Day two - Monday 2nd Feb

We start Day two in a bad way, Mrs P overslept, missed breakfast and so by lunchtime she had called to tell me that if I intended to keep giving her salad for the rest of the month then I could do one. A small over-reaction I thought, but probably fair. Politely put, we are not generally 'salad people' and thinking we could make the transition so easily was almost certainly a little naive to say the least.  Mrs P did capitulate a little and admitted that the croutons that I made last night were the best part of the meal. I had cut up a granary bread crust and fried it until crisp with crushed garlic and a pinch of salt. Left them to cool and put in a separate tub for transport, the salty crunch gave a bulk to the meal that went some way to give a little bit of satisfaction. I did miss some form of dressing though, another thing for the list next week.

A small side note on bread - for this experiment, I've kept with our usual Tesco own brand, granary farmhouse loaf. We like the maltiness, crunchy seeds and the fact that it's only £1. Well, I say we but really there is nothing Mrs P likes more than sandwiches, toast or pretty much anything made from bread so white the stain banishing Gods of Domestos would be proud. If we make it through this without significant personal injury, maybe I'll treat her, maybe.

Anyway, where was I? The Child had cereal for breakfast and I put an apple in her school bag for a snack. Like many children her age, she has lunch at school and while I'm sure the meals are nutritionally balanced, I can't be sure how much she actually eats (announcing she has survived the day on a bit of cheese and cucumber is not uncommon), so an extra piece of fruit will make sure I know she has one of her f&v portions for the day.

We've already talked about lunch with ripped lettuce, chopped celery, finely sliced carrot, peppers and croutons (something to work on there) and so now we crash headlong into dinner. Due to other arrangements, I missed dinner with the family but have no fear, the plan had been set. After the menu planner was published, we switched up the wedges for mash as we had some left over roasties and chopped up, then softly fried the remaining veg from Sunday to make the base of the gravy. A crumbled stock cube went in and water and finally the remaining pork before it was left to simmer, reduce and generally become delicious, quick and easy gravy. I also chopped up a red pepper for chargrilling because, well, I love chargrilling things. For pud we had bananas, a great go-to healthy pudding for an eight year old!

The result was tasty, it's certainly not going to appear on the front of Food magazine but as a solid family dinner we couldn't go far wrong. We used up all the left over food from yesterday and even came away with a portion of mash for later, so it was thumbs up all round.

Now, what am I going to do about that salad....