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Chicken Stew and Dumplings

February 16, 2021 by Celia @ Fig Jam and Lime Cordial

A friend once said to me “you’re always adding up what everything costs”. She was right too, and I don’t seem to be able to stop.

I think it started in our thirties when we went through a bad cash crunch for a couple of years. Pete was retrenched at the same time that Small Man was diagnosed with Stage 4 cancer.

Worrying about paying the bills would wake me up in the middle of the night. I kept endless spreadsheets, constantly trying to figure out how to trim our budget. And in hindsight, we learnt some amazing life lessons as a result. Never waste money, but make it a goal to be free from the burdens it imposes. Be smart enough to be content. Don’t incur debt recklessly. Don’t fall into the trap of measuring your life against other people‘s. Importantly, be prepared, because the universe can pull the rug out from under your feet at any time.

Even now, more than 20 years later, I’m still counting. Not out of fear any longer though. These days the habit (and it really IS a habit now) is fueled by a desire to waste as little as possible, and the personal power that comes from knowing we’re living – thriving – within our means.

So please indulge my excitement at last night’s ridiculously delicious dinner of chicken stew with dumplings, made from the carcasses I wrote about last week.

The entire pot, easily enough to feed four, cost us under $5 in total. It was incredibly good, not just for a frugal meal, but rather serve-at-a-dinner-party good. It was also a doddle to make – the stock and pulled meat were in the freezer, the dumplings were just self-raising flour and butter, and the vegetables were in the fridge and pantry. The recipe came from Save With Jamie and it’s available online here. We left out the bacon and fried the veg in chicken fat instead, and substituted a tin of corn kernels for the button mushrooms. It was a wonderful way to start the week! ♥

Posted in Frugal Living, Recipes | 2 Comments »

Homemade Blood and Bone

February 7, 2021 by Celia @ Fig Jam and Lime Cordial

Today was Stock Making Sunday!

Every few months, I’ll purchase three bags of chicken carcasses from Chicken George at nearby Marrickville Metro (nine carcasses for $5 total), stash a few in the freezer and turn the remainder into stock and schmaltz. I wrote about this last year, but we’ve added a new step to the process, so I thought it warranted a revisit. I also thought it was worth adding a little more detail on how Pete renders down the chicken fat, so here’s a step-by-step rundown.

Step 1: we trimmed the fat off five carcasses then roasted them in a 175C fan oven (unseasoned) until golden.

Step 2: the carcasses then went into our large stockpot with a knob of peeled ginger, a sliced onion, a tablespoon (four teaspoons) of flossy sea salt and five litres of water. It was brought to a boil covered, then simmered covered for 30 minutes. The heat was then turned off, and the pot allowed to sit covered for a further 30 minutes.

A side note: this is now my preferred method of making chicken stock. I don’t boil it for hours or use a pressure cooker any more, although I’ve done both in the past. I’ve found that roasting the bones first and simmering covered for just half an hour produces a lovely, full-flavoured stock and plenty of it – I ended up with a full five litres (possibly a bit more) for the freezer. The shorter cooking time is more energy efficient as well.

Step 3: we cut the trimmed fat into small pieces with kitchen scissors, then put them into a saucepan just large enough to fit them all in a single layer. Water was added to just cover the fat and brought to a  gentle boil with the lid on. We then uncovered the pan and let it simmer very gently until all the water was gone and the remaining liquid (fat) was quite clear, the bubbles had mostly subsided (we had to watch it carefully near the end to make sure it didn’t darken and burn), and the solids had turned crispy and brown (these are Pete’s instructions, he’s in charge of fat rendering).


Step 4: we removed the carcasses from the stock and picked the tender meat off the bones, leaving the bits that were too dry.

Step 5: (and this is where it gets exciting) after picking the meat off the bones, we broke them up and roasted them in a hot oven (200C – 220C with fan). They took about 30 minutes to dry out completely but Pete kept a close eye on them – they needed to be very dry to the point where they were just starting to burn around the edges (see photo below)…


Step 6: once the bones had cooled a little, we blitzed them in Henry the Hot Mix (Pete says any robust blender with a glass or metal bowl or jug should work, but probably not a food processor. He also warns not to use anything with a plastic bowl as it would probably scratch it very badly).


Step 7: we then mixed the resultant bonemeal with wood ash saved from Rosie the Smoker, in a proportion that has at least 50% bonemeal (we use about 2/3 bonemeal, 1/3 ash). We also added dried and ground up egg shells. Pete says that the ash is to help dry out the bonemeal but it needs be added judiciously – not all gardens can take a lot of ash (apparently it depends on the soil pH).

Voila! Homemade blood and bone…


So to sum up: our $2.78 worth of chicken carcasses (five of the nine we bought for $5) produced:

  • 8 boxes (5 litres) of roasted chicken stock for the freezer
  • 1 box of picked chicken meat (which we’ll use in soups and risottos)
  • 1 jar of chicken fat (schmaltz), and
  • 3 cups (approximately) of homemade blood and bone

There’s something incredibly satisfying about starting with what was already a waste byproduct (chicken carcasses) and being able to turn them into so much goodness for the kitchen and garden. Best of all, we were able to use up every bit of the carcasses – not a single scrap ended up in the rubbish. It felt like a big win! ♥

Posted in Frugal Living, Recipes | 12 Comments »

Make and Thrive

February 4, 2021 by Celia @ Fig Jam and Lime Cordial

I’ve always had a problem with the expression “Mend and Make Do”.

I understand the history behind it, and during a period of war shortages, it would have been a critical mindset. But the notion of compromise irks me, because mending and making help our family to thrive, not make do.

My most recent project has been to replace our fitted sheets. After more than a decade of daily service, our king sized Lands End sheets have finally given up the ghost. The fabric won’t be wasted though – I’ve turned the usable parts into beeswax wraps, the thinner sections into large furoshiki to bundle up out of season blankets, and the really torn bits into rags.

I was keen to purchase new sheets from Sheridan Australia – their fabrics are sensational and I’ve long been an admirer of their many sustainability and social justice initiatives. I didn’t end up buying from them in the end (the $300 starting point for a KS set was out of my budget), but their website is definitely worth a read.

So I went back to what I know, and made some new fitted sheets. They’re actually a doddle to sew, providing you can wrap your head around the big numbers. If anyone is interested in knowing more, let me know and I’ll try to draft up a rough tutorial.

In 1994, I’d purchased a roll of thick pure cotton sheeting – a Country Road second, I was told – from Fox’s Fabrics for $1 a metre. Oh how I loved that shop! Old Mr Fox was a wizard at picking up bargains at auction, and Maude and I used to visit almost weekly. The giant roll I bought has since been used for everything from bags to beeswax wraps, and face masks to dress toiles. I’ve also made bedsheets for the entire family from it, and I found two king sized top sheets leftover from an earlier set I’d made (it always seems to be the fitted sheet that wears out first!).

The first sheet was slightly too short, so I added a section from the worn out fitted sheet to extend it (the bits which had been on the side of the mattress were unworn). I then boxed the corners and sewed some leftover boxer short elastic (another Fox purchase from 1994) around the outside and voila…new king size fitted sheet…

The second sheet was larger, but I’d run out of boxer short elastic, so I used the drawstring elastic I’d purchased from The Sewing Basket in Newington. Donated by Bonds Australia, I’d been trimming it down to make mask straps, but it was also perfect for the sheets. I started by pulling the cord out from the middle channel…

The elastic was then folded in half and zigzagged around the edge of the boxed sheet. I used a wide stitch, stretching from front and back as I sewed (see video below). When I make these, I don’t pin anything (too lazy), I simply stretch the elastic, encase the edge, stitch, then move on to the next bit. The elastic on fitted sheets doesn’t need to be precise! My KS fitted sheet used up approximately 5 metres of the elastic, which meant I ended up with a super high quality thick cotton fitted sheet for just $5 and about 40 minutes of my time. It’s hard to argue with those sorts of numbers!

In case you’re wondering, the hand wave was a signal to Small Man to keep filming, rather than a Liberace style flourish…

. . . . .

To finish off the sheeting story, I sewed a new linen flat sheet from a rescued quilt cover. It also needed an extender piece, provided by the other side panel of the old fitted sheet…

Here’s an upcycling tip – sheeting is the great find in thrift stores. Most people are put off by used bed linen, but it’s completely fine if you’re selective. Avoid fitted sheets and pillowcases, as they’re usually very worn and often a bit gross. Flat sheets are always worth a look, particularly if they’re vintage. But quilt (doona) covers are the real treasure – they’re usually barely used and offer a wealth of fabric for very little money. I picked up an as-new vintage Sheridan (back when it was still made locally) pure cotton quilt cover, queen sized, for just $12 recently at the Salvos. It’s nearly eight square metres of super high quality fabric! A soak in Napisan followed by a hot water wash brought it back to new.

Over the past year, I’ve gone through a lot of drawstring elastic – firstly for mask straps and now for sheeting – so I was keen to find something to do with the excess cord…

I ended up attempting my first macrame project in over 40 years, following this very clever tutorial…

Tah dah! I stitched three cords together to make a thicker handle, and the bag ended up a lot smaller than the one on the tutorial, probably because I was using thinner cord. It’s the perfect size for carrying a bottle of champagne to a restaurant though, 70s hippy style…

Best of all, it made use of a resource which might otherwise have gone to waste…

See how this is so much more than simply making do? Being able to repurpose and rescue materials, save money along the way, exercise creativity, problem solve…it’s all about thriving rather than just surviving.

Do you have a project on the go at the moment? I’d love to hear about it! (I’ve just started a slow stitch journal which I’ll tell you about soon) ♥

Posted in Frugal Living | 27 Comments »

36 years

January 12, 2021 by Celia @ Fig Jam and Lime Cordial

Good morning, friends!

Pete and I have just celebrated our 32nd wedding anniversary, and I thought this mash-up might make you smile – the photos were taken 36 years apart.

The first you’ve seen before – it was snapped by our best man Yuji in Cath’s bedroom at college in 1984. Back when photos were on negatives and sent to the chemist to be processed. Back when I wore berets and wristwatches.

The second was taken by my darling sister at Big Boy and Monkey Girl’s wedding in February last year. We’re still so grateful that it all happened before COVID19!

Wishing you all a very happy day! ♥

Posted in Food & Friends | 28 Comments »

Sustainability Winners

December 26, 2020 by Celia @ Fig Jam and Lime Cordial

It’s now been three full years since we started our waste reduction plan.

Here are a few of the changes we’ve made that have worked brilliantly, and continue to do so after all this time. They’re our sustainability winners!

. . . . .

T-Shirt Bags

We’ve experimented with all sorts of reusable bags – the green polypropylene ones from supermarkets, crocheted mesh bags, foldaway minis and furoshiki (which I still love), but without a doubt, our favourites and the ones we use almost exclusively now are t-shirt bags. Here’s our simple tutorial on how to make them.

They’re super strong, very durable, sit comfortably on your shoulder and most importantly, they WASH easily. Which means we use them to cart home messy stuff like raw meat and takeaway chicken, then the bags go straight into the laundry afterwards. And they’re made from Pete and the boys’ old t-shirts, so they make me smile every time we use them.

. . . . .

Beeswax Wraps

Yes, I know, I blag on endlessly about these, but what can I say? It’s not just that they’re an adequate green alternative; in most cases, we find they work much better than plastic bags. This is the pile we currently have on rotation…

And here are our latest veg purchases, wrapped ready for the crisper drawer. A nice, thick beeswax wrap will keep a head of lettuce fresh for up to two weeks…

As I mentioned in last week’s post, I recently spotted a packet of three small wraps (11″ square in imperial terms) for $39.95. That’s too small to wrap one of my loaves of sourdough or a bunch of snake beans from the garden…

By comparison, our homemade ones are 60-74cm long x 46cm wide (that’s about 24-29″ x 18″) and cost us less than $2 each to make. Plus they’re made from fabric that would otherwise have been thrown away (old sheeting is particularly good).

Our tutorial is here, and recently we’ve discovered that putting the fabric through the washing machine and tumble dryer first causes it to plump up, which means it will absorb more wax and therefore last longer. Some of our wraps have been going for over a year now, and we no longer keep any clingfilm in our kitchen…

. . . . .

Secondhand Clothing

This handsome man would like me to tell you all that secondhand and vintage clothing is not just more sustainable than new, it’s usually much more interesting as well. Over the past three years, Pete’s wardrobe has transitioned to almost entirely used and vintage finds (thanks in no small part to lovely Arnold at Potts Point Vintage). And my engineer who would only ever wear muted blues and blacks seems to have discovered a love for colour in the process (which I’m completely thrilled about!)…

Here he is, fully vintage attired in Japanese denim ($500 jeans that we found secondhand for $12), a 70s tshirt, a thick 1950s suede jacket which came from the performance collection of comedian “Bob Downe”. and a belt made from upcycled firehose by the inimitable Elvis and Kresse. Clothes are so much better when they have a story to tell!

Ok, this photo probably wasn’t necessary and I’ve posted it before, but I’m a bit besotted with it (and him!) and it’s Christmas, so I thought I’d share it again…

 

. . . . .

Secondhand Everything

It’s been surprisingly cathartic to step back from the new retail market.

With a few notable exceptions – underwear, the odd hardcover book, and purchases made to support young artists – almost everything we’ve bought this year has been secondhand. My Chinese mother finds it perplexing – why would we buy secondhand when buying new on sale can often cost the same?

But it comes down to two things for us: firstly, a wish to limit our consumption of new resources, given the energy and raw materials required to produce these, and secondly..the thrill of the hunt! It’s enormously rewarding to scour opshops (thrift stores), Reverse Garbage and the Bower for the perfect secondhand frame, only to find an even better, imperfect option. As a craft lover, finding everything I’ve needed this year (and…ahem…quite a few things I didn’t) at The Sewing Basket has meant that all my purchases were donated items diverted from landfill. And I’ve returned the ones I didn’t end up using, after “renting” them for a couple of months.

I’m honestly not sure my mental health would have survived 2020 without these creative outlets…

. . . . .

Cloth Napkins

Our stash of cloth napkins has been going strong for THREE YEARS and we haven’t had a single one wear out in that time. We use them every day, and we even pack our own when we eat out.  They’ve been through over a hundred washes each and occasionally I’ll Napisan a batch after a big curry dinner. That’s a saving of over 4,000 paper napkins to date.

I wouldn’t normally recommend using new fabric to make things, but the tenegui cloths we bought from Daiso have been so durable and low maintenance that it’s hard to fault them. The open weave makes them particularly easy to wash and line dry, and I’ve never bothered to iron them…

. . . . .

Solar Panels

It’s been a full year almost to the day since we had our solar energy system installed and we haven’t regretted a single minute of it. Whilst we’re still dependent on the grid for about 25% of our energy (because of timing issues and seasonal fluctuations), we’re thrilled to have been able to completely offset our electricity consumption for the past 12 months. According to one of the tracking apps we use, we’ve offset nearly 4.5 tonnes of carbon emissions over the year…

. . . . .

Worms, Soldier Flies, Chickens

It’s taken a while for us to get our backyard food recycling system running smoothly, but these days almost no food waste ends up in the red bin. Our original attempts included a Bokashi bin, but that didn’t work well for us – waiting for the leavings to break down and then burying them was too much of a smelly palaver.

These days, large scraps go to the chickens, vegetable scraps to the worms, and everything else goes into the soldier fly hatchery. The soldier fly pupae then provide a high source of protein for the chickens. Throwing organic material into waste is one of the worst things we can do with it – not only are the nutrients lost, but once it’s buried and trapped in plastic, it produces large quantities of methane as it decomposes…

. . . . .

Cotton Dishcloths and Hessian Scrubbers

I took the photo below just before drafting this post – several of the dishcloths shown have been in use for SEVEN YEARS. That sort of track record is hard to challenge! In all that time, I’ve only had to repair one, and only because I cut through the stitches while washing a knife.

These days we use the cotton cloths for wiping down benches and spills, and we clean pots with our homemade hessian scrubbers. The latter don’t last nearly as long, but they’re completely biodegradable, remove stuck-on burnt bits pretty easily, and go through the washing machine at least a dozen times before they need to be retired. And when they’re past their best, they go straight into the worm farm where they break down within weeks – the worms love them!

. . . . .

Learning to Mend

Again, I know you’re all sick of hearing me say this, but learning to mend has shifted our perspective on material possessions. We no longer look at something and automatically discard it when it’s broken or past its best. And when something has to go, there’s quite a lot of thought given to whether or not we can reuse or upcycle the materials before they finally end up in the bin.

This old laundry bag is a great example – it only cost $1 to buy years ago, and the plastic zip had separated from its base…

I was very close to just throwing it away, when I realised that a few handstitches were all that was required to reattach the zip. It lives to wash another day…or year…

I mended these for wee Sebastian across the road and he loves them…

. . . . .

Research Pays Off

This isn’t really one for the list, but it’s probably the crux of our sustainability journey. Make informed decisions! Wherever possible, deep dive into a topic as much as you can before making a choice. For example, after a couple of weeks of research, we decided to stick with our Kleenex toilet paper instead of switching to Who Gives A Crap.

Examine the information provided on items carefully – not only for what is provided, but also for omissions – do they advise how to dispose of their packaging? What are the ingredients and additives, and where are they sourced from? Are the items truly biodegradable? (Remember, there is no mandated definition of “biodegradable”, so in theory, everything will biodegrade…eventually).

Before each and every purchase, we try to ask ourselves, “could we source this secondhand? Are we making the most sustainable choice? Is there an end of life plan for this item?” It would be very hypocritical of me to imply that we do this perfectly, but we continue to make imperfect attempts in the hope that we can gradually do better.

I still get caught out with annoying purchases – like the roll of “biodegradable” wipes I picked up at the Salvos recently that had plastic in them. And we continue to eat meat, which is both environmentally problematic and can really only be bought in plastic, although we have reduced our intake substantially this year. But it’s worth noting that even with our imperfect efforts, the difference is still massive – we continue to only throw out one small bag of rubbish each week, whereas before we started this journey, the bin was often full to overflowing.

. . . . .

So that’s where we’re at, three years into this journey.

We all have different lives and homes, which means we can only do the best we can, but I hope this post will encourage you to think about the small changes you might be able to make.

Not everyone can set up a backyard recycling “farm”, but there may be options within your community that let you manage your food waste and leftovers more sustainably. My friend Carol walks hers down the road to a neighbour who happily collects the street’s waste for his compost – she found his details on our local council website.

The Big Kids hired artificial flowers for their wedding from Faux Fernery, saving thousands of dollars but even more importantly, saving a truckload of flowers from ending up in landfill after just one night. For Christmas, we baked cookies, tempered chocolate and made beeswax wraps for our friends and neighbours – they all went out in sustainably sourced packaging and everyone loved them.

Learn to mend your tea towels – it’s amazing how much wear and tear they can survive with just a little bit of maintenance. And explore your secondhand options – even my mum has learned to love her local Salvos! As a wise friend once told me, it’s much better for many people to be making an imperfect effort, than for just a few to be making a perfect one.

I’d love to know how your green journey is going. Please feel free to leave a very longwinded comment below if you like! ♥

. . . . .

Here’s a link to our earlier
Waste Reduction Plan Posts

Posted in green living | 16 Comments »

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