Day one - Sunday 1st Feb

Aaaaaaand we're off! Day one and we enjoyed a bowl of porridge with a splurge of Jam and obligatory glass of orange juice for brekkie. I know we're lucky because The Child does enjoy a good bowl of porridge and always has, but even so, it's always pot luck if we get a thumbs up - so we're off to a decent start.

Lunch was roast leg of pork (found in the reduced section - lovely job) with roast potatoes, roast veg (onion and carrot) and leek with cabbage sweated down in a bit of butter. And of course, we couldn't have roast pork without a decent bit of crackling*. The gravy was still not up to Mrs P's very high standards, so clearly more practice needed.  On a gravy note, I made ours simply with water, a stock cube reduced with the juices from the roast pork, as there were no pennies left for extra gravy granule flavour... We'll see what next weeks budget will afford!

We're working on the 'mothership' concept here, spending a bit to have a good Sunday lunch which will keep us going not just for the majority of the day but hopefully, Monday as well. This is something we have done for the last year or so and have found it makes Sunday lunch special, as well as being cost effective!  One difference from normal, is that I actually cut the Pork in half today before serving to make sure we didn't get greedy and  leave enough for tomorrow. It must have worked, because we all seemed pretty stuffed at the end. Oh, and yes, your eyes do not deceive you, we had an extra little mouth today, so we were feeding four rather than three.

Dinner consisted of cheese on toast and crunchy veg for the kids as they couldn't take any more porky goodness but Mrs P and I had no such reservations. A pork sandwich each went down a treat, but I did miss the mustard and mayo that should have definitely played a role. They are going on the list for next week right now.

The kids had a tangerine for a snack and we've been rationing the orange juice so it's been milk and water to drink - again, not too much of a serious issue as it's good that we don't forget what it's like to drink from the tap.

Final verdict from day one is fairly good - we haven't really done anything different from normal although as Mrs P just pointed out, this is where we would usually have a couple of nibbles for the evening, so we may have to break into a packet of crisps to share. I think I'll prepare the salad for tomorrow and I've had a half decent idea for garlicky croutons using some left over toast from the kids tea, we'll see what happens. ONWARDS!!

*FYI that was the best bit of crackling I have ever cooked. I was a little too proud.