Frugal Friday

 Hello and welcome to another Frugal Friday post!

It has been a busy week around here with homeschooling and urban homesteading! Since it is autumn here I find it is always a time of productivity before the winter weather comes. Harvesting the last of vegetables from our garden, weeding and tidying the gardens, preserving and canning.

My sister and I are doing a challenge for a month on a daily task that is either frugal in nature to save money and to waste less, or something to prep for our winter supply of food and emergency pantries. We love a good challenge!

It is very inspiring when doing these challenges with someone else because it encourages you to look for something to do every day, stay productive and prepare for the months ahead with food. We grew up with a mum who preserved and canned, our dad had a huge vegetable garden and our parents didn't always have a lot of money so learning to make do and not waste food is in our nature.

So I would like to share a few things that I have done this week to be frugal and prepare ahead.

1. Vegetable stock from scraps.

Intrigued? It is super simple. Sometimes the thought of making ones own homemade stock can sound complicated and too much to do but I discovered an easy way that is nutritious and prevents waste.

So all you do is select a plastic container that can go in the freezer and every time you are preparing a meal and have scraps that can go into stock, you just pop them in the container and keep the container in the fridge.

What do I have in here?

Onion ends and skins, parsley stalks, celery stalks and leaves that couldn't be eaten, ends of carrots and a few peelings, stalks of silverbeet that weren't nice enough to eat, ends of courgettes/zucchini.

To make I placed the scraps in a large pot, added a bunch of extra fresh parsley from the garden and some peppercorns and covered with cold water. I brought it to the boil and then simmered for somewhere between 1-2 hours.

Strain in a colander and then pour into a jar or container and keep in the fridge. I then put the vegetable scraps in the compost. Nothing goes to waste.

That's it!

Do you always need stock?

Hugh Fearnley-Whittingstall of River Cottage, says in his Leftovers cookbook, that if you're working with full-flavoured ingredients in soups and stews you don't always need stock. If you're making a soup based on the slow sautéing of a mirepoix of vegetables (diced onion, carrots & celery), adding water may just be enough. Especially if you are adding stronger flavoured vegetables or ham or bacon. If you're going down the no stock route he suggests using butter or fat from chicken, beef or bacon to add flavour. Always add a pinch of salt and use herbs. These all add flavour.

I found these suggestions to be very helpful.

You can also save vegetable water from steaming or boiling some vegetables. The liquid I keep is mainly from cooking carrots, broccoli & cabbage. 

2. Homemade cleaning spray.

I do this two ways.

First Spray: Grab a spray bottle and fill 2/3 of tap water, top up with white vinegar, add a good squirt of dish liquid and several drops of a favourite essential oil. I mostly use lavender. Ready to go. I use this in the kitchen and showers. It keeps our showers really clean in between deep scrubs.

Second Spray: Save orange skins from at least 3 oranges and place in a large glass jar and fill with white vinegar. Leave for 2 weeks to do its thing. I then pour about half into a spray bottle and top with water. A nice natural cleaner that has a refreshing smell to it. Great in the kitchen but you can use it anywhere.

I have been a few other things this week which I will share in a post next week. Look out for my post on my Kimchi experiment which will be up this coming Monday.

Thank you for visiting again and I hope you have learnt something new to try and be inspired by. If you have any great tips you would like to share please comment below.

Have a blessed weekend,

Fiona 

"I keep my eyes always on the Lord. With him at my right hand, I will not be shaken." Psalm 16:8