Back to the good old days

Times are tough, that's no secret. Times are particularly tough when you're on maternity leave pay rather than a proper salary. For these reasons, I'm trying to be better about not wasting food. In the past, I admit, I've thrown away bags of salad which I'd meant to eat but hadn't got to before it got slimy (or which I'd rejected in favour of something more appealing like a packet of pink wafer biscuits).

So, at the weekend we had a roast lunch - nice large chicken, a bargain at only £4.99. Although I failed to boil down the carcass to make stock (come on, life's too short) I did make soup out of the leftover broccoli and cabbage along with some of the chicken. And it was actually really nice, much better than I'd expected. Isabel slurped it down with gusto which was great, and declared that it was just like leek and potato soup. Funny, since there were no leeks or potatoes in it.

And today I made what I always think of as a really seventies dessert. Yummy, and again a bargain. I bought a flan case, filled it with sliced strawberries, blueberries and grapes, then poured in Quick Jel. It set in about 20 minutes, and looked so nice that Husbandio insisted I must have bought it. Unfortunately we ate it so quickly that there's no picture of it, so you'll just have to take my word for it!