Growing Fruit & Veggies – Bit of the Good Stuff

Crunchy Nut Apple Crumble (Vegan / Dairy-free) for Suma Blogger’s Network

Published on October 29, 2014 by Sharon16 Comments

This year we had a bumper crop of fruit on our apple tree. Thanks to the late September sunshine, within the space of two weeks the apples transformed from green and small to red and huge! We must have picked at least a hundred apples so far. And with this amazing bounty, we’ve been able to indulge in lots of delicious apple treats.

For this month’s Suma entry, I thought I’d share one of our all-time favourite Autumnal desserts – Apple Crumble ♥ I’ve lost count of the number of crumbles I’ve made this past month, but it could be getting on for ten!

As well as oats and wholegrain flour, I love to add some pecans and almonds into the crumble, which gives it a delicious crunch. Traditionally, this dessert has a fair amount of cane sugar and dairy butter in it. However, instead of cane sugar, I prefer to use coconut sugar and maple syrup as they add a delicious, caramel-like sweetness and beautiful golden hue to the crumble.

Instead of dairy butter, I use coconut butter (the aroma-free kind) or a non dairy spread. Through Suma, I discovered the Tiana Organic Coconut Cooking Butter and I’m loving it! It’s really versatile and you can use it for all kinds of cooking and baking. I made some scrumptious pasties with it last week. Unfortunately they were devoured before I could take any pics, so I’ll re-create them soon and post the recipe.

BTW, those lidded Pyrex glass dishes are really handy for cooking, storing and transporting the crumbles. I took a couple with me to Essex recently to share with our relatives. Stored in a thermal bag, six hours after I’d baked them they were still warm!

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This healthy twist on the classic Apple Crumble is packed with delicious flavours and crunchy texture. We love to serve it in colourful ramekins, either on its own or with a drizzle of non dairy cream, yogurt or custard. It’s delicious eaten warm or cold. Lil’ L and I actually prefer it cold as the topping firms up in the fridge for extra crunchiness!

Serves 6
Hands on time: 25 minutes Cooking time: 35 minutes
Ready in: 45 minutes

Ingredients
1 kg / 35 oz cooking apples (e.g. Bramleys), peeled, cored and sliced (about 7 medium apples)
1 tsp ground cinnamon
60g / 2 oz / 1/3 cup sultanas
3 TBSP fruit juice (or water)
3 TBSP maple syrup (or agave syrup)

Crumble Topping:
100g / 3½ oz / ¾ cup fine wholemeal (whole wheat) or chapatti flour (use a GF flour mix, if needed)
1 tsp baking powder
½ tsp ground cinnamon
60g / 2 oz / 4 TBSP aroma-free coconut butter (e.g. Tiana) or non dairy spread (e.g. Pure)
75g / 2½ oz / ¾ cup rolled oats (use certified GF oats, if needed)
4 TBSP coconut sugar (or unrefined caster sugar)
2 TBSP maple syrup (or agave syrup)
30g / 1 oz / ¼ cup pecans, chopped
40g / 1½ oz / ¼ cup almonds, chopped

Method
Preheat the oven to 180C (160C fan) / 350F / Gas 4.

Place the sliced apples, cinnamon, sultanas, juice and syrup in a large saucepan. Partially cover with a lid and simmer for 15 minutes until the apples are soft and fluffy. Taste test and add more sweetener, if needed.

Meanwhile, prepare the topping: Place the flour, baking powder, cinnamon and coconut butter in a food processor and pulse until the butter is fully incorporated. Tip into a bowl and stir in the oats, sugar, syrup and nuts.
Spoon the apples into a 1.5 litre / 1½ quart ovenproof dish. Sprinkle the crumble on top. Bake for 20 minutes or so, until the topping is golden.

Stored in an airtight container, it will last up to a week in the fridge, or for weeks in the freezer.

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Products used in this recipe (UK stockists)
Pyrex Rectangular Lidded Dish, available from Amazon (currently discounted to £3.50)
Magimix Food Processor
Tiana Coconut Cooking Butter, available from Suma, health food shops and online
Biona Organic Coconut Sugar, available from Suma, health food shops and online
Suma Organic Sultanas, available direct from Suma, via Amazon, and independent health food shops (love that they come in recyclable packaging!)
Clarks Original Maple Syrup, available from Tesco, Asda, Sainsbury’s, Morrisons

What’s your favourite fruit crumble? For me, it’s a close call between apple and plum 🙂

Have you made any crumbles this Autumn/Fall? If you’ve posted any recipes, please do share below xx

Our Wildlife Garden & Summer Fruits Energy Shake (‘Breakfast in a Glass’)

Published on September 20, 2013 by Sharon5 Comments

What a glorious summer we’ve had this year! After a spell of wet, overcast summers, it was such a refreshing change to have blue skies and sunshine for pretty much the whole of July and August. I absolutely loved it and took every opportunity I could to be outside, making the most of it ♥

The plants and insects clearly loved the weather too! This year, I decided to let the failed ‘veggie’ patch grow wild and turn it into a little haven for wildlife.

The whole summer it’s been a hive of activity, filled with all manner of bee, butterfly and beetle. We’ve also had baby toads and slow worms living in there too!

Does anyone know the name of the yellow plant below? I think it’s beautiful and it doesn’t get munched at all. As soon as I know its name, I’ll add it to my list of slug and snail resistant plants 🙂

We’ve also had success growing raspberries in the patch 🙂 A generous friend gave me six plants earlier this summer, and by late August they were already producing fruit. This raspberry is golden yellow in colour, which seems to make it less appealing to the birds. While the leaves of the plant have been munched, the fruits haven’t been touched at all!

Normally at this time of year, I would be out on my bike foraging for blackberries, but this year there was no need. By leaving the garden wild, we ended up with our own bumper crop!

In the mornings, I’ve been enjoying energy shakes for breakfast, made with a cup of freshly picked blackberries. By adding in some oats, ground almonds and chia seeds, the shake becomes a very satisfying ‘breakfast in a glass’. The additions make the shake so filling that I don’t get hungry all morning!

This shake also makes a fantastic post-exercise recovery drink and after-school ‘snack’ to revive energy levels. I find they’re especially useful as a filling, energy booster on weekday nights when Lil’ L has after-school activities and dinner is going to be served late.

These smoothies have been a great way to encourage Lil’ L to eat berries. He still won’t go anywhere near whole berries (it’s a ‘texture thing’) but he’ll happily gulp them down in a shake. When he was little, I used to blend the berries and milk first, then strain it to make it completely smooth before blending in the remaining ingredients. These days, he’s happy to drink the smoothies straight up, pips and all!

Here’s how we make them:

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Summer Fruits Energy Shake

Makes 1 large drink
Hands-on time: 5 minutes Ready in: 5 minutes

Ingredients
240ml / 8 fl oz / 1 cup fortified soya milk (or other non dairy milk)
4 tbsp soya yoghurt (or other non dairy yoghurt)
140g / 5 oz / 1 cup fresh summer fruits* (blackberries, strawberries, raspberries, blueberries, tayberries)
1 TBSP rolled oats (use certified GF oats, if needed)
1 TBSP ground almonds
1 TBSP chia seeds
1 TBSP maple syrup (or agave syrup)
Ground cacao nibs (optional, for nutrient boost & garnish)

*You can use frozen berries to make a thicker, ice cream-style shake

Method
Place the ingredients in a high speed blender. Pulse to break up the fruit, then blend on high speed until smooth. Taste test and add more sweetener, if needed. Pour into a tall glass and serve.

Notes
To make a smooth, pip-free shake (which might be more appealing to small children), first blend the milk and berries on high speed for a minute. Pour through a sieve to catch all the pips. Return the shake to the blender, add in the remaining ingredients and blend on high speed for a minute or so.

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And to make to even more scrumptious, I like to top off my shake with some ground cacao nibs 🙂

The Good Stuff ♥
Blackberries – Fantastic immunity boosters, packed with antioxidants, including vitamin C. Also a great source of dietary fibre, vitamin K, and manganese
Fortified soya milk & yoghurt – Good source of protein, calcium, vitamins B12 and D, yoghurt cultures
Oats – Provides slow-release energy
Almonds – Provides protein. Rich source of antioxidant Vitamin E, riboflavin, manganese and magnesium
Chia seeds – Good source of protein and dietary fibre. Rich in calcium, manganese, phosphorous and omega 3 fat
Cacao Nibs – Packed with nutrients, including lots of antioxidants. Check out my raw chocolate post to find out more.

Products used in this recipe
Alpro soya milk and plain soya yoghurt (available in all major UK supermarkets)
Mornflake Superfast Oats (available from Tesco and Asda)
Chia seeds (available from health food stores and online. I purchased mine from Earthfare)
Duronic 1200 1.8 litre Jug Blender, available from Amazon
Cacao nibs – available from health food stores and online. I use the Elements for Life Cacao Nib Grinder

Have you had any success growing fruits or veggies this year? Do you ever go foraging?

Sunshine, Veggies & Sport Relief!

Published on March 27, 2012 by Sharon17 Comments

Hi everyone! I hope you’re having a great week so far! 🙂

What glorious weather we’re having here in the UK! What with the clocks going forward on Sunday, the lighter evenings and warm sunshine, it feels like we’ve entered Summer rather than Spring.

The magnolia tree by our front door is now in full bloom.

I love the blossom on these trees. Yet another beautiful sight of Spring!

We spent the whole weekend outside, enjoying the good weather. On Saturday, we went to the market town of Devizes in Wiltshire and had a lovely lunch sitting outside the Little House of Coffee, in the Market Place. The town was buzzing with activity and had such a great vibe. The people here are so friendly!

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We then popped to see friends in the village of Seend Cleeve and had a great time catching up with them whilst sunning ourselves in their garden. Is this seriously March? If feels more like July!

On Sunday morning, M, Lil’ L and I took part in the Sport Relief Mile in Victoria Park Bath. It’s the first charity running event that we’ve completed as a family and it was so much fun!

We’ve raised about £100, which we’ll be sending off to join the other £54 million + that has been raised so far for this very worthwhile cause.

Huge respect for John Bishop who cycled, ran and rowed over 295 miles from Paris to London in five days to raise money for Sport Relief. Talk about guts and determination. So far he’s raised over £3.4 million. What a guy! And he’s vegetarian! Ha ha, had to get that one in there 😉 You can read about John’s “Week of Hell” here. After seeing what John went through, never again will I complain if I get a stitch when I’m out on one of my little 4 mile runs!

Sunday afternoon we did some work in the garden, and I started to have a think about what to plant this year. We’ve always struggled to grow veggies because of the billions of slugs, snails and other little critters that live here. Rather than making the same mistakes over again, I thought it would be a good idea to start with a review of how our veggie growing attempts have gone this past year.

To be honest, it didn’t go as well as I’d hoped…

I’ll start with the disasters…

1. Tomatoes
We grew about 12 plants (10 from seed). We grew them in pots, grobags and some directly in the ground. It looked promising, and we actually had little green tomatoes growing on the plants.

Then disaster struck. We had so much rain last August that all the plants got blight and went black & mouldy.
Yield: zero edible tomatoes 🙁

2. Courgette (zucchini)
I grew one courgette plant in a pot. It started to get eaten by slugs, snails and wood lice, so I ended up bringing it into the back porch every night. It then got covered in black fly.

But then a ladybird took up residence on the plant and the black fly were gone. The plant produced the most beautiful flowers and 3 lovely little courgettes started to appear on the plant.

As soon as we got back from our holiday in August, I rushed into the garden to see how my ‘pet’ courgette was doing… only to discover that the plant was covered in earwigs happily munching away on my little veggies 🙁
Yield: half a courgette

3. Butternut squashes
I grew the squashes from seed and planted them out in the raised beds that M had spent hours making for me. I covered the plants with bell cloches to protect them while they were small.

As soon as the bell cloches were removed…. the slugs descended! Night after night, come rain or shine, I went to the veggie patch and removed the slugs. In one night, I picked up 40! There were 2 toads resident on the veggie patch and even they couldn’t keep up with the sheer volume of slugs.

The gravel round the raised beds didn’t deter the slugs (instead it just attracted cat poo 🙁 ). We put copper tape round the top of the wooden border, and that didn’t work either. I tried putting strong smelling plants (like rosemary) round the edge, again no luck.

Yield: zero squashes. Most of the flowers got eaten before the squashes had a chance to grow. About 5 little squashes did appear… but they got eaten too!

4. Sweetcorn
We grew the sweetcorn from seed and had 5 plants that were strong enough to plant out. As soon as the sweetcorns started to appear, most of them got eaten by slugs/snails and earwigs.

Yield: 4 very small sweetcorns. They were delicious, but took us about 2 minutes to eat.

5. Gooseberries
We bought two gooseberry bushes. They were covered in spikes so I didn’t imagine that they would be eaten. Wrong! Even though we kept them in pots, every single green shoot on the plants got eaten by slugs/snails!

Let’s move onto the successes now…

6. Flat leaf parsley
Last summer I sprinkled some parsley seeds into a pot… and they grew beautifully! The plant is still going strong now 🙂 Slugs and snails don’t go near it. It requires very little care; just the occasional watering. I did bring it into the back porch over the winter, but it’s back outside now.

Yield: Since last summer, I’ve been using this parsley in my cooking and for garnishes. As soon as you cut it, it seems to shoot up again. Such a great plant!

7. Basil
Last Spring I sprinkled basil seeds into old yoghurts pots and was amazed how quickly they started to grow. I transferred the plants into larger pots and put them on the dining room window sill. They were really easy to look after, looked beautiful, and smelt wonderful as you brushed past them.

Yield: I had so much fresh basil that I made my own home-made pesto throughout the Spring and early Summer. We also used the basil in pasta dishes and for tomato & basil salads.

Before we went on holiday in August, I froze a huge bag of basil leaves, and it was a good job that I did. The plants had to be left in the garden whilst we were away and, on our return, we found them totally munched and covered in white fly 🙁

8. Rosemary
The rosemary bush has been at our house longer than us! Slugs/snails leave it alone. It survives all weather conditions. The perfect low maintenance plant!

Yield: A never ending supply of fresh rosemary which I use in cooking and bread making.

9. Lemon Balm
I planted this in the raised bed in the orchard and the slugs/snails leave it alone. I haven’t used it in my cooking yet, but I’ll be looking out for some recipes shortly.

10. Kale
We filled Lil’ L’s old sand pit with compost, placed it up on our summer house deck and attempted to grow some kale in it. Shortly after it started growing, a large batch of caterpillars arrived and ate most of the leaves. About half of the plants survived… and they’re still going strong now.

Yield: We’ve got about 3 scarlet kale plants that are still producing lots of leaves.

11. Apples
We had a huge bounty of apples last Autumn. Literally hundreds 🙂

Even the tiny apple tree in our rockery grew lots of lovely eating apples 🙂

For months, we didn’t have to buy a single apple from the supermarket. We enjoyed lots of apple compotes, apple crumbles, and apple pancakes.

In an attempt to overwinter the apples, M made this ventilated storage system which we filled with the best apples.

Until a couple of weeks ago, I was still using surplus apples that we’ d stacked in an old cardboard box. You can imagine how delighted I was when I went to select one of our ‘finest’ apples from the storage system… only to find that the whole lot had been eaten by mice! You gotta laugh!

12. Plums
Last Autumn we had the best crop of plums that we’ve ever had. Literally hundreds! The boughs were so laden with fruit that some of them unfortunately snapped.

I made sure that we didn’t waste a single plum. I stewed big batches of them and put them in the freezer. Plum compote is one of my most favourite desserts ever! We finished our last batch of frozen plums only a few days ago.

Veggie growing plans 2012
Isn’t it just typical that the most success we had last year was with the plants that pretty much look after themselves… the apple and plum trees and the parsley!

This year, I’m not going to bother growing any veggies other than the kale. I think the kale has got potential to work, but I must remember to cover it with netting to try and prevent the caterpillars arriving.

I’d love to buy another fruit tree. Perhaps a greengage?

But mainly, I’m going to focus on herbs. I’ll definitely be growing more parsley and basil. I also bought these three little herbs from a charity sale in Lacock – thyme, sage and chocolate peppermint.

The chocolate peppermint smells wonderful! I’m already looking forward to a cup of fresh chocolate mint tea! Yum!

Are you planning to grow any veggies, fruits, or herbs this year? If so, I’d love to hear your plans. Can you recommend any easy, low maintentance veggies that I should try? (preferably slug proof 😉 )

Big Budget Challenge – Weeks V & VI

Published on November 17, 2011 by Sharon11 Comments

I’m now into my sixth week of the Big Budget Challenge, hosted by the lovely Laura @ KeepingHealthyGettingStylish. I’m still really enjoying this challenge, largely due to the fact that I’m finding ways to make lots of savings without feeling that I’m depriving the family or compromising on the quality of the goods I’m buying. That’s the way to do it! 😉

Here’s a rundown of my money saving attempts over the past two weeks:

1. Avoid waste. Still haven’t thrown away any food! In the past, I would often end up throwing away half-used pots of hummus that were hiding at the back of the fridge. Since taking on the B.B.C. challenge, I’ve made sure that I make regular checks of what’s in the fridge and use up everything before it starts to grow fur.

Last week, I found myself with a large bag of organic carrots that would soon be past their best, so I decided to make some carrot and coriander soup. I asked M to stop at the supermarket on the way home from work and buy some speciality bread to make the meal a touch more special. By the time he arrived there, all the freshly made bread was being sold off at a fraction of the original price so he picked up some fantastic bargains, including some carrot and pumpkin seed bread for 50p a loaf!

The soup was so delicious… really creamy, yet I didn’t put any milk or cream in it! If anyone’s interested in the recipe, I can post it.

2. Shop around for the cheapest deals. I did another large online grocery shop last week and used www.mysupermarket.co.uk again. So simple and quick to use (took me less than 20 mins). Again, the website confirmed that Tesco was the cheapest supermarket for my grocery basket (£127 at Tesco vs £145 at Sainsbury; £147 at Asda; £168 at Waitrose). I saved £15.85 by multi-buying (2-4-1s, etc) and a further £16.40 by using the website’s ‘Swap & Save’ function.

This week’s top bargains from Tesco:
– 750g Natco Cashew Nuts for £5.00 (compared to £1.99 for 200g in the Tesco own label range)
– 400g Natco Jeera Ground cumin for £1.99 (compared to 85p for 43g in the Tesco own label range).

3. Make use of home-grown foods. Still using tons of home-grown apples, stewing them, making puddings, and puree for apple pancakes.

4. Go foraging! I didn’t go far this week… just into the garden. With the crazy weather we’re currently experiencing, lots of plants that we normally see in Spring have started shooting up now… including the stinging nettles. For years I’ve been saying that I’m going to try cooking the nettles and, last Tuesday, I finally got round to doing it! The Nettle Bhajee (which featured in yesterday’s post) was really tasty and I’ll definitely make it again 🙂

5. Make use of vouchers and deals. This week, I did an online shop at Goodness Direct to stock up on nuts and seeds, as well as buy some delicious healthy organic treats. There are a few codes available on the web that give you £10 off your order with Goodness Direct, including the one on the right-hand side of Laura’s website. You also get free delivery when you spend over £35.

It felt like Christmas had come early when the box arrived on the door step! Here’s what I got…

I bulk-purchased some of the foods that we consume a lot, and this saved me a small fortune. My top two bulk purchases were 3kg of brown linseed for £5.07 (this will keep us going for the next year!) and 500g pitted dates for £1.55 (I bought 2 bags). These prices are way cheaper than anything I’ve ever found in the supermarkets or local health food stores.

Another tip… if you buy broken Brazil nuts, they are much cheaper than whole Brazil nuts. For ages, I’ve been buying whole Brazil nuts then spend ages chopping them up! At Goodness Direct, 250g of broken Brazil nuts are £1.99 compared to £3.33 for the whole nuts!

So, with all these savings on bulk purchases, free delivery, £10 off, I felt I deserved a few delicious organic treats (even if I am in the midst of the Big Budget Challenge 😉 ) At the moment, I am absolutely loving Meridian’s organic wild blueberry and cherry & berry spreads, and their Green Pesto (in the ‘Free From’ range). Regardless of the fact that it’s vegan, I think this is the best pesto out there! Not only does it taste great, but it’s also got an amazing texture (little bit crunchy, just how I like it 🙂 )

I’m definitely going to explore bulk purchasing more. Do you bulk buy any grocery items? If so, what’s your top bulk purchase items and where do you buy them?

Big Budget Challenge – Weeks III & IV

Published on November 3, 2011February 20, 2023 by Sharon11 Comments

As it was the half term school holidays last week, which began with a mini break to Sherwood Forest followed by Lil’ L’s 8th birthday, I didn’t get round to posting an update for Laura’s Big Budget Challenge. Many apologies Laura! To make up for this, I’ll give a rundown of my ‘money saves’ over the past two weeks vis-a-vis my 5 budget rules.

1. Avoid waste. I’m pleased to say that I’ve managed to avoid throwing away any food over the past two weeks 🙂 There was a close call with a bag of spinach that was starting to look sorry for itself, but Laura’s post on Monday inspired me to make a spinach, butternut squash and chickpea curry. I even roasted the squash seeds (for the first time ever) and we had them with the hemp burger and roasted squash dinner on Monday. No seeds will ever get thrown away again… they’re so nice lightly roasted! 🙂

2. Shop around for cheapest deals. I’m planning to do another big online grocery shop tomorrow and I’ll definitely be using www.mysupermarket.co.uk again. It saved me quite a few pounds on my last big grocery shop and I’m intrigued to see what I can save this time round 🙂

3. Make use of home grown foods. We’ve been eating lots of home-grown apples (still not sick of them 😉 ). We’ve also had some very generous donations of home-grown produce from friends and family, including these amazing courgettes/zucchinis.

As well as using the zucchini in lots of savoury dishes (roasted veg & pasta; lasagna; fajitas), I made some wicked date and zucchini brownies last week, which I pictured in yesterday’s post. (I’ll be writing up the recipe and posting it very soon).

All the donated produce has been used up now, so I’ve turned my attention to some rather unusual home-grown produce… dandelion leaves and nettles. I didn’t intentionally grow these, but as they’re growing so beautifully in my garden, it’ll be fun to see whether I can turn them into something tasty 😉

4. Go foraging! Whilst cycling round Sherwood Forest last week, I couldn’t resist a quick pause to collect sweet chestnuts.

The cases are so prickly! I used my feet to squeeze the nuts out of the shells, while M adopted a more hands-on approach.

I didn’t have a bag with me, so I crammed as many as I could into the back pocket of my cycling jacket.

You won’t believe how many I actually managed to cram into that pocket!

I absolutely adore roasted chestnuts! They really remind me of childhood Christmas Eves when my Dad would roast chestnuts, sprinkle them with salt and tip them on a newspaper. We’d then sit on the living room floor and tuck in!

Today, I decided to use some of the nuts to make a sweet chestnut casserole with herby dumplings.

The dumplings were flavoured with fresh rosemary from the garden. This is one of the few edible plants that the slugs and snails actually leave alone! It’s a really easy herb to grow and seems to look after itself. Our plant has been here the whole time we’ve lived in Bath (11 years now) and it hasn’t need any attention at all. (That’s SO my sort of plant 😉 )

5. Make use of vouchers and deals. We used our Tesco vouchers again on Lil’ L’s birthday, saving us £21 on the entry fee into a sea aquarium. I’m glad we didn’t pay real money for this trip as the aquarium was awful (in my opinion). The image of the snake-headed turtle pounding up and down its tiny tank is still haunting me 🙁

So that’s my big budget challenge update for weeks III and IV! Have you had any great money saves in the last month? If so, I’d love to hear them!

The Big Budget Challenge – Week II

Published on October 20, 2011 by Sharon10 Comments

I’m now in my second week of ‘The Big Budget Challenge’ hosted by the lovely Laura @ Keeping Healthy Getting Stylish. I did okay in Week I, but Week 2 has been even better 🙂

Here’s a run down of my top ‘money saves’ this week:

1. Avoid waste. No food thrown away this week!

See these sad-looking bananas….

I turned them into this:

It’s banana cinnamon ‘ice cream’. It’s so creamy that you would think it was proper ice cream! To make it, I simply cut the bananas into slices, froze them, then whizzed them in the blender on the ice setting until they were all chopped up. I then transferred them to a bowl, added a dash of nondairy milk, lashings of cinnamon and a tablespoon of ground linseed. I then pulsed them using a hand blender until they went white and creamy. The bananas were so ripe that I didn’t need to add any sweetener. Lil’ L loves this dessert and it makes a nice change from apples 😉

2. Shop around for cheapest deals. I finally got round to trying out www.mysupermarket.co.uk that a friend recommended way back in the summer. I was really impressed with it. It’s so simple to use. At a click of a button, it allows you to import your online shopping basket from your usual provider (mine’s Tesco). You can then easily edit the basket, deleting items you no longer need and adding new items.

Then, it does something really useful…

It shows you how you can save money by swapping to cheaper items. If you agree with their ‘Swap & Save’ suggestions, you just click to swap. I saved £6.36 by swapping some items.
It then compares the cost of your basket at four supermarkets. If your shop would be cheaper elsewhere, you just click to swap. I did a big grocery shop (83 items) and the total was £139 at Tesco. In Asda, the same shop would have cost me £155; Sainsbury’s £166; and Ocado (Waitrose) a wopping £177. I’ve always done my big grocery shops at Tesco, so it was great to discover that it is actually the cheapest supermarket for me. 🙂

It’s interesting because the cheapest supermarket very much depends on the types of groceries you buy. For my friend, Sainsbury’s came out £30 cheaper than Tesco! Lately, I’ve been disorganised with my grocery shopping and have ended up buying bits and pieces on a weekly basis from the Waitrose in Bath. By getting more organised and ordering a fortnightly Tesco home delivery, I should save a small fortune! 🙂

3. Make use of home grown foods. We’re eating tons of apples and there’s still hundreds left! After watching Monty Don’s episode on how to ‘over winter’ apples, I challenged M to make me a storage contraption using old scraps from the garage. He rose to the challenge and made a great storage system…..

… but it took him the whole of Sunday. He’s now banned me from watching Gardners’ World as he’s fed up with landing Monty Don’s ‘Jobs for the Weekend’. 😉

4. Go foraging! No foraging this week as I’m still working out what to do with all the nuts we found last week!

5. Make use of vouchers and deals. HUGE savings here! Last Friday, me and my good friend J went to London to meet up with our gorgeous friends N and H for lunch. I converted my Tesco vouchers into tokens for redspottedhankie.com and managed to get both our travel tickets for FREE! A total saving of £66! This meant we had more cash to spend on gorgeous eats and drinks 🙂

So, lots of savings this week. Good thing too because next week is going to be v. v. expensive 😉