Cook Smart with Southern Co-op
Independent retailers Southern Co-op have come up with some great tips if you are cooking on a budget. Here’s a shorter version below. The tips in full are available as part of Southern Co-op’s free to join All Yours membership (link here): Cook smart – All Yours (all-yours.co.uk). All Yours benefits include extra in-store discounts, exclusive previews of up coming food offers and access to recipes and meal ideas.
Plan your meals Planning what you are going to cook really does help save money. Try working out your meals for a whole week. Start by listing what you need to use up in the fridge. Then work out your shopping list, balancing it against your budget with tweaks like buying tinned fish and frozen veg, which save pounds and give you ingredients that can be stored longer.
Make stock Next time you’re peeling veg, don’t throw the odds and ends into the food waste. Instead, put them towards making a flavoursome vegetable stock that can be used as a base for stews, soups and veggie risotto. Get a large plastic box with a sealable lid. Add any veg peelings, this includes root veg such as carrots and leeks, and other scraps including celery, mushrooms and any parsley or thyme stalks. Avoid starchy veg, such as potato, and leafy greens, which will turn your stock bitter. Seal and store in the freezer after each addition. Once the box is full, make your stock. You want at least a third of the odds and ends to be onions and garlic. Put the frozen veg into a very large saucepan, cover with water, then add a few peppercorns and a couple of bay leaves and bring to the boil. Reduce to a simmer and cook for around an hour. Remove the vegetables, then strain the liquid through a fine mesh sieve. Measure into storage containers, Use straight away or freeze for up to three months.
Make meat go further Bulk out classic meat dishes with pulses, by adding a tin or two of kidney or mixed beans. Also, stretch meat over a couple of meals. For example slice and stir fry meat with veg and noodles one night, then slice and dice the rest and fry with chopped tomatoes and spices to use as a filling for tacos the next.
Slowly does it The slow cooker is your friend. Cheaper cuts of meat and budget-friendly ingredients can be made delicious by cooking them gently for a long period of time. An example is a sausage stew (on Southern Co-op’s website) with ingredients including just olive oil, sausages, onions, sticks of celery, carrots, flour, stock, chutney and store cupboard dried herbs (Rosemary and thyme).
Waste not Freeze leftover ingredients to use another day. Try to work what you have left into other dishes in a creative way. For example, stews, chillies and curries all make interesting toppings for jacket potatoes. Make a leftovers soup once a week with any cooked veg left in the fridge. Simply fry an onion and some garlic gently until soft. Add a little dried thyme, chopped potatoes and pour in a litre of stock. Simmer for 15 minutes until tender. Add the leftover cooked veg, a squeeze of lemon, then whizz with a stick blender until smooth. Heat and serve.