Making it fun

It's all about your state of mind, you know.
If you stand in front of your nearly empty cupboards and think, "I'm going to struggle here", then you probably will.
If, instead, you stand there with the attitude of, "Right, let's see what we can create out of this little lot", it becomes more of a challenge than a despair.

If you see flour, you have pancakes, naan bread, pastry beginnings, even homemade pasta possibly.
If you see lentils, you have curry, Dahl, soup, stew.

One thing I maintain is my spice shelf.
With spices you can turn almost anything into a delicious meal.

We go to an indoor market to buy our spices in bulk, as they are cheapest there.
The ones I keep are: cumin, turmeric, smoked paprika, cinnamon, harissa, and a herb mix of thyme, parsley, sage and rosemary.

I always have onions, and cook in the cheapest veg oil.

After that, I can create meals from whatever we have as leftovers on a "beam ends" week, or plan recipes using a few simple ingredients.

Tonight's supper was a chick pea curry - served in a deep bowl, so no need for rice.
We added some fine green beans that needed using up, but you can add almost anything to a curry!

Tomorrow I'm using a couple of branches of broccoli with a knob end of Stilton for a yummy thick soup.

I have enough bits and bobs to feed us for almost two weeks without shopping, using up the food that travelled home from France with us, and the tins in my store cupboard.


How do you stretch the last bits and bobs and make it fun?