Wednesday 14 April 2021

The £3 a Day Challenge - Day Two



Day two and it was a lovely morning so I nipped over to Sainsbugs nice and early before the doggy walk.

Armed with my breakfast £1 plus the 30p carried forward from yesterday, I knew I could go for a nice healthy breakfast with a bit of fruit included.  I had a look at the prices when I was there yesterday and fruit is the most expensive thing to buy in the fresh food aisle and the majority of it is packed in plastic so you have to buy multiples, which although cheaper in the long run, for the purposes of this Challenge makes them out of my price range.

Bananas are always the cheapest fruit to buy.

A TIP -  if you're watching the pennies don't buy single bananas from Aldi unless they have really large ones available.  At Aldi they are charged at 13p per fruit regardless of size, at Sainsbury's you can get bananas starting at around 8p.

Breakfast Shopping

500g bag of oats - 60p
2 bananas - 18p
1 apple - 30p

Total £1.08

Leaving me with 22p change to carry forward.

My Breakfast

I was going to have the apple later for elevenses with a cup of coffee, but I just wasn't hungry.



Lunch Shopping

Bag of SR flour - 45p

Change = 55p

Leaving me with 77p to carry forward.


Some pastry made with oil was on the cards for lunch using the leftover stew from yesterday as the filling for a couple of pasties.  


With lots of extra pepper and some salt it made for a good pasty filling.  I compress my fillings into one of my breakfast bowls and then divide into two, et voila ... the right shape to fill a pasty with no air gaps.


They might not be the prettiest pasties in the world due to the pastry being so short it was like a deliciously savoury shortbread ...


... but they were so tasty I ate this one and then went on to try and eat the other.  

No chance once I got to almost halfway through I was so stuffed I offered it to Alan, who had already had his lunch, and he wolfed it down in a couple of minutes ... he's always happy to help 😁


While the pasties were in the oven I used the same bowl to weigh out some flour to get a head start on tonight's tea.


And five minutes later my Tagliatelle was drying on a coat hanger 😀


Teatime Shopping

Haha ... this looks so random!!

I needed an onion and some garlic to make a tasty tomato sauce for my tagliatelle and as this really was all I needed when I spied the lemons for 30p I thought why not.  I have been missing my morning lemon slice in hot water and now I don't have to miss it anymore.

Onion - 16p
Garlic - 25p
Lemon - 30p

Total = 71p

With 29p change from this particular pound.


Tea

Tagliatelle with garlicky tomato sauce with a pitta garlic bread.  Gosh this was so tasty and so filling and added bonus ... I do not need to fear vampires tonight  😄

Cash Carried Forward
£1.06

Food Carried Forward
2 potatoes
celery
half an onion
porridge oats
1 banana
1 apple
6 lemon slices
half a bulb of garlic
4 pitta breads

I'll be back tomorrow with Day Three, it's going to be good starting the day with extra money and I will be able to leave some oats soaking while I walk the dogs.


Sue xx


18 comments:

  1. Well done, Sue, it all looks tasty 😋 I'm hopeless at making pastry as it comes out tough every time and tagliatelle? Oh boy, I'm a rubbish cook! You are certainly cramming in the fruit and veg too and for pennies. Inspirational, I say x

    ReplyDelete
    Replies
    1. Pastry made with oil is quite soft and difficult to work with, to help this I usually roll it out between two sheets of floured cling film and the film helps you to flip it over the contents of your pasties. It is worth it though as it is deliciously short.

      The only trick I know with pastry is to handle it as little as possible, and let it rest in the fridge before you roll it out and it's the opposite with pasta as you need to knead it for a few minutes to release the gluten.

      Delete
  2. This is really interesting! I'm trying to be very frugal and this is brillian, thank you. I'm wondering about the protein content though, I've read that between 50g and 60g is recommended, have you any thoughts on that please?

    ReplyDelete
    Replies
    1. My only thoughts really are that ALL foods have some protein in them, the only exceptions being fat and sugar so I am always getting some protein.

      This Challenge is for just 7 days and as I am a healthy, mildly active normal person there is absolutely no need for me to worry about protein deficiency. I always take a daily multi-vitamin/iron tablet and also a B12 tablet to make sure I hit all my needed quotas of most things, and have no hang up about following recommended levels of anything, I just aim for a balanced diet over each week.

      After reading your comment I had a quick look at my porridge and flour packs just out of interest and just in my breakfast porridge and the flour that I used there are 24g of protein, so as you can see I am halfway to the recommended amount straight away.

      Delete
    2. Thanks for answering. I hadn't thought of there being a substantial amount of protein in things like oats and flour and as you say, there wouldn't be a problem over the 7 days anyway. Due to a change in circumstances this is something I'm doing on a long term basis and need to plan very carefully, factoring in more expensive things like coffee is a huge dent in the budget. Also not having a basic store cupboard to start with of oil, spices etc., has made it harder.

      Delete
  3. Sorry, that should read "brilliant"

    ReplyDelete
  4. Looking great! Do you have a market close by?
    xx

    ReplyDelete
    Replies
    1. We have a street market on Thursdays, hopefully they will be up and running again this week for the first time in what feels like ages. There didn't used to be much food available though, it used to have a fish stall and a large fruit and veg stall, all the rest are household items, books, toiletries, cards and a large plant stall. It will be interesting to see what arrives on Thursday ... I can't wait.

      Delete
    2. I was thinking, you could get a single piece of fruit on market stall, maybe?
      xx

      Delete
    3. I'll definintely go and have a look, if I plead poverty and show them my single pound they might be nice to me ;-)

      Delete
    4. You can but try! :-)
      xx

      Delete
    5. They weren't there!! No fruit and veg stall on the market today ☹️

      Delete
  5. the challenge is going brilliantly so impressed love to read it :)

    ReplyDelete
  6. You are amazing and you are teaching us a lot, thank you. I love today's photo's on your other blog.

    ReplyDelete
    Replies
    1. The light was amazing, it would have been hard to get a bad photo ... well maybe not for me, haha!

      Delete
  7. As always, very interesting. From the States.

    ReplyDelete

Comments are now turned off for this old blog of mine. Thank you for reading the posts, I hope you enjoyed them. xx

Note: only a member of this blog may post a comment.