A very, very simple pasta bake (seriously) that you can throw any leftovers you like in (makes enough to feed 4 approx)
1) Boil pasta shells/shapes of any description
2) Melt 3 tablespoons butter
3) Add enough flour to form a dry paste (about 2 tablespoons)
4) Pour in a small amount of milk and stir until combined with flour. Repeat with small amounts of milk until mixture forms sauce.
5) Remove from heat.
At this point you can add grated cheese if you have it, but it's ok if you don't.
6) Mix pasta and white/cheese sauce together until well combined.
Now, here's where you add whatever. Right now, if you've added cheese you have your basic mac and cheese, so whatever you add becomes much more of a meal. I added to mine a little chicken, leek, carrot and peas all of which I had cooked up together with whatever dried herbs I had. I also had a small bit of leftover cream so that went in to.
Then, mix with the pasta and sauce, put in overproof dish and bake for about 30 minutes.
If this recipe seems vague it's because it is! There's nothing fixed about it. All you really need is the pasta, the white sauce and some leftover goodies and you're away!
One of my favourite things to do is go out for breakfast, but obviously it's a very expensive treat, therefore I have been working on cooking more 'cafe' style breakfasts at home. This morning I cooked up my version of a subway breakfast (not that I would go out to Subway for breakfast, but my husband was hungover and this seemed to fit the bill).
I had already bought two sub rolls from Coles, so had one left over, meaning 6-inch each. It was a day old, so perfect for what I was doing. I broke an egg into a wide cup, beat it and stuck it in the microwave for 20 seconds, took it out, stirred and nuked it for 20 more seconds, so it was still fairly runny. Then I sliced the 6-inch sub in half lengthways and pressed the dough on one side in to make a trough. Then I poured the egg into this trough. A few slices of cheese on top followed by the top of the roll and then wrapped the sub in foil. Once I'd finished the other one I stuck them both in the oven for about 10 minutes till the cheese had melted.
When I unwrapped them I lifted the top of the sub up and poured tomato sauce in, but you could put anything or nothing in if you liked. It was delicious, and the husband said, better than Subway.
So, in my wallet I have about 6 of those 'buy 10 get one free' coffee things. No brainer, huh? You probably all have them. However, I take it one step further. I always make sure I do the coffee run every morning, and usually end up getting at least 3, if not 4 coffees for my colleagues (they give me cash of course! Did you not read how hard up I am?!). Essentially what I do is, go down, buy the coffees for them, get the stamps and only get myself a coffee when I have enough stamps, usually every third or fourth day. At the price of coffee nowadays, this is saving me $19 per week!
Now, some people have to have a coffee everyday and I sympathise. I am currently researching cheaper options for daily coffee so stay tuned!
I have switched over half of the downlights in my kitchen from halogens to LEDs. I found that the halogens were forever blowing and I have 8 of them, so it was getting pretty expensive. I bought the LEDs from Bunnings, but I've seen them in Coles/Woolies etc, so they are out there.
The Pros:
- They state that they will last for 20 years
- They only use 1 watt of electricity. This is pretty impressive when you compare that to halogens
- Money saving
The Cons,
- They create spots of light, so there are more shadows in my kitchen
I worked out that roughly, just from changing 4 out of 8 lights to LEDs that I would save $80 per year on electricity bills. That is some good savings.
moar_skills for financial tips and advice, including saving money on the things you want and need. If you have any ideas please feel free to join and share - the community has still got its bubblewrap on but already has over 200+ members. :D