A damp bank holiday

What a very damp Bank Holiday that was! And it’s set to be much the same all through this half term week. I am looking out of the windows at the front and the back of the house and there are big weeds that need uprooting, but I don’t enjoy gardening in the rain, so they’ll have to wait. I also noticed that the cherries on the trees in the front garden have just a hint of pink on them, I must cover those over with their shroud of fleece or the birds will get them – they might not wait!. I need to pinch off the new shoots reaching for the sky first, or they will get too big under the fleece with the ripening cherries. They are right at the top, and difficult to reach, I should probably cut a bit off to make them a little shorter.

Using up chicken leftovers

Using up some chicken leftover from a roast for dinner today. I fried a big onion and a few mushrooms, mixed in some diced carrot and half a tin of chopped tomatoes and about 180g of chicken, then topped it with a crumble mix made up of 100g each of flour and oats, 120g veg oil and a big handful of pumpkin seeds. It cooked in the Remoska  and there was the last of a pk of spring greens to go with it.

I priced the chicken using the same sums as for the Rubber Chicken
So 654g of chicken meat divided by the £4.99 cost. I haven’t included the cost of the pumpkin seeds, as they are optional

100g onion, Asda 2kg/98p 5p
100g carrot, Asda 2kg/£1.18, 6p
half tin tomatoes 15p
180g chicken £1.37
100g flour, value, 45p/1.5kg, 3p
100g oats, 75p/kg, 7p
120ml oil, £1.25/litre, 15p
Total of £1.88, 4 portions = 47p

It made 4 portions, so two left over for tomorrow.

It was delicious, creamy and flavoursome. You could make any tasty mix and pop a crumble over it, and in the process, either stretch out a few shreds of meat, or use up some assorted vegetables and beans. I used 180g of chicken, but it could easily be done with less.  The basic mix of equal quantities of flour and oats, with a little more than that of oil is tasty on its own. Any seedy additions you have in the cupboard are good, pumpkin, sunflower or sesame for instance. You could use wholemeal, spelt, plain or self raising flour, or gram or rice flour.

I would do this mix with some chickpeas or big lentils, green or brown, or puy if you have them. The red lentils would be nice too, but they will melt and disappear into the mix. If using lentils and no meat, make sure there is enough flavour in there by tasting. If you need more flavour, maybe try adding some soy sauce, or worcestershire, garlic and ginger, tomato ketchup, half a tin of baked beans, or crispy cooking bacon pieces, ham, a little cooked mince, or add some grated cheese to the topping  etc etc