My brood's books - part two of two

Of course most of the books that my youngest daughter now has, have previously belonged to the others! We seem to play a never ending game of moving books from one room to another. I was fairly ruthless when I cleared out her room and gave loads to charity, but I kept the books which had originally been mine, like the Flower Fairy sets and Beatrix Potter. I like the idea of sharing them with my grandchildren as and when I get any!

Daughter number one has limited space having had to cram her uni life back into her teenage bedroom for the time being, so it's all a bit busy!

Daughter number two passed on many of hers to her younger sister a couple of years ago to free up space in her room.

Wonky shelves!

My son LOVES reading and has many many box sets - more than I can possibly photograph - they are stacked in a old kitchen cabinet - three rows deep in some cases, balanced on top of his wardrobe. Poor soul - his room is small but perfectly formed! He has now become a film buff too so we'll need to investigate DVD storage for him! 

Youngest daughter had a room revamp so is probably the tidiest at the moment. Here are a few of hers...

There really are some brilliant books out there for children and young adults. Far more than I ever had. I am very happy that my children have all enjoyed reading and appreciate books.

Book shelves (part one of two)

I have really enjoyed looking at people's book collections recently on their blogs, so I thought I'd do a couple of posts from my bookshelves. Today - my books and Mr D's and tomorrow a brief look at other books around the house!
Looking at the photos, I realised a) my shelves are chaotic and messy b) it's a REALLY eclectic mix of books showing various interests from the last 20 odd years of a life shared and c) there are some slightly uncomfortable choices in there - please don't judge!! X

These are along the window sill - I ran out of space on the shelves, surprise, surprise!

In the kitchen, it's almost entirely cookery books and a few lifestyle. My most recent book is Rhonda Hetzel's book from the Down to Earth blog. I have read this book three times already from cover to cover, it's so interesting.

I have no idea why there is a small furry thingy on this shelf! 

I tried to have a rule of one book in and one out - BIG FAIL! I find it very hard to pass books on.....

In the lounge, we built some shelves into the alcove many years ago, and these house mostly reference books and my husband's sportsman autobiographies. Again, there are some books up there I never look at, but they would have been expensive gifts in their day. Perhaps when we move.....? The bottom shelf has photo albums. Many many years ago, my husband had to have an operation and to keep himself busy whilst he recuperated, he logged our life in these albums, from the time we first met, right through five albums to the point when my youngest was born. They're brilliant to look at, but stupidly we haven't continued them .... I guess we just don't print off photos in the same way these days.

The bookcase, the other side of the fireplace houses mostly fiction and the overspill from the DVD shelf. Too many books on the second shelf, so I've had to go double thickness again! We watch a lot of films in this house and have built up a huge collection of DVDs. Again I have tried to slim these down, but have met with so much resistance from the tribe, I've just given up and stacked them!! The baskets on the bottom shelf contain Wii controllers etc.

At the top of the stairs, there is a small bookcase. Probably the most mixed of the whole house. On here, there are books from my student days (I studied French and German). I can tell you now, I will never pick up Bertolt Brecht's Caucasian Chalk Circle and read it in German ever again and yet ... there it is on the shelf. I have so many, they are double thickness......I know, I need help here!
I also have some books from various 'dreams' I've had over the years - moving to France, opening a b&b etc...
On the bottom shelf are the children's books, which were mine and have been passed on to my children, but they have so many of their own books, that they've come back out of their rooms again, so I've crammed them in a chaotic fashion on this shelf. Displaying this photo makes me painfully aware of how awkward they look, displayed like this!

Peanut butter and granola bars

Another recipe from my Vegan and Gluten free Baking book at a request from Mother Noah. These are truly delicious, but beware.....they are very moreish!

Vegan and GF margarine for greasing
100g crunchy peanut butter
30g brown sugar (I used soft brown)
2 tbsp golden syrup
450g GF granola (i only had 415g as I was using up what I had - it was fine!)

• Preheat oven to 189c.
• Grease an 18 by 25cm shallow baking tin and line with parchment allowing it to overlap at the sides to enable lifting the bars out later.
• Cream the peanut butter, sugar and golden syrup together in a large bowl. I used a wooden spoon, but you could use a mixer I guess.
• Stir in the granola and mix very well to coat the granola - this is quite hard work!!
• Press the mixture firmly and evenly into the tin.
• Bake in the oven for about 25 mins until golden brown.
• Lift it out in the parchment and allow to cool on a wire rack.
• Cut into bars. The recipe said 12, but I made 16. 

TIP- I gathered the crumbs that had collected when I cut the bars and sprinkled them on a vanilla soy yoghurt as my pudding - delicious! Apparently they were also yummy stirred into GF porridge made with soy milk. I suspect they'd be good added to a crumble topping or mixed into apple puree........you could even top the bars with vegan GF chocolate? Sorry! I'm getting carried away...ENJOY!

When the cupboard is bare

I know it's only half way through February, but already I'm thinking of stretching the budget! Is that a bad sign, I wonder? .........

What do you make, when it's near the end of the month, the budget is nearing an end and there's very little left in the fridge? You still have mouths to feed and they want proper food!

Photo from google images.

My 'go-to' budget recipes are :-

 * Soup - served with home made bread. Any kind, but especially curried vegetable - using up any remnants of root veg, softening in vegetable stock and adding some curry powder before blitzing in the liquidiser.  I also make a version of Cranks tomato and lentil soup - Soften an onion and some garlic with a pinch of dried herbs. Add a tin of tomatoes, some tomato puree and vegetable stock with a 1tsp of marmite, then add red lentils and simmer until the lentils are soft. Lovely served with grated cheese on top!
* Beans - I make bean casseroles with tinned beans of any shape, onion/garlic/herbs/spices and any fresh veg I have left over - peppers, frozen peas, beans or sweetcorn, diced carrot etc. This is good served over a jacket potato or indeed with grated cheese on top. If I have ever been unwell, this is what I crave - hot, in a bowl, curled up on the settee......
 * Risotto - I always have risotto rice in the cupboard. It makes an excellent quick meal for all six of us. Sometimes I add puree frozen peas, sometimes tomato and basil, sometimes diced mixed vegetables, sometimes just white wine and herbs. In the past, I would have added grated cheese, now I use nutritional yeast instead.
 * Pakoras - mix one cup of gram (chickpea) flour with ground cumin and coriander and water to make a runny batter, the consistency of single cream. Stir in frozen peas, sweetcorn or small florets of cauliflower or broccoli. Fry in spoonfuls in a drizzle of hot oil to make pakoras. This amount makes about 20 small pakoras. I serve mine with raita, red onion relish and mango chutney, but they are basically street food so can just be eaten as they are! I reckon they'd also be nice wrapped in a crisp lettuce leaf, but have yet to try this. They can also be frozen.

What cheap, store cupboard meals do you use, to make the most of any leftovers, when the money is tight at the end of the month?

Who needs a takeaway?

In the past when I was working full time and I had very little spare time, a whole load of stress and more disposable income, we wouldn't think twice about having a takeaway. It always seemed a great idea at the time, but somehow they were always a little disappointing - expensive, slightly greasy, too salty, poor flavour or once even, undercooked !!!
These days takeaways are off the menu for a whole variety of reasons - none of them are gluten free, few would be vegan, they are ALL ridiculously expensive!
So, it remains to me to be a little inventive in the kitchen to ensure that we don't feel we're missing out......
Indian:-

Vegetable curry, raita with soy yoghurt, red onion relish and the ubiquitous mango chutney. This was a Jamie Oliver curry recipe and was delicious! I made his curry base sauce and froze half.

A rather large pile of home fried poppadums. They make the house smell of frying which I'm not that keen on, but they really do taste so much more authentic when cooked at home.

Chinese:-

Vegetable pad thai

Pizza:-

One vegetarian and one with a cheeky bit of chorizo on top! 

Burger:-

Sweet potato and sweetcorn burger and homemade thin cut chips

Who needs a takeaway when you can feed a family of six for pence rather than pounds, know exactly what has gone into what you are eating and it tastes so much better home-made!

DIY chez moi

After the recent hall, stairs and landing redecoration, we needed to put our family photo wall back up. I decided to put them a little higher up the wall this time, to make way for some more frames lower down. However, I soon realised that there was a flaw in my plan ..... I couldn't reach to put the top ones back. I did try, but when I nearly fell down the stairs and I was alone at home, I could envisage how cross Mr D would be at my stupidity, so I waited until he got home.
Even then, it wasn't easy! I'm sure this method would break pretty much every health and safety rule in the book, but we a) got the pictures back up and b) caused some hilarity amongst our offspring!!
Probably as case of "Don't try this at home!" ...

There are photos of seven generations of my family on this wall! I love the old formal photos so much. I've been fortunate enough to be able to trace the family history back nine generations (from my children) on my father's side, but still need to put it all together in a properly presentable format. My grandmother was one of 14 children, some of whom died very young and she was just shy of 104 when she passed away eighteen years ago. Her daughter (my aunt) is still alive and kicking at 91 and has lived in the same Victorian terrace house since she was 9 years old! We all love going to visit her - best tea ever, made with proper leaves and served in China cups. You can't beat her tea and cakes of an afternoon x 

Getting to grips with veganism

As I mentioned, I'm giving Jamie Oliver a try this week. So far, so good - he hasn't disappointed!
Last night's meal was vegan mac 'n' cheese (obviously gluten free too).

Quite simple and straightforward to make, so I was feeling perfectly confident as I brought it out of the oven and carried it across to the table. Then Daughter number one says "That's brave! Macaroni cheese is the holy grail of vegan cooking - it's the one thing all vegans seek to conquer!" Hecky thump! My confidence started to wain away pretty quickly....
However, apart from the fact that next time I'd have more sauce, it was a great success with everyone going in for seconds and daughters 2 and 3 even going for a third helping! VERY unusually for me, I added some ketchup - not normally my style at all, but it went very well with it. I also served it with a large mixed green salad.

It was also the first outing for my new lasagne dish - £10 from Tesco. My previous one had developed an alarming crack and despite trying several thrift shops, I couldn't find a second hand one big enough for the six of us.

My vegan, gluten free bake this week - peanut butter granola bars. OMG - these are dangerously moreish!! I had the crumbs left over from cutting them into bars, mixed in some yoghurt - delicious!! Obviously you need to like peanut butter (which two of mine don't) but for those of us who are fans, these couldn't get much better!! Will definitely make these again.