Our Frugal Lifestyle

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Passionate about eco-frugality. I used to party hard, clubbing my way from pay-packet to pay-packet. Never getting ahead, just getting by. Then came our much wanted baby with no savings in the bank - only an old car. Changes were made to our lifestyle and we didn't turn back. In the past 6yrs we purchased a flat, found employment, lived below our means, built an emergency fund, purchased a reliable car and saw the financial benefits of our frugal lifestyle. Our only debt is our mortgage. Our aim is to manage our cash flow wisely, pay off our home quickly and eventually work for pleasure, not necessity. Join us on our journey, share insights, tips and tricks to help us and others to get ahead while having a good time.

Friday, January 27, 2012

Kitchen Cook Up

Hi Everyone,

Hope you all had great frugal fun day. As for me it was a long day... I returned to work, after 4 weeks of recreation leave. It was hard getting my brain focused on the job. I can't believe 2011 went by so quickly and my 4 weeks off went even quicker. I didn't do all the jobs on my To Do List. I actually hardly did any of them at all as I dashed from one activity to another for Dolly's enjoyment or experimented daily with procrastination.

Last night was a hive of activity in our home. Dolly, The Rambling Expat and I cooked as a family. We made potato and bacon frittatas for dinner. We've never made these before but wanted to see if Dolly would like them in her school lunchbox. While Dolly cracked the eggs and stirred, The Rambling Expat and myself chopped and grated to keep her bowl topped up with all the needed ingredients. Once in the oven Dolly and her Papa got onto to the business of playing.

While they played I chopped up left over choice pieces of chicken from the previous nights dinner. I added chopped tomato, cucumber and a dash of mayonnaise, salt, pepper. Mixed and stored in the fridge for the next days lunchtime sandwiches.

Lunch Prep


I placed the left over chicken bits and carcase in my slow cooker with water, ungrated potato ends from the frittata making, celery tops, 1 spring onion, 1 brown onion and a dash of salt/pepper. After 6 hours it was ready to be divided. Half went into a pyrex dish as stock to cook rice this week, the over half in another dish to be eaten as chicken/veggie soup.

Slow Cooking Stock and Soup.


Stock and Soup


Playing over, table set and the frittatas were sampled. They were a hit with the three of us. Unfortunately we used muffin baking trays which I did not grease beforehand so the frittatas stuck, causing angst in getting them out and Oh the drama of cleaning the trays. However as we made double quantity, half of the mixture was placed in a glass pyrex dish and into the oven. These slid out beautifully, no waste and cleaning was a breeze. So I think we will stick to using our pyrex dishes in the future.

Dolly's Dinner, Sampled and Loved. She ate it all!

I Love My Pyrex. Easy Cooking, Storing and Cleaning


2 hours of cooking and cleaning has resulted in 4 dinners and 1 lunch for us three. 2 frittata dinners (just add salad), 1 chicken soup dinner (just add carrot and beans), 1 chicken lunch filling (just add bread) and 1 chicken flavoured rice meal (just add rice).

One happy frugal productive evening :-)

How about you? Any additional cooking lately? Have you been bulking? Cooking any new meals?

9 comments:

  1. Might make some soup this weekend.

    Your 2 hours have been very productive.

    Sft x

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  2. I love cooking up a storm and planning for multiple meals for the week in the one session. I also do the same with leftover roast chicken carcass. for stock.

    I love the home made stock to cook risottos and then add whatever vegetables are at hand a sprinkle of parmesan cheese and voila! perfect risottos everytime. I even cook up more risotto than required and then go on to make arancini....delish. Or line a pie dish and make quiche.

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  3. wow all the meals look great! and not to mention quite health.

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  4. I am so ill and so hungry. Those fritatas are delicious looking!

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  5. SFT, I love soup. My mum grew up poor eating lots of soup so she hates it so I didn't get much soup as a kid. The Rambling Expat always had soup as one of the dinner time meal courses in France.

    Daffodil, That risotto with veggies and cheese sounds really yummy - I think I will do that.

    Practical Linda, Virtual hot soup posted to you ;-)

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  6. that looks delicious!! It would probably only do my hoard for a meal or two but how yummy!

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  7. Hey Ozzie Thrifter, Must be hard feeding a big family. I would feel chained to the kitchen.

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  8. Wow! You have been productive!!! Everything sounds delicious and having meals on hand helps the "fast food" urge when you just don't feel like cooking.

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  9. Hi there, I am in awe of you and your ability to create so many meals so efficiently. I love your blog, so glad i found it. Would you mind posting the recipe for the potato and bacon frittata? It looks fab and something my boys would eat.
    Thanks so much
    Mimi

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Thanks for commenting - I love getting feedback, sharing experiences and learning from you.