Read all about it here.
Okay, so it's a horrible photo. But I'm still happy that the whole Buy Nothing New got out there. Hopefully I didn't found like too much of a nutcase or like too much of a hippy.
Any thoughts?
Unfortunately, I forgot/didn't manage to get the radio show taped... In fact, I didn't even listen to it (who likes the sound of their own recorded voice?) Oops.
Monday, 29 June 2009
Tuesday, 23 June 2009
Day 23 - Indian feast (well, almost)
Finally back to normal with not spending too much, it was my turn to cook and from our Riverford box we had two red onions, 2/3 a bag of spinach (which is now a week old) and a medium sized kohlrabi. Before our box arrives tomorrow, pickings were awfully slim. One of the drawbacks of breaking down the cost to a set amount per person, per day.
I thought about making a kohlrabi salad, something nice and summery, since kohlrabi is really refreshing and crisp anyway. Unfortunately the only one I found (that wasn't a coleslaw type thing) used apples and dates--neither of which we have, and both of which are fairly pricey. Luckily, I found an Indian recipe. One sprouting potato leftover from Sunnyfields at the farmers market and our spinach from Riverford gave me another dish, and that recipe suggested tarka dahl (one of Mac's favourites to get at Indian restaurants). AND it was all fairly cheap! Three dishes, plus rice, for less than 60p a serving. Not bad.
What was organic/local?
Organic - oatmeal, [leftovers for lunch: risotto rice, plum tomatoes, veg bouillon, haricot beans,] kohlrabi, red lentils, red onion, potato, spinach
Local - [rapeseed oil and cooking cheese plus herbs from the garden from leftovers] garlic, spinach, potato
Monji Kalia (Kohlrabi stew)
For half a recipe (4 very small portions) made without milk and yogurt, 15p total, 4p per portion
I had to cut the recipe in half because we only had 400g of kohlrabi. Also, we didn't have any yogurt or milk, so I had to leave it out. Considering how spicy it ended up being (not too hot, but a bit hotter than I'd usually have), I wish I'd had some. It still tasted fine without, though.
Ingredients
1 kg (2.2 lb) Kohlrabi (ganth gobhi) (Riverford)
1 1/4 cups (250 ml) 8 fl oz Vegetable oil (used the recycled oil we keep for frying... kohlrabi maybe absorbed 10p worth?)
4 Cloves (laung) (oops. I forgot!)
2 Black cardamom (badi elaichi), crushed (2p)
a pinch Asafbetida (hing) (I've yet to buy this...)
1 cup (250 ml) 8 fl oz Water
1 tsp (2 g) Turmeric (haldi) powder (less than 1p)
1 tsp (2 g) Ginger powder (sonth) (2p)
1 tbsp (5 g) Aniseed (saunf) powder (missed this too...)
1/2 tsp (1 g) Garam masala (less than 1p)
Salt to taste 2 tbsp (60 g) 2 oz Yoghurt (dahi) (skipped)
2 tbsp (30 ml) l fl oz Milk (skipped)
3 Green cardamom (choti elaichi) (we used green instead of black earlier in the recipe)
Directions
1. Wash, peel and cut the kohlrabi into 1 inch cubes.
2. Heat the oil and fry the kohlrabi until golden. Drain and keep aside.
3. Heat 3 tbsp oil in a deep pot; add cloves, black cardamom, and asafoetida. Fry a little and then add water. Cover to prevent the oil from spattering.
4. Add the kohlrabi, turmeric powder, ginger powder, aniseed powder, garam masala, and salt. Cook on high heat for 10 minutes.
5. Add the milk and yoghurt (whisked together), stirring constantly till it comes to the boil. Cook for S minutes and then remove from heat.
6. Heat 1 tbsp oil in a small pan, saute the cardamom and add to the pot. Serve hot.
Tarka Dhal
£1.67 total - If 5 servings, 33p
Ingredients
The Dhal
300g red lentils (masoor dhal) (1.08)
40g ghee (I used 2tsp rapeseed oil and 2Tbsp veg oil) (10p + 6p)
1 medium onion, peeled and thinly sliced (I only used onion for the tarka, not the dhal)
1 garlic clove, peeled and thinly sliced (4p)
1.5 tsp turmeric (1p)
1 tsp ground black pepper (oops...I forgot. skipped)
Salt to taste
750mL water
1 dried red chilli-do not split (4p--I'm guessing)
The Tarka
1 tbsp sesame seed oil (skipped--I used one more veg oil)
1 tbsp vegetable oil (3p)
1 tsp mustard seed (optional) (3p)
1 tsp cumin seed (2p)
1 tsp coriander seed (1p)
8 curry leaves (optional)
4 garlic cloves, peeled and thinly sliced (18p)
1 small onion, peeled and thinly sliced (Riverford)
2 long dry red chillies (7p--I'm guessing)
1 tsp aswain or lovage seed (skipped. I don't know what either are!)
Directions
1. Wash and sift the dhal (lentils) thoroughly to remove husk and stone. Drain.
2. Heat ghee in heavy pan and fry onion and garlic gently until softened
3. Add turmeric, salt, pepper and dhal. Stir gently to coat all dhal
4. Add water and chillies. Boil, covered, for 20-30 minutes until lentils are cooked and resemble a medium custard in consistency. You may need to add extra water to maintain consistency. Do not let them dry out. When cooked to your liking set aside in a serving dish in a warm place, preferably with a cover.
5. To make the tarka, heat the oil until it smokes and throw in the mustard and reduce heat a bit.
6. When mustard crackles add chillies and fry for 30 seconds, constantly turning. Mind your eyes as the fumes will be pungent.
7. Add rest of tarka ingredients except lovage and keep energetically stir frying until garlic is blackening or chillies are blackening whichever is first.
8. Add aswain or lovage, remove from heat and keep stirring for 10 seconds.
9. Pour mixture over lentils and cover. Serve hot.
The use of mustard and curry leaf is a South Indian variation. Try this recipe with and without the optional ingredients. When you've got the hang of it, try the recipe with other types of dhal and with mixes of dhal. I like a mix of masoor, toovar, urid and pearl barley. (masoor is sweet, toovar is meaty, urid is bitter and pearl barley adds bite.)
Saag Aloo
56p total for 4 small portions (we definitely did NOT have 500g of spinach, and I would ideally have wanted more potatoes). That's 14p each.
Ingredients:
60g / 2¼oz butter or ghee (used 2Tbsp veg oil - 6p)
5cm / 2in piece root ginger, peeled and grated (our ginger disappeared. We probably had 1/2 inch - 5p)
4 garlic cloves, chopped (18p)
2 onions, chopped (skipped)
2 green chillies, chopped (used 1 dried - 4p?)
200g / 7oz floury potatoes, peeled and cut into 5cm / 2in pieces (probably 300g? 28p)
1 tsp ground cumin (2p)
1 tsp ground coriander (1p)
½ tsp turmeric (less than 1p)
¼ tsp salt (less than 1p)
500g / 1lb 2oz spinach leaves, rinsed and chopped (you can also use frozen spinach, defrosted) (Riverford)
pinch garam masala
Directions
Melt butter or ghee in large saucepan over medium heat. Fry ginger, garlic, onions and chillies, stirring frequently, for 2 minutes.
Add potatoes and continue stirring for 5 minutes. Then add cumin, coriander, turmeric and salt. Continue frying and stirring for 15 minutes, or until potatoes are tender. I found that everything really stuck to the base of the pan unless I stirred non-stop. If this happens, add a little vegetable oil rather than more butter.
Throw in the spinach at the very end. You want it to stay nice and fresh, so take the saucepan off the heat after you’ve stirred it in, as it will continue to cook for a while with the heat from the potatoes.
Sprinkle garam masala over and serve hot.
Plus, all of this was served with plan basmati rice (we have a 5kg bag in our airing cupboard, so that's never an issue!)
(24p for 1cup... probably enough for 4. 6p)
Breakfast: oatmeal with 1tsp honey and a pinch of cinnamon, 11p PLUS Megan then had 30g raisins (7p) with 10g of peanut butter (2p)
Riverford: 77p
Lunch: Leftover risotto 34p
Dinner: fried kohlrabi (4p), tarka dahl (33p), saag aloo (14p) over rice (6p). 57p total for 3 different Indian dishes. Not bad! Plus Mac had two pieces of bread with pate before he went off to a meeting at 7 because we were too slow in finishing cooking (oops) (30p).
Total: Megan £1.88, Mac £2.09
I thought about making a kohlrabi salad, something nice and summery, since kohlrabi is really refreshing and crisp anyway. Unfortunately the only one I found (that wasn't a coleslaw type thing) used apples and dates--neither of which we have, and both of which are fairly pricey. Luckily, I found an Indian recipe. One sprouting potato leftover from Sunnyfields at the farmers market and our spinach from Riverford gave me another dish, and that recipe suggested tarka dahl (one of Mac's favourites to get at Indian restaurants). AND it was all fairly cheap! Three dishes, plus rice, for less than 60p a serving. Not bad.
What was organic/local?
Organic - oatmeal, [leftovers for lunch: risotto rice, plum tomatoes, veg bouillon, haricot beans,] kohlrabi, red lentils, red onion, potato, spinach
Local - [rapeseed oil and cooking cheese plus herbs from the garden from leftovers] garlic, spinach, potato
Monji Kalia (Kohlrabi stew)
For half a recipe (4 very small portions) made without milk and yogurt, 15p total, 4p per portion
I had to cut the recipe in half because we only had 400g of kohlrabi. Also, we didn't have any yogurt or milk, so I had to leave it out. Considering how spicy it ended up being (not too hot, but a bit hotter than I'd usually have), I wish I'd had some. It still tasted fine without, though.
Ingredients
1 kg (2.2 lb) Kohlrabi (ganth gobhi) (Riverford)
1 1/4 cups (250 ml) 8 fl oz Vegetable oil (used the recycled oil we keep for frying... kohlrabi maybe absorbed 10p worth?)
4 Cloves (laung) (oops. I forgot!)
2 Black cardamom (badi elaichi), crushed (2p)
a pinch Asafbetida (hing) (I've yet to buy this...)
1 cup (250 ml) 8 fl oz Water
1 tsp (2 g) Turmeric (haldi) powder (less than 1p)
1 tsp (2 g) Ginger powder (sonth) (2p)
1 tbsp (5 g) Aniseed (saunf) powder (missed this too...)
1/2 tsp (1 g) Garam masala (less than 1p)
Salt to taste 2 tbsp (60 g) 2 oz Yoghurt (dahi) (skipped)
2 tbsp (30 ml) l fl oz Milk (skipped)
3 Green cardamom (choti elaichi) (we used green instead of black earlier in the recipe)
Directions
1. Wash, peel and cut the kohlrabi into 1 inch cubes.
2. Heat the oil and fry the kohlrabi until golden. Drain and keep aside.
3. Heat 3 tbsp oil in a deep pot; add cloves, black cardamom, and asafoetida. Fry a little and then add water. Cover to prevent the oil from spattering.
4. Add the kohlrabi, turmeric powder, ginger powder, aniseed powder, garam masala, and salt. Cook on high heat for 10 minutes.
5. Add the milk and yoghurt (whisked together), stirring constantly till it comes to the boil. Cook for S minutes and then remove from heat.
6. Heat 1 tbsp oil in a small pan, saute the cardamom and add to the pot. Serve hot.
Tarka Dhal
£1.67 total - If 5 servings, 33p
Ingredients
The Dhal
300g red lentils (masoor dhal) (1.08)
40g ghee (I used 2tsp rapeseed oil and 2Tbsp veg oil) (10p + 6p)
1 medium onion, peeled and thinly sliced (I only used onion for the tarka, not the dhal)
1 garlic clove, peeled and thinly sliced (4p)
1.5 tsp turmeric (1p)
1 tsp ground black pepper (oops...I forgot. skipped)
Salt to taste
750mL water
1 dried red chilli-do not split (4p--I'm guessing)
The Tarka
1 tbsp sesame seed oil (skipped--I used one more veg oil)
1 tbsp vegetable oil (3p)
1 tsp mustard seed (optional) (3p)
1 tsp cumin seed (2p)
1 tsp coriander seed (1p)
8 curry leaves (optional)
4 garlic cloves, peeled and thinly sliced (18p)
1 small onion, peeled and thinly sliced (Riverford)
2 long dry red chillies (7p--I'm guessing)
1 tsp aswain or lovage seed (skipped. I don't know what either are!)
Directions
1. Wash and sift the dhal (lentils) thoroughly to remove husk and stone. Drain.
2. Heat ghee in heavy pan and fry onion and garlic gently until softened
3. Add turmeric, salt, pepper and dhal. Stir gently to coat all dhal
4. Add water and chillies. Boil, covered, for 20-30 minutes until lentils are cooked and resemble a medium custard in consistency. You may need to add extra water to maintain consistency. Do not let them dry out. When cooked to your liking set aside in a serving dish in a warm place, preferably with a cover.
5. To make the tarka, heat the oil until it smokes and throw in the mustard and reduce heat a bit.
6. When mustard crackles add chillies and fry for 30 seconds, constantly turning. Mind your eyes as the fumes will be pungent.
7. Add rest of tarka ingredients except lovage and keep energetically stir frying until garlic is blackening or chillies are blackening whichever is first.
8. Add aswain or lovage, remove from heat and keep stirring for 10 seconds.
9. Pour mixture over lentils and cover. Serve hot.
The use of mustard and curry leaf is a South Indian variation. Try this recipe with and without the optional ingredients. When you've got the hang of it, try the recipe with other types of dhal and with mixes of dhal. I like a mix of masoor, toovar, urid and pearl barley. (masoor is sweet, toovar is meaty, urid is bitter and pearl barley adds bite.)
Saag Aloo
56p total for 4 small portions (we definitely did NOT have 500g of spinach, and I would ideally have wanted more potatoes). That's 14p each.
Ingredients:
60g / 2¼oz butter or ghee (used 2Tbsp veg oil - 6p)
5cm / 2in piece root ginger, peeled and grated (our ginger disappeared. We probably had 1/2 inch - 5p)
4 garlic cloves, chopped (18p)
2 onions, chopped (skipped)
2 green chillies, chopped (used 1 dried - 4p?)
200g / 7oz floury potatoes, peeled and cut into 5cm / 2in pieces (probably 300g? 28p)
1 tsp ground cumin (2p)
1 tsp ground coriander (1p)
½ tsp turmeric (less than 1p)
¼ tsp salt (less than 1p)
500g / 1lb 2oz spinach leaves, rinsed and chopped (you can also use frozen spinach, defrosted) (Riverford)
pinch garam masala
Directions
Melt butter or ghee in large saucepan over medium heat. Fry ginger, garlic, onions and chillies, stirring frequently, for 2 minutes.
Add potatoes and continue stirring for 5 minutes. Then add cumin, coriander, turmeric and salt. Continue frying and stirring for 15 minutes, or until potatoes are tender. I found that everything really stuck to the base of the pan unless I stirred non-stop. If this happens, add a little vegetable oil rather than more butter.
Throw in the spinach at the very end. You want it to stay nice and fresh, so take the saucepan off the heat after you’ve stirred it in, as it will continue to cook for a while with the heat from the potatoes.
Sprinkle garam masala over and serve hot.
Plus, all of this was served with plan basmati rice (we have a 5kg bag in our airing cupboard, so that's never an issue!)
(24p for 1cup... probably enough for 4. 6p)
Breakfast: oatmeal with 1tsp honey and a pinch of cinnamon, 11p PLUS Megan then had 30g raisins (7p) with 10g of peanut butter (2p)
Riverford: 77p
Lunch: Leftover risotto 34p
Dinner: fried kohlrabi (4p), tarka dahl (33p), saag aloo (14p) over rice (6p). 57p total for 3 different Indian dishes. Not bad! Plus Mac had two pieces of bread with pate before he went off to a meeting at 7 because we were too slow in finishing cooking (oops) (30p).
Total: Megan £1.88, Mac £2.09
Monday, 22 June 2009
Day 22 - Back to (budget) normal
Today we had our first meeting for the next half of our ethical food project--an ethical food conference. It will feature fair trade (and trade justice in general) more heavily, but will still hopefully tie into the ideas about eating ethically on a budget. I'd like to get someone in to talk about saving seed in developing nations and in the UK, to talk about the ethics of buying from a supermarket (which often supports Fairtrade suppliers, but can hurt the power of UK farmers) and getting through the idea that EVERYONE can afford to choose fair trade and organic/local produce at least some of the time.
One of the group members mentioned making clear the distinction between choosing to spend £2 a day on ethical food and having to spend $2 a day on living--food, shelter, medicine, clothing, everything. I hope that it will go well.
We're looking at doing it in the spring next year. In other food news, I'm hoping that my friend Hannah and I will start up a food zine. I don't know what would be in it, but I've wanted to write a zine since I was 14 or 15, and still haven't. I'd like some wartime recipes in there, and maybe an interview. I think Hannah said I could be the "vegetarian correspondent" and she has a Norway correspondent and a London correspondent. Maybe she thinks there is a country called Vegetariana?
Anyway, we ate well today, and under budget. As I write this, the costings have all been done, Mac even managed to take some photos, AND we're about to settle down, watch a film (from Lovefilm--we never remember to watch the films and send them back in time so it's more like a £10 donation to their company) and have some popcorn with butter with the money we have left over from today.
White Bean Risotto
Serves 4 £1.36 total, 34p per serving
1 medium onion, chopped (skipped)
2 tbsp Rape seed oil (30p)
2 cloves garlic, minced (9p)
5 mini plum tomatoes, chopped (Riverford)
1 1/2 cups arborio rice (70p)
28 ounces stock (4p)
80g (1/2 cup) Dried Haricot Beans (16p)
5g freshly grated Lyburn cooking cheese (3p)
Fresh mixed herbs to taste (we used a bit of fresh oregano, fresh basil, and fresh thyme from the garden)
Salt and freshly ground black pepper, to taste
1. Soak beans overnight, and change water in the morning or a few hours before cooking, simmer for 1-1½ hours until tender.
2. Coat a large skillet with rape seed oil. Saute garlic of 1 minute, add tomato and cook for another 2-3 minutes.
3. Stir in arborio rice and cook for another minute. Add stock and bring to a boil.
4. Reduce heat to simmer and cook uncovered, stirring occasionally, until broth is absorbed and rice is tender. This will take between 25 and 35 minutes. Stir in white beans, cheese, herbs, salt and pepper. Cook until all ingredients are hot, probably an extra one or two minutes.
Breakfast: Mac had porridge with honey and cinnamon (11p), Megan had hers with raisins (13p) Riverford: 75p
Lunch: Leftover lentil stew (36p because it turns out there was only enough for 5 portions, not six) (plus Megan had one of the savoury muffins our friends brought over)
Dinner: Risotto (34p) and the last two savoury muffins Plus popcorn with our film!
£1.56 for Mac (before popcorn) and £1.58 for Megan (before popcorn)... although I'm now considering all the other things I can eat with my extra 40p! I can't believe we had filling lentil stew AND a lovely risotto and still have so much money left. What on earth have we been eating for the last week?!?!?
Mac settled on 110g of broken cashews (at £3.50/kg, broken nuts are the way to go!) with a tiny bit of soy sauce and salt to bring him to just under £2.00
Megan went with 50g of broken cashews (18p), also roasted, AND 50g of popcorn (7p) with butter (7p)
for a grant total of £1.90
One of the group members mentioned making clear the distinction between choosing to spend £2 a day on ethical food and having to spend $2 a day on living--food, shelter, medicine, clothing, everything. I hope that it will go well.
We're looking at doing it in the spring next year. In other food news, I'm hoping that my friend Hannah and I will start up a food zine. I don't know what would be in it, but I've wanted to write a zine since I was 14 or 15, and still haven't. I'd like some wartime recipes in there, and maybe an interview. I think Hannah said I could be the "vegetarian correspondent" and she has a Norway correspondent and a London correspondent. Maybe she thinks there is a country called Vegetariana?
Anyway, we ate well today, and under budget. As I write this, the costings have all been done, Mac even managed to take some photos, AND we're about to settle down, watch a film (from Lovefilm--we never remember to watch the films and send them back in time so it's more like a £10 donation to their company) and have some popcorn with butter with the money we have left over from today.
White Bean Risotto Serves 4 £1.36 total, 34p per serving
1 medium onion, chopped (skipped)
2 tbsp Rape seed oil (30p)
2 cloves garlic, minced (9p)
5 mini plum tomatoes, chopped (Riverford)
1 1/2 cups arborio rice (70p)
28 ounces stock (4p)
80g (1/2 cup) Dried Haricot Beans (16p)
5g freshly grated Lyburn cooking cheese (3p)
Fresh mixed herbs to taste (we used a bit of fresh oregano, fresh basil, and fresh thyme from the garden)
Salt and freshly ground black pepper, to taste
1. Soak beans overnight, and change water in the morning or a few hours before cooking, simmer for 1-1½ hours until tender.
2. Coat a large skillet with rape seed oil. Saute garlic of 1 minute, add tomato and cook for another 2-3 minutes.
3. Stir in arborio rice and cook for another minute. Add stock and bring to a boil.
4. Reduce heat to simmer and cook uncovered, stirring occasionally, until broth is absorbed and rice is tender. This will take between 25 and 35 minutes. Stir in white beans, cheese, herbs, salt and pepper. Cook until all ingredients are hot, probably an extra one or two minutes.
Breakfast: Mac had porridge with honey and cinnamon (11p), Megan had hers with raisins (13p) Riverford: 75p
Lunch: Leftover lentil stew (36p because it turns out there was only enough for 5 portions, not six) (plus Megan had one of the savoury muffins our friends brought over)
Dinner: Risotto (34p) and the last two savoury muffins Plus popcorn with our film!
£1.56 for Mac (before popcorn) and £1.58 for Megan (before popcorn)... although I'm now considering all the other things I can eat with my extra 40p! I can't believe we had filling lentil stew AND a lovely risotto and still have so much money left. What on earth have we been eating for the last week?!?!?
Mac settled on 110g of broken cashews (at £3.50/kg, broken nuts are the way to go!) with a tiny bit of soy sauce and salt to bring him to just under £2.00
Megan went with 50g of broken cashews (18p), also roasted, AND 50g of popcorn (7p) with butter (7p)
for a grant total of £1.90Sunday, 21 June 2009
Day 21 - £2 a day on the radio!!
I was on the radio today talking about the £2 a day diet with Georgina Windsor. You can listen to it here for the next week. (If that link doesn't work, google "radio solent" and then find the "listen again" button and scroll down until you get to "Georgina Windsor". It only works for a week, though. Anyone know how to make an mp3 recording of it?
Mac thought I was too negative and kept talking about the limitations of the £2 a day diet, rather than stressing all the good food we've eaten. I guess I just didn't want people to think that it was super easy. Although I do stick by my statement that the math is the worst part about it.
I think Mac and I are really considering doing £3 next time we do it, so that we can have more dairy and fruit. Still, I think we're getting some great food. Check out the bright colours at the start of me making lentil soup:
I am also happy to report that I am FINALLY caught up with all this math. I am also looking forward to the end of the month now that we're 2/3 of the way done so that I can put away the spreadsheet for a while. All the math drives me nuts. (It doesn't help that while I've been trying to update the blog over the last two days I've been distracting myself with episodes of Alias. That is precisely why we don't have a TV! I have so little willpower!)
Anyway, no more expensive ingredients, we survived (just about) the dinner party, and have almost nothing from the veg box left... We've found a risotto white bean recipe for tomorrow, and then will have spinach and kohl rabi to get us through Tuesday. I have no idea what that recipe will look like.
In a flash of foresight, Mac has ALREADY added up tomorrow's dinner, and I already have the figures for our lunch (which will be more lentil soup). This should prevent us from making more silly decisions to put us over our £2 a day limit.
What was organic/local today?
Organic - most of the soda bread I made (plain flour, milk and white wine vinegar), the pate, peanut butter, couscous and raisins.
The haricot beans, chickpeas and tomatoes from lunch.
The lentils, potatoes, carrots, basil and oregano from dinner.
Local - the butter, aubergine from lunch, and rapeseed oil.
Lentil Soup
Serves at LEAST 6. Possibly more, but we'll have to wait and see!
£1.82 total, 30p per serving, maybe less.
Ingredients
1 onion, chopped (skipped. Mac doesn't like using red onions in place of onions... he swears it ruins the flavour. I'm happy to use garlic instead)
2T olive/rapeseed oil (30p)- the original calls for 4T. That's unnecessary.
2 carrots, sliced (Riverford)
2 stalks celery, chopped (skipped)
2 cloves garlic, roughly chopped (15p)
1tsp dried oregano (I used a small handful of fresh from our garden)
1 bay leaf (less than 1p)
1tsp dried basil (a small handful fresh from our windowsill)
1 (14.5 ounce) can crushed tomatoes (I used half a can 37p... about 200g. That's nowhere near 14.5oz)
2 cups dry lentils (£1.00) (make sure you use brown or green or continental. Red goes well with OTHER recipes because it turns to mush!)
8 cups water (I could only fit 6 1/2 in my pan)
1/2c spinach, rinsed and thinly sliced (I forgot this!)
2T vinegar (I forgot this too, but I would use red wine vinegar... or actual red wine if you have it handy)
salt to taste
ground black pepper to taste
Directions
1. In a large soup pot, heat oil over medium heat. Add onions, carrots, and celery; cook and stir until onion is tender. Stir in garlic, bay leaf, oregano, and basil; cook for 2 minutes.
2. Stir in lentils, and add water and tomatoes. Bring to a boil. Reduce heat, and simmer for at least 1 hour. When ready to serve stir in spinach, and cook until it wilts. Stir in vinegar, and season to taste with salt and pepper, and more vinegar if desired.
The Breakdown:
Breakfast: toast with butter (10p) and then toast with pate (22p) for Mac. Toast with peanut butter (11p) and some more leftover couscous with raisins and cinammon and a dash of brown sugar for Megan (15p) plus a cup of tea (weird cardamom tea given to us by friends..I'm not really sure where it came from.)
Riverford: 75p
Lunch: Leftover potato salad and couscous salad for Mac--37p. Megan had leftover garden salad (all Riverford and garden!) and then a weird (and expensive at 71p) red lentil (35p), tomato paste (25p) and cumin (1p) concoction with a bit of chili flakes (2p) and a handful of quinoa (11p for about 40g).
Plus probably 4 cookies throughout the day for each of us - 26p Thankfully they are now all gone and won't be ruining our figures (the math kind or the waist kind).
Dinner: lentil and potato soup (30p) with a slice of bread (8p)
Total: Mac £2.08, Megan £2.36 (it's either the fault of all the cookies--although I still would have gone over--or the ridiculous lunch. Last time I throw things together without a recipe. I didn't even like the way it came out!)
Mac thought I was too negative and kept talking about the limitations of the £2 a day diet, rather than stressing all the good food we've eaten. I guess I just didn't want people to think that it was super easy. Although I do stick by my statement that the math is the worst part about it.
I think Mac and I are really considering doing £3 next time we do it, so that we can have more dairy and fruit. Still, I think we're getting some great food. Check out the bright colours at the start of me making lentil soup:
I am also happy to report that I am FINALLY caught up with all this math. I am also looking forward to the end of the month now that we're 2/3 of the way done so that I can put away the spreadsheet for a while. All the math drives me nuts. (It doesn't help that while I've been trying to update the blog over the last two days I've been distracting myself with episodes of Alias. That is precisely why we don't have a TV! I have so little willpower!)Anyway, no more expensive ingredients, we survived (just about) the dinner party, and have almost nothing from the veg box left... We've found a risotto white bean recipe for tomorrow, and then will have spinach and kohl rabi to get us through Tuesday. I have no idea what that recipe will look like.
In a flash of foresight, Mac has ALREADY added up tomorrow's dinner, and I already have the figures for our lunch (which will be more lentil soup). This should prevent us from making more silly decisions to put us over our £2 a day limit.
What was organic/local today?
Organic - most of the soda bread I made (plain flour, milk and white wine vinegar), the pate, peanut butter, couscous and raisins.
The haricot beans, chickpeas and tomatoes from lunch.
The lentils, potatoes, carrots, basil and oregano from dinner.
Local - the butter, aubergine from lunch, and rapeseed oil.
Lentil Soup
Serves at LEAST 6. Possibly more, but we'll have to wait and see!
£1.82 total, 30p per serving, maybe less.
Ingredients
1 onion, chopped (skipped. Mac doesn't like using red onions in place of onions... he swears it ruins the flavour. I'm happy to use garlic instead)
2T olive/rapeseed oil (30p)- the original calls for 4T. That's unnecessary.
2 carrots, sliced (Riverford)
2 stalks celery, chopped (skipped)
2 cloves garlic, roughly chopped (15p)
1tsp dried oregano (I used a small handful of fresh from our garden)
1 bay leaf (less than 1p)
1tsp dried basil (a small handful fresh from our windowsill)
1 (14.5 ounce) can crushed tomatoes (I used half a can 37p... about 200g. That's nowhere near 14.5oz)
2 cups dry lentils (£1.00) (make sure you use brown or green or continental. Red goes well with OTHER recipes because it turns to mush!)
8 cups water (I could only fit 6 1/2 in my pan)
1/2c spinach, rinsed and thinly sliced (I forgot this!)
2T vinegar (I forgot this too, but I would use red wine vinegar... or actual red wine if you have it handy)
salt to taste
ground black pepper to taste
Directions
1. In a large soup pot, heat oil over medium heat. Add onions, carrots, and celery; cook and stir until onion is tender. Stir in garlic, bay leaf, oregano, and basil; cook for 2 minutes.
2. Stir in lentils, and add water and tomatoes. Bring to a boil. Reduce heat, and simmer for at least 1 hour. When ready to serve stir in spinach, and cook until it wilts. Stir in vinegar, and season to taste with salt and pepper, and more vinegar if desired.
The Breakdown:
Breakfast: toast with butter (10p) and then toast with pate (22p) for Mac. Toast with peanut butter (11p) and some more leftover couscous with raisins and cinammon and a dash of brown sugar for Megan (15p) plus a cup of tea (weird cardamom tea given to us by friends..I'm not really sure where it came from.)
Riverford: 75p
Lunch: Leftover potato salad and couscous salad for Mac--37p. Megan had leftover garden salad (all Riverford and garden!) and then a weird (and expensive at 71p) red lentil (35p), tomato paste (25p) and cumin (1p) concoction with a bit of chili flakes (2p) and a handful of quinoa (11p for about 40g).
Plus probably 4 cookies throughout the day for each of us - 26p Thankfully they are now all gone and won't be ruining our figures (the math kind or the waist kind).
Dinner: lentil and potato soup (30p) with a slice of bread (8p)
Total: Mac £2.08, Megan £2.36 (it's either the fault of all the cookies--although I still would have gone over--or the ridiculous lunch. Last time I throw things together without a recipe. I didn't even like the way it came out!)
Day 20 - dinner party!
We had some people over for dinner last night. This is the first time since we started this diet. Mac made LOADS of food, I tidied up the lounge, and we got out our nicer dishes that I got as a leaving present. Mac made a couscous salad and a potato salad with a gorgeous mustard dressing. I put together a Riverford-and-garden salad and made some soda bread. One of the fastest and most filling breads you can make. I never have self-raising flours or buttermilk, so I'll put in the substitutions I used. I wish we'd been having people over more often--it's not that bad, because we only count what we eat--our guests can pig out and eat nice cheeses (see our nice cheeses?)
We have some gorgeous oak smoked cheddar from Lyburn farm, blue vinney from Dorset, and some goat's cheese from Loosehanger farm. Most of which we've barely touched this month. Sharing it out with friends seems a good plan. I had 15g of the oaksmoked with a piece of bread.They brought some really nice savoury corn muffins with basil and linseed. I love corn muffins! I should make some corn bread and we could make homemade fake baked beans. I bet we could do all that on our diet as long as I didn't use a super-dairy heavy recipe.
We had peanut butter and oatmeal cookies for dessert (they really need to be eaten before we consume them all) and broke out our massive box of assorted teas. We ended up trying for the first time some cinnamon tea and cardamom tea. I was a bit dubious of both, but they were really nice and light and not too spicy. Plus, they were light enough that you didn't need milk, which was a good thing because I used it all up making the soda bread. Oops.
What was organic/local?
Organic: couscous, red onion, sunflower seeds, sesame seeds, pumpkin seeds, potatoes, walnuts, white wine vinegar, milk, plain flour, oats, raisins, peanut butter and flour in the cookies.
Local: wholemeal flour in the bread, rapeseed oil, butter (for spreading on bread), and the parsley from our garden that Mac had cunningly saved in our freezer.
Couscous Salad
1.15 total, about 5 servings for 23p (It was a dinner party, so there were quite a few seconds and we still had some left over)
Ingredients
225g/8oz couscous (49p)
1 bunch fresh parsley, chopped (garden)
1 red onion, very finely chopped (Riverford)
30g sunflower seeds, toasted (7p)
10g sesame seeds, toasted (5p)
20g Pumpkin seeds (9p)
3 tbsp rape seed oil (45p)
salt and freshly ground black pepper
Per person: 10P
Directions
Toast the sunflower, sesame and pumpkin seeds together in the oven at about 180C. Keep an eye on them and shake occasionally--you don't want them to burn and it can happen quite quickly.
Cover the couscous with twice its volume of hot water and leave to soak for 10 minutes.
While you're waiting for the cous cous, finely chop the red onion and chop the parsley.
Mix all ingredients together and leave to stand for 30 minutes to let the flavours develop.
Serve at room temperature.
Potato Salad
Serves 5 (or so) for 69p (excluding the potatoes and onion, which are from Riverford). Per portion, 14p
Ingredients
2 tbsp walnut pieces (11p)
1 tbsp cider vinegar (4p)
1 tsp coleman mustard powder (4p)
1tsp white wine vinegar (4p)
3 tbsp rapeseed oil (45p)
1 tsp honey (1p)
flaked sea salt and freshly ground black pepper
900g/2lb new potatoes, such as Jersey Royals or Charlotte, washed or scrubbed (Riverford)
1/2 red onion, finely chopped, and soaked in water, (Riverford)
Direction
1. If you're using the walnuts, place in a hot oven (about 200C/400F/Gas 6) for a few minutes until beginning to colour slightly. This gives a fresher, less bitter flavour to the nuts.
2. Place the vinegar, mustard, oils, honey and salt and pepper in a screw-top jar or in the bowl of a small hand blender. Shake or blend well until creamy. Add more seasoning if preferred.
3. Cook the potatoes in boiling salted water for about 15-20 minutes until just tender. Drain well and, when just cool enough to handle, cut into halves or quarters, if quite large.
4. Place the potatoes in a mixing bowl shallots and walnuts, if using, and toss in as much or as little of the dressing as you want. Serve just warm or, if you're not eating straight away, refrigerate and return the salad to room temperature before eating.
Irish Soda Bread
79p total. (about 10 slices, so 8p each)
Preparation time less than 30 mins
Cooking time 10 to 30 mins
Ingredients
170g/6oz wholemeal flour (20p--I'm guessing. It's Winchester City Mill flour and I can't remember what I paid)
170g/6oz plain flour (14p)
1 1/2 tsp baking powder (3p)
1 tsp salt (1p)
3/4 tsp bicarbonate of soda (less than 1p)
290ml/½ pint milk (37p)
1Tbsp lemon juice OR white wine vinegar (4p)
Method
Preheat the oven to 400F/200C/Gas 6.
Add 1Tbsp of white wine vinegar OR lemon juice (not both) to milk. Stir and set aside for 5 min. This will create a buttermilk-substitute.
Tip the flours, baking powder, salt and bicarbonate of soda into a large mixing bowl and stir.
Make a well in the centre and pour in the buttermilk, mixing quickly with a large fork to form a soft dough. (Depending upon the absorbency of the flour, you may need to add a little milk if the dough seems too stiff or more flour if it's too sticky.)
Turn onto a lightly floured surface and knead briefly.
Form into a round and flatten the dough slightly before placing on a lightly floured baking sheet.
Cut a cross on the top and bake for about 30 minutes or until the loaf sounds hollow when tapped. Cool on a wire rack.
Breakfast: oatmeal and with honey and cinnamon 10p plus a cup of tea 3p
Riverford: 75p
Lunch: leftover haricot bean and aubergine for Megan, 44p and leftover Aubergine curry with couscous for Mac: 57p...and then Megan had some of Mac's leftover couscous with some cinnamon and raisins (about 14p)
Plus probably 4 cookies throughout the day for each of us - 26p
Dinner: couscous salad (23p) plus garden salad (nil!) plus potato salad (14p) plus savoury muffins (from our guests) plus bread (16p for two slices) and butter (5p) and a little cheese (about 10p)
Megan: £2.40
Mac: £2.39
We're pretty terrible at the whole not-going-over thing, but not bad having a dinner party AND all our other meals during the day plus a ridiculous number of cookies all for under £3.
Friday, 19 June 2009
Day 19 - still backdating.
Before moving on to anything else, check out how cool our tomatoes are from Riverford! I didn't know you could even get watermelon-like tomatoes! I think they might be called zebra ones or something.Right. I'm getting a little fed up that we hadn't done the math earlier. It would have been a good way to prevent us from having running over day after day last week. I'm still backdating (which leads to a strange blend of past and present tense for which I apologise), and it's frustrating to see that we kept going over £2. Especially seeing as how we were eating pretty well over the last few days and probably didn't even need to have anything extra. I blame the cookies--it's hard to resist them!
This haricot bean salad (one of MANY we've tried since I accidentally ordered 5kg of them from the co-op instead of 1kg) was nice--I should have added fresh parsley to it, but we didn't have any (Mac cut all of his down because he thought it was fuelling bugs going to his tomatoes). Haricot beans are pretty good in my book. I like cannellini a little bit better, but they are fairly similar. They've made a good chili/refried bean style dish, as well as numerous chilled salads. We're going to try white bean risotto some time soon, so we'll see if it works for that.
What was organic/local?
Organic: haricot beans, white wine vinegar, carrots, salad leaves and tomatoes in the salad, oatmeal, raisins, milk on tea (tea is Fair Trade) Plus the risotto rice, white wine vinegar and broad beans from the risotto. Oh, and the peanut butter, flour, and oatmeal from the cookies.
Local: Aubergine, rapeseed oil, plus the asparagus, cheese, and butter from the risotto. Plus the very tasty but quite expensive raisin and walnut bread... which I think is also organic.
Piyaz (haricot bean salad) with grilled aubergine
Served 3, £1.33 total, 44p per portion
Ingredients:
250g haricot beans (50p)
2T lemon juice (6p)
1T white wine vinegar (4p)
aubergine (50p)
1 1/2T rapeseed oil (23p)
Soak 250g kuru fasulye (haricot beans) overnight. The next morning drain off the water and put the beans in a pan of boiling water, at which 2 dessertspoonful of sodium bicarbonate was added, and let boil for 4-5 minutes and drain again. (I didn't do this, but maybe I should have... I don't know what the baking soda would do, but I've heard it recommended before)
About 2 1/2 hours before you want to eat, put the beans in a pan and cover over the top with fresh water and cook for around 1 1/2 hours.
When done, spare ½ cup of the water and drain the remaining water.
Add salt, 2Tbsp lemon juice, and 1 Tbsp white wine vinegar vinegar to the ½ cup of water and pour it over the beans and stir. Cover the pan and cool. Add olive oil after an hour.
Dress with green onions (or dry onions), chopped parsley, olive, and tomatoes and especially with boiled eggs. Serve cool. We skipped the last part, and instead I topped it with grilled aubergine.
To prepare the aubergine, preheat a ridged grill pan on medium-high heat.
Slice the aubergine into 1/2" pieces and lightly coat both sides with olive (rapeseed) oil. Place onto the grill. Turn after 4-5 min. If any pieces are a bit thicker than the others and aren't cooking as well, you can push down on them with a fork or wooden spoon. It will make them a bit mushier in appearance, but they will cook faster.
Breakfast : porridge with raisins and a cup of tea - 13p + 3p
Riverford: 75p
Lunch: leftover risotto 60p
Dinner: Piyaz (Haricot Beans) with grilled Aubergine 44p along with a garden salad (all either from Riverford or our garden) plus two cookies 13p and Megan had the last piece of walnut & raisin bread with 5g of butter (28p)
Total: Mac £2.08, Megan £2.36 I guess I should have done the math before we ate anything after dinner.
Thursday, 18 June 2009
Day 18 - more expensive vegetables
Everyone really liked the peanut butter and oatmeal cookies (who wouldn't?) and I managed to have three while at work. Unfortunately, this is day three of super expensive vegetables, so it looks like we'll have gone over again.... by a bunch.
At least the risotto was really good and I got more cookies!
What was organic/local?
Organic: Oatmeal, raisins, white wine vinegar, risotto rice, veg stock, milk in tea, oatmeal and peanut butter and flour in the biscuits, and the broad beans. (plus all the stuff from the aubergine curry the night before)
Local: Butter, asparagus, cooking cheese, and the aubergine from the night before.
Early Summer Risotto
serves 4 - £2.39 total, 60p per portion
Ingredients
* 50g butter (33p)
* Frozen celery leaf (? maybe 5p?)
* 1.5 litres vegetable stock (9p)
* 350g Risotto rice, such as Carnaroli (70p)
* 1 Tbsp White wine vinegar (4p)
* 1 bunch (250g) Asparagus, trimmed and chopped into short lengths - £1.00
* 100g Broad beans, blanched and double podded (RIVERFORD)
* 50g frozen or fresh peas (8p)
* 3 Tbps Lemon juice (9p)
* 8g Parmesan or Lyburn Farm Cooking Cheese, finely grated (4p)
Directions
1. Melt half the butter in a wide, high-sided pan over a low heat. Add the celery, and let it soften and become silky without colouring.
2. Stir in the rice, coating the grains in the buttery mixture, and cook for a couple of minutes until the grains become translucent.
3. Heat the stock in another saucepan, keeping it at simmering point.
4. Turn up the heat under the risotto and add the white wine vinegar. Allow it to bubble up, stirring the rice until all the liquid is absorbed. Add the chopped asparagus and a ladleful of the hot stock.
5. Stir the rice until all of the stock has been absorbed, then add another ladleful of stock and carry on stirring. Continue doing this until the rice is creamy and tender but still has a little bite to it, this will take about 20 minutes. You may not need all of the stock, but equally you may have to top it up with some hot water.
6. After 15 minutes of cooking and stirring, add the blanched broad beans to the pan.
7. When the risotto is cooked, take the pan from the heat and stir in the lemon zest, parmesan and remaining butter. Season with salt and freshly ground black pepper, cover and leave to rest for a couple of minutes before serving.
Breakfast - porridge with raisins, 13p
Riverford - 77p
Lunch: Leftover eggplant curry 57p and Megan had three cookies to celebrate her birthday and two cups of tea - 25.5p
Dinner: Risotto was 60p per person. Both of us were at meetings in the evening, so Mac cooked and ate and then left it for me to finish. I munched on the leftovers at the Art House (a bit of roasted veg pasta salad with pesto, a spoonful of potato salad and a pita bread) because she ended up staying 3 hours instead of half an hour. . . . Mac had made asparagus, broadbean and pea risotto (it did make the rice turn a kinda light green) so Megan ate a bit of that as well. When Mac got back, he ate the rest of the sourdough bread (probably 3 pieces at around 53p)
Mac: £2.60 Megan: £2.33
At least the risotto was really good and I got more cookies!
What was organic/local?
Organic: Oatmeal, raisins, white wine vinegar, risotto rice, veg stock, milk in tea, oatmeal and peanut butter and flour in the biscuits, and the broad beans. (plus all the stuff from the aubergine curry the night before)
Local: Butter, asparagus, cooking cheese, and the aubergine from the night before.
Early Summer Risotto
serves 4 - £2.39 total, 60p per portion
Ingredients
* 50g butter (33p)
* Frozen celery leaf (? maybe 5p?)
* 1.5 litres vegetable stock (9p)
* 350g Risotto rice, such as Carnaroli (70p)
* 1 Tbsp White wine vinegar (4p)
* 1 bunch (250g) Asparagus, trimmed and chopped into short lengths - £1.00
* 100g Broad beans, blanched and double podded (RIVERFORD)
* 50g frozen or fresh peas (8p)
* 3 Tbps Lemon juice (9p)
* 8g Parmesan or Lyburn Farm Cooking Cheese, finely grated (4p)
Directions
1. Melt half the butter in a wide, high-sided pan over a low heat. Add the celery, and let it soften and become silky without colouring.
2. Stir in the rice, coating the grains in the buttery mixture, and cook for a couple of minutes until the grains become translucent.
3. Heat the stock in another saucepan, keeping it at simmering point.
4. Turn up the heat under the risotto and add the white wine vinegar. Allow it to bubble up, stirring the rice until all the liquid is absorbed. Add the chopped asparagus and a ladleful of the hot stock.
5. Stir the rice until all of the stock has been absorbed, then add another ladleful of stock and carry on stirring. Continue doing this until the rice is creamy and tender but still has a little bite to it, this will take about 20 minutes. You may not need all of the stock, but equally you may have to top it up with some hot water.
6. After 15 minutes of cooking and stirring, add the blanched broad beans to the pan.
7. When the risotto is cooked, take the pan from the heat and stir in the lemon zest, parmesan and remaining butter. Season with salt and freshly ground black pepper, cover and leave to rest for a couple of minutes before serving.
Breakfast - porridge with raisins, 13p
Riverford - 77p
Lunch: Leftover eggplant curry 57p and Megan had three cookies to celebrate her birthday and two cups of tea - 25.5p
Dinner: Risotto was 60p per person. Both of us were at meetings in the evening, so Mac cooked and ate and then left it for me to finish. I munched on the leftovers at the Art House (a bit of roasted veg pasta salad with pesto, a spoonful of potato salad and a pita bread) because she ended up staying 3 hours instead of half an hour. . . . Mac had made asparagus, broadbean and pea risotto (it did make the rice turn a kinda light green) so Megan ate a bit of that as well. When Mac got back, he ate the rest of the sourdough bread (probably 3 pieces at around 53p)
Mac: £2.60 Megan: £2.33
Wednesday, 17 June 2009
Day 17 - It's my party...
Happy Birthday! Okay, so this wasn't the most exciting of birthdays. I celebrated with a BBQ on Sunday, so we stuck to the £2 a day today. It was my second day of work and I managed to tell them that it was my birthday AND about the £2 a day ethical diet. Becky, one of the girls I work with, got really excited (turns out she's a bit of a foodie!) and they told me about a local abattoir. They say it's from farms that the guy knows, but I think I'll have to wait and see. There are lots of "local" farms around the States that are intensively farmed. Despite the fact that people should treat you on your birthday, the tradition in England is that you buy people cakes on your birthday. I think that's ridiculous, but I guess that ensures that everyone takes a turn and people don't have to remember everyone else's birthday. I told them I'll make cookies and bring them in Thursday. They'll be the peanut butter and oatmeal ones that I made at the beginning of our February challenge.
Good news is that we got the small box this week, so the cost of our box goes down 10p per person per day. Also, I made us homemade chips, which made me a very happy girl. Don't they look good?
AND then I made cookies (the link has the egg replacement recipe. Use it for ANY cookie recipe and it works perfectly for a lot less money) and we both had one before going to bed.
The bad news is that although Mac was super sweet and cooked for me, he chose an awfully expensive meal (and this is the toned down version of the recipe! The original wanted TWO cans of tomatoes and LOTS more puree. Ridiculous. The version that we made still tasted very tomato-ey and was fine.
Combined with the super expensive pasta and asparagus from yesterday, we went WAY over.
What was organic/local/fair trade?
Organic: potatoes for chips, chickpeas, tin of tomato, tomato puree, cous cous, peanut butter, flour, oatmeal and raisins. Plus the pasta and basil from yesterday.
Local: aubergine, garlic, and butter.
Chickpea & Aubergine Curry
Serves 4 to 6 (Served 5. 2.84 total, 57p per portion.)
Ingredients -
1 Large Onion (skipped)
300g Chick Peas (17p or thereabouts because we made it from 1/2c dried)
1 large Aubergine (50p)
2 inch piece Root Ginger (15p)
2 Cloves Garlic (15p)
2 to 6 fresh Chillies (used a sprinkling of crushed chili flakes instead - 2p)
800g Tinned Tomatoes (used only 400g--1 tin- 75p)
100g Tomato Pureé (50g of puree 28p)
125ml Tomato Juice (skipped, used water instead)
2 Teaspoons Cumin Seeds (4p)
2 Teaspoons Brown Mustard Seeds (4p)
2 Teaspoon Ground Cumin (4p)
2 Teaspoons Ground Coriander (2p)
2 Teaspoons Ground Turmeric (2p)
1 Teaspoon ground Fenugreek (4p)
½ Teaspoon Cayenne Pepper (skipped)
1 Bunch Fresh Coriander (skipped)
300g cous cous (66p)
Directions
* Soak the chick peas overnight in cold water. Drain them, rinse and put in a sauce pan covered with cold water on a high light to cook. When boiling turn down to a simmer, cover and allow to cook. Chick peas take a long time to cook, up to an hour so it is best to give yourself time. The good news is that you cannot overcook them even if you try.
* Put your heaviest pan on a high light and add enough oil to cover the bottom. Put all the seeds in a saucer or other vessel and whilst the oil is heating peel and chop the onion. When the oil smokes throw in the seeds, cover the pan and shake it a little to get the seeds really popping. CAREFUL! It is really easy to burn yourself when the oil spits. Turn down the heat and as soon as the initial explosion is over and put in the onions stirring so they do not burn.
* Wash the ginger and chillies, peel the garlic and crush or blend them to a smooth paste, using a little oil if necessary. As with the previous recipe just finely chop everything if you are without benefit of blender. Add the paste to the onion mixture and allow to cook for five minutes or so, making sure it does not stick.
* Add all the rest of the spices except the fresh coriander and carry on cooking, stirring it all well to prevent burning.
* Wash the aubergine and cut into fairly large dice or slices and add to the pan. Leave to cook for ten minutes.
* Blend or chop the tinned tomato and add to the pan along with the puree and the tomato juice (or puree and water if being frugal). Mix it all together and allow to continue cooking.
* Once the chick peas are cooked, drain, rinse well and add to the pan. Stir the curry together and season to taste. Cover and allow to simmer slowly for 30 minutes adding water if necessary.
* Wash and chop the fresh coriander, if using, and add. Stir in and serve immediately.
Breakdown:
Breakfast: Both porridge with raisins 13p, Megan had a cup of tea 3p
Riverford: 77p
Lunch: leftover pasta, 68p, Megan had another cup of tea at work 3p
Dinner: homemade chips (potatoes were Riverford, and we're going to reuse the oil used for frying. I'll estimate 50mL was used for frying plus then a Tablespoon or so of cider vinegar once they were done - about 13p total!)
Then we had chickpea and aubergine curry (57p) AND a peanut butter and oatmeal cookie before bed (7p)
AUGH! Way over at £2.35 for Mac and £2.41 for me. Sigh.... I guess that's what happens when you get asparagus in one meal and aubgerine in another all in the same day. Nice to know we still would have gone over even without the chips or cookie, though!
Good news is that we got the small box this week, so the cost of our box goes down 10p per person per day. Also, I made us homemade chips, which made me a very happy girl. Don't they look good?
AND then I made cookies (the link has the egg replacement recipe. Use it for ANY cookie recipe and it works perfectly for a lot less money) and we both had one before going to bed.The bad news is that although Mac was super sweet and cooked for me, he chose an awfully expensive meal (and this is the toned down version of the recipe! The original wanted TWO cans of tomatoes and LOTS more puree. Ridiculous. The version that we made still tasted very tomato-ey and was fine.
Combined with the super expensive pasta and asparagus from yesterday, we went WAY over.
What was organic/local/fair trade?
Organic: potatoes for chips, chickpeas, tin of tomato, tomato puree, cous cous, peanut butter, flour, oatmeal and raisins. Plus the pasta and basil from yesterday.
Local: aubergine, garlic, and butter.
Chickpea & Aubergine Curry Serves 4 to 6 (Served 5. 2.84 total, 57p per portion.)
Ingredients -
1 Large Onion (skipped)
300g Chick Peas (17p or thereabouts because we made it from 1/2c dried)
1 large Aubergine (50p)
2 inch piece Root Ginger (15p)
2 Cloves Garlic (15p)
2 to 6 fresh Chillies (used a sprinkling of crushed chili flakes instead - 2p)
800g Tinned Tomatoes (used only 400g--1 tin- 75p)
100g Tomato Pureé (50g of puree 28p)
125ml Tomato Juice (skipped, used water instead)
2 Teaspoons Cumin Seeds (4p)
2 Teaspoons Brown Mustard Seeds (4p)
2 Teaspoon Ground Cumin (4p)
2 Teaspoons Ground Coriander (2p)
2 Teaspoons Ground Turmeric (2p)
1 Teaspoon ground Fenugreek (4p)
½ Teaspoon Cayenne Pepper (skipped)
1 Bunch Fresh Coriander (skipped)
300g cous cous (66p)
Directions
* Soak the chick peas overnight in cold water. Drain them, rinse and put in a sauce pan covered with cold water on a high light to cook. When boiling turn down to a simmer, cover and allow to cook. Chick peas take a long time to cook, up to an hour so it is best to give yourself time. The good news is that you cannot overcook them even if you try.
* Put your heaviest pan on a high light and add enough oil to cover the bottom. Put all the seeds in a saucer or other vessel and whilst the oil is heating peel and chop the onion. When the oil smokes throw in the seeds, cover the pan and shake it a little to get the seeds really popping. CAREFUL! It is really easy to burn yourself when the oil spits. Turn down the heat and as soon as the initial explosion is over and put in the onions stirring so they do not burn.
* Wash the ginger and chillies, peel the garlic and crush or blend them to a smooth paste, using a little oil if necessary. As with the previous recipe just finely chop everything if you are without benefit of blender. Add the paste to the onion mixture and allow to cook for five minutes or so, making sure it does not stick.
* Add all the rest of the spices except the fresh coriander and carry on cooking, stirring it all well to prevent burning.
* Wash the aubergine and cut into fairly large dice or slices and add to the pan. Leave to cook for ten minutes.
* Blend or chop the tinned tomato and add to the pan along with the puree and the tomato juice (or puree and water if being frugal). Mix it all together and allow to continue cooking.
* Once the chick peas are cooked, drain, rinse well and add to the pan. Stir the curry together and season to taste. Cover and allow to simmer slowly for 30 minutes adding water if necessary.
* Wash and chop the fresh coriander, if using, and add. Stir in and serve immediately.
Breakdown:
Breakfast: Both porridge with raisins 13p, Megan had a cup of tea 3p
Riverford: 77p
Lunch: leftover pasta, 68p, Megan had another cup of tea at work 3p
Dinner: homemade chips (potatoes were Riverford, and we're going to reuse the oil used for frying. I'll estimate 50mL was used for frying plus then a Tablespoon or so of cider vinegar once they were done - about 13p total!)
Then we had chickpea and aubergine curry (57p) AND a peanut butter and oatmeal cookie before bed (7p)
AUGH! Way over at £2.35 for Mac and £2.41 for me. Sigh.... I guess that's what happens when you get asparagus in one meal and aubgerine in another all in the same day. Nice to know we still would have gone over even without the chips or cookie, though!
Tuesday, 16 June 2009
Day 16 - we go WAY over (by almost 30p!)
I started my new job today. Everyone seems really nice, but I did have to spend a good chunk of the day reading through health and safety guidelines and looking through an "induction pack". I think they only make packs like that because they know that otherwise the first day on a job would be fairly boring.
Mac has, over time, told people at his work about his £2 challenge and other things--although I'm still not sure if they know whether we don't have a TV. (Of course I've been watching more Alias, Angel, and Numb3rs episodes while cooking and doing blog updates than could ever be good for me, so it's probably not fair to say that we don't have a TV. I still watch crap) I'm not sure whether or not to tell people....who am I kidding? I like talking, so I'm sure I'll end up telling people anyway.
I do wonder sometimes if this is worth doing as a challenge--the idea is to show people that it can be done, that buying organic isn't beyond people's means... but if we're worried about even mentioning it because we might alienate people or weird them out, what's the point? We don't need to prove anything to ourselves anymore. Maybe if we did a £3 a day challenge and were able to eat more cheese and fruit, we wouldn't feel so weird mentioning it. Of course, then if might not get the same kind of attention.
Anyway, as to what we ate today, what was organic/local/fair trade?
Organic: oats, raisins, milk in tea (the tea was fair trade), pak choi, red pepper, carrots, pasta (also fair trade), tomatoes, and basil.
Local: asparagus, butter, bread, garlic, and probably a fair portion of our veg box ingredients.
Summery Pasta with tomatoes, basil and asparagus
This is a quick and easy summer pasta recipe. You can use more basil and tomatoes and just use those, or slow cook in butter some mushrooms, or sautee until brown some courgette (zuchinni). There are lots of options for this, and just about all of them taste good--especially if you have fresh, local ripe tomatoes (do not EVER try this recipe with crappy supermarket out-of-season tomatoes! It will be bland and horrible and probably put you off tomatoes for life. I may be exaggerating slightly, but it won't be good. Trust me.)
400g pasta - 96p
Asparagus 250g - £1.00
Assorted cherry tomatoes RIVERFORD
6 cloves garlic 45p
a few handfuls of basil - from our windowsill(!!)
2T extra pressed rapseed oil - 30p
Heat oil on medium-low heat, and preheat your oven to 200C (400F) or thereabouts. You aren't baking, so it's not an exact science.
Once the oven is hot enough, place the whole cherry tomatoes in it on a baking dish. You can gently cover them in oil if you like, put a bit of salt and pepper ontop, but neither are necessary. Leave to roast for 20 min or so.
Meanwhile, slice your garlic and add to the oil. You don't want the oil too hot because the garlic should NOT burn. You want it to ever-so-slowly turn a light gold colour. Depending on how small your asparagus is, you might get away with just adding it to the oil. Before you do that, snap off the ends by bending both ends until it snaps--it will snap at the point where the woody-bit ends and the nice tender bit begins. Hopefully you won't lose too much asparagus that way--that's another good reason to buy local seasonal produce!
When you add the garlic, boil up a pan of water at the same time. You can add the asparagus to this for a minute and then strain out--you'll use the same water for your pasta.
If you aren't short of pans, you can always place the asparagus in a pan of boiling water for 2 min. Mac boiled about an inch of water and then placed the asparagus standing up for about 5 min (we don't have a fancy-pants asparagus steamer pan). Once you've done that, you can either grill it (my favourite) on a ridged grill pan or add it straight to your oil and garlic. Asparagus is fairly flexible.
Once 10 min or so have passed since you put in the tomatoes, add the pasta to a pan of boiling water and cook for however long the package says.
Take out your tomatoes (they should be bursting at the top, but still pretty whole), add all ingredients to a bowl, stir well and add the basil.
Breakdown:
Breakfast: Both: porridge with raisins 13p. Megan had a cup of tea, 3p
Riverford: 85p
Lunch: leftover stirfry 27p, Megan had 2 more cups of tea 6p (they really like tea at my new job!)
Dinner: Pasta with roasted garlic, tomatoes, asparagus and basil for £2.71 for 4, 68p per person, plus a piece of sourdough bread with butter (18p + 7p)
Total: £2.18 for Mac, £2.27 for Megan. Stupid asparagus.
Mac has, over time, told people at his work about his £2 challenge and other things--although I'm still not sure if they know whether we don't have a TV. (Of course I've been watching more Alias, Angel, and Numb3rs episodes while cooking and doing blog updates than could ever be good for me, so it's probably not fair to say that we don't have a TV. I still watch crap) I'm not sure whether or not to tell people....who am I kidding? I like talking, so I'm sure I'll end up telling people anyway.
I do wonder sometimes if this is worth doing as a challenge--the idea is to show people that it can be done, that buying organic isn't beyond people's means... but if we're worried about even mentioning it because we might alienate people or weird them out, what's the point? We don't need to prove anything to ourselves anymore. Maybe if we did a £3 a day challenge and were able to eat more cheese and fruit, we wouldn't feel so weird mentioning it. Of course, then if might not get the same kind of attention.
Anyway, as to what we ate today, what was organic/local/fair trade?
Organic: oats, raisins, milk in tea (the tea was fair trade), pak choi, red pepper, carrots, pasta (also fair trade), tomatoes, and basil.
Local: asparagus, butter, bread, garlic, and probably a fair portion of our veg box ingredients.
Summery Pasta with tomatoes, basil and asparagus
This is a quick and easy summer pasta recipe. You can use more basil and tomatoes and just use those, or slow cook in butter some mushrooms, or sautee until brown some courgette (zuchinni). There are lots of options for this, and just about all of them taste good--especially if you have fresh, local ripe tomatoes (do not EVER try this recipe with crappy supermarket out-of-season tomatoes! It will be bland and horrible and probably put you off tomatoes for life. I may be exaggerating slightly, but it won't be good. Trust me.)
400g pasta - 96p
Asparagus 250g - £1.00
Assorted cherry tomatoes RIVERFORD
6 cloves garlic 45p
a few handfuls of basil - from our windowsill(!!)
2T extra pressed rapseed oil - 30p
Heat oil on medium-low heat, and preheat your oven to 200C (400F) or thereabouts. You aren't baking, so it's not an exact science.
Once the oven is hot enough, place the whole cherry tomatoes in it on a baking dish. You can gently cover them in oil if you like, put a bit of salt and pepper ontop, but neither are necessary. Leave to roast for 20 min or so.
Meanwhile, slice your garlic and add to the oil. You don't want the oil too hot because the garlic should NOT burn. You want it to ever-so-slowly turn a light gold colour. Depending on how small your asparagus is, you might get away with just adding it to the oil. Before you do that, snap off the ends by bending both ends until it snaps--it will snap at the point where the woody-bit ends and the nice tender bit begins. Hopefully you won't lose too much asparagus that way--that's another good reason to buy local seasonal produce!
When you add the garlic, boil up a pan of water at the same time. You can add the asparagus to this for a minute and then strain out--you'll use the same water for your pasta.
If you aren't short of pans, you can always place the asparagus in a pan of boiling water for 2 min. Mac boiled about an inch of water and then placed the asparagus standing up for about 5 min (we don't have a fancy-pants asparagus steamer pan). Once you've done that, you can either grill it (my favourite) on a ridged grill pan or add it straight to your oil and garlic. Asparagus is fairly flexible.
Once 10 min or so have passed since you put in the tomatoes, add the pasta to a pan of boiling water and cook for however long the package says.
Take out your tomatoes (they should be bursting at the top, but still pretty whole), add all ingredients to a bowl, stir well and add the basil.
Breakdown:
Breakfast: Both: porridge with raisins 13p. Megan had a cup of tea, 3p
Riverford: 85p
Lunch: leftover stirfry 27p, Megan had 2 more cups of tea 6p (they really like tea at my new job!)
Dinner: Pasta with roasted garlic, tomatoes, asparagus and basil for £2.71 for 4, 68p per person, plus a piece of sourdough bread with butter (18p + 7p)
Total: £2.18 for Mac, £2.27 for Megan. Stupid asparagus.
Monday, 15 June 2009
Day 15 -
On Monday I basically sat around and did nothing. I didn't pick up our food order from the co-op, I didn't meet up with anyone, I didn't clean up the house, I didn't even update the blog. I started my new job on Tuesday, so this was one day to relax. I think I read two books between Sunday and Monday. I think I might have gone to a gig or something Monday night. Maybe that makes up for it?
Vegetable Stirfry - mostly taken from here: http://allrecipes.com/HowTo/Super-Easy-Stir-Fry/Detail.aspx which gives GREAT overall directions for a stirfry.
We made enough for 4 - £1.09, 27p per person.
Ingredients:
2 red peppers (RIVERFORD)
Pak choi (RIVERFORD)
7 little mini carrots (RIVERFORD)
2 cloves garlic (15p)
1/2 inch piece of ginger (4p)
1 1/2 cups basmati rice (36p)
2 oz of soy sauce (34p)
2 oz of vegetable stock (1 heaping teaspoon plus 2 oz boiling water)
2 tsp rice wine vinegar (3p)
1/4 cup shredded basil (from our windowsill!)
Broken cashews (half the price of normal ones!) (14p)
Follow the instructions on the allrecipes website for this recipe. It gives you general instructions on how to make a stirfry, no matter what the sauce, veg, or protein (we skipped the protein because we didn't have any tempeh or tofu or chicken or anything handy... plus they all cost too much) We used the herb sauce they listed, although most of them would probably be good.
I highly recommend allrecipes in general for recipes because they allow people to rate and review them saying "actually, I used less chili pepper for this" or "this was delicious --try it with almonds!" sort of thing. Invaluable to get advice from people who have tried the dishes.
The breakdown:
Breakfast: Mac: Toast with pate 18p + 18p - Megan: 2 pieces of raisin and walnut bread - 47p with peanut butter and jelly 10p
Riverford: 85p
Lunch: Mac: leftover lentil stew 26p. Megan: 27p for cabbage (RIVERFORD) cooked in butter (4p) and a bit of lemon juice (2p) (with 1/2c of bulgar wheat (13p), a handful of chickpeas (8p?) and some cumin (1p) and turmeric (1p)
Dinner: Vegetable stirfry with cashews over rice, 27p.
Totals: Mac: £1.74, Megan: £1.96
Vegetable Stirfry - mostly taken from here: http://allrecipes.com/HowTo/Super-Easy-Stir-Fry/Detail.aspx which gives GREAT overall directions for a stirfry.
We made enough for 4 - £1.09, 27p per person.
Ingredients:
2 red peppers (RIVERFORD)
Pak choi (RIVERFORD)
7 little mini carrots (RIVERFORD)
2 cloves garlic (15p)
1/2 inch piece of ginger (4p)
1 1/2 cups basmati rice (36p)
2 oz of soy sauce (34p)
2 oz of vegetable stock (1 heaping teaspoon plus 2 oz boiling water)
2 tsp rice wine vinegar (3p)
1/4 cup shredded basil (from our windowsill!)
Broken cashews (half the price of normal ones!) (14p)
Follow the instructions on the allrecipes website for this recipe. It gives you general instructions on how to make a stirfry, no matter what the sauce, veg, or protein (we skipped the protein because we didn't have any tempeh or tofu or chicken or anything handy... plus they all cost too much) We used the herb sauce they listed, although most of them would probably be good.
I highly recommend allrecipes in general for recipes because they allow people to rate and review them saying "actually, I used less chili pepper for this" or "this was delicious --try it with almonds!" sort of thing. Invaluable to get advice from people who have tried the dishes.
The breakdown:
Breakfast: Mac: Toast with pate 18p + 18p - Megan: 2 pieces of raisin and walnut bread - 47p with peanut butter and jelly 10p
Riverford: 85p
Lunch: Mac: leftover lentil stew 26p. Megan: 27p for cabbage (RIVERFORD) cooked in butter (4p) and a bit of lemon juice (2p) (with 1/2c of bulgar wheat (13p), a handful of chickpeas (8p?) and some cumin (1p) and turmeric (1p)
Dinner: Vegetable stirfry with cashews over rice, 27p.
Totals: Mac: £1.74, Megan: £1.96
Sunday, 14 June 2009
Day 14 - Farmers Market and a Birthday Barbeque
I decided, since it was the day after the Food for the Future event which had taken over my life AND it was a few days before my birthday AND it was the day of the Winchester farmers' market, that I would celebrate my birthday today and not stick to £2 for the whole day. Notice the bunting in the picture above demonstrating that this is not an ordinary BBQ, it is a birthday celebration BBQ.In the end, I ate a perfectly reasonable breakfast and lunch, and then ate loads at dinner. Actually, the lunch was mostly supplied by the free samples of chutneys and cheeses and things (plus a bite of someone's water buffalo burger and a bite of a hog roast sandwich). I heart the Winchester Farmers' Market.
Some cheeses from Loosehanger farm. I'm glad they didn't make the guy who served me wear their silly cheese hats that they sometimes have. I bought the little wheel of goat's cheese that you can just make out in the front of the lefthand basket. About 250g for £4.50. Apparently that's a good price for their cheese because it's more expensive to cut and package the wedges.Other highlights from the farm? We got two aubergine for half price (you can't barter with ASDA people... yet another reason to love the market) I finally got my 5L of rapeseed oil for £20--that's about what you'd pay at an ethnic food store for 5L of olive oil. It's also half the price of what I had been paying for the same oil in a 500mL bottle. Also, everyone I was with was super excited about the market and I think I have a dedicated group who are willing to go with me! I hope that the other people who live up in London start going more often to markets near them, too.
After going to the farmers' market, we went to relax in a local pub called the Black Boy (I find that name slightly strange.... It's behind the Black Rat). We read the paper, the boys amused themselves by drawing penies over pictures in the newspaper, and our butter started to melt (which of course we didn't realise until we were almost home. Oops.
Here's some of the local spread at the BBQ. You can just see in the corner my basket that I carried around the market and then Paul helped me carry back. By the end it was REALLY heavy. There was talk of doing a photo like a cornucopia showing off all the stuff we bought in an artistic way, but I totally forgot. Oops. Maybe next time!Anyway, I'm not going to bother doing a breakdown because I know that we ate a lot more than
£2. However, what we ate was the following:
Breakfast: Mac had toast (?). Megan had toast with peanut butter and jelly
Lunch: We got lots of free samples from the farmers' market, and then came back and Mac had some more Moroccan stew.
Dinner: We brought a garden salad and strawberry shortcake to Hannah, Ed and Dan's for a BBQ. I ate a local Hampshire garlicky sausage, a bunch of Hampshire cheese with local sourdough bread and chutney, more than a pint of Hampshire apple juice, some potato salad, some garden salad, and then strawberry shortcake. It was a good pre-birthday party. Mac managed to eat two sausages AND two burgers. I think it's fair to say that neither of us are vegetarians.
Saturday, 13 June 2009
Day 13 - Food for the Future!
Saturday was the Food for the Future event at the Down to Earth Community Farm. It went really smoothly, all the events went well, but we just didn't get nearly enough people throughout the day. I think it was probably about 80-100 (if you include families with kids) and the rest of the Fair Trade Group estimates about 50. Chances are it's somewhere in between. Which is a shame. We could have easily had over 100 at any one time without having it seem too busy.
Well, maybe next year.
Stalls
The garden area (they had wheat growing on top of the normal potatoes, cabbages, strawberries, etc. and the farm area--they had brand new piglets which were really cute.
Sunnyfields provided catering--they had local meat, own-made veggie burgers, their own salad leaves for a salad. It was great.
We're going to Sunnyfields July 3rd for a Mediterranean meal using local ingredients AND it's only 25.
This is how I got fed for most of the day. It was DELICIOUS. This is Kate Hughes on the left who did our cookery demos. She runs cooking classes from her business Cook Academy.
I'll have to try her recipes for myself and post them. She made an aubergine and cous cous fruited salad, a broadbean and pea pate, puy lentil and fresh soy bean salad, and a strawberry tart. It was all amazing.
I also ate a little bit of dried fruit that we were giving away as samples.
This is me giving a talk to people about the £2 a day diet. I didn't know quite what I should say, but I thought just giving general tips would be helpful to people. Plus I thought it would be handy because people kept trying to walk off with the two copies I had of the explanation about the diet on a stall.
It went well, although I was disappointed with the turnout (as were, I think, most of the stallholders). However, all the people who went as attendees seemed to really like it. I dont know how we get more people to turn up. Maybe if it was at a school? Billed more as a fete? I don't know....
Anyway, onto the food:
Breakfast: Megan had toast with peanut butter and jelly (12p), Mac skipped breakfast
Riverford: 85p
Lunch: Megan got free samples from the Food for the Future event (and they were DELICIOUS!) Mac had a few free samples and ate leftover Moroccan stew with chickpeas (21p + 3p cabbage)
Dinner: We were hurrying back from the Hobbit and Mac needed to get to his gig, so he didn't eat and ended up finishing off Andy and Nic's falafel from the place near the Joiners because they couldn't eat it all. Megan was happy to be lazy after an exceptionally long weekend and had leftover lentil and vegetable stew for dinner 26p.
£1.23 for Megan, £1.21 for Mac.
Well, maybe next year.
Stalls
The garden area (they had wheat growing on top of the normal potatoes, cabbages, strawberries, etc. and the farm area--they had brand new piglets which were really cute.
Sunnyfields provided catering--they had local meat, own-made veggie burgers, their own salad leaves for a salad. It was great.
We're going to Sunnyfields July 3rd for a Mediterranean meal using local ingredients AND it's only 25.
This is how I got fed for most of the day. It was DELICIOUS. This is Kate Hughes on the left who did our cookery demos. She runs cooking classes from her business Cook Academy.
I'll have to try her recipes for myself and post them. She made an aubergine and cous cous fruited salad, a broadbean and pea pate, puy lentil and fresh soy bean salad, and a strawberry tart. It was all amazing.
I also ate a little bit of dried fruit that we were giving away as samples.
This is me giving a talk to people about the £2 a day diet. I didn't know quite what I should say, but I thought just giving general tips would be helpful to people. Plus I thought it would be handy because people kept trying to walk off with the two copies I had of the explanation about the diet on a stall.
It went well, although I was disappointed with the turnout (as were, I think, most of the stallholders). However, all the people who went as attendees seemed to really like it. I dont know how we get more people to turn up. Maybe if it was at a school? Billed more as a fete? I don't know....
Anyway, onto the food:
Breakfast: Megan had toast with peanut butter and jelly (12p), Mac skipped breakfast
Riverford: 85p
Lunch: Megan got free samples from the Food for the Future event (and they were DELICIOUS!) Mac had a few free samples and ate leftover Moroccan stew with chickpeas (21p + 3p cabbage)
Dinner: We were hurrying back from the Hobbit and Mac needed to get to his gig, so he didn't eat and ended up finishing off Andy and Nic's falafel from the place near the Joiners because they couldn't eat it all. Megan was happy to be lazy after an exceptionally long weekend and had leftover lentil and vegetable stew for dinner 26p.
£1.23 for Megan, £1.21 for Mac.
Friday, 12 June 2009
Day 12 - in which one of our heroes battles sickness valiently
I was sick on Friday (otherwise known as day 12). I felt fine, but kept throwing up. Sorry, that's not really appropriate conversation for a food-full blog, but it explains why on the breakdown for that day it lists pretty much only toast (and it was cheap Co-op brand bread, too)
I spent a few hours at the food co-op that we belong to sorting orders until I was sick and realised I should go home. So I went home.... and wrote up some resources, sent them off to Staples to get copied, helped Chris pot up compost for the salad kit giveaway, bought some supplies, and eventually had to go down to Staples to help them re-format some documents and pick them all up. And every so often I'd go to the bathroom and throw up. By the evening I was feeling really hungry, but didn't want to try eating food. So we went to the Illustration show by the third year students at Solent University (including work by my friend Kate. I ate half a brownie (probably not the best first food to try) and eventually went home to have four pieces of toast and two mugs full of broth. Delicious.
Mac was in a big hurry to go to about 3 different gigs that night, so he left me and ate some of the food I was given for helping out with the co-op (which I had absolutely no intention of eating) before quickly leaving.
As a result, not a whole lot going on this day food-wise.
Breakfast: Porridge with raisins, 13p
Riverford: 85p
Lunch: Mac had leftover kohlrabi stew (21p + 3p of cabbage). Megan had 2 pieces of dry toast (yum) 10p and peppermint tea (5p)
Dinner: Megan: 4 pieces of (super cheap) toast with peanut butter (20p + 12p) , 2 cups of broth (6p) Mac: food I got for free from the co-op
Total: £1.22 for Mac, £1.45 for Megan.
I spent a few hours at the food co-op that we belong to sorting orders until I was sick and realised I should go home. So I went home.... and wrote up some resources, sent them off to Staples to get copied, helped Chris pot up compost for the salad kit giveaway, bought some supplies, and eventually had to go down to Staples to help them re-format some documents and pick them all up. And every so often I'd go to the bathroom and throw up. By the evening I was feeling really hungry, but didn't want to try eating food. So we went to the Illustration show by the third year students at Solent University (including work by my friend Kate. I ate half a brownie (probably not the best first food to try) and eventually went home to have four pieces of toast and two mugs full of broth. Delicious.
Mac was in a big hurry to go to about 3 different gigs that night, so he left me and ate some of the food I was given for helping out with the co-op (which I had absolutely no intention of eating) before quickly leaving.
As a result, not a whole lot going on this day food-wise.
Breakfast: Porridge with raisins, 13p
Riverford: 85p
Lunch: Mac had leftover kohlrabi stew (21p + 3p of cabbage). Megan had 2 pieces of dry toast (yum) 10p and peppermint tea (5p)
Dinner: Megan: 4 pieces of (super cheap) toast with peanut butter (20p + 12p) , 2 cups of broth (6p) Mac: food I got for free from the co-op
Total: £1.22 for Mac, £1.45 for Megan.
Thursday, 11 June 2009
Day 11 - Moroccan stew
I don't know what's going on with the font size on my blog, but it's a little irritating. Sorry!
Two days before the Food for the Future event. I didn't work today because I wanted to make sure I was able to get ready for this. Instead, I ended up going to Kate's house and prepped up another things of bunting. I also cleaned the WHOLE flat and it's never looked tidier. I wish I'd taken pictures. That was so that it would be nice and neat for when the Daily Echo photographer and journalist came over (they brought a work experience student with them). In the end they took pictures of me holding up the things I'd bought since January (used, of course). I'll try to post the article once I've scanned it (although I look terrible). The journalist asked about the Buy Nothing New year long challenge, the £2 a day diet, a bit about the Food for the Future Day, and questions about why I'm doing all of these different things. I was just amazed that she knew how to write in shorthand. (It looked amazing!)
Best parts about the day shown in pictures I stole from Google Images?
Shorthand, finally eating a banana and finding a good recipe for kohl rabi (stole that picture from Frumpyfoodie.com--great photos but MAN does she talk a lot. I would probably just look for her recipes like those here.
Not much interesting food-related stuff happened on Thursday, so I'll just post the lovely recipe for Moroccan kohlrabi stew and the daily breakdown.
Kohlrabi Stew
Recipe 84p for 4 - 21p per person - Note: we adapted a lot of the ingredients. Actual price for the list on the link will be a bit higher.
Origin: North Africa
Ingredients
(L) 2 Tbsp oil (we used veg oil--5p)
(O) 1 medium Kohlrabi RIVERFORD
1 large onion, chopped [We skipped]
(O) 3-4 large carrots, RIVERFORD
(O) 1 tin tomatoes (we didn't have any, so I used a bit more water and 3Tbsp of tomato paste - 25p)
(O) 400ml can of chick-peas, with liquid (or 1/2 cup dried chickpeas cooked for 2 hours - 17p)
100g Bulgur wheat (16p)
(O) 100g raisins (I think I only had about 60g - 16p)
1tsp ground coriander (2p)
1/2 tsp ground turmeric (less than 1p)
1/2 tsp ground cinnamon ((less than 1p)
1/2 tsp ground ginger (2p)
1/4 tsp ground cumin (less than 1p)
700ml water
Don't look to the original website for instructions. I mean, you can, but you won't find many. Their advice was to stick it all in a pan and then simmer for 30 min. I'd look for one line instructions if I was making a cup of tea or a peanut butter sandwich--not for a whole stew.
Directions
Peel and chop the Kohlrabi and onion. Don't peel the carrots, but chop into large chunks.
Heat oil and add onion (if using) and the carrots. Cook for a little while. Add kohlrabi and all spices, stir to coat with spices and cook a further 5 min.
Add tomatoes and water, and bring to a boil. Simmer for 15 min or so until carrots are tender, but not soft. Add raisins and bulgur wheat, and stir well. Cover and allow to cook until bulgur wheat is fully cooked (it will probably absorb most of the moisture).
Tanzanian Braised Cabbage
Yield: 8 portions (we made enough for 3--23p total, excluding RIVERFORD costs. 7p each)
In a saucepan saute 1/2 cup bermuda onions (purple), chopped finely [we skipped this bit, because we were out of onions] 1 tsp. salt, 1/4 tsp. red pepper flakes (2p), 1/2 tsp. curry powder (less than 1p), 1/2 tsp garlic powder (I used 2 cloves fresh garlic finely chopped instead 15p(L)), 1/4 tsp. powdered ginger (less than 1p), in 2 oz. oil (I used about 10g butter instead - 5p(L)).
Once the spices are cooked (and, if using onions, the onions are soft), add 2 Ibs. cabbage cut in 1-inch wedges. (we probably had about 300g cabbage--enough for 2 people and a little left over from RIVERFORD(O) ). Saute lightly until cabbage begins to lose its crispness.
Add 1 cup vegetable stock (O) (3p) and seasonings to taste.
Simmer for 5 minutes.
Total breakdown:
Breakfast: (O) Porridge with (O) raisins, 13p and Megan had a (O/FT) banana (36p)
Riverford: 85p
Lunch: lentil stew, 26p and a nice fresh salad (O) (all from Riverford!)
Dinner: morrocan stew with bulgar wheat, chickpeas and kohl rabi and a side of spring greens 21p for the stew, 7p for the cabbage.
Total for the day: Mac: £1.52, Megan: £1.88
Two days before the Food for the Future event. I didn't work today because I wanted to make sure I was able to get ready for this. Instead, I ended up going to Kate's house and prepped up another things of bunting. I also cleaned the WHOLE flat and it's never looked tidier. I wish I'd taken pictures. That was so that it would be nice and neat for when the Daily Echo photographer and journalist came over (they brought a work experience student with them). In the end they took pictures of me holding up the things I'd bought since January (used, of course). I'll try to post the article once I've scanned it (although I look terrible). The journalist asked about the Buy Nothing New year long challenge, the £2 a day diet, a bit about the Food for the Future Day, and questions about why I'm doing all of these different things. I was just amazed that she knew how to write in shorthand. (It looked amazing!)
Best parts about the day shown in pictures I stole from Google Images?
Shorthand, finally eating a banana and finding a good recipe for kohl rabi (stole that picture from Frumpyfoodie.com--great photos but MAN does she talk a lot. I would probably just look for her recipes like those here.Not much interesting food-related stuff happened on Thursday, so I'll just post the lovely recipe for Moroccan kohlrabi stew and the daily breakdown.
Kohlrabi Stew
Recipe 84p for 4 - 21p per person - Note: we adapted a lot of the ingredients. Actual price for the list on the link will be a bit higher.
Origin: North Africa
Ingredients
(L) 2 Tbsp oil (we used veg oil--5p)
(O) 1 medium Kohlrabi RIVERFORD
1 large onion, chopped [We skipped]
(O) 3-4 large carrots, RIVERFORD
(O) 1 tin tomatoes (we didn't have any, so I used a bit more water and 3Tbsp of tomato paste - 25p)
(O) 400ml can of chick-peas, with liquid (or 1/2 cup dried chickpeas cooked for 2 hours - 17p)
100g Bulgur wheat (16p)
(O) 100g raisins (I think I only had about 60g - 16p)
1tsp ground coriander (2p)
1/2 tsp ground turmeric (less than 1p)
1/2 tsp ground cinnamon ((less than 1p)
1/2 tsp ground ginger (2p)
1/4 tsp ground cumin (less than 1p)
700ml water
Don't look to the original website for instructions. I mean, you can, but you won't find many. Their advice was to stick it all in a pan and then simmer for 30 min. I'd look for one line instructions if I was making a cup of tea or a peanut butter sandwich--not for a whole stew.
Directions
Peel and chop the Kohlrabi and onion. Don't peel the carrots, but chop into large chunks.
Heat oil and add onion (if using) and the carrots. Cook for a little while. Add kohlrabi and all spices, stir to coat with spices and cook a further 5 min.
Add tomatoes and water, and bring to a boil. Simmer for 15 min or so until carrots are tender, but not soft. Add raisins and bulgur wheat, and stir well. Cover and allow to cook until bulgur wheat is fully cooked (it will probably absorb most of the moisture).
Tanzanian Braised Cabbage
Yield: 8 portions (we made enough for 3--23p total, excluding RIVERFORD costs. 7p each)
In a saucepan saute 1/2 cup bermuda onions (purple), chopped finely [we skipped this bit, because we were out of onions] 1 tsp. salt, 1/4 tsp. red pepper flakes (2p), 1/2 tsp. curry powder (less than 1p), 1/2 tsp garlic powder (I used 2 cloves fresh garlic finely chopped instead 15p(L)), 1/4 tsp. powdered ginger (less than 1p), in 2 oz. oil (I used about 10g butter instead - 5p(L)).
Once the spices are cooked (and, if using onions, the onions are soft), add 2 Ibs. cabbage cut in 1-inch wedges. (we probably had about 300g cabbage--enough for 2 people and a little left over from RIVERFORD(O) ). Saute lightly until cabbage begins to lose its crispness.
Add 1 cup vegetable stock (O) (3p) and seasonings to taste.
Simmer for 5 minutes.
Total breakdown:Breakfast: (O) Porridge with (O) raisins, 13p and Megan had a (O/FT) banana (36p)
Riverford: 85p
Lunch: lentil stew, 26p and a nice fresh salad (O) (all from Riverford!)
Dinner: morrocan stew with bulgar wheat, chickpeas and kohl rabi and a side of spring greens 21p for the stew, 7p for the cabbage.
Total for the day: Mac: £1.52, Megan: £1.88
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