Living on a Box - Day Thirteen

Breakfast - Peanut Butter on  Toast with Apple Slices and Almonds

Today I ate the last of the almonds, as well as having them with a couple of my breakfasts they have been a good little snack when I've needed something to nibble on with my morning or afternoon cup of coffee.  There's been a lot of  'last ofs' over the last couple of days which is only to be expected I guess with such a limited amount of food 🤣  

As I got the piece of frozen bread out for my toast I double checked there were still two slices left in the bag for tomorrows lunch - there were, phew!!

Lunch - Baked Potato with Butter and Cheese

No zapping this potato in the microwave, this was cooked long and slow in the oven for maximum flavour and it was delicious and very filling.

Dinner - Hummus Pasta with Peas and Spinach

Why have I never thought to use hummus as a pasta sauce before, this was delicious.  I simply drained the pasta through a colander catching some of the cooking water in a mug, and then tipped the tub full of hummus into the pan to warm through, thinning it down slightly with some of the saved pasta water as it heated through until it was a nice coating consistency.  Then the pasta was tipped back into the pan to heat up again in the sauce.

Another very successful days food.

Sue xx

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Living on a Box - Day Seven

Breakfast - Granola and Almond Milk

Eaten whilst sat at my desk answering the first enquiry from someone from London interested in buying our house, then literally an hour after the advert went live on the estate agents website we have another local person interested!!

After all that excitement I needed a cup of coffee and a couple of biscuits.

Lunch - Two Chick Strips on a Bun with a small side salad.

And a cup of coffee.

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Roasted Vegetables

5 small Peppers

2 Onions

2.5 Tomatoes

Garlic Granules

Chilli Flakes

Mixed Dried Herbs

Olive Oil

Chop the vegetables to the size you would like them.  

Add all the herbs and spices and the olive oil and leave to marinade for however long you have.  

I left them for a couple of hours in the fridge.

Cook in a medium hot oven until the vegetables are cooked but still with a little bit of 'bite'.

Serve with rice, pasta or as in my case today ... Cous Cous.

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Dinner - Roasted Vegetables with Cous Cous

And there was enough spare to give Alan a few tablespoonfuls to have with his Pesto Pasta.

Sue xx

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Living on a Box - Day Six

Breakfast - Yoghurt, Apple, partially whizzed up Almonds and a dash of Peanut Butter.

This is my last yoghurty breakfast, and yes, the yoghurt had stayed nice and fresh since it was opened at the start of the Challenge.  This is the first time I have used the Alpro natural flavoured yoghurt, previously I have always bought the vanilla flavoured version, but I think this one is my new favourite.  

The taste is similar to a nice sweet Greek style yoghurt, just enough tang to be yoghurt but sweet enough to be able to be eaten on it's own or with none-sweet things, if you know what I mean.  I will definintely be buying this from now on.

Next it was time to make a variation of this Deliciously Ella recipe, using the ingredients that I had available.

I forgot to take a photograph of the assembled ingredients but this is the finished pan of :

Potato, Chickpea and Cous Cous Curry.

Ingredients:

350g Baby Potatoes

145g cooked Chickpeas

50g Cous Cous

1 Onion, peeled and chopped

Large Handful of Spinach

Handful of Frozen Peas

1tsp Turmeric

1tsp Garlic Granules

1tsp Cumin

1/2 tsp Ground Coriander

1/2 tsp Chilli Powder

1 Vegan Stockpot

Seasoning 

Water

Basically I sautéed the chopped onion, added the spices and then added the potatoes and chickpeas a few minutes later.  Then boiling water was poured in with the vegan stockpot and everything was brought to the boil.

Once boiling it was transferred to the bottom oven of the Aga for an hours slow simmering.  After an hour the spinach was stirred through and the frozen peas added to wilt and warm through in the heat of the now cooked curry.  Then the pan was left to sit on the side, cooling gradually.

When it was time for it to be eaten it was reheated and checked for seasoning.  Salt and pepper were added.

Lunch - 2 Slices of Toast and Hummus

Oh this was lovely, nice and simple but lovely.  Eaten with a cup of coffee whilst sat at the computer loading photos on the Greenshifters website we are using as one way to sell our house.

Dinner -  Potato, Chickpea and Cous Cous Curry.

Served with 100g of Cous Cous

There was enough made for Alan to have a portion with rice for his evening meal and for a good sized tub full to be saved for a meal for me next week. 

 So now I don't need to worry about my missing sausages!!

Sue xx

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Living on a Box - Day Four

Breakfast - Yoghurt, Banana, Almonds and Peanut Butter

with black coffee

It's a good job that it was the turn of the banana to be eaten, as it was getting just enough black speckles in the heat of the kitchen to possibly put me off eating it any other day.  A third of it went into the freezer ready to be added to a smoothie next week and two thirds went into the bowl for this morning along with everything else.

A lot of my money saving or limited income Challenges have had me eating porridge oats everyday for breakfast, so this Challenge with it's yoghurty breakfasts this week and cereal to look forward to next week has been a pleasant change.

Lunch - A Cheese and Onion Sandwich 

with cucumber slices on the side.

It was nice to have a bit of freshness and crunch from the cucumber slices, and with these to nibble on while I had a whizz around blogland and answered emails on my computer, it made this lunch surprisingly satisfying for it's size.

Then it was time to start making my dinner, which was to be Vegetable Stew.

Vegetable Stew

2 Carrots, washed and sliced

3 Potatoes, washed, peeled and chopped

1 and a bit onion, some chopped finely, some chopped chunky

1 Stock Pot

Salt and Pepper

Boiling water

First stop, save potato peelings and carrot top and tail, pop into bag in freezer ready to make emergency 'free soup' if necessary.

Then add finely chopped onion to the pan with a spot of oil.  Sauté for a few minutes before adding the carrot and then the potato and stock pot.  Pour over the boiling water to cover vegetables and bring to the boil.  Leave to simmer until all the vegetables are nice and soft, usually around 20-25 minutes. 

 Check for taste and add seasoning if necessary.

Once cooled slightly, whizz the leftovers to make soup.  You can make it as chunky or smooth as you like ... 

... I went for smooth.

I now have two large portions of Vegetable Soup for lunches.

Dinner - Vegetable Stew

I was going to have a slice of toast with this but it was so filling I didn't need any.

Sue xx

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Living on a Box - Day Three

Breakfast - One Slice of Toast with Peanut Butter and an Apple

I rarely eat apples, but when I do I tend to go for Golden Delicious or Royal Gala,  and this Gala apple was absolutely delicious.  Crispy cold straight from the fridge it went so well with the toast ... and of course a black coffee.

But it wasn't a particularly filling breakfast and after a spot of hoovering up a hoover-full of dog and cat fur ... why aren't they bald by now the amount of fur I've hoovered up recently they should be ... I needed a couple of little biscuits with my next cup of coffee before I set to to make tonight's tomatoey pasta sauce.

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Tomato and Pepper Pasta Sauce

1 pack of Passata

2 Onions, finely chopped

2 Carrots, washed and grated

3 little Sweet Peppers, deseeded and chopped finely

Garlic Granules

Mixed Herbs

Sprinkle of Chilli Flakes

A good squirt of Tomato Ketchup

Salt and Pepper

Water

Sauté the onions on their own for a few minutes then add the peppers and then the carrots and everything else.  Fill the passata tub with water from the kettle to rinse it out and add that to the pan.

Bring to the boil and then simmer gently for an hour or so.

You can leave it chunky as it is or whizz it up as I did after this photo was taken.

This made four plastic takeaway containers of pasta sauce, one went into the fridge and the other three are now in the freezer.  

Adding tomato ketchup to sauces is a genius idea.  I think I picked it up off Jamie Oliver's lockdown recipes.  If you think about it the ketchup is already a mixture of concentrated tomatoes and various herbs and spices, which when added to any recipe give a degree of rounded mellowness that I have never had before.

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Lunch - a Hummus and Salad Bun 

...with the additional bits of tomato on the side.

The contents of the bun.

Dinner - Pasta and Sausage Bake.

With peas and Cheese

I have decided that I really do not like these Heck Meat-Free Sausages one little bit.  Unusually for me they have gone straight into the bin.  If I hadn't done that they would possibly have been used again and left on the side of the plate as these pieces were,  now they are gone I will have no choice but to re-plan the menu.

I honestly would rather go hungry than eat them again.  However the rest of the pasta bake was delicious and I will definintely be making my tomato sauces with passata from now on and adding a squirt of tomato ketchup.

Sue xx

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Living on a Box - Day Two

Breakfast - Yogurt, grated Apple and partially whizzed up Almonds.

With a cup of black coffee.

I decided to alternate my banana and apple yoghurt breakfasts just for a bit of interest.

Straight after breakfast I set to with the chickpeas that I had left soaking overnight.

The 500g bag of dried chickpeas after soaking made up to exactly 1.2 kg

Following the instructions on the packet, I then put them in fresh water, boiled them for ten minutes and then simmered them for an hour in the bottom oven of the Aga.

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Hummus Recipe

450g cooked Chickpeas

10tbs Oil

2tbs Peanut Butter

Squirt of Garlic Puree and/or garlic granules (or 3 cloves)

3tsp Cumin

Salt and Pepper

Water

Add all the ingredients to a food processor and whizz together.

  Scrape the bowl down a couple of times and taste.  Adjust the seasonings and flavours to your own taste by adding more of anything, and add water to get this to your preferred consistency.

Whizz again for longer than you think if you like the texture of shop bought hummus, but by making it yourself you can make it more chunky if that is what you like.

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As I had so many chickpeas and two weeks of the Challenge ahead of me I then repeated this and made a second batch.  One lot of food processor washing up is more than enough for me 😁

So I ended up with three 200g tubs, two 300g tubs and this rather large portion for todays lunch 😄

The two 300g tubs and one of the 200g tubs went into the freezer for next week.  

I only found out recently that you can freeze both cooked chickpeas and hummus ... so we will see how this is when it's thawed out as and when it's needed next week.

The bowl was for my lunch and the other two 200g portions have gone into the fridge.  Homemade hummus keeps well in the fridge, but I tend to use it within a week.

I also have 290g of cooked chickpeas leftover, half of these have gone into the fridge and the other half are in the freezer.

So in total my 500g bag of dried chickpeas has worked out to be equivalent to buying five cans of  chickpeas and has given me:

1450g of hummus

and 

290g of cooked chickpeas.

Brilliant  😃

Lunch - Hummus with a slice of toast, cucumber slices and carrot sticks, using one carrot.

I know ... I ate far too much hummus, as obviously I was tasting it as I was making it and the bowl had to be wiped out with a finger, as did the food processor blade AND then there was over a tub full for my lunch.

My name is Sue I am a Hummus Addict  🤣🤣

Dinner - Homemade Coleslaw with 2 No-Chick Strips and leftover Baby Potatoes.

Gosh this was filling and very tasty.

As I was so full up yet again, I still haven't touched any of my little Lotus biscuits that were destined to be my supper.  All the more for another day then.

Sue xx

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Living on a Box - Day One

Day One

Breakfast - Yoghurt, 2/3 Banana, Almonds and Peanut Butter

As yoghurt and almond milk both need to be used up within around five days of opening, I have decided that I will open one of them at a time, so ... this week will be yoghurt week and next week will be cereal and milk week.

I realised that the bananas (when peeled) weighed  much more than the 80g required for one my five a day so I could save a third of each of my two bananas when I peel them to use, and pop the extra piece into the freezer.  Then next week for one of my breakfasts I can make myself a nice smoothie using frozen banana, an apple and some of the spinach, and thus saving myself a slice of bread.

I decided to slightly whiz up the almonds that I need for the first of this weeks breakfasts.  Using 20g a day which seemingly is the recommended serving size  I have enough for ten days of almonds to add to my breakfasts.   (Gosh Google is coming in handy with all this planning.)   So in the interests of balance, I will split that into five days of almonds for each week.  For the four days that I will be eating yogurt and fruit this week I will used the slightly whizzed nuts sprinkled on top and on the toast and peanut butter day I will eat the almonds as they are.

An interesting fact - most almonds weigh exactly 1g each  😃

Lunch - Sausage Bun with onion, one of my tomatoes and a few cucumber slices.

And as always a black coffee.

I thought I would need two sausages but when I opened the pack they were big fat sausages, so I just used one and sliced it into quarters lengthways when it was cooked.  It was perfectly adequate with my salady nibbles for a good lunch after a morning in the polytunnel.

Dinner - Chilli Mince and Baby Potatoes

Gosh this was delicious, a lovely rounded flavour with all the added extras, not hot at all as I am not keen on hot chilli, but just enough chilli flakes to give it a bit of flavour.  As I hadn't got any spare tomatoes or tomato   puree to put into this I use a huge squirt of tomato ketchup and it worked a treat to balance out the flavours.

I had tipped all the Baby potatoes out to make sure they were all in good condition, they were.  So I chose to use the smallest first and they were chopped in half and boiled to go with the Chilli mince.

My eyes were obviously bigger than my belly, and I had leftovers ... so I have yet again changed the menu plan so that I can use these up tomorrow.

As you can already see the menu is morphing significantly away from my first scribblings.  I decided I should use most of the fresh ingredients first, so although this meal was going to be Chilli with Cous Cous, I thought using some of my Baby Potatoes would be a better idea.  A lot of my fresh ingredients will be batch cooked this week into meals for both this week and next. 

 I will include any recipes on the day that I make them.

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Chilli Mince

1 Pack - The Meatless Farm Co Meat Free Mince

2 onions, peeled and chopped

2 carrots, washed and grated

1 Vegan Savoury Stock Pot

Squirt Tomato Ketchup

1 tsp Garlic Granules

1 tsp Chilli Flakes

Salt and Pepper

Follow the cooking instructions on the mince packet.

Add all the other ingredients, along with enough boiling water to cover nicely

Bring to the boil and then simmer for an hour, stirring a couple of times.  Add more water if it looks too dry.

Taste to check seasoning.

Serve, or cool and freeze in portion sized tubs.

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The only 'trimmings' were the top and tail of the carrots, but I saved them and popped them into the freezer in case I want to make a pan of 'free soup' ... if I run out of food!!

Sue xx

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