Neil's Food Plan

This is my attempt at making a weekly vegetarian food plan with minimum leftovers. I hope to try it out and revise it according to what I've got left over. If anyone's got any tips please help!

Meal ideas

Love food, hate waste

• Mixed vegetable curry
• Indian sausage parcel
• Vegetable lasagne
• Vegetable rosti cakes
• Vegetable pilaff
• Aubergine and tomato moussaka
• mushroom risotto
• Vegetable thai curry

Vegsoc

• Herby Mushroom Pasta
• Vegetable and Nut Stir Fry
• Cheesy Potato and Lentil Bake
• Spinachy Pancakes
• Black-eyed bean stew

Week 3

Shopping

• 3(ish) carrots

• 750g courgettes
• 1 onion
• 2 green peppers
• 450g tomatoes
• 1 tablespoon chopped mint
• 100g Gruyère cheese
• 300ml natural yoghurt
• 2 eggs

• 150g button mushrooms
• 1 carton soured cream

• 4 large flat mushrooms
• black olive paste
• 125g goats' cheese
• pine nuts

• 85g Wensleydale cheese
• 1 stick of celery
• 1 leek
• 1 can mixed beans

Saturday

For lunch I'll buy a couple of extra carrots and make carrot soup

For dinner I will have the sausage casserole for the third day running :)

Sunday

Lunch maybe make a sandwich

Courgette Moussaka (page 85 in the recipe book)

Monday

Herby Mushroom Pasta again. Let's try it with a red onion.

Tuesday

Left over moussaka

Wednesday

Hrmm.. baked flat mushrooms with goats' cheese. From page 51 of the book.

Thursday

Shepherd's pie (should use up the potatoes I've got). I'll use a red onion again even though it'll probably be weird.

Friday

left over shepherd's pie

Week 2

Thursday and Friday last week I completely failed and got a take away and a ready meal. But I think I'll move my shopping day to a Saturday anyway because I'm usually feeling pretty lazy on a Thursday.

Saturday 20/2

Shop this afternoon, need to buy:

• 400g can chickpeas
• Coriander
• harissa paste or chilli powder
• plain flour
• sunflower oil
• toasted pitta bread
• tub tomato salsa
• green salad
• 1 red onion

• 2 onions
• courgette
• pepper
• leeks

• 675g potatoes
• 1 cooking apple
• 450g carrots
• Tinned tomotoes
• vegetable stock

Lunch, soup with the garlic bread I've got

Dinner

Falafel

Yummy! And no need to trudge around London trying to find that shop!

Ingredients 400g can chickpeas , rinsed and drained garlic clove , chopped handful of flat-leaf parsley or curly parsley 1 tsp ground cumin 1 tsp ground coriander ½ tsp harissa paste or chilli powder 2 tbsp plain flour 2 tbsp sunflower oil toasted pitta bread 200g tub tomato salsa , to serve green salad , to serve 1 small red onion , roughly chopped

Sunday 21/2

Sunday lunch at Mum's

Monday 22/2

Falafel burgers again. hopefully there will be some left over.

Tuesday 23/2

Dinner, lasagne. I've already got a jar of white sauce and some tinned matoes. I'll make a red sauce with onions, courgettes, peppers and leeks

Wednesday 24/2

I've still got some veggie sausages from last week so lets make veggie sausage casserole.

Thursday 25/2

Left over lasagne

Friday 26/2

Left over sausage casserole.

Results

Last week went a bit off piste. I couldn't be bothered to cook on Saturday so I left the falafel until Monday. But I completely failed to cook it properly because I chopped the vegetables too small before grating them and then I couldn't get the frying to work without the burgers falling apart. And then I accidentally melted a plastic spoon into the mix so I had to throw most of it away. I ended up baking what was left so I had enough for an edible but not very nice meal. Tuesday and Wednesday Abi stayed over so we had a takeaway curry on Tuesday and made the lasagne on Wednesday, but there wasn't any leftover because there was two of us. On Thursday I made the sausage casserole which was quite nice. I ate that again on Friday and I *still* have some left! I now have a couple of carrots, half a bag of potatoes, and a red onion to use up.

Week 1

Wed 10/2

Quick shop on the way home from work to make Black-eyed bean stew

Need to buy:

• 3x onions
• a green pepper
• 1 thing of garlic
• tinned tomoatoes

I already have bay leaves, black eyed peas and parsley. I won't bother with the oregano. I will eat with some garlic bread which will hopefully keep until tomorrow.

Thu 11/2

Time for a bigger shop.

Vegetable Gratin from the recipe book (number 68)

Need to buy:

• 750g parsnips
• 225g carrots
• 225g courgettes
• 175g cauliflower florets

Will use onions bought Wednesday and cheese that I already have. Serves 4 so I'll try to keep half of it.

Friday 12/2

Left over vegetable gratin from Thursday.

Saturday 13/2

Lunch: let's make a quick sandwich with bread and cheese.

Dinner: more time to cook, let's have Vegetable rosti cakes

Need to buy:

• 450g potatoes, peeled and halved
• 2 medium carrots, halved lengthways
• 250g parsnips or swede cut into chunks
• 250g courgettes, grated
• 4 spring onions
• 1 lightly beaten egg
• 2 level tablespoons of plain flour

I'll just use olive oil instead of sunflower oil

Sunday 14/2

Faux sunday lunch. New potatoes, vegetarian quorn thing. Cauliflower left over from Thursday.

Dinner, ready made soup.

Monday 15/2

Left over rosti cakes

Tuesday 16/2

Herby mushroom pasta

Need to buy:

5oz / 150g button mushrooms, sliced 1oz fresh basil, finely chopped ½ carton soured cream

will just use the fusili i've already got instead of taglietelle. onion from wednesday.

Wednesday 17/2

Lets use the potatoes and parsnips that I've probably still got and make parsnip and potato mash with some veggie sausages and maybe some baked beans. I will have to incorporate the remaining sausages into next week.

Results

The bean stew worked well enough and I'd give it about a 6 out of 10.

The vegetable gratin was really good and really easy to make. I ate it with some soda bread that I had. It was also fine to the next day so 8 out of 10.

For Saturday lunch I forgot buy any cheese so I ended up with a chutney and hula hoop sandwich :) The rosti cakes turned into a huge disaster because I didn't read the recipe properly and cut the vegetables up too small so it made it really hard to grate. Then I completely failed at frying them and ended up with a burnt mess. Also I accidentally melted a plastic spoon into some of it so I had to throw it away. I salvaged some of it by baking it and it was enough for a meal but it wasn't great.

Sunday, I realised my new potatoes were a bit sprouty so decided not to eat them and had the parsnip + potato mash with a Quorn thing instead. That was quite nice. Soup was nice too.

Monday I went to the Scrabble club so I didn't get back until late but I ate something on the train instead.

Tuesday - herby mushroom. Quick and easy and quite nice 7/10