Looking for inspiration

I couple of weeks ago I read this truly great book by Juanita Phillips: A Pressure Cooker Save My Life.  It is all about her quest to keep her family healthy, happy, fed, hold down a busy job and keep up the mortgage repayments. Definitely a must read for any working mum.  Ever since I have been on the look out for a cheap pressure cooker, but no luck so far.  And unfortunately my budget doesn't stretch far enough to be able to splurge on one of these.  I am very keen to try out some of the recipes she includes.

It is sad to note that since this book was published my understanding (from tabloid fodder) is that her husband has battled through bowel cancer and they have since divorced.  However the book is fantastic and a completely realistic take on the challenges faced by many families with small children.

After reading the book, I really felt like Juanita Phillips could comfortably sit on the lounge in our hectic household and chat the afternoon away, ignoring spilt drinks and the attention seeking dog quite happily.  Not sure if this is truly the case or she is in fact just a great writer (or possibly indeed both).

What is your favourite kitchen accessory?

Sounds a bit weird, but mine is my iPad!  It gets the most use sitting in the recipe holder in the kitchen to save me printing out recipes or running back and forth to the computer to check what to do next.

A bit slow

Things have slowed down considerably this week.  I am unwell with a cold so many of our meals have been spaghetti on toast or bacon and eggs.  I did manage to hold out until the weekend to get the grocery shopping done and also (I think given my state of feeling miserable) did a very small shop.  So hopefully that means some good savings this week.

Today I am going to try and do some slice baking,  so am pulling our one of my most loved and most used cookbooks.

Keeping it all together

A couple of girlfriends have asked me recently how do I keep it all together and under control??  Simple answer: I really don't!! Everything is usually chaotic and rushed and frayed tempers are not uncommon let alone a huge pile of washing to fold and dishes in the sink.  If you have visited my house recently, you can definitely vouch that this is the case.

To try and ease some of this rushed and crazy feeling I make sure I plan quick and easy meals (or leftovers or cook ahead options) for the days when I am at work.  Then on my day off and weekends I do loads of baking and cooking to see us through the next week. 

Our other single most relied on organisational tip is that my husband and I share an online calendar synced to our phones, so if its in the calendar its happening and its your responsibility to know about it.  And EVERYTHING goes into the calendar.  A downside to this is our phones are continuously going "bing bong" reminding us to pay a bill, return a note for an excursion, wear mufti, or be somewhere for a meeting or appointment.

My only survival tip here is that you have to learn to let things go.  If you are working and a mum, its unlikely you are going to stay on top of the housework too.  That's ok, its probably only you who cares.  I know its easier said than done, I'm not good at going to bed with a messy house - but I am getting better at leaving it until I at least have the time to deal with it properly and head to bed at a reasonable hour instead.  My bet is its probably not much different for stay at home parents, lets face it, its often easier to go to work for the day than it is to mind the kids!!

Menu plan week 13 & 14

I cannot believe we are into Week 13 and 14 already!  Still no work commenced on the new house, although the old one is well and truly gone.  I am hoping this fortnight sees things starting to happen!

I ended up shuffling around last fortnights menu plan and "accumulated" some extra food I had not planned for.  We also ended up eating out once and I headed out for dinner with girlfriends another evening.  So all in all the freezer is still pretty full.  The fortnightly food and grocery bills came in at $346 - pretty happy with that given the eating out factor!

I need to work extra days and hours this week so I am hoping that my groceries (with the help of a fruit and veg box delivery) may last until the weekend when I will get my first chance to head to the shops to try another Aldi shop.  Unfortunately this does not make for a very interesting menu this week as I use up things like the frozen veg and oven bake chips in the freezer.

I am also using some meal bases that Mars sent me after I wrote in to Dolmio about my Lasagne recipe.

Here is the plan:

Wednesday -  Crumbed chicken wings, lemon risotto and peas

Thursday – Lamb chops with oven chips, peas and carrot

Friday – Carbonara (Using the Dolmio Carbonara meal base but adding mushrooms)

Saturday - Chicken meatball soup and Choc-hazelnut bread and butter pudding (from latest Superfood ideas)

Sunday – Meatloaf with oven chips and salad plus make some Tuna mornay pies to freeze (from latest Superfood ideas)

Monday – Leftovers

Tuesday –Curried sausages (Using Masterfoods Curried Sausages recipe base) with mash, peas and beans

Wednesday – Country beef casserole (Using Masterfoods Country Beef Casserole recipe base) with rice, peas and asparagus

Thursday - Leftovers

Friday - Chicken cacciatore risotto

Saturday – Beef and vegetable casserole with rosemary dumplings with Apple and butterscotch sponge pudding (both from latest Superfood ideas)

Sunday – Leftovers

Monday – Enchiladas and rice

Tuesday – Leftovers

Sticky date pudding

It was good, albeit cramped, to have friends over last night.  Some mad menu reshuffling this week has resulted in a really well stocked freezer so I had plenty to work with.  We had crumbed chicken wings (I picked up a stack of these for a bargain $2) and sausages on the BBQ, old faithful potato bake, salad and for dessert, sticky date pudding. The pudding was pretty yum, although a bit light on sauce (maybe I cooked it too long??) - I even enjoyed the leftovers for breakfast this morning.

And for those of you who wonder why I nearly always feed our guests sausages??  It is because most of them have children under 5, and I am yet to meet a child who doesn't at least eat a sausage sandwich.

Melt in your mouth shin stew thanks to Jamie

If only web pages could be "Scratch and Sniff"... when I was cooking this the house smelt so very good! Great recipe for the colder weather.  I must say I was a little dubious about the cinnamon and red onions, but it really worked!

I made a couple of ingredient substitutions, just a small amount of ground cinnamon instead of the cinnamon stick, just the red wine I had open in the pantry (and probably only a third of the bottle) and fresh button mushrooms.  First time I used my Circulon pan in the oven, it worked really well.

Probably the best bit about this recipe that all my carrots, celery and mushrooms where nearing the end of their useful life, and by the time this dish was cooked you could not even tell.  I served it with mashed potato and there was enough for plenty of leftovers for another meal too.  Can't say the kids loved it (they did eat it), but not much other than sausages and ravioli gets eaten by Mr 3 at the moment anyway.