Last week was a bit of an odd week as I was working a late shift at work during the week so I wasn’t at home to cook.  I also didn’t write a proper meal plan (I know, I’m hanging my head in shame) because I was away in London at the weekend and felt very bleugh when I got home. 

Mr Frugal waited until I got home for his tea and was on lates himself 3 out of the 5 nights so the kids had to mainly fend for themselves which I would absolutely expect them to be able to do at their age (17 and 14).  Let’s see how they got on…

Monday
Homemade Chicken Parmo with chips, salad and garlic dip

I was off work on Monday as it was Miss Frugal’s Birthday and Master Frugal had some blood tests at the doctors.  I had a couple of hours free in the morning so I finally got around to writing up my Homemade Chicken Parmo recipe which inspired me to send Mr Frugal a shopping list to buy what I needed to make it again for tea.  We had a lovely meal followed by a shop-bought Birthday cake which was amazing but highlights how busy I’ve been as I’ve made some pretty elaborate (over-ambitious) cakes for the kids over the years. 

Tuesday
Tuna Melts on Toast

I feel like the kids were pretty proud of this meal as they sent me a photo of it as they were serving it up (it actually inspired the idea for this post) and yes, I know it’s basic and absolutely not that nutritious but I’m OK with that for the odd meal.  I’m more concerned about the addition of crispy fried, dried onions that they must have dug out from somewhere.

Wednesday
Salmon, pea and brocolli risotto / Scrambled eggs on toast

Tonight’s tea was a frozen risotto that we bought from Iceland many moons ago and it’s been languishing in the garage freezer since we bought it.  Miss Frugal went for this as it was a simple pop in the pan to Cook for 12 minutes.  She says it was ‘OK’ but nothing special.  Master Frugal isn’t as adventurous so he made himself beans on toast.  They both had smoothies to go with their tea and I made them eat a banana when I got in to help reduce my mum guilt at no-one being there to cook tea.

Thursday
Gammon and rice

Before I went to work, I popped a gammon joint in the slow cooker so that a mini midweek roast would be super easy to make.  I had brocolli in the fridge and Yorkshire Puds in the freezer.  I even boiled some potatoes so they could do something with them without having much faff.  I would usually cook cold slightly crushed boiled potatoes in the oven with some olive oil drizzled on them to make kind of crispy lumpy mash.  Much nicer than it sounds.

What actually happened is that no-one could be bothered to do anything with the potatoes or even to cook the veg or the Yorkshire Puds.  They had Uncle Bens Spicy Mexican Microwave Rice with the gammon instead. 

Friday
Corned Beef Hash

Oh dear, last nights un-used potatoes were fried up with some corned beef, red onions and a tin of beans.  There’s a couple of eggs in there too by the looks of it.  I’ll be honest, when I got this photo from Mr Frugal I had to question what it was but apparently it was lovely and at least used up the potatoes that I’d cooked for last night!

I’m back this week, thank goodness!

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The post What my teenagers ate last week when I wasn’t there to cook for them…. appeared first on The Diary of a Frugal Family.