Who ate all the pies?

Blackberry and Apple pudding with 9p Tesco instant custard...............a bit sweet but delicious.

 Hello again,

I couldn't resist sharing my kitchen endeavours today. I've had a lovely day (Dearly Beloved came home at lunchtime which greatly lifted my mood, I'm no good without him). I've laundered all the clothes, hung them out to dry and brought them in and they are ironed and put away! I've also mown the front and back lawns and weeded the paths in the back garden.

I cooked a lovely Sunday lunch of roast chicken. Usually, when we have a roast dinner, I plate up four lunches, we eat two and I reheat two on a Monday night, when I've usually worked late at school. There is no school tomorrow, but I batch cooked just as normal. If I'm going to use the big electric oven, then I want to get the most done for the cost of electricity.I cook the carrots, onions, potatoes and chicken all in the same pot. I steamed the broccoli but the rest gets cooked together. Here are the extra portions, cut up and ready to go into two chicken pies.

 I picked every scrap of chicken off the carcass. There is so much on a chicken that I used to feed four of us from one and still have enough for pie or curry later in the week.

 I'm still using up the Approved Foods, suet crust pastry. The tiny lumps of suet melt and create air pockets in the pastry and it is light and crispy. I must order some more. I added the meat and veg to the same pot and mixed up some instant Tesco Value gravy and stirred it all together.

 The result is a very chunky pie filling with a lovely gravy. Brush the edges with milk.

 Roll out and add the pastry lid.

 Trim off the excess pastry.

 I always bag up my extra pastry and, when I have enough, will make a quiche, pie or pasties..........even the tiniest bit is salvaged.

 The result is two fantastic pies, each one will make two meals for us. These will be wrapped in cling film and frozen until we fancy them.

 Just in case you're interested................here's the close up.

Even a lazy Sunday can be used to store away food for another day and make sure absolutely nothing is wasted.

I treated myself!

 Teachers get exam results the day before students, so I am in the know!! I can't give anything away, but I am in a celebratory mood! I called into Aldi on my way home and bought two butternut squashes for 85p each. Both were almost the size of a rugby ball! I also bought some tomatoes and beetroot! Now, you may ask why this is a treat; it's because I discipline myself to only go into one shop to do my weekly shop, once a week. If you discipline yourself not to carry money and never to go into a shop, then you can't part with any money! I broke that rule today! I also had a mid-week roast supper. I had some left over roast pork that I had in the freezer, and yes I know, some people are sniffy about re-heating meat, but if you get it hot enough and keep it at that temperature for long enough; there is very little risk. And! what do you think they give you in the Chinese takeaway? We had a whole butternut squash between us, a roasted red pepper to share and a whole packet of beetroot, which I also roasted.

Mid week roast pork, with a mountain of green beans, butternut squash, red pepper and beetroot! Not frugal at all and came to £1.60 each! Tomorrow will be full of fizzy happy teenagers, who might even thank us! Tonight, is my quiet celebration and a pat on my own back!