The Storecuboard/Freezer Challenge!

JosieDelonge

Full Member
Or also known as the "in my overdraft and don't get paid until 15th and can't afford to buy food so will have to make do with what's already here" challenge!

I haven't been sticking to plan very well and a check of my bank account today shows that it is also not very healthy (although more lean than I am!). Since that scuppers my plans for a good shop today I'm going to have a go at making meals from what's already here. I want to see if I can make tasty healthy meals from the food I have left in the cupboards (although trying to ignore the jars of curry sauce - want to be SW friendly as much as I can!).

My cupboards aren't bad, we have quite a bit of tuna and there's some chopped tomatos in there. Unfortunately the only pasta type stuff I have is a lot of spaghetti and one portion of rice. The freezer has a good supply of frozen veg athough it's mostly brocolli, cauliflower, green beans, peas and mixed sliced peppers. There's not a lot of meat in there so looks like I'll have to attempt veggie this week.

Feeling a bit lost already! I might have to buy some basic fruit but that'll have to do. I'm going to do a search for some recipes on here but if any of you have any ideas that might help, I'm very grateful!

Anyone else managed to stay healthy without doing a decent shop? :confused:
 
why not get a sharpie pen and find out the syns of everything in the freezer and mark them up - then you can plan meals around what you have.....the frozen veg and a do you have any sauces in the cupboards (chopped tomatoes etc) and spaghetti is fine on green so perhaps this will all work out fine!

Make a list of all the foods you have and then plan meals from there....

Good luck honey xxx
 
Ooo im in the same boat! No money, pay day 30th nov...EEEK!

This website is great for ideas Slimming Eats

Also potatos are cheap and you can make loads of things with them if youre going Green for a while, good luck :)
 
I've had a look around, it's not too bad. I have 7 potatos left (3 are jacket size!), and the freezer contains a big bag of syn-free sausages so looks like I can do a sausage dinner at some point this week.

I found some fish portions (free!) and one lonely chicken breast. I'm thinking of a chicken and bacon spaghetti thing in a tomato based sauce later in the week. Tonight can be using up the leftover lamb from Sunday as another roast dinner. I like my cooked dinners - I could eat them without having a meat portion! Will probably do fish and chips with veg for another meal.

I found a lot of frozen leftovers too, mainly free/superfree soups so that'll be my work lunches this week, also a portion of very low syn beef stew (I used gravy granules) so that's another lunch option for work.

I've got a bread machine and all the stuff I need to make a loaf or several so I can get that on and ave some money.

I really don't want to buy extras if I can help it. By the time pay day comes around I'll be another £60 down and that's just on petrol! I'll buy fruit (mainly for my son though as I don't want him to suffer) but going to try not to buy anything else. We've started ona block of cheese so once that's gone, it's not being replaced until I can afford it!

I'll get my husband to ask his boss about eggs as she has chickens and sells a box of 6 for about 80p which we can afford :) Probably do egg and chip bake this week then also and I can use up the plum tomatos as my superfree (can easily eat a whole tin if I just have 1 egg and not so many chips!).

It still feels like it'll be a struggle but I am feeling a bit more positive now. Cheers guys! Any more ideas will be gratefully recieved :)
 
my only other tip would be to pop to the supermarket late in the day to get anything with a discount sticker on that you can freeze!?! I got loads of bargains on Sunday about 3:30 in Tesco - its worth trying!

x
 
A freezer challenge sounds like a good idea for me as it is stuffed and I really should empty it out so I can defrost it.

Lots of possibilities with the ingredients you mention:

Quiche
Vegetable Chilli
Vegetable Curry
Soups
Carbonara
Kedgeree

Pulses are dead cheap so think about adding some to your frozen veggies eg Lentil dahl, bean chilli

Break the spaghetti into bits and add it to soups to bulk them out

There is a spaghetti frittati recipe in the recipe sub-forum and how to make fake rice from cauliflower

Roast some peppers for a pasta sauce

Check out Pasta recipes - Recipes - BBC Good Food= for lots of recipes using spaghetti

Cauliflower bakes, currys, soups etc
Cauliflower recipes - Recipes - BBC Good Food
 
Cheers!

Last night was lamb dinner to use up the leftovers from the weekend but I made roasties instead of mash (no butter!) and I made gravy from an oxo cube, gravy thickener and mint sauce. It was good!

Tonight is chicken and bacon spaghetti. Going to blend a tin of chopped toms with some garlic and oregano (or basil), and cook with an onion or two. Will top with HExA cheese. Should be good. We only have one chicken breast left but it's not a bad size to go between two of us, especially with the bacon and pasta.

I'm keepign away from chillis at the moment as the last one I had came back :( I don't think the baby liked it. I wouldn't mind trying a veggie curry though! Do you think I should defrost the veg first or cook it all from frozen?

I've had a portion of stew from the freezer for lunch and feeling satisfied. I bought some apples, bananas and satsumas to last the week and my husband is going to be bringing eggs home tomorrow from work so I just need to plan a bit for the weekend mainly.

I'm thinking probably porridge for breakfast over the weekend or a fry(light) up for lazy brunch (might keep me going better).

I have lentils in the cupboard so I might cook some of those and add to a soup to pad it out. I never even thought of snapping spaghetti in to soup!
 
Oh! I'm sure I have some lasagne sheets in the cupboard! I could attempt a veggie lasagne maybe? Hmmm... Off to google recipes...
 
oooooo im in!!!!
hubby doesnt get paid until 28th nov....its crap at the moment moneywise anyway but car had mot today too!!
we have very full cupboards and freezers so we are going to plan it all and buy the absolute minimum which should just be bread,milk and bit of fruit/veg.
 
Mmmmm egg and chip bake sounds lovely, I'd forgotten about that recipe, so thanks :)

Your jars of curry sauce may not be too bad if you pad it out with chopped toms and loads of veg ?
 
i always try to use up all the stuff in the cupboards before i do a big shop

one wee recipe i love that is quick and really easy and very filling is

I boil up some rice and add some chicken stock to it when its cooking when its nearly cooked i add some frozen veg to it and also some tinned sweetcorn or really any veg thats about and some more stock for flavor ... once its cooked i add some frylite to a pan and the rice and veg and fry it up a big ... its yummy home made veg fried rice :)

cheap cheerful and filling :)
 
Last night I made my chicken and bacon pasta. Whizzed up an onion, garlic, 1 red chilli and some roasted peppers from a jar, then added a blended can of chopped toms with extra oregano to make the sauce. Went really well and because of the amount of spaghetti that went in, we even had leftovers (which hubby has taken to work!).

Tonight is fish and chips with more veg. I've brought my last WW ready meal out the freezer to have for lunch (4.5syns) so that'll keep me going this afternoon.

I'm doing ok for the moment, but need to have a think what to cook tomorrow night. And over the weekend of course (although possibly a syn-free sausage dinner with cheesy mash and onion gravy will feature).

Hope the rest of you are doing ok? I'm not sure if I can do it for another week, but if I can at least do one week without the supermarket, I'll be chuffed! :)
 
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