Week 5 of Zero Waste
This week we got into a bit more of a routine and it's taking us less time to do our shopping. We know which stalls we want to go to and which ones have the better deals, we also split up to take less time. I'm enjoying the time in town together as well, it's a nice way to spend the morning soaking up the atmosphere with the buskers, shoppers and chatting with the shop keepers and stall owners. Each week we find more and more unpackaged items which we thought we could only get packaged. This week we found gluten free sausages and streaky (American style) bacon loose.
Shopping
This weeks shop was 108€ in the below shops:
English Market (Meat, eggs, bread) - 21€
Maher's Pure Coffee (Loose tea, coffee) - 11€
Lush (Shampoo bar) - 8€
Holland & Barrett (Pick 'n' Mix nuts/dried fruit/chocolate covered raisins) - 9€
Nature's Choice (Castile soap) - 9€
Blackpool Butcher (Meat - unpictured) - 8€
Dunnes (Fruit/veg, milk, gluten free stuff (burger buns, granola bars, beer), spaghetti sauce, cocoa etc) - 42€
Bulk bins
When we got to Holland and Barrett we were running low on containers and it was the first time I'd used their bulk bin/weighing scales. I was under the impression you needed to package and weigh each item separately (which I didn't have enough bags for) but to my pleasant surprise you can put everything into 1 bag as it's all the same price per weight. Delighted with my mix of snacks for work this week.
Meals
Dinners
Bacon/eggs
Spaghetti
Burgers with avocado and tomato on the side
Steak, corn on the cob, potatoes
Warm salad with fish, potatoes, tomatoes, kale
Pork stir-fry (rice, garlic, carrots, yellow pepper)
Lunches we buy at work as we're lucky enough to have subsidised on-site restaurants
Breakfasts
Porridge
Strawberry banana smoothie
Toast/peanut butter
G/F granola bars
Snacks
Apples
Bananas
Olives
Nuts
Chocolate raisins
Yogourt covered cranberries
Castile Soap
I'm trying the castile soap for washing up liquid, it's concentrated so I filled up my usual pump dispenser with about 1/8th of a cup of the castile soap, diluted with water (though I read this also dilutes the preservative so we may need to make smaller batches next time). The 9€ bottle should last a couple of months - unless I also use it for it's numerous other cleaning purposes listed here
Shampoo bar
The shampoo bar is supposed to be good for 60 washes if you dry it off when not in use - I'll keep you posted on how it works.
Bread
This morning when I was transferring our gluten free flour into our glass storage container I saw the recipe on the bag for gluten free bread. As we didn't get any this week I thought I'd try it out. It was very simple and Colm says it's similar to the stuff we buy at the baker (so a bit crumbly). I froze half and put the other half in our re-pac bag which keeps it from drying out and getting mouldy for longer. Next time I might try a normal bread recipe and substitute the gluten free flour for regular and see if it comes out more like normal bread which we can both eat.
Gluten free bread recipe
