Tinned Potatoes

I hadn’t eaten tinned potatoes since the many wonderful camping trips I went on with my family as a child. But, I recently started buying tinned potatoes to have in the cupboard for occasional meals. I find they are a useful ‘filler’ that can be added to stews and bakes or are quite tasty oven roasted [...]

Cooks&co

I came across cooks&co stuffed vine leaves. They are not cheap at over £2 per can but they are absolutely delicious, I ate the whole can in one sitting. But eaten in a meal the can would do four or so and is a great way to add zing to plain ingredients; and as starters [...]

Puttanesca Pasta Sauce

Never heard of it before but it, Tesco brand, was heavily reduced, I hope not a sign that it is discontinuing although it may not be mainstream taste containing capers and anchovies, but what a treat, I’m glad I stocked up. The olives are whole and juicy, I thought they were large capers but the [...]

Fried onions

Eazy spanish onions chopped small and tinned in olive oil. OK it’s incredibly lazy, it doesn’t take long to chop an onion but these are great for the days when you’ve run out of onions. The can is standard size so there is too much for a small meal but they keep in the fridge.
So [...]

Nozzarella

I bought Tesco Value mozarella substitute to try it. I didn’t check the price, I have yet to come across a Value item that isn’t cheap. After a few days in the fridge the shreds were melding together and the raw taste is not good but in cooking and for gratinées it’s pretty good unless [...]

Sprattus Sprattus

Sometimes I veritably crave tinned sardines, maybe something to do with the biorhythms of my brain. Anyway, one brand I tried is John West Wild Scottish in Olive Oil. The box is deceptive. The latin translation, silver card, aesthetic embossed picture of the wild sea, and personalised photo on the back makes the packaging look [...]

Carrot cake

I’ve always loved carrot cake. For my son’s birthday he asked for not a chocolate cake (I made all birthday cakes till a few years ago by the, only recipe I know, magic 4-4-4-4 formula) and I found respectorganics organic carrot cake. The Tesco version looked good too but I was so impressed with the [...]

Soulful Sarnies

There is much to be said for the humble sandwich and plenty also about the luxury sandwich. The first consideration is bread and with the recent veritable explosion of bread varieties in the UK (still none quite match up to the crusty delight of French country breads or the wonderfully chewy, open-textured experience of Catalan [...]

Still Stew

The basic lentil stew can be made in 40 minutes from dried green lentils, brought to the boil and left to simmer. Onions and carrots can be kept large and added at the start or sliced and added later. A bit of shoyu or tamari (soya sauce) to serve with is delicious but even better [...]

Budgeting

When the children were young and my budget was tight, I started to think of the cost of meals rather than the cost of individual foods or rather to think of the value of the food cost, the role of the food in our diets. In the supermarket I would calculate how many meals a [...]