Over the years it's fair to say I haven't done very much cooking. I have mostly avoided this by sticking to 3 mains food groups. Frozen, tinned and takeaway. Some of what I have done might have been loosely termed 'warming things up', but cooking ie mixing different things together to make food. No.
Well, it's come to my attention lately that I make terrible food decisions when I'm hungry. Also, I keep getting texts and emails from Domino's when I'm at my most vulnerable, and even worse, I keep answering them!
Anyway, two things have happened over the last couple of weeks. I've been working late and I don't have any money left. So, instead of having a day out last Sunday Ruth and I went shopping and made all the meals for last week in advance (I did help a bit, I threw peelings in the bin and washed up and stuff). I can't tell you what a help this was when I was getting in after 7 at night last week.
To try and follow her good example, and as she's on nights this weekend, and also because I'm starting another new job involving late nights this week, I thought I'd do likewise today.
People who know me might think I've been kidnapped by aliens, but no. I looked up some recipes yesterday, and I went out in the fog and I bought some ingredients to make proper meals. This week will probably be stressful enough, so I don't want to fall into the Dominos' trap again (you won't get me this week Phil, with your tempting BOGOFs, you see he even uses his first name on the texts, how underhand is that?, it's like he thinks we're friends).
Anyway, I started with a chilli, because I've made that before, and I can do that without looking at a book. Except, could I find the chilli powder? No. I knew it was in there somewhere but it was hidden in amongst about 100 other little jars of powder.
The first thing I took out was Star Anise. What the hell is that? Anyway, that was fine because it didn't expire till 2013. I then took about another 80 jars out of the cupboard, and although I didn't go so far as to enter the dates onto a spreadsheet, at a rough approximation I would say the average expiry date across all the spices was somewhere around mid 2009. Not only that but some things had four or five duplicates. I can't remember eating much cinnamon in the last 10 years but I must have intended to at some point because there's five jars of the stuff in there!
Anyway, I started off throwing away everything over 2 years out of date (I figured that the dates are only a guide), but then I had so many duplicates that I had pretty much at least one of everything I might use that was still in date.
After I'd done this, I was momentarily seized by the insane impulse to alphabetise what was left, but then I realised about 20 of the 27 jars that were left were all things beginning with C, so that seemed a step too far.
But the really good news was this. I found the chilli powder. And it's still in date!
And now I'm off to do some cooking!
Well, it's come to my attention lately that I make terrible food decisions when I'm hungry. Also, I keep getting texts and emails from Domino's when I'm at my most vulnerable, and even worse, I keep answering them!
Anyway, two things have happened over the last couple of weeks. I've been working late and I don't have any money left. So, instead of having a day out last Sunday Ruth and I went shopping and made all the meals for last week in advance (I did help a bit, I threw peelings in the bin and washed up and stuff). I can't tell you what a help this was when I was getting in after 7 at night last week.
To try and follow her good example, and as she's on nights this weekend, and also because I'm starting another new job involving late nights this week, I thought I'd do likewise today.
People who know me might think I've been kidnapped by aliens, but no. I looked up some recipes yesterday, and I went out in the fog and I bought some ingredients to make proper meals. This week will probably be stressful enough, so I don't want to fall into the Dominos' trap again (you won't get me this week Phil, with your tempting BOGOFs, you see he even uses his first name on the texts, how underhand is that?, it's like he thinks we're friends).
Anyway, I started with a chilli, because I've made that before, and I can do that without looking at a book. Except, could I find the chilli powder? No. I knew it was in there somewhere but it was hidden in amongst about 100 other little jars of powder.
The first thing I took out was Star Anise. What the hell is that? Anyway, that was fine because it didn't expire till 2013. I then took about another 80 jars out of the cupboard, and although I didn't go so far as to enter the dates onto a spreadsheet, at a rough approximation I would say the average expiry date across all the spices was somewhere around mid 2009. Not only that but some things had four or five duplicates. I can't remember eating much cinnamon in the last 10 years but I must have intended to at some point because there's five jars of the stuff in there!
Anyway, I started off throwing away everything over 2 years out of date (I figured that the dates are only a guide), but then I had so many duplicates that I had pretty much at least one of everything I might use that was still in date.
After I'd done this, I was momentarily seized by the insane impulse to alphabetise what was left, but then I realised about 20 of the 27 jars that were left were all things beginning with C, so that seemed a step too far.
But the really good news was this. I found the chilli powder. And it's still in date!
And now I'm off to do some cooking!
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