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Dear Boris Johnson - this is not what £15 of food looks like. The Free School Meals Scandal.

 Free school lunches are making viral waves across social media in the UK at the moment.  To understand why you have to know that during term time those families whose income falls below a threshold value are entitled to free school meals.  It can be a lifeline especially in these times when the powers that be bring in benefit freezes and can become the only real food a child will get in one day so should be of enough calorific content and also have the nutritional value that they need.  Schools are given a flat rate of £2.30 per child (£11.50 in total) to cover the cost.  At the moment (thanks to a footballer (Marcus Rashford)- not thanks to any politicians most of whom voted against it) the government £15 per child per week which they can either give as vouchers or food parcels to replace this free meal whilst they are at home because the schools are shut.  Food parcels to me points to a suspicion that £15 will not be spent on food but on other expenses by the families involved.  Insulting at best, ignorant at worst.

This is what one such scheme thinks £30 of food (for one main meal for 10 days) looks like.  (source story here)

(From a Tweet by RoadsideMum on 11 January 2021)

Leaving aside the fact that this is not enough food for 10 main meals and snacks for one person lets see how much this would come to in your average supermarket (Tesco online strikes again!)

1 small loaf of bread - 36p for 800g loaf (own brand) - which looks bigger than this but nevermind

8 cheese slices (Creamfields = 10 slices for 50p) - 40p

3 apples (Gala apples £1.60 for 5 pack )- 96p

2 carrots (94p each loose) - 8p

2 bananas (13p each loose)- 26p

1 tin Heinz beans -85p

2 potatoes (loose baking potatoes 25p each) - 50p

1 tomato (75p for 6 pack) -13p

2 mini soreens (lunchbox pack £1.40 for 5) - 56p

1 small bag pasta - even if we are generous and say 500g this is 29p for Tescos own brand

grand total = £4.39

Let me reiterate this is supposed to be worth £30 and for 10 main meals on it's own.  The level of incompetence that would be necessary for this to be a realistic proposition is beyond belief and can only say that Chartwells a private company contracted by the DofE (as in our own Government) who provided this package are lining their pockets are the expense of starving children.

Update where I do my own (virtual) £15 shop for 5 meals to follow!

Post Furlough/Student Food : Carrot Flan

 DD and I are doing the shopping at the moment as late as possible in the evening to avoid as many people as possible - 9 pm last night.  Upside-you don't end up standing in a huge queue with people who think it is OK to remove their masks whenever they talk or cough, or that just covering your mouth is OK.  Downside some of the shelves are emptier than normal because you end up dodging the shelf stackers.  

With both of us grabbing things off the list and putting them in the trolley to get round as fast as possible somehow we ended up with 2kg of carrots instead of one.  So this is a recipe I have been itching to try (the original one is in pounds and ounces for those old enough to remember a time when those existed!).  Just need to make a version with vegan cheese to make sure that works - no DD is not vegan (and this has eggs in it) but has been diagnosed with a dairy allergy.  I guess I'll just have to try it twice for comparison!

Anyway a meat-free recipe for a main meal that is a little different and another one where you could use your own home grown veg.

Carrot flan (serves 4)

shortcrust pastry made with 170g flour and 85g margarine

1 medium onion (peeled and chopped)

40 g butter or margarine

2 eggs (separated)

50g grated mature cheddar cheese

175g carrots (grated)

2 tbs  flour

¼ pint milk

Salt and pepper

Preheat the oven to Gas Mark 6/400°F/200°C.

Fry the onion in the butter or margarine until they begin to brown. Turn down the heat and add the grated carrots, stirring them until they soften to a puree.

Add the flour and milk and stir until the mixture thickens.

Add the grated cheese, salt and pepper.

Remove from the heat and beat in the egg yolks. Leave to cool and then fold in the whites, stiffly beaten.

Line an 8″ flan tin with the pastry and fill with the mixture.

Bake uncovered for 30 minutes until the filling is well risen.

Serve with new potatoes and steamed veg or salad

Variations:

Not tried yet but...

Use a shop bought pastry (or even a shop bought crust) if your pastry skills are not the best

Add cheese to the pastry as well as the filling.

On the herbs and spices front carrots usually partner well with parsley, oregano, thyme or dill.  For the spices cumin and coriander work well with carrot.

Cost (from Tesco as usual for the mid range price comparison)

plain flour - 220 g (45p for 1.5kg) - 7p

margarine - 125 g (soft spread 59p 500g) -15p 

onion - 10p

2 eggs (89p for 6) - 30p

mature cheddar - 50g (£1.55 for 220g) - 36p

carrots- 175g (41p per kilo) -8 p (assuming some waste with topping and tailing and peeling)

milk - 1/4 pint (1 pint 50p - yes the most expensive way!) - 13p

total cost =£1.19 or 30p a portion.

The Cash Envelope budgeting system - has social distancing killed this off?

 The Cash Envelope system of budgeting is where you put aside cash in separate places for separate categories in your budget.  It used to be how I budgeted far too many decades ago since the expansion of YouTube if you search for a budgeting technique it is probably the one which will pop up.  First define your categories

For Example:

Food

Travel Expenses (petrol/bus fare etc)

Clothes

etc.

Then have a separate amount in cash (worked out in advance) for each of these categories from one pay day to the next.  It is almost impossible to overspend as even if you cheat and take the cash from another envelope you are limited to the total amount in folding stuff you have withdrawn.  At the end of the pay period you can either put any left over money into a savings account or just withdraw the balance to take you up to the starting amount in each envelope and leave the rest in your account.  This was easy when I lived in town and it was only a short walk to the bank but became something that was more difficult when I moved to a village with no bank and when I stopped using this system.   It does however remain the number one method that most people rely on probably because it works because no-one wants the embarrassment of standing at the head of a checkout queue and having to put some of the shopping back because you do not have enough cash.

This year when COVID-19 struck cash became a dirty word in most shops, we were told payment should be contactless where possible.  Not that this was not a trend already but it has accelerated with not wanting to touch a physical object that has been touched by someone else without it being wiped down!  The cash envelope system worked because it is physically impossible to overspend - the amount of cash you have in your hand is the amount you have, no creeping over by a few pence/pounds here and there, so can we still do this?

Well in theory yes.  There is no limit legally to the number of current accounts you hold and (again in theory) you could set up one for each of your envelopes.  If these have no fees and no overdraft either it would work in the same way as an envelope per category- except of course you need to keep a running total as you no longer have the physical evidence of how much you have spent or saved in  front of you.  But I bet no-one really wants 6/7 current accounts, I mean how would you tell which card was which?

Some bank accounts also let you allocate different budgets for different things from the same account so you can see if you went over or under but again this is in retrospective. 

The easiest way would seem to be to use your smartphone assuming that you have one to keep track of spending with any one of the myriad of apps that are available for free.  Bear in mind though that this is also retrospective and you need willpower since you are not prevented from overspending in the first place. 

So having worked out our budget how do we stick to it?

1. Shop around online.  Most companies now have an online presence and you can work out the cheapest way of buying everything from the new smart phone to your weekly shopping.

2. Is it a need or a want? Have a list of essentials that you are getting (regardless of whether it is this weeks food or the kids school shoes).  Then have an amount of money that you can spend on "extras"  for each category if and only if you need them and you know you cannot get them cheaper anywhere else.  This way you will not feel that you cannot take advantage of an offer that drops into your lap without blowing the budget.

3. If you are not sure your "extra" is cheaper elsewhere then do some research.  Either look it up on your phone then and there or wait until you get home, this has the bonus that you have extra time to think about it and cancel that impulse buy.  Looking it up then and there has had a bonus effect from time to time, when you tell the shop assistant who is trying to serve you that you are looking to see if it is cheaper elsewhere you can often get a price match or better deal (at the managers discretion) of course without the adding expense/hassle of travelling to the other shop.

4. Keep a tally.  Yes it is boring and yes I often forget for days at a time since my life is so hectic but if you don't know where you are how can you tell if you are getting anywhere?  Remember the challenge is not to spend the whole allowance, not to see how much you can shoehorn into it.  Thinking I'm only a few quid over I'll make it up next month very very rarely works no matter how good your intentions are; largely because either you forget, or prices have gone up again.

5. If in doubt, wait.  Giving yourself 24 hours to think about whether or not to spend the money will stop you from any impulses (hopefully) and who knows if you talk to your mates about it they may have a spare whatever it is for you to borrow and find out if you really need.  Thinking about things in terms of how many weeks food that would buy or some other relatable amount helps me to realise the value of what I am about to spend.

5. All work and no play... Remember if all you ever do is save, save, save it can feel that you are ground down on a daily basis.  Add something into your budget that is just for you but an appropriate amount.  So maybe a bottle of wine once a month rather than a meal out.

6. If you do fall off the wagon it is very rarely the end of the world.  You are unlikely to lose the roof over your head over one overspend but if you then think "I've blown it anyway" and throw everything away then you are more likely to put yourself in a difficult situation.  The important thing is to quickly realise that you have gone over, not to beat yourself up about it but put it down as a bad day and work out how to recover - even if that has to wait until next payday.

7. Have a reason to save.  It could be something seemingly unachievable like a house deposit or something small like a weekend away.  Make it something that you can visualise and then have a running total of how close you are.  A friend of mine who wanted a new kitchen had a plan on the fridge and coloured in each cupboard as she thought she could afford it.  Having a purpose will make it easier to turn it into a challenge rather than a chore.

8.When it all gets to much take one day at a time.  I know I can always get through today.  Tomorrow will come by itself anyway.

Stay safe and well.

Post Furlough/Student Food: Widow's Rice

 Now that the case number for COVID seems to be sky high everywhere we are using up the rice and pasta that we have slowly stocked up on all year to avoid going shopping as much as possible..  This is a vegan rice dish that I would normally make in the summer with veggies from the garden where possible and homemade stock, then it is super cheap; however this time of year you can use frozen veggies to get a similar result.   

You will need a large frying pan or paella pan, it doesn't need a lid.

Widow's Rice (serves 4)

Vegetable oil

Half an onion

tin of chopped tomatoes

1/2 a red pepper cut into strips (or frozen pre chopped mixed peppers is fine)

1/2 a courgette cut into rounds as thick as a pound coin

100-150g broccoli florets sliced in half through the stem if fresh

100g green beans topped and tailed and cut in half lengthways

100g peas

200g rice - paella rice is good but any rice will do!

1 vegetable stock cube or chicken stock cube

Fry the onion in the vegetable oil until it is translucent.  Add the other veggies and fry for about 5 minutes to start to soften (they will not be cooked at this point!)  Add the rice and stir to coat in the oil.

Add the tin of tomatoes and use the tin to measure out two tins of water.  Add the stock cube. and stir to dissolve then turn down the heat and leave it alone.  The key to this dish is not to stir the rice as it cooks, we don't want a risotto!  Give the pan a gentle shake from time to time and you should be able to tell when the water is nearly all gone - do not add more we want all the water to be absorbed.  At this point taste the rice - depending on the type you use you may need to add more water (the rice will still be crunchy) only add half an tin at a time and then test again when that has all gone.

Serve.

Variations:

The veggies that you use can be changed according to what you have; try sweetcorn either from a tin or baby corn like you would use for a stir fry, cauliflower rather than broccoli, runner beans rather than green beans etc etc etc a real "bottom of the fridge" dish in terms of what veggies you can add.

Sliced mushrooms add protein.

Use fresh tomatoes rather than tinned

Use saffron (if you have it!) - this dish has Spanish origins so totally allowed

Add sliced garlic if you are a fan

The cost of this one is difficult since it varies so much by season and if you grow your own.  Where you buy your rice is also a big factor. If you can get 10 kg bags (Morrisons do them in the ethnic section in my local store) this is much cheaper than buying it by the kilo, if you're lucky then a local asian grocers may have these.  However wherever you are forced to shop now that we shouldn't travel it doesn't have meat so it will always be cheap!  Definitely under a pound a person all year round.

Stay Safe

Stay safe.

Post Furlough/Student/Furlough food - A new to me UK frugal recipe site with meal plans; Thrifty Leslie

  Ahh - a shiny New Year.  Along with it comes homeschooling with no pay (again).  Like many sadly this horrible virus has decimated my income this year with over 4 months unpaid so far.  My employer is however trying to hold my job open for me to go back to which (since I work for a company with Head Office in France) will remain to be seen.  

So hope for the best and prepare for the worse springs into action once again and with it the need to make the food bill smaller if we can.  

With this in mind I hit the Internet looking for frugal recipes and once again despaired that so many of them weren't English.  Why does this matter?  Surely all cheap food recipes are good?  Well yes and no.  What is available in your local food shops is dependent on what the community is used to eating, but also what is available to retailers.  

For some of this it depends on custom and practise.  For example when I lived in Germany for a couple of years about 10 years ago it was impossible to get spices to cook curry from scratch.  The German supermarkets had brilliant fresh baked artisan bread and cakes to put supermarkets over here to shame along with a fantastic selection of meats (yes- sausages).  If you wanted veggies that had been canned to preserve them there were whole aisles so getting snowed in was not a problem if you stocked up.  But spices, no.  Germany had been an industrial nation but not really a naval one.  The Dutch on the other hand (like the British) explored the globe and colonised large chunks of it.  Now Slavery and Colonialism arguments aside along with the men woman and children who went out to "convert" the rest of the world influences flowed the other way too in terms of food. Which was why when I lived near the German/Dutch border if you wanted spices you headed towards the Dutch supermarkets.  

The things like veggies in the supermarkets depend upon both the climate of the country that you are in (seasonal is usually cheaper and when you add in airmiles and the carbon footprint it is a no brainer).  It also depends on the deal that the government has with other countries throughout the globe with regard to importing food.  Something that will come to bite back as Brexit takes hold.

Why the tirade?  Well I got a little frustrated at the packet of "this and that" that appear in the US recipe sites/You Tube channels of which there seem to be millions.   Not everyone will have access to these pre-prepared items, and often little or no explanation is given as to what they contain so good luck finding a substitute.  

I was delighted therefore to come across another budget site that is trying to keep the food bill down, (Jack Monroe's cooking on a bootstrap being to go-to I usually recommend.) and that is Thrifty Leslie.

I especially like the fact that she has menu plans as well as the normal "single use" recipes.  All I need now is for my OH to finally accept some recipes with pulses in....wish me luck and good luck to you with whatever the New Year may bring.