Ditch Supermarket Salads, Make your Own!

Summer is here and we all start to worry about our beach bodies and perhaps shaving off a few pounds. So that means salads, right?

M&S bring out their summer of food range and Sainsbury's pick up their game with couscous salads, etc. but if you actually look at the calorie and fat content in these salads, they're still not very healthy... To make matters worse, they cost a fortune. You will be looking to spend at least £3 on one of these salad pots and you will end up feeling quite disappointed in the taste department.

I went to my Mum's house the other evening and I prepared a salad for us both, using the lemon & mint dressing from my previous blog post, and here is how you can recreate it.

Avocado & Prawn Salad

Ingredients:

• 2 eggs
• 200g shelled prawns
• 1 avocado
• 1 bag of rocket & watercress salad leaves
• 1 stick of celery
• 1/2 a punnet of cherry tomatoes
• 1/2 cucumber
• 1/2 pack of feta cheese
• 1 red pepper
• lemon & mint dressing

Recipe:

1. Put the two eggs on to boil and start prepping the ingredients. You will need to wash the salad and leave it to drain in a colander, scoop and pit the avocado and then slice it thinly, chop the celery; tomatoes; cucumber; feta cheese and pepper.
2. Once the eggs are cooked, place them in the fridge to cool down. When they have cooled, peel the shells off and cut them into quarters.
3. Toss the rocket and watercress in the lemon & mint dressing, this is the base for the salad so layer it on to the plate when ready.
4. When all the other ingredients are ready, add them to the leaves. Try and spread everything out so you will get a little bit of everything in each bite. Alternatively, you can add all the ingredients to a bowl and toss them together but I would recommend leaving the egg out for this bit.
5. When your salad is plated up, splash some more of the dressing on top and enjoy!

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Make Your Own: Infused Oils

Making your own infused oils and dressings is a great idea. They make cute little gifts for your friends and family, you know exactly what has gone into them so you don't have to worry about harmful additives and the stylishly decorated bottles can really jazz up your kitchen.

You Will Need:

• 1 bottle for each type of oil you intend to make.
• Masking tape
• Spray paint
• Permanent marker pens

Instructions:

1. Purchase a swing stopper bottle to keep your oil in. These bottles are best as they make for easy pouring, they're cheap and they have that great vintage look. I bought mine for £3ea from Cargo.
2. For my first attempt, I have gone for a simple design. I have decided I want it to have a gold bottom and that's about it. So I have masking taped up the parts of the bottle that I don't want to get paint on.
   
3. Take the bottle to a well ventilated area and lay some newspaper or rags around it for protection. Hold the bottle as far away from the area you intend  to spray as possible and spray the desired area from a distance of about 30cm until you have an even coverage. If you spray to near to the bottle you may get drip marks, if this happens, dab the area with kitchen towel asap and respray the area from further away.
4. Leave the paint to dry, spray paint tends to dry quite quickly and you will know when it is because the smell of solvents will be distinctly reduced.
5. Once the paint has dried, slowly peel off the masking tape to reveal the finished pattern.

   

   The masking tape should leave
    a clean straight line.

6. Use your marker pens to write on the bottle if you wish to label it with what's inside. Remember you can get some great typography examples on Pinterest.

Now that you've got a beautiful bottle to keep your oils and dressings in, you'll need some recipes to fill them up. So I have listed a few of my favourites below.

Lemon & Mint Salad Dressing:

Ingredients:

• 100ml olive oil
• 1 lemon
• 1 tsp Dijon mustard
• 1 tsp sugar
• Pinch of salt
• Garlic (1 clove or 1 tsp granules)
• Handful of fresh mint

Recipe:

1. Pour olive oil into a measuring jug and squeeze the juice of 1 lemon into it and give it a good whisk.
2. Chop the fresh mint leaves roughly, scrunch them up a bit to help release the flavour and add them to the oil.
3. If using garlic cloves, finely chop the clove and add it to the oil. If using garlic granules, measure out 1 tsp and add it along with the sugar and salt.
4. Be sure to give it another good whisk so that the ingredients are well combined.
5. Pour the mixture into a storage bottle with a tight lid.
6. Add the teaspoon of mustard to the bottle, secure the lid tightly and shake it until the mustard has combined with the mixture.
7. Keep refrigerated.

Balsamic Vinaigrette 

Ingredients:

• 30ml Balsamic vinegar
• 100ml Olive oil

Recipe:

1. This one is nice and easy, you just have to add the balsamic vinegar to the olive oil. No need to shake it, the vinegar will sink to the bottom as it is denser than oil.

Oriental Dressing 

Courtesy of Leon cookbook.

Ingredients:

• 1 clove of garlic
• 1cm piece of ginger
• 1 spring onion
• 1/2 a red chilli
• 2 tbsp soy/fish sauce
• Juice from 1 lime
• 100ml Peanut oil

Recipe:

1. Grate or finely chop the garlic and ginger.
2. Finely slice the spring onion and chilli, be sure to remove all chilli seeds.
3. Add the soy/fish sauce and lime juice to the peanut oil and give it a good shake.
4. Add the fresh ingredients to the oil.

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Shopping For a Bargain

I am always on the lookout for a bargain in the sales. I hardly ever buy any clothing at full price any more (unless it's something I really can't resist!) It has gotten to the point where my mum doesn't believe me when I say I've only paid a fraction of the price for something new and lovely. There are some necessary tips if you want to excel at bargain hunting and here are a few that spring to mind.

• Sign up to email updates

Email updates can be annoying, we all hate being constantly spammed by companies clamoring for our attention and tugging at our purse strings. However there are some benefits to email updates - you will be considered a VIP customer with a lot of companies and they like to reward you for putting up with the bothersome emails with some great offers such as preview sales or money off codes. Urban Outfitters are particularly good for this. I recently had a (little) splurge on the Urban Outfitters website as they gave me exclusive access to their sale before everyone else!! It was great, they had all the sizes and they offered me a code to instantly take 50% off the full price items in advance of the sale. The trick is not to get carried away - don't go crazy and start buying up everything in sight because you're "saving money". Look out for items you've seen previously, coveted and put down due to the extortionate price tag. I'd had my eyes on a MinkPink skirt in Urban Outfitters since it had arrived in store, I loved it, I had to have it... but it was £50. I simply couldn't justify spending £50 on one skirt which would be amazing in the Summer and not quite so useful in Autumn/Winter. There it was in the pre-sale and I had a 50% off code... Of course I bought it. I could definitely spend £25 on it, a much more reasonable price for a skirt.  I indulged in one other purchase too, a gorgeous Paris blouse by Cooperative. 

Cooperative Paris Blouse from Urban Outfitters

Again, I'd seen it in the store (I really need to stop going in there, it's torture...) and fallen in love. I love anything to do with Paris and the material felt light and luxurious but at £38, I wasn't willing to purchase it just yet. Instead I got it for a mere £19 which I was very happy with. I had to pay £3.99 postage (Tip: free postage if you spend over £50 and they often do discount codes for postage at just £1 so keep an eye out!) but altogether I spent only £47.99 (inc. p&p) which is still cheaper than what I almost paid for that beautiful skirt.

Here it is: Ta-dah!

• Sometimes you have to play the waiting game...

It's not easy. Nobody said it was, that is why you are so highly rewarded with savings if you can wait it out. I have worked in Retail for several years so I know that sales work in waves. You get the initial phase, a lot of stuff goes in, some of it up to 50% off. Don't panic, when a sale starts they still have LOADS of stock and it gets replenished so wait a few weeks. You can always have  a look at the website (or sign up for those email updates) to see when phase two starts. Phase two is when the good stuff starts to go in! The stuff they hadn't previously reduced because it's so beautiful that it is still selling well at full price. Now is perfectly acceptable to start shopping but if you fancy a risk, wait for phase three. Phase three - pandemonium! 75% off! Aaahhh!! 

My best example of playing the waiting game was with a pair of gorgeous deep purple velvet, platform heeled chelsea boots by Deena & Ozzy. They were £120 and the most beautiful things I had ever seen, they were gaudy and kitsch but in all the right ways. Even if I hardly wore them, I just wanted them as something beautiful to look at. There are very few things that I am willing to pay £120 for and, as tempted as I was, a pair of shoes that I would hardly get to wear was not one of them.

So I waited...

A 20% off code came a long, tempting. Very tempting, but they would still have been a whopping £96. No, that wasn't good enough.

Then came the sale - Phase One and they went down to £60. I reasoned with myself that that was half price and a lot better than £120 or £96... But still a LOT of money.

So I waited some more...

And JACKPOT! The shoes went 75% off (£40) and I was able to get student discount on them so I ended up paying a measly £36 for the dream shoes that I had lusted over for so long!

• Students - register on Unidays

Oh Unidays... No more googling "student discount voucher codes", simply log in to your Unidays account and copy and paste the code provided. A lot of companies are offering discounts through Unidays now, with up to 20% brands such as UGG, Apple, Cath Kidston and ASOS (the list goes on and on, I could be here a while so check it out yourself.) This is an easy way to, not only save money on full price items, but sometimes get a little extra off those sale goodies too! It's always worth a try, pop in the voucher code at the checkout and see if it will accept it because you will be pleasantly surprised. 

But that's not even the best part! I graduated a year ago and my Unidays account STILL works! I can't get away with using my student ID in the shops but online I'm free to shop like a student once more.

• Don't forget about mid-season sales

Having worked in Retail, it always astounds me when the shops would go into mid-season sale and all the customers would ask: 

"Oh, it's not the end of the season yet, is this a closing down sale?"

No, not at all. Pretty much all the shops do mid-season sales now. They are a relatively new thing but it has become quickly established. Mid-season sales are great because you can get all this season's clothes at next season's reduced prices! It was always pretty annoying buying jumpers at the end of Winter to put away for next year and vice versa with Summer dresses. Now you don't have to wait. Enjoy your clothes at half the price and at the right time of year. This is also a great time to go on holiday. I went to Rome in April and was able to take full advantage of mid-season sales to get a great new holiday wardrobe.

This skirt set me back only £16, instead of its
original value of £45

• Search for a price comparison

If there is something that you really want and the price doesn't seem to be dropping, it might be looking elsewhere. There's a possibility that you can get it elsewhere for a lot less. The first thing you need to do is get the style name. I really wanted a pair of Sebago deck shoes but the pair I wanted were £80 and I'd never tried them before so I wasn't sure how well they lasted or how well I would get on with them. I searched the name on Google and after a small amount of trawling, I discovered a website called AllSole where they stocked exactly the same shoes but I paid only £55 because they had been put into a promotion. AllSole no longer stock Sebagos, unfortunately, but they do stock many other popular shoe brands such as Hunter, Ted Baker, FitFlop and Vivienne Westwood. They offer great reductions online and often have extra promotions to take a little bit more money off so it's worth having a look. I was even able to get a second pair of Sebagos from this website for just £20 because I bought them at the end of the season with an extra discount.

Another tip is to watch out for companies that are selling other brands. Sometimes they will stick a bit of extra money on to the price to make a better profit margin. A lot of Urban Outfitters homeware is originally from a company called Sass & Belle. Urban Outfitters sometimes charge up to twice as much for items that are sold on the Sass & Belle website, I got these two cushions for £12 and £15 respectively instead of £25ea which was the Urban Outfitters price.

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Don't Pay for Wagamamas, Make Your Own Katsu Curry

I love going out for dinner. It's a great opportunity to catch up with friends, enjoy some good food and chill out. However I don't appreciate the price tag that comes with it so here is a cheaper (and healthier) alternative by Gizzi Erskine to one of my favourite meals from Wagamamas.

Chicken Katsu Curry

Ingredients

• 1 tbsp peanut or vegetable oil (Tip: I was able to get peanut oil from Lidl for £1.19 but before I could find any I used to use vegetable oil and stir a teaspoon of peanut butter into the sauce)
• 1 onion, peeled and chopped
• 5 whole garlic cloves, peeled and crushed
• 2 carrots, peeled and chopped
• 1 tbsp medium curry powder
• 600ml chicken stock (Tip: Fresh stock is best but OXO cubes are the best dried variety in my opinion, they can be found much cheaper in Poundland and Lidl compared to other supermarkets)
• 2 tsp honey (Tip: If you don't have honey, 1tsp of (preferably dark brown) sugar works just as well)
• 1 tbsp soy sauce
• 1 bay leaf
• ½ tsp garam masala (Tip: Sounds fancy and hard to come by but can be found in Sainsburys with the other herbs and spices for £1)
• Salt and pepper
• 4 x 100g chicken breasts
• 100g flour, seasoned with lots of salt and pepper
• 1 free-range egg, beaten lightly (Tip: Cheap free-range eggs can be found in Co-op in their essential range)
• 120g breadcrumbs


• Rice or salad to serve

Recipe

1. Heat the oven to 200°C. To make the sauce, heat the oil in a small pan. Add the onion and garlic and sauté for 2 minutes, then throw in the carrot pieces and  cook slowly for 10 minutes, with the lid on, giving the odd stir occasionally. You want to sweat the vegetables until softened and starting to caramelise.
   


2. Stir in 2tbsp of flour and 1tbsp of curry powder and cook them for a minute. Slowly pour in the chicken stock bit by bit until combined (do it slowly to avoid getting lumps). Add the honey, soy and bay leaf then bring to the boil. Reduce the heat to a slow simmer and cook for 20 minutes. The sauce will have thickened and taken on all of the flavours, although you still need it to have a pouring consistency. Add the garam masala, salt and pepper, then pass the sauce through a sieve. (if you like a chunky sauce so feel free not to strain it, I have chosen to keep it chunky)


3. While the sauce is cooking, get on with the chicken. Lay the seasoned flour, egg and breadcrumbs on to separate plates. Coat the chicken breasts into the flour, then the egg and finally cover with the breadcrumbs.

   

   












4. Spritz with oil then put in the hot oven for 12-15 minutes. Slice the chicken diagonally then serve with Japanese steamed rice and salad.

Enjoy!

Wagamamas Cost (per person): £10.00
C-I-Y Cost (per person): <£5.00*

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*Price may vary, I only needed to buy chicken, carrots and garam masala as I already had the other ingredients in my larder. Try to build up a larder of useful items such as those listed above.

Growing Your Own Windowsill Garden

I have decided to start a windowsill garden after being inspired by one of the LEON cookbooks (Leon: Naturally Fast Food) so this blog post is all about why you should too and how to go about it in a stylish but savvy way.

Reasons why this is a great idea:

1. It's cheaper and tastier than buying dried herbs - I just bought a mint plant which cost me eighty pence. Far cheaper than a pot of dried mint, and perfect for the summer. I use it to make lemon and mint salad dressing, to freshen up a glass of Pimms or to garnish salads and it is far more effective than the dried variety that lives in the back of you cupboard.
2. It looks pretty - I live in an apartment in the centre of a town so there's not much greenery about. Having some nice potted plants helps to cheer the place up and creates a lovely scent.
3. It's a great way to start a new hobby - When I was a child, I used to love growing things in my parents garden but as I got older, busy schedules have gotten in the way and it's easy to forget how much I enjoyed the simple pleasure of helping things grow. It gives you a real sense of achievement! Some examples of low maintenance plants include Rosemary, Mint and Sage. These are great plants to start with if, like me, you're a little rusty or new to plant care.
4. You can be creative - I love searching Pinterest for ideas on how to personalise things around the home. I went to a store that renovates old vintage items and bought a little pot for £3.00 to replant my mint into. Originally, I wanted to write straight onto the metal finish but I tested it underneath and it didn't work very well (always test an idea somewhere unnoticeable before you carry it out) so I decided to make a little sign instead.

          To make this, I used:

• A small amount of thread and a needle
• A piece of card (I used the price tag off a shirt)
• A sheet of paper
• Some pens
• Sellotape
• A cocktail stick
• Soil

         So here is how you do it:

1. You need to source a new pot for your plant because those ones the come in won't provide much space for it to grow. Great places to look for something a bit different is a farmer's market or a shop that renovates vintage items or, if you're lucky, a charity shop will have just what you're looking for. I got this pot from an antique revival store for just £3.00:
   
   

   

   Tip: Drainage is important for your plant. If the pot you choose doesn't have a
   hole in the bottom, add some gravel to the base before you add soil.

   
   
2. Cut the piece of card to your desired shape. Mine was already in a sort of "gift tag" shape, so I just cropped it to make it a little smaller. Once you have done this, use the card as a stencil to cut out two pieces of identically sized paper.
3. Design your label on one of the pieces of paper. It might be worth browsing the internet (Tip:again, Pinterest is a great place to look) for some TYPOGRAPHY examples if you want a quirky font. I drew my font in a big bold marker to make it stand out and then I hand-sewed some read thread around the edge of the paper only.
4. Punch a hole in one of the edges of the card and paper to feed through a piece of ribbon (Tip: I keep all the ribbon off of Christmas and birthday gifts and put it away for these sorts of projects). I chose to tie mine in a simple knot but a bow can look nice too. The ribbon will then hold the paper and card together.
5. Attach a cocktail stick to the back of the card to use as a stand for the sign. I chose to spray-paint my cocktail stick first as I had some lying around, but it looks good without.

   

   If you're rubbish at sewing, like me, it doesn't matter!
   It just gives it a shabby chic effect.

6. Laminate the sign in sellotape. This will protect it from sunlight and from getting wet when you water the plant.
7. Take the plant out of its original pot and place it into your new pot. Remember: If your pot doesn't have drainage you must add gravel first. Then fill the remaining space with fresh soil, give the plant a good drink and watch it grow in your new chic windowsill garden! 

         

Ready to be re-potted!

Total Cost: £3.80

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