Category Archives: food

Veggie Prep paid off!

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 Last weekend I decided to try something new – prepping my veggies for the week ahead. After putting the shopping away I chopped up:

  • carrots
  • onions
  • zucchini
  • pumpkin
  • broccoli
  • beans
  • capsicum
  • salad greens
all put in bags in the fridge so we could quickly prepare a salad at lunchtime and cooked veggies in the evening. The next day I cooked a tray of pumpkin, frozen cauliflower, tomato’s & onions, made some salad dressings and a big pot of split pea soup (16 serves for the freezer). I’m just trying to get more organised so I have no excuse not to eat well when I go back to work.
Well the next day I ended up with a bad arthritis flare and I’ve been living on the lounge since only able to walk to the bathroom as my feet are quite painful. So no more spring cleaning has been done at all. 
But having done that prep work has made it so much easier to eat really well while being laid up. Lunches have been salads and soups, dinners have been steamed & stir-fried veggies, tray bake veggies and meat. Its saved so much time and its something I’m going to continue. 
Today I’m able to walk about a little more as the pain and swelling in my ankles is going down. This will certainly slow down my exercise & weight loss for a few weeks. But I’m feeling better today and plan on working on my budget and goals for 2021 while I rest up.

Budgeting

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I really need to get back to basics with our budget. We’ve overspent small amounts but they quickly add up to large amounts. Our grocery spending has crept up again. Theres plenty of food in pantry and freezer so for the rest of the month we need to be using up food we already have.

I’m going to go back to tracking every cent and I’m going to spend some time reviewing our expenses and see where we can cut back.

Yesterday DD made a big batch of chilli. We’ve been trying to cut back on our meat consumption so we added 2 tins of beans to 1kg of beef mince. This made 3 meals for dinner last night and 10 for the freezer. She also made a batch of choc chop cookies and froze them.

One change I have made this month is to just eat breakfast and dinner, that gives me 17 – 18 hours of fasting. I’ve done five morning walks ( 1 hours) and six afternoon walks at work (15 mins) so far this month. My weight is down to 97.3 kgs so I’m really pleased with that, I’m down 2.6kgs (6lbs) so far.

Tonight I’ll do a bit of a stocktake of whats in the freezer so I can plan ahead. I don’t really like menu planning but its a habit that would help I think.

Are you a menu planner? Do you find you stick to the plan?

Food & Fires

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I enjoyed pottering about the house yesterday morning.  I spent most of the morning working in the kitchen again, making chicken stock and pumpkin soup.  I’m a home cook so recipes are not precise, but they taste good.

Heres how I make my chicken stock:

  • 6 chicken thighs – brown in a little olive oil
  • 1 large red onion – quarter and add to pan with chicken
  • a few cracks of salt and pepper

Once the chicken is nicely browned add it, the onion and the pan juices to a crockpot. Then add:

  • 2 litres of boiling water
  • 3 large carrots halved
  • the top &leaves from one bunch of celery 
  • teaspoon of Italian herbs
  • salt & pepper to taste
  • teaspoon of vinegar ( helps draw the marrow out of the bones)
Cook on high for 6-8 hours, cool, strain and freeze. I love the taste of this stock and often just have a bowl it as broth, particularly if I’m not well. Its great for soothing an upset tummy and getting some collagen.

Once the stock was on I made roasted pumpkin soup that I had started the day before. Heres my pumpkin soup recipe:

Add to an oven tray:

  • Half a kent pumpkin cut into 2-3 inch pieces
  • One large red onion cut into eights
  • Tomatos – 2 – 3 regular size cut into quarters or a few handfuls of mini tomatos or a capsicum
Toss in a little olive oil

Roast in the oven till browned
Then use a large non-stick pot and add:

  • A few tbspns olive oil 
  • 1/2 tsp cumin
  • 1 tsp turmeric
  • 1-2 tspns curry powder depending on how hot you like it
  • half a small onion chopped
  • a little black pepper
Mix the herbs and oil to a paste. Once the onions have softened add a tin of beans, a litre of stock and simmer for 5 minutes. Add the roasted pumpkin/onions/tomatos and a litre of hot water. Simmer for 5-10 minutes. Once cooled a little, blend the soup. 


Tastes fantastic and you get veggies, turmeric & beans all in one meal. This made 8 serves for the freezer and a tasty lunch!

In between cooking I cleaned out the pantry, mostly just a good tidy up was needed and it  looks much better now. I was given some lovely big glass jars for free last week so I have filled two with lentils and split peas and will fill the rest after the next shop.

In the afternoon it got quite really hot (40C – 104F) and the smoke was really bad. The fires were so bad yesterday everywhere, but it was awful watching Lithgow, surrounded by fire, seeing streets we know so well and houses right near where we lived on fire, people fighting embers and evacuating – all roads out of town cut off for most of the evening. 

Overnight the heat was bad, too hot to sleep much, but it has cooled down this morning. The smoke is still very thick though – (we are about 30 mins from the fire and in no danger.) so I won’t be opening any windows.

My plan for today is start cleaning DS’s room as he will be home on Christmas Eve. We gradually started using his room as a bit of storage so I need to sort it out a bit before he gets here.  Then tomorrow I have one present to buy and I’ll be ready for Christmas.