The dreaded bog off offer. Buy one get one free

Melon were on a Buy one get one free offer in Tesco, they were quite large and were not a bad price even if it was just for one.
I have heard that thousands of tons of food is thrown away every year because the supermarkets do offers like this, and they are creating this wicked waste, increasing their profits, without a care for the wasted food, or its effect on the environment. Possibly true, but we have a responsibility, if we buy food, use it. Food is a precious resource, and as so many people do not have enough to eat, we should be extra careful to treat the food we have with respect, and not waste it.
There are opportunities, if one has a glut of any produce whether it is from buying special offers at the supermarket, your garden growing lots of produce, or just buying in bulk to save money.
One idea is to share your good fortune with other people, have people round to dinner, or give away stuff to a neighbour.
Find ways to preserve what you have, freezing is what I use most at the moment, as it is quick, and it is amazing what you can freeze successfully. We should not forget the old tried and tested methods of preserving food, Jams, marmalades, jellies, and chutneys are all really easy, and the recipes can be manipulated to suit your own taste. Bottled fruit keeps for at least a year, and salting vegetables like runner beans, is another way to preserve food. Salting is my least favourite as I use very little salt in my cooking, and so salt preserved food even when well washed tastes pretty nasty to me, but I dare say it would not taste so salty if you are used to eating more salt than I do.
Another Idea is to find different ways to eat the same produce. This is where trawling through recipe books for inspiration really helps. And it can work using an ingredient you have available to replace one you don’t have, be brave it is all food and you can sometimes find you have invented a new dish. My big problem is remembering what it was I used when it was a successes.
So you have two Melons. Here are a few ways to use them up. I am not sure any of the following would work with water melon, but are fine with a firm fleshed melon like, honey dew or cantaloupe,
The simplest starter, slice and sprinkle with a little sea salt and serve. Or slice and serve with black forest ham, Prosciutto or similar. And another unusual recipe that is suitable as a starter is, diced melon with a little finely chopped onion, walnuts, raisins and French dressing.To use for desert try adding some stem ginger in syrup, or just using a bit in a fruit salad.It also can be the main ingredient in a pimms salad, melon balls, strawberries and cucumber with a dash of pimms.

Sunday

I have had writers block, well it sounds more interesting than I have been too busy to do my blog. Actually the days have been filled with the usual round of horse care, dog walking, feeding etc. Plus lots of house work and gardening, mainly for other people, hence my house and garden look as if a dustbin lorry has been upended in it. Never mind I have still eaten quite well. With some fairly interesting and mostly healthy options.
Best day was Friday when Steve cooked dinner, Liver and bacon with mashed potatoes and mixed vegetables. I will eat almost anything or at least try it, but one thing I cannot get to like is liver cooked the way chefs cook it, soft and pink, and usually lambs liver, I think it is truly disgusting, so for any of you who think you don’t kike liver and have been told you need to eat it for the high iron content, this is what you do.
Use pigs liver for a start, cut it fairly small coat in flour season fry, with onions, add herbs and red wine, as a minimum. Also if you fancy it add tomatoes preferably tinned, bacon, mushrooms. Then cook through, you do not want it to get really tough but the taste changes if it is well cooked, and don’t care what all you wizzy clever chefs say that is the way I like my liver cooked.

Well it is Wednesday already so must catch up on my blog. Luckily I have kept a record of all breakfast, lunch and dinner so no problems remembering this time.
Monday being a bank holiday we treated it as a Sunday and had a roast for dinner.
But to start with breakfast, nothing exciting just shredded wheat. But for lunch as Steve was out for the day I thought I would look for inspiration in the cookery books and treat myself to something new.
As I have mentioned in the past I use cookery books more for inspiration than for slavishly following any recipe, So the best cook books have inspirational pictures, and one of my favourites is Nigella Lawson’s, Nigella Bites. This was where I found the ultimate naughty sandwich. She calls it trashy food, something for occasional indulgence. It was a banana and peanut butter sandwich, fried in butter! How bad is that? Even then I did not manage to be as bad as the recipe, as that asked for white bread and I did not have any, so it was made with nice soft wholemeal bread instead. Promise will try harder and get white bread for the next time. It was good, well done Nigella. It was according to her, Elvis Presley’s favourite sandwich.
Dinner was also inspired by Nigella Bites cook book, Slow roasted leg of Lamb, I did not have any pomegranate so that was left out this time, I have used it before and it is a good and easy recipe, so can highly recommend it. I can honestly say I can recommend the whole book as it is definitely one of my most used. Must tell you about some of the others that I use frequently. But that is for another blog.
Anyhow back to Monday dinner, with the lamb all the usual vegetables. But to start with, Cantaloupe melon with black forest ham.
Tuesday was a simple day for food, for breakfast shredded wheat, lunch cheese on toast, and Dinner cold lamb and salad.

Sunday

Shredded wheat for breakfast, just one with hot water a quarter of a teaspoon of sugar and a dash of milk just enough to keep me going for the first part of the day, Walk the dogs and feed the horses. One of the horses is still stabled at night so I have to muck out and fill a hay net ready for the evening. The rest of the horses are not stabled so just need a change of rug, hay, feed and field clearing. If anyone is interested I plan to start another blog dedicated to all things horsy in my day.
For lunch it had to be toast, as the last of the bread was not as fresh as it could have been. but as I refuse to waste anything if I can help it, toasting the bread makes it quite edible. As we had not had any oily fish for quite a few days I had the toast spread with sardines in tomato sauce, followed by yet another hot cross bun.
Dinner. I had planned to start with a salad, but then remembered that I had bought two cantaloupe melons and as one of them is now ripe that served as a starter, just sprinkled with a little sea salt. For the main dinner we had boiled rice, pork with ginger, red pepper spring onion, and fennel. Served with stir fried vegetables, green pepper, onions garlic, ginger, mushrooms, carrots and cauliflower.
Well plenty of vegetables today if a bit light on the fruit. Also had a few peanuts and a gin and tonic.

Saturday

Well I don’t think I did any better yesterday, either from a healthy eating point of view, or from a reducing weight sort of diet.
Breakfast time we had mandarin oranges and grapefruit, both tinned, that was the healthy bit, then as it was Good Friday hot cross buns.
Steve was not impressed as he had wanted a traditional English breakfast. Well he could have cooked one and had it waiting for me on my return from horse feeding and dog walking. Hint Hint.
So, for lunch we had traditional English breakfast. Using what I had in the way of ingredients. Scrambled eggs, bacon, tinned tomatoes and toast.
Took the horse and pony out, I rode the horse and lead the pony, and Steve walked the dogs. By the time we had put them all to bed and seen to another two horses, we were running rather late. Steve suggested picking up fish and chips on the way home. I did not need too much persuasion. Just to help make sure we ate our quota of fresh fruit I made a salad of apple, banana, pear, and Satsuma, and had a multi vitamin and mineral pill just to help.
Ate chocolate and peanuts. Bad.

Good Friday

Yesterday was not the best day in the way of inspirational eating or the best in good nutrition, but never mind how would I ever feel righteous and smug if on good days, if I did it right all the time.
Breakfast was orange juice followed by porridge that had been made mainly with water so that was a fairly low fat start to the day. Good.
Lunch was very late, I spent too long on this computer, I think computers eat time.
For lunch we had fish sticks salad and bread and butter. Maybe overall the day was not that bad from a nutritional point of view after all.
In the afternoon Steve and I did an emergency dash to rescue a pony that was larking about on the top of an enormous dung heap and endangering himself, it was a bit of a pain as it meant I missed riding my horse. After that we still had to exercise the dogs, and then we went shopping. After that we arrived home quite late. So the bad bit of the day was crashing out in front of the telly and eating two huge pizzas and drinking beer. (Just the one).

Tuesday 3rd of April

Monday was sandwiches for lunch, then leftover Chinese. Steve's brother Nigel made a flying visit, literally, arriving after dinner on Sunday then leaving first thing Monday. As we had already eaten he bought himself some food from the local Chinese takeaway. It's only about 30 metre away as the crow flies, a bit further on foot. Too temptingly close for my waistline, or pocket.
Anyway he ended up with too much food and left some in the fridge, which went very nicely with some fresh vegetables, stir-fried, and more chinese from the freezer.
Finished up yesterday's trifle for dessert.