heat a pan.

2. Add the minced beef and onions - cook thoroughly.

3. Add raw potatoes and carrots, keep stirring.

4. Add the spices and keep stirring.

5. Add all the other ingredients, except the peas, cook for 20 minutes.

6. Add the peas and cook for a further 10 minutes.

When cooked, sprinkle with chopped mint and stir well.

If I had any yoghurt, then I would have made a Raita to go with this, we’re running down the cupboards, fridge, freezer ect so we’re trying not to shop. So, as I had some mango chutney, they I served it with a dollop of that instead. You could make this without potato and serve with rice but adding potato makes this a quick one pot meal. Let’s face it, if I couldn’t be bothered to cook then I really couldn’t be bothered to wash up!

Until tomorrow,

Love Froogs xxxxx

Blue Blueberry Pancakes

frugal food

Hello Dear Reader,
Here is living proof that cookery can and does go wrong. I often take a recipe and just change the wheat flour for gluten free. I usually use Dove’s Farm flours, often as they are the only brand in my local supermarkets. There still are not too many gluten free alternatives that behave in the same way as wheat flour.
That seems simple enough but I always end up having to play with recipes and alter them slightly. Gluten free flour needs more fluid and has a ‘thicker’ texture. It will need an extra raising agent and I shall add more next time to get these to puff up. I’ll also make them wetter so they won’t be so thick.
Here’s the recipe and my suggestions for a gluten free adaptations.
200g of SR flour
1 beaten egg
1 Tsp baking powder for wheat flour, but 2 for GF
300ml milk or 350ml for gluten free
20g of melted butter- I put it in a cup and microwave for ten seconds
A little butter for cooking.
The recipe said 150g of blueberries, I had more than that and I used them still slightly frozen. They tasted great but they turned the pancakes blue. It was a bit ‘Willy Wonka’ but I think they wouldn’t go completely blue, rather like blueberry muffins do if I’d have used fresh blueberries.
We had these with a scoop of ice cream and we had them warmed for breakfast with a spoon of local honey.
I thought I would share these as my food isn’t always perfect looking but it’s ok not to be perfect. One thing I never do is just bin it because it didn’t turn out like the cook book.
Over to you Dear Reader, does it go wrong for you too? Do you end up adapting recipes after you’ve found out it doesn’t work?
Until tomorrow,
Love Froogs xxxx

Slow food Sunday

frugal food
Hello Dear Reader,
Thanks for your concerns, I’m still a snot monster and all I wanted to do today was potter about in a warm kitchen.
I defrosted five great big chunks of neck of lamb, just under £3.50 from my local butchers.
I peeled and sliced six carrots, half a head of celery and diced two large onions. I added a liberal sprinkling of Rosemary, parsley and garlic. I then added a litre of stock.
I popped in a low slow oven for six hours.
Here’s the finished result, it just fell off the bone.
I removed all the bones and diced the lamb.
I made up some extra gravy and topped the lamb with potatoes.
Here’s the finished result.
Six dinners. I always cook on a Sunday for Monday’s supper too.
I’ve recorded and watched James Martin’s Home Comforts and he made a delicious pudding that I’ve emulated but made simpler and cheaper. I buttered for small pudding dishes and covered the bottom with golden syrup. I then spooned in some blueberries and covered them with cake batter.
I baked them in my grill pan with some water in my small top oven at 180 for 25 minutes.
The custard was 99p for three tins in, where else but the 99p store! Well, I’m not making my own when I can get it at that price.
The finished little puds.
In a custard pond!
Slow food on a Sunday, two quick lunches for the next two days and ‘ding cuisine’ for tomorrow’s supper.
Over to you, how’s your weekend been?
Until tomorrow,
Love Froogs xxxx
.

Saving energy and money in a rented house

frugal home
Sponsored by Duette®




Hello Dear Reader,

Sometimes, it only needs a ‘tweet’ to get me going. I read that “This week alone, Britain has wasted £6,974, 691 by not insulating its homes properly, and counting”. All well and good you might say, but what if you are among the rising numbers of families who will not be able to buy and face a lifetime in a rented house? More and more families live in rented homes and not every house is insulated. Older houses in conservation areas may have loft insulation but have sash windows and wooden doors and even if the landlord wanted, they couldn’t change the windows for double glazed either due to cost of planning regulations.

A draughty house is a cold house, it will have damp spots and will cost a fortune to heat. This is where I did my research, not only looking around but remembering back to growing up in an old house that leaked air at every junction and a family that didn’t have much money to heat it? Does that sound familiar?

There are ways of making temporary adaptations to a rented house that can be rectified later without any structural changes and making sure you don’t lose your deposit.


Draught excluders are a great way of stopping warm air escaping and cold air getting into rooms. It’s often the case, especially with rented flats to have an internal door as a ‘front door’ to a family home. We used to call the draught excluders ‘hissing sid’ as they looked like snakes and stopped the wind whistling under our ill fitted front door.


To start you can put up door curtains. If you have a wooden frame you can use self tapping screws to fix a curtain pole to the top of a door. Afterwards, with careful removal and wood filler, no one would ever know there was a door curtain there. You could even hang them on glazed internal doors to stop heat loss from room to room.



Another thing I would suggest is to make sure your curtains are lined. Often, rented houses come with curtains and the landlord expects them to be in good condition at the end of the tenancy. It would be advisable to take them down and store them safely and put them up again when the agent comes to check the tenancy at the end of the agreement. In the meantime, use your own curtains and blinds.

If you have a longer tenancy and if the house just isn’t warm enough I would go the to the trouble of investing in insulating blinds. In the main living areas at the very least as these would save you anything up to 25% of your heating bills over the years. Our combined gas and electricity bill is £900 a year and if I used energy saving blinds then that could bring it down by £225 a year and that is a substantial saving. Even if you rent somewhere with double glazing, you will still lose heat through the windows, they provide insulation but they are not brick walls. Simple fixings can easily be removed at the end of a tenancy, filled with wood filler, painted over and no one would ever know that you’d been warm throughout your stay.


Buying blinds might seem a bit expensive in a rented house as insulating blinds, that also blackout light and insulate against noise can start from £150 and yes of course you can make curtains but not everyone has the skills or time. However, if you can stop draughts, keep the light out and the children asleep and reduce traffic noise will help make life a lot better for families. If it’s going to become the norm that more and more families live in rented homes then fewer people will choose where they live, whether a house is insulated, sound proofed, double glazed or particularly warm. More and more families won’t have the choice and will be taking a home based on proximity to schools and work. It will be the case that families will have to do the best them.

If renting was my only option then I would put up door curtains, line the curtains that were there, I would use door insulators and I would invest in some insulating blinds especially if I had sash or single glazed windows because I was lucky enough to live in a conservation area.

p.s - It’s still so cold!

Until tomorrow,

Love Froogs xxxx





Chicken and Chorizo Jamalaya with cauliflower rice

frugal food

Hello Dear Reader,

Sorry about the photograph, I just couldn’t get the lighting right tonight and it was so dark when I cooked this evening. I should have used red peppers and some tomatoes for some contrast but I’m a home cook and not a food stylist. We all get used to seeing people, their homes, and their food airbrushed that when we see the wobbly bit of life, including on our plates, we tend to see imperfections.

My food is ‘as it comes’ sometimes and this is one of those occasions.

I read, afterwards, that I should have removed the stalks but I’m such a stingy thing that I just can’t see them wasted. I always eat the stalks and usually the greens around the cauli too! I popped the cut up chunks of cauliflower into the food processor and whizzed it up. I’ve kept the ‘greens’ to have with another meal.

Here’s the results. I then ‘dry fried’ it in a non- stick pan to cook it through and remove any extra moisture. Here’s what I did with the rest of the ingredients.

Serves 4 - (We’ll have half for our lunch tomorrow)

I cauliflower - 69p - used to make the cauliflower rice
2 large chicken breasts - about 150g each (I bought a kilo in Aldi as they are on offer for £5.49 a kilo) 90p each
1/4 of a Chorizo sausage, skin removed and chopped into small chunks - 63p
1 large courgette - chopped - 22p
1 large onion - chopped - 22p
1 green/1 yellow pepper - 62p

1 tsp - corriander - 5p
1 tsp - cumin - 5p
1 tsp - paprika - 5p
1 tsp - mixed dried herbs - 2p
salt and pepper to taste - 2p


£4.37 - £1.09 per person.

I fried all the above ingredients until cooked.

Add the seasoning and stir

Add the cauliflower and half a cup of water.

Here’s my findings: I could have done with more spice, I felt it needed a chopped chilli and corriander leaves chopped up would have been nice. It also needed a tin of chopped tomatoes that I didn’t have, maybe a chicken stock cube too? I often adapt recipes once I’ve made them a few times to get them the way we like them.


It was really delicious and low in carbs and lower in calories without the rice. Next time, I’ll make it spicier but it was lovely.

Over to you, who else finds life just so airbrushed and filtered? It’s never perfect, our houses, our food, our families and our selves never look like the magazines and nor do they bloody well need to!

Until tomorrow,

Love Froogs xxxxxx

Chicken and Broccoli with lime and ginger

frugal food

Hello Dear Reader,

Simple supper tonight, well you would think. I eat gluten free noodles, which are just too expensive as far as I’m concerned and DB has the regular cheap ones. In American you call them Ramen noodles, here they are just the ones for 19p a pack, they have a flavour sachet that I don’t use and he doesn’t seem to mind them at all. Any way, that means I have to cook two lots of noodles!

To make this you will need

A chicken breast per person , finely sliced.
thumb sized piece of ginger, peeled and finely diced
three garlic cloves, finely diced
zest and juice of two limes.
60ml of runny honey.

Dry fry the chicken - brown it on both sides.

Steam the broccoli, I used frozen and it was fine, then chop it into smaller pieces and add to the chicken.

Cook the noodles. So simple, his get dropped into boiling water for 3 minutes and mine come out of a pack and get warmed up. I just mustn’t muddle them or I will be in belly ache hell and toilet central for hours!

Then, add the lime, ginger, garlic, honey and warm through. Be careful not to catch it as it burns easily. Just heat it through. Drain the noodles and toss the noodles, sauce, chicken and broccoli together.

I like the slurpy sauciness of this and kept rolling my chicken and noodles in the sauce. I didn’t add any cornflour and purposefully didn’t thicken it.


Until tomorrow,

Love Froogs xxxx

Upcycling shirts

frugal home, upcycling

Hello Dear Reader,

I haven’t done a tutorial in a while. Here’s one for you. I am desperately tired of my cushions and really don’t want to buy any. Here’s how I made new covers instead.

First, I measured the cushions! 16″ by 16″

Then I measured them again, I swear cushions, curtains ect change shape! Measure twice and cut once.

I bought three items of clothing from the cheap charity shops. I also went into the £1 charity shop. Nothing there but the £1.99 Red Cross shop had lots of fabric to buy. I always look out for XL men’s shirts…………..I get more for my money that way.

Here’s my haul of fabric.

I dismantled the clothes.

I ironed all the fabric.

I measured again, then wrote the sizes down! I’ve been caught out so many times by shape shifting cushions!

I then cut the shirts into strips. 3″ strips, or there abouts, they didn’t need to be exact.

I then sewed them together.

Ta - dah! I kept sewing until I had 54″ of strips sewn together.

I trimmed off the excess on either side.

Just as if I were making a pillow case, I didn’t add any zips or buttons, just folds. I sewed down the seams of the folds so they were not visible from the outside.

I then simply sewed up the two side seams and turned it the right way round.

Here it is, one cushion and I have plenty of fabric left over for quilting projects in the future.


Shirt to cushion. A few more of these in a variety of fabrics and colours will brighten up my lounge.

Until tomorrow,

Love Froogs xxxx