Thank you all for the birthday wishes and much appreciated compliments on Katherine’s cake. It really was a delicious bake, very impressive indeed. We had a lovely week in Aylesbury, though sods law came into play a little and the weather has improved exactly one day after arriving back in Aberystwyth. Oh well, at least it is finally here and the month-long deluge is over. Prepare yourselves for a lengthy, but comical, rant regarding pastry!
Being able to identify and prepare the cheaper cuts of meat is one of the many paths to becoming truly frugal. As my tips section explains, meat is the main culprit behind the lack of frugality these days. Indeed, if you’re going to be excessively carnivorous, you may as well do it economically. Not only this, but the cheaper cuts are often the most flavoursome; lamb bread and pork hand are evidence of this. The reason for their relative lack of expense is the fact that they can often take a while to prepare or cook. Lamb breast is also considered to be too fatty by most people. However, one must remember that the cooking process has the added effect of melting most of the fat present in meat; this makes its use entirely optional.
My grandmother has, in the past couple of weeks, started passing on a number of her recipes that I have expressed an interest in trying out. Since she is of a certain age, my grandmother is from an era in which most people would naturally eat frugally. As one might imagine, it was unacceptable, both socially and economically, to waste resources during war-time and post-war Britain; the setting in which she grew up. Though it is fairly clear that the roots of this dish do not lie in the 1940s – particularly with the addition of dried apricots – I believe that it still retains the frugal sensibilities of that period, as so many of my recipes do.