My summer garden of veges in pots on the front porch is booming away. Lettuces, spring onions, red onions, mesculun, peas are all providing us with summer veges. The beans, cherry tomatoes and parsley are not quite there yet but should be ready in a week or two. Yesterday I sowed more spring onions, lettuces, chives, basil thai and parsley. Now that I’ve got the hang of keeping a constant supply of veges I thought I would branch out with the type of seeds I am trying. So yesterday I purchased some organic seeds from Commonsense Organics. I am looking forward to seeing what type of lettuces grow from my Koanga Gardens heritage lettuce mix. My next step is to get some certified organic potting mix so I can raise some organic herb seedlings and pass them on to friends/family as gifts.
Animal Welfare Amendment Bill
Most of us are horrified to read in the news stories of cruelty to animals but it is happening every day to certain farmed animals. To help protect the rights of animals NZ has the Animal Welfare Act. Unfortunately there are loopholes in the act through an exceptional circumstances provision. Through this provision practices such as sow crates and battery caged hens are allowed and are the norm in NZ. Sue Kedgley’s Animal Welfare Amendment is due to be debated on September 21st. The aim of her private members’ bill is to ensure that farming practices which breach key principles of the Animal Welfare Act are no longer allowed to continue. Countries such as Britain have banned sow crates since 1999. So many of us are proud to be New Zealanders but NZ has many shocking skeletons in our cupboards that we have no reason to be proud of. You can do something by emailing/writing a letter to your local MP or to David Carter. Animals can’t vote – they need our support.
Bob Kerridge : Buyers want end to barbaric farming methods – Environment – NZ Herald News
Saving $50 a week July Challenge (Week 4)
Well we have come to the end of a cold July and our month of save $50 a week challenge Simple Savings – Free Newsletters. Looking this morning at our overall monthly expenditure summary it has been the lowest spending month since February and the lowest food bill category since September 2009. So thank you Simple Savings for the inspiration. Our savings for Week 4 were:
• Only doing a small shop for vital items – saving $80.
• Having a takeaway free week – saving at least $20.
• Going to our local Farmer’s Market to find free range bacon for half the price of what we pay at the supermarket – saving $7.40.
• Growing our own lettuce seedlings rather than buying seedlings (about 4 punnets worth) – saving $12.
• Getting free lemons from the in-laws tree.
Saving $50 a week July Challenge
The Simple Saving website has the July challenge of saving $50 a week off your expenses Simple Savings – Free Newsletters. I don’t belong to the simple savings club but I keep in touch with the website every now and then – I thought it sounded like a good challenge. For the first week of July I’ve cut the money off our food expenses by avoiding takeaways and only grocery shopping for the very essentials. There are enough ingredients in the freezer and cupboards to make meatballs and spaghetti for dinner tonight and a chicken and rice dish with roti for dinner tomorrow. Hubby didn’t buy his lunch yesterday so that will help save $10 this week also. Baking wise for nibbles I’ve tried the coconut loaf again this morning adding jam swirled in the middle of it this time to see what that turns out like (only had a small amount of jam left – more next time!). All up cutting back on food spending should save us at least $100 this week (which of course goes to show in our house hold that normally we spent far too much on food).
Spreading the word
Visiting family a few weeks ago my sister-in-law mentioned that she was now doing what we do at our house and planning meals on the fridge door and it was making a huge difference. (Ours is defrosting in the fridge at the moment. Steak on toasted ciabatta bread, lettuce, red onion, tomato, avocado, onion marmalade chutney……. mmmm.). Meanwhile my mother at the age of 74 has become a white vinegar convert because of me and in turn is spreading the word to all she meets. I was talking to someone the other day about the usefulness of white vinegar and they said they couldn’t live without their Jiff but even my husband who was a Jiff fanatic happily uses our white vinegar spray and wipe. My mother–in–law has become a bush baby dwarf bean plant convert after I gave her some seeds last year (very easy to grow). It’s nice to see people’s lives getting a little easier just from simple things that you do in your life. It all helps to make us the eighth happiest country in the world NZ eighth happiest country in the world – National – NZ Herald News – maybe if we all work at it we can move up in the ranks after the next survey!
Getting out of the Rut
I haven’t been writing lately. It has been a hectic time at work and I have been putting in 80 plus hours a week. I am constantly at a computer but not for blogging. Hubby and I were starting to go off track a little in that we had got bored with our meals and I was constantly tired by the time I got home so it was easier to pick up takeaways a coupe of times a week. Not a good way to be heading in to winter! So this weekend is mostly a weekend off from work and we are getting back on track. We found this recipe in the Dom Post – New World Recipe – a few weeks ago and it has become one of our new dishes.
Tuscan Lamb Chops
6 lamb loin chops , half a cup red or white wine ,1 teaspoon Tuscan seasoning mix , 1 lamb stock cube crumbled or 1 tsp lamb or beef stock powder and quarter cup cranberry jelly.
Preheat oven to 180 degrees . Place one or two lamb chops on a piece of foil large enough o completely enclose the chop. On to the lamb in each parcel pour over a little wine, some Tuscan seasoning mix and stock powder and place a tablespoon of cranberry jelly on top.
Fold up the foil to enclose the lamb and seal slightly. Refrigerate for one to six hours to marinate. Bake for 35 mins. Stand for 5 minutes and serve with peas and mashed potatoes.
Put kiwifruit on the shopping list
Last weekend’s newspapers were heralding the wonders of the humble kiwifruit http://www.stuff.co.nz/the-press/news/2996350/Kiwi-fruit-really-works-for-health.
The good news is that although most of us can’t really grow our own in the backyard it doesn’t really matter as it’s a relatively cheap fruit. I had one each day this week for lunch (along with other food!) and it worked out at 25c a kiwifruit. Can’t really beat that for value if you’re trying to stay within a budget while eating healthy http://www.zespri.com/zespri-health.html.
Love Food Hate Waste (3)
Well our Love Food Hate Waste challenge continues this week. We are up to Day 5 past our normal grocery shopping day. Today I finished off the about to expire cream making a jelly cream whip for dessert for dinner. It was lovely, although usually I prefer the yoghurt one as it is a ‘bit’ healthier! (see below).
Berry Whip
1 pkt boysenberry jelly, 4000ml boiling water, 1 tblsp orange juice, 1 tsp finely grated orange zest, 2 x 150g cartons berry – flavoured yoghurt
Make up jelly with the boiling water and orange juice, place bowl in the refrigerator until almost set.
Add the zest and yoghurt to the jelly. Beat using an electric mixture until the mixture is frothy.
Spoon into 4 individual glasses, return to the fridge for 1-2 hours. Decorate with cream and seasonal berries.
Dinner tonight was spaghetti and bolognese with the left over put into the freezer for another meal. Tomorrow’s baking will include pikelets to use up the left over milk, with a little bit of cream to go on them! Half of them can go in the freezer for another day. Mmmm ……can’t wait for tomorrow to come.
Domestic Goddess Morning
I have a few days off from work at the moment so have the luxury of not having to race out of the house in the morning. I got a call today from a friend wanting to pop around so I had a quick look at what I could make. We are stretching our food at the moment so we are three days past our shopping day. The lemons were starting to look past their best so it was time to use them – 20 mins later a dozen Alison Holst Crunchy Lemon muffins were in the oven (some destined for the freezer) and all the spare lemons had been juiced and put into the ice cube tray so I can have lemon juice available for emergencies. Part way through mixing the muffins I realized I hadn’t cleaned the bathroom this weekend so quickly raced around with vinegar and baking soda, not a stressful job anymore as it can be sprayed on all surfaces – all ready for visitors! Rags went into the laundry- not a single paper towel used. Checked the fridge – cream, milk and mushrooms are getting close to their use by date so I grabbed a few slices of bacon, puff pastry and cheese out of the freezer – time to make some little quiches for lunch the next few days. Popped hubby’s work clothes into the washing machine to soak for a few hours in cold water to get stains out – saves on stain removal. Sat down to the computer to finalise the accounts for September and analyse our spending – looks like we’ve saved money this month again, this is slowly getting a little easier each month as changes in our lives become second nature. Think I deserve to put my feet up this afternoon after my productive morning!
Love Food Hate Waste (2)
Back in March (28/03/2009) I wrote about the British campaign to reduce the amount of food that we throw away uneaten. There is now a website with lots of good ideas to help people eat what they buy rather than throwing it out. I’ve found parts of it quite useful so thought I’d pass it on – today I’ve been looking at salad tips given the lovely weather Salad days and Picnics – Love Food Hate Waste , on the side of the page are lots of tabs to other tip topics. Must go and get my lettuce sorted out for the week…….