Category Archives: food

Using up the stockpile challenge

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So we’re a few days in to our challenge and making good progress! heres what we’ve eaten so far:

Baked dinner on Sunday with leftover roast beef for sandwiches

box of pumpkin soup
ham & cheese sandwiches
I juiced the fresh pineapple and oranges

then I  made a pasta bake

pkt grated carrot
4 zucchini chopped
2 boxes of tomato & garlic minced
1 tin red kidney beans
1 onion
1/2 pkt pasta
1 pkt haloumi cheese
grated cheese

I did the veggies in a little olive oil, soaked the pasta in water for 10 mins then put it all in a baking tray and sliced the haloumi cheese on top and baked it. While it doesn’t look that great in the picture, it tasted fantastic and I will definitely be making this again.

DD has been using up the frozen pastry to make chicken and veggie tarts and they’ve also had home made pizza with veggie toppings.

 Yesterday I stewed up the apples which had gone a bit soft.

So we’ve had stewed apples and cream for desserts and I am going to make whats left into apple crumble tonight using some mixed nuts and brown sugar.

So far, so good….

Using up the stockpile!

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 We’ve been eating down our stockpile for a few months now and spending much less on groceries as a result. My stockpile has saved us a lot over the years. I buy items when they are on special, often half price and its a part of our working pantry. I built a big pantry storeroom when we built this house years ago. I had visions of shelves stacked with preserves and a nice big food storage. We used to have our own fruit trees and a vegetable garden but that has gone by the wayside in last 5-10 years.

I’ve kept my pantry full and costs down through smart grocery shopping  over the years, knowing when items come on special and stocking up enough to last till next time. I refuse to pay full price when I can get things way cheaper just with a little planning ahead.  I use a different coloured sticker for each calendar year and every item that went in the pantry got a sticker. That made it easy to rotate foods. But I realised earlier this year that its time to cut way back so we’ve already eaten through a fair bit of what we had.

I took these photos this morning of what is left of our stockpile. I’ve made a list so I can focus on meal planning around using up whats left before we go on holidays. And I’m going blog my meals so I can keep myself focused.

 There is also some food still left in the freezer and what is in the fridge.  This is going my big challenge for the next five weeks – to see how I can use up these foods. I’m not someone who likes to cook much or menu plan and I need to just suck it up and do it anyway as it will help us save money.

The plan is to get the freezer and pantry as empty as possible before we go on holidays then when we get back I can clean out and declutter the rest of the pantry/storeroom and then plan what we need to stock up on and how much is reasonable for us to keep now.

So I’m going to create a new page for this challenge and get myself out of this funk I’ve been in for the last week. I kicked it off with having a box of pumpkin soup from the pantry for breakfast this morning. Its snowing out of town here and really cold after a beautiful sunny 18C day yesterday – a good day to menu plan!

Coldest morning in 27 years!

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Well this morning records for coldest temperatures have been broken all over the place!  Here it was the coldest morning in 27 years at -8 deg C so we’ve been rugged up all morning till the sun finally broke through just after lunch.

Its the weather for a hearty beef stew and so I have one simmering away in the crockpot – it smells great and I’m looking forward to dinner tonight.

Yesterday afternoon I did something I haven’t done a few years. I spent an hour soaking in a nice hot bath, listening to an audiobook. It really did me good – I felt so relaxed afterwards.

I have missed having the energy and time for myself that I had when I wasn’t working. I’m trying to take time to do more nice things for myself that aren’t expensive. As an introvert I’m very happy just spending time at home reading, sewing, watching TV, gardening, crocheting and crafting. I don’t feel the need to go out and do things on weekend or after work.  I’m quite happy at home and can entertain myself easily. I’m sure my life looks quite boring to others but it suits me very well.  I find I have nothing to contribute to the Friday and Monday conversations about what people are doing on the weekend.

Are you happy being a ‘homebody’ or are you an extrovert who likes to go out and do things?