I’ve been fairly quiet on the blog front the last couple of weeks. In some ways I have been lacking inspiration and I was also thinking to myself “what’s the point?”. Not in a full of ennui “What’s the meaning of it all” kind of way but more in a why are people going to read this? There are countless food blogs out there so why are people (other than those who know and love me) going to read mine?
So I think I may have finally found my niche, I have been spending a lot of time with good friends recently, we’re all at that age of coupling and doing boring things like buying houses. So weddings, hens and housewarmings are abundant. In talking to my friends at these gatherings I have realised one thing; none of us really have a clue what we’re doing!!
We are not of an era where we learned useful things in school, we didn’t do a household budget in home economics or a how to feed yourself class! Most of us can feed ourselves at this age (it’s 33 if you must know) but do most of us know how to do it well and reasonably cheaply?
So here it is; my new look blog and a promise to once a week give you a meal plan and shopping list. The shop will only ever cost around €60 and I’ll even show you my receipt (starting next week because I totally lost yesterday’s one). I will give a couple of recipes each week and links to others for inspiration.
Here we go:
The pusheen pen is part of my refusal to fully grow up.
I always have these things in the house and replace them as required:
- Butter
- Milk
- Eggs
- Olive/Rapeseed oil for frying
- Fancy extra virgin olive oil for salad dressings
- Caster/ soft brown sugar
- Flour
- Cornflour
- Cider vinegar
- Mustards/Hot sauces/Mayo etc, you’ll have your own favourites
- Maldon sea salt and Black pepper in a mill
- A selection of spices, I admit I’m a spice junkie but have a look at my other blog for essentials
- Stock pots/cubes – chicken, beef and vegetable
- Tins tomatoes, tomato puree
- Chick peas, kidney beans
- Tahini, peanut butter and honey
So about the list:
I shop in Aldi, there I said it, so the list is always based on the super 6 offers. I do this for 2 reasons; it’s cheap and it stops me cooking/eating the same things all of the time. I may also hit up a Lidl during the week for any extra fresh veg/bread I might need. Every so often I’ll need a trip to Super Valu or Dunnes for the likes of Maldon salt and decent mayonnaise. You don’t have to do your shop in Aldi but my meal plan will be most reasonable if you do!
So what’s for dinner?
Saturday:
I finally let the chap cook and he made his amaaaazzzzzing pizza:
And yes that is ham and pineapple on the right, I realise I may have already lost half my readers but I love it so! That’s chorizo and chilli and peppers on the left which is my other favourite topping – the man knows his audience!
But I mostly ate salad:
I swear:
Sunday:
We are dining at my sister’s – I have baked Tres Leches cake and will post the recipe if it turns out nice
Monday:
Dinner is courtesy of Nigella but I may mess with the spicing a bit
Tuesday:
Oven baked barbecue style chicken legs with some salad and probably cornbread or some tasty carb if I’m honest
Wednesday:
I’ll pan fry some pork chops and serve with a warm mustardy potato salad and some greens cooked simply in the microwave
Thursday:
I have the steak pieces so depending on my mood I’ll have a traditional stew or a chilli if I’m feeling exotic. This will most likely be made the night before and reheated.
Friday:
A simple chicken stir fry, quick and easy to get on the table after a long week
So that’s dinner sorted and I always have leftovers for lunch which I urge you to start doing! You may as well cook a little bit more when you’re cooking in the evening, it’ll save you making boring sambos in the morning or spending a fortune on lunch every day.
Oh and I know the day by day approach may seem somewhat prescriptive but it’s mostly so I remember how many days in the week there are. Feel free to mix it up; have pork chops on Friday and stir fry on Monday; gwan I won’t tell!