Meal Plan 29/12/13 - 04/01/14

We've only got 6 meals planned this week as we will not be eating at home on new years eve. We may also end up eating on another day, so may take one of the below meals over to the following week as well.

There's a few additional items in there this week as I'm trying to build the store cupboards up a bit, I thought that this might help with creating recipes. One thing on my to do list is to organise my cupboards better. Some of the food bought this week is specifically for the other half as these are things that he likes ( like the super noodles, which is something I personally don't eat).

Meal Plan 29/12/13 - 04/01/13

Stuffing Crusted Pork with Tenderstem Broccoli, Carrots & Beans

Garlic & Herb Spaghetti

Turkey, Stuffing & Cranberry Pie

Cheese and Ham/Bacon Quiche with Baked Beans

Blue Cheese Burgers and Wedges

Turkey Mince & Polenta Lasagne

Breakfast: Cereal, Porridge, Fruit

Lunch: Ham or Tuna Sandwiches, Leftovers

Snacks: Fruit

Leftovers:  Frozen Beans, Red Lentils, Flour, Pork, Turkey Mince

Shopping List:

Milk £1.00
Bananas * 5 (0.785 kg) £0.53
Mango * 2 £1.50
Red Grapes (Reduced) £0.50
Cereal £2.68
Muller Vitality Drinks (6) £1.00
GF Ciabatta £2.00
Southern Fried Wedges £1.00
Tenderstem Broccoli £1.20
Free From Flour £1.65
Free From Stuffing £2.00
Cranberry Sauce £0.82
Smoked Bacon £1.68
Honey £2.00
Eggs £1.41
Baking Powder £1.29
Cathedral City Cheese 2 *350 g £4.00
Mackerel £1.00
Garlic & Herb Cheese £1.10
Potatoes £1.00
Hendersons Relish £1.57
Onions ( 4 - 0.610 kg) £0.46
Tomato Puree £0.48
Baked Beans * 4 £1.24
Mushy Peas £1.00
Super Noodles * 4 £2.00
Ravioli £0.64
Anchovies £0.79
Chopped Tomatoes £0.31
Total £37.85

I'm really looking forward to trying the Turkey Mince and Polenta Lasagne and hoping that it turns out to be nice, to give us a different option to the regular lasagne sheets which can be quite expensive when buying them gluten free.

Home Made 5 Spice Powder

I don't know about you, but after the rush of finishing off the Christmas presents and eating way too much over the festive period, for a couple of days I quite like to stay at home and not do much! It was on one of these days that we were due to make Chinese food. We quite like to make a "takeaway" type meal, in the hope that it will stop us from buying a take away.

We realised quite quickly that for the Salty Crispy Chicken recipe that I cook, we need 5 spice which we were out of. Neither of us wanted to go to the shop, preferring just to have a relaxing day instead. A quick scout on the internet later and I came across a home made 5 spice recipe.

I must admit that I've never used the grinder function on my food processor, but I will most definitely be using it again as this was so easy! 

The 5 spice powder was really aromatic and it tasted really good in the recipe, so I don't think I'll be buying the small jars on pre-made stuff from the supermarket from now on. You can find the recipe on the food.com website here.

I used whole black peppercorns in my recipe, as this is what I had in the house. I would love to taste it with with szechuan peppercorns.

Do you make your own spice mixes?