Cooking with Tallyrand

The days of oppulence in cuisine for most people seems to be a distant memory, replacing it seems to be more the days of my parents. Parents born of the post war era, rationing books and tight family budgeting. Well OK, I maybe exagerating a little, but we all seem to be tightening our belts now, more than we have for a decade or so 

With that in mind, I thought an article on saving on the family budget in the kitchen. Tips and tricks, with links to budget recipes. Maybe dusting off some recipes and ideas from a bygone era but still provides a hearty, nutritious home cooked meal, or snack 

tips and tricks 

• reduce cooking time of roast meats by piercing a couple of metal skewers, through it and then roasting (with the skewers left in. This helps the heat penetrate 
• retain the end crusts of sliced loaves in the freezer and make a bread and butter pudding when you have enough of them or use for a summer pudding
• boiled a gammon? Don't throw away the cooking liquor, allow it to simmer away until only half a cup is left and freeze it down in a cube tray or similar and use it as a concentrated stock for soups and stews
• biscuits or crackers gone stale? don't throw them away, pre-heat an oven to 180C, pop them onto a baking tray and bake for approx 5 minutes, once cool they are as good as new! This is because they go stale by absorbing moisture, baking them dries them out again

tips and tricks links

• prolonging fresh vegetable shelf life      - http://dawlish.com/article/details/59

recipe links

• hearty vegetable soup                          - http://dawlish.com/article/details/45
• corned beef hash                                  - http://www.dawlish.com/article/details/73