tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-45201404592965942152024-02-19T07:34:26.248-08:00Mummy of MunchkinsLeannehttp://www.blogger.com/profile/15694935828714338392noreply@blogger.comBlogger5125tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4520140459296594215.post-43105622724604173032017-03-16T14:58:00.000-07:002017-03-16T14:58:18.271-07:00Poorly Munchkin = Extra cuddles and Soup!If there is one thing I hate the most about parenting, it would be when my children are poorly. The "Fear" you feel once they are born is intensified and you don't want to let them out of your sight for one minute for fear that something bad will happen. Now I am not a paranoid mum and I definitely do not wrap my children in cotton wool, but the slightest sniffle sends me into overdrive with the thermometer, continually checking temperatures, making sure we have enough supplies of Calpol, saline spray and Snuffle Babe to get us through the latest illness!<br />
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Since he was born just 4 months ago, William has had a cold 3 times and the last one was a real corker, with so much mucus he could give a snail a run for its money and a cough that made him sound like a 40 a day smoker. Because he is so young, I have been able to do little to relieve his symptoms and just let it run its course. 2 products I have found so helpful have been a saline nasal spray, which made William sneeze every time we used it and therefore cleared his nasal passages easily, and snuffle babe menthol rub, which I applied to the soles of his feet, back and chest. After a couple of nights of using these he began to sleep really well. During the day I would pop him on a mat on the bathroom floor, shut the door and take a long hot shower, mainly so that he could breathe in the steam from the hot water and help his cough a little.<br />
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Grace started being poorly this week after school, having really high temperatures and a sore throat which made her so upset. This week she definitely needed her mummy and I really could not resist letting her sleep in our bed, actually it was the best nights sleep I have had since William was born! I do love a cuddle with my babies! Also this week we have let her eat whatever she fancies so plenty of ice cream with chocolate sauce, cookies and my special heal-all chicken noodle soup!<br />
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My recipe for chicken noodle soup actually comes from my husband who learned from his dad. One day we will have a competition to see whose is best, though we all make it the same way so they will probably taste exactly the same!<br />
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Chicken soup is probably the easiest dish to make and all you need is a chicken carcass left over from your sunday roast, a couple of carrots, celery, an onion and a couple of stock cubes. The noodles I buy from the Chinese supermarket, rice noodles I find work the best and have that awesome slurpable quality (the only time I will allow slurping at the dinner table!).<br />
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What dish do you guys prepare for your children when they are poorly? Or do you have a childhood cure all dish that you remember having yourselves? Mine was Lucozade and a bunny blanket!<br />
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<b><u>Chicken Noodle Soup</u></b><br />
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<b>Ingredients</b><br />
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1 chicken carcass leftover from a roast, any remaining meat stripped and kept aside for later<br />
1 onion cut in half, unpeeled<br />
2 carrots halved, unpeeled<br />
2 sticks of celery, halved.<br />
If you have any leftover veggies from your roast add those too.<br />
2 chicken stock cubes<br />
Rice noodles ( I haven't put a quantity here as it depends how much liquid you have and how full of noodles you like your soup to be, I tend to use a whole pack of rice noodles as I like the dish to be filling)<br />
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<b>Method</b><br />
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Pop the chicken carcass in a large saucepan or stock pot, add the vegetables and cover with cold water until just covered. Bring to the boil then turn the heat right down so that the water is at a gentle simmer.<br />
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Simmer for 3-4 hours (yes it takes a long time but it is so worth it, we have cooked this overnight before and it was delicious) and then drain the soup through a colander into a large bowl. You should be left with a clearish stock, discard the carcass and vegetables.<br />
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Let the stock cool completely and place in the fridge to cool. Once cool you will notice a layer of fat will have settled and solidified on the top of the stock, remove the layer of fat and pop the stock back into the stock pot to reheat.<br />
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Add the chicken meat, noodles and stock cubes and simmer for 5-10 minutes or until the noodles are soft and the chicken is cooked through. Serve immediately and slurp away at those noodles!<br />
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<b>Serves 6 </b>Leannehttp://www.blogger.com/profile/15694935828714338392noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4520140459296594215.post-3431273750480133362017-03-07T01:36:00.000-08:002017-03-07T01:48:24.023-08:00Waste Not Want Not - My 5 Tips to Help Reduce Food WastageFor 6 years now, we have been making a concerted effort to reduce our level of food wastage, and making the money we spend on food stretch further. An article from the Guardian written in 2015 highlighted a very real food waste problem in the UK and the impact this has on us as consumers.<br />
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"In the UK, 15 million tonnes of food is lost or wasted each year, and consumers throw away 4.4 million tonnes of edible food each year, this equates to £700 of perfectly good food per year or £60 per month".<br />
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When the average household spends £50-100 per week on food for the family, you can see that wasting a weeks worth of food shopping is not something any of us can afford to do.<br />
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In order to reduce our food wastage dramatically there are a few tweaks we can make to the way we shop, cook and dispose of our food, over the past 6 years, I feel we have perfected these changes and therefore have reduced our spend on food considerably.<br />
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1) <b><u>Plan Your Meals</u></b><br />
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This is such a given and has been talked about in the press, in Facebook groups etc, but how many of us actually sit down and plan a whole week of meals?<br />
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Planning meals ensures we only purchase food that we actually need for the week and keeping leftovers and wastage to a minimum. Also meal planning can expose how repetitious we are with our eating habits, maybe eating the same meals week in and week out, and therefore persuade us to learn to cook something new.<br />
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2) <b><u>Get Creative!</u></b><br />
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I love trying new dishes and combining different flavours together. Pinterest has long been my go to site for new recipes and meal ideas and is without a doubt the best place for ideas on reducing food waste. I use Pinterest when meal planning as I can access ingredient lists and just transfer them over to my shopping list. I usually aim to try at least 3 new recipes a month.<br />
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3) <b><u>Plan for leftovers</u></b><br />
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I love leftovers! I get a real sense of satisfaction when I can make a roast chicken last for 4 meals and when I cook something really tasty with the leftovers of the previous day's dinner. Personal favourites include Chicken and Pearl Barley soup; Cottage Pie "cakes" made by mashing up leftover cottage pie, coating in egg and breadcrumbs and either baking in the oven or frying in a little oil to make them extra crispy; and Jumble risotto (I haven't found an ingredient that doesn't go in risotto!).<br />
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4) <b><u>Save your Scraps!</u></b><br />
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Only a few months ago I saw a video on Facebook about saving veggie scraps to make stock for soups and stews. Any vegetable scraps you have just pop them in a freezer bag and place in the freezer. Keep topping up the bag and when full chuck the lot in a large saucepan or stock pot, cover with water and simmer for 45 minutes. Drain the scraps and pour the stock into ice cube trays and freeze. You can then pop the stock cubes into a freezer bags and use at your leisure!<br />
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I also made Ham stock cubes using the bones from 2 ham hocks I purchased last week - perfect for ham and pea soup, casseroles and stews; and when my husband brought home a bag full of garlic that was going to be thrown away at his restaurant, I chopped up the lot in my food processor, divided the mixture into 2 ice cube trays and poured olive oil over the top and froze them. I can just use a cube every time I cook and no need to peel and chop any garlic for months!<br />
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5) <b><u>Invest in a dehydrator</u></b><br />
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I bought my dehydrator from Lakeland 5 years ago and I absolutely love it. Overripe fruit can be turned into a healthy snack for my daughter, leftover chopped onions and mushrooms I dehydrate and pop in a sealed jar to use in soups for the autumn and winter, and cherry tomatoes that are a little too soft I turn into "sun dried tomatoes", which are placed into jars and covered in Olive oil. Once the tomatoes are used up the remaining oil can be used in a variety of dishes and dressings. I want to try herbs next as I always seem to have packets of herbs that go bad really quickly and don't want to keep throwing them away!<br />
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These five tips I will go into in more detail over the next few weeks and will include my favourite recipes for you all to follow and enjoy yourselves! Cooking for my family is my main passion and I'm always looking for new dishes to feed to my daughter and soon my son.<br />
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If you have any tips or recipes that you would like to share with me please do leave a comment below, sharing is caring!<br />
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Leanne x<br />
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<br />Leannehttp://www.blogger.com/profile/15694935828714338392noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4520140459296594215.post-77830529968483457912017-02-27T05:46:00.002-08:002017-02-27T05:46:52.378-08:00Recipe: Korean style noodle soup.I have an obsession with noodle soups. Give me a bowl of ramen anytime of the day and I am one happy Mama!<br />
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The comfort of hot spicy broth and slurpable noodles can be enjoyed at lunch or dinner depending on what ingredients you have and how hungry you are. I recently purchased some Korean Gochujang chilli paste from our local Asian supermarket and have been dying to try it in a soup - it was heavenly, just what was needed on a wet and windy day last week!<br />
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For protein I used Quorn chicken style pieces but you can substitute this for chicken, seafood, beef, tofu or whatever you may fancy.<br />
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<u><b>Ingredients</b></u><br />
<u><b><br /></b></u>
600ml water<br />
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1 chicken or vegetable stock cube (Knorr is really good for this purpose)<br />
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3rd packet of Quorn pieces<br />
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30g noodles (I recommend Ramen or udon noodles)<br />
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1 heaped teaspoon of Korean Gochujang chilli paste<br />
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Fish sauce and sesame oil to season<br />
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<b><u>Method</u></b><br />
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Bring the water to the boil in a medium saucepan. Once boiling add the stock cube, quorn pieces and noodles and cook until noodles are tender and Quorn pieces are cooked through, approx 10 mins.<br />
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Add the chilli paste and stir to combine, the soup will take on a lovely red colour. Then season to taste with the fish sauce and sesame oil.<br />
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Serve in a big bowl and slurp away!<br />
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<b>Serves 1 but quantities can be adjusted easily to serve a larger number.</b><br />
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I hope you all enjoy this recipe, if you decide to try it out please do leave me your feedback and any suggestions or requests for further recipes in the comments below.<br />
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Leanne x<br />
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<br />Leannehttp://www.blogger.com/profile/15694935828714338392noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4520140459296594215.post-3099621139298770492017-02-20T06:27:00.002-08:002017-02-20T06:27:53.210-08:00Monday MusingsToday marked the end of the Half Term Holiday and Grace went back to school. This past week has been action packed with lots of activities, from trampolining and rock climbing to picnics in the living room to crafting, it's been so much fun spending quality time with my eldest and I feel so lucky to be on maternity leave, to be able to spend that time and make those memories!<br />
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We also had a lovely time taking part in a nature trail on the Ashridge Estate, followed by Roman Pottery making. Grace loved donning her wellies and squelching through the muddy tracks, and we now have a lovely little trinket pot ready to paint on our next craft day! Ashridge is a country Estate in Hertfordshire compising of 5000 acres of woodland, commons and chalk dowland, the woodland just the perfect place for welly walks and Gruffalo Hunting!<br />
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<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiSCShRR1kyi7ZsDOHsa4JAJBBPOA14_JajTG1RF9f4JdAb7I2v8yXX_-MhhefHkOdq29pIudcoXwK52K7e89PU0KavSbgt6YrWQrRIBOMdFUVn6KTWwb3AHJ7sIe5BJjWfvd9GbJ-Rebs/s1600/20170216_104855.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" height="320" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiSCShRR1kyi7ZsDOHsa4JAJBBPOA14_JajTG1RF9f4JdAb7I2v8yXX_-MhhefHkOdq29pIudcoXwK52K7e89PU0KavSbgt6YrWQrRIBOMdFUVn6KTWwb3AHJ7sIe5BJjWfvd9GbJ-Rebs/s320/20170216_104855.jpg" width="180" /></a><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgh4tg2Ad_6l_aUWHVBHlNO3ypVAg2yYpgIz_GEk3_sSPpPiLjOowEXjqxfd0xutz9xk9YAGGa-t3tTbT_1olOHtdoPRPKZjW5CYjytHLsVGf1I0BWEs2tN6uLOGObqzuU2Gl41SN0ZFDA/s1600/20170216_111200.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" height="320" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgh4tg2Ad_6l_aUWHVBHlNO3ypVAg2yYpgIz_GEk3_sSPpPiLjOowEXjqxfd0xutz9xk9YAGGa-t3tTbT_1olOHtdoPRPKZjW5CYjytHLsVGf1I0BWEs2tN6uLOGObqzuU2Gl41SN0ZFDA/s320/20170216_111200.jpg" width="180" /></a></div>
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We decided to purchase a family National Trust membership after our visit so that we can take full advantage of the beautiful treasures our country has to offer. To find out more about The National trust and the Estates you can visit, head on over to their website at <a href="https://www.nationaltrust.org.uk/">https://www.nationaltrust.org.uk/</a> and if you guys have any suggestions about where we can visit next please do leave a comment below!<br />
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This week marks the start of a new, and fairly big, project for me, making memory blankets for Grace and William using their newborn clothes. I have never made a blanket before, let alone a memory blanket so I am looking forward to the challenge. I cannot justify paying someone else to make one when I have all the equipment here to do it myself. One of my fondest memories as a child is of a bunny blanket in our house. This was a blue and white blanket covered in bunnies, that my mum used to get out when either myself or my younger brother were poorly and I swear it had healing powers, I always felt better when I wrapped myself in it. I hope that the blankets I make this week will do the same for Grace and William.<br />
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Also this week William will be having his 12 week immunisations and we will be transitioning him from a crib to a cot, as he has had a big growth spurt and no longer fits in the crib! I will also be turning an old Ikea side table into a lego table for Grace to build on!<br />
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As mentioned before please do leave your National Trust visit suggestions below, or further school holiday ideas, I would love to see what everyone else gets up to!<br />
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Leanne x<br />
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<br />Leannehttp://www.blogger.com/profile/15694935828714338392noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4520140459296594215.post-44429256600732178282017-02-15T12:15:00.000-08:002017-02-15T12:15:03.012-08:00Let's Get StartedFrom the moment I fell pregnant with my second child I have wanted to start a personal blog. I wanted to have a place where I could place all of our memories so that when our children are old enough they can look back, together and remember those details, whether big or small that made our family special.<br />
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My pregnancy wasn't the easiest, physically and emotionally so this blog was put on a backburner and the longer I delayed typing a first post the harder it became to start. My turning point came when watching a Facebook live post from Emily Meyers of the beautiful blog <a href="http://www.freckled-fox.com/">The Freckled Fox</a>. Emily tragically lost her first husband Martin last year and one of the things she said was that she was so grateful for her blog, as all her memories including her late husband where all there, ready for herself and her 5 young children to revisit in the present and future. It really made me think of how I needed to save those memories of my family. My Husband and children are so special to me that I just want to capture every moment and savour each one forever.<br />
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I am currently on maternity leave and so far it has been so wonderful to be able to spend every single day with my husband and children, to be the wife and mother that I have so craved to be since our daughter was born 5 years ago. I have so far been able to indulge in my passion for cooking and improve and challenge my sewing skills, skills I aim to develop this year. I have so many home based projects to start and personal goals to achieve this year, from upcycling furniture to finally baking a decent loaf of bread, and this arena will be a perfect place to document my efforts.<br />
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This week we are on a school holiday and it has been a busy one, but the opportunity to make it special for my daughter, will enable her to remember it for years to come. I can't wait to share what we did here.<br />
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Until then I will share the little loves of my life and my reason why.<br />
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Leanne xLeannehttp://www.blogger.com/profile/15694935828714338392noreply@blogger.com0