7 Quick, Cheap and Easy Recipes to make this week

Another week closer to Summer, but also a week before payday! So we at NeighbourBlog have come up with 7 meals to make this week that won't break the budget. Plus they taste great!

Tuna Sweet Potato Jackets

Ingredients:-

4 Sweet Potatoes

2 Cans tuna, drained

1 Red Onion, thinly sliced

Juice of 1 lime

6 tbsp Mayo

Handful of Coriander, finely chopped

Prick the potatoes with a fork, wrap in tin foil and bake in the oven for around 35-40mins at 180c.

In a bowl mix together the tuna, onion, mayo, lime juice and coriander. 

Then serve on top of the potatoes.

Fish Cakes

Ingredients:-

600g Potatoes

2 x 120g can of sardines or salmon

4 tbsp chopped Parsley

Juice of 1 lemon

6 tbsp mayo

1 tbsp seasoned flour

4 tsp olive oil

Cook the potatoes until tender. Coarsely mash the sardines/salmon and mix in 3 tbsp of the parsely and half of the lemon juice.

Meanwhile, mix the mayo with the remaining Parsley, lemon juice and seasoning. 

Drain the potatoes and mix in with the fish mix, shape into 8 patties and dust with the flour.

Heat the oil and fry each side for around 3-4 minutes each. Serve with the mayo and enjoy!

Spicy Sausage Pasta

Ingredients:-

1 tbsp Olive Oil

Packet of 8 Pork Sausages 

1 large onion

2 garlic cloves, crushed

1 chilli, finely chopped

400g can of chopped tomatoes

300g fusilli pasta

Heat the oil and fry the sausages, onion and garlic. Stir in the Chilli and the tomatoes whilst you cook your pasta.

Drain the pasta once al dente and mix in with the sausage sauce, serve immediately. 

Honey and Mustard Chicken Pot

Ingredients:-

1 tbsp Olive Oil

8 Bone-In Chicken Thighs

2 Onions, diced

350g Parsnips, cut into strips

300ml Veg Stock

2 tbsp Wholegrain Mustard

2 tbsp clear honey

Few sprigs of Thyme

Heat the oil in a pain and brown the chicken, once done set the chicken aside and add in the onions until softened. Put the thighs back in and add the parsnips. Then mix into the stock the honey and the mustard, pour over the chicken and add the Thyme. Transfer to the oven for 30 minutes at 180c, serve immediately. 

Chinese Style Beef

Ingredients:-

3-4 tbsp Olive Oil
Thumb size piece of ginger, chopped finely
6 Garlic Cloves, crushed
5-6 Spring Onions, chopped
1 Chilli, finely chopped
1 1/2 kg Braising Beef, diced
2 tbsp seasoned flour
1 tsp Chinese Five-Spice
2 tsp sugar
3 tbsp Dry Sherry
4 tbsp Soy Sauce
500ml Beef Stock
Bok Choi

Heat 2 tbsp oil in a large stewing pot, add the garlic, onion, ginger and chilli. Once softened, add the beef, flour, oil and brown off the beef. Heat your oven to around 150c.
Then add the five-spice, sugar and sherry. Pour in the soy sauce and stock, and bring it to simmer. Cover with a lid and transfer to the oven, cooking for around 1 1/2 - 2 hours.

Serve with steamed Bok Choi and Rice.

Veggie Pizza

Ingredients:-

200g Carton Passata
Pack of 5 Flat-breads
1/2 Bag fresh or frozen Spinach (frozen is much easier)
1 Garlic Clove, crushed
3 Balls Mozzarella, torn into chunks
5 eggs
Fresh Basil
Parmesan Shavings

Heat oven to 200c.
Spread passata evenly across the flatbreads, add the spinach, garlic and mozzarella. Create some space in the middle and crack an egg into the middle of each pizza. Season and put in the oven for around 7-8 minutes, about 6 minutes into cooking, add the Basil and Parmesan shavings. Enjoy!!

Tuna Pasta Bake

Ingredients:-

600g Pasta (Shells or Rigatoni work best)
50g Butter
50g Plain Flour
600ml Milk
250g Cheddar, grated
2 cans tuna, drained
330g Can of sweetcorn, drained
Seasoning

Heat the oven to 180c, boil the pasta in salt water for 3mins less than the time indicated on the packaging.
In another pan, melt the butter and slowly stir in the milk. Take off the heat, and add all but a handful of the grated cheese, and stir in until it becomes thick.
Drain the pasta and add it to the sauce, mixing in the tuna and sweetcorn. Transfer to a baking dish and top with the leftover cheese, season and bake for 18-20mins.





So there you have it, 7 cheap and cheerful meals to keep you going through until Pay day. Enjoy!

NeighbourBlog

NeighbourBlog’s Ten Money Saving Tips of the Week

Now we all know that feeling of ‘Let’s do something crazy this weekend, like go to Rome for the weekend!’ then your Bank Account kindly reminds you to calm the hell down…

Well we at NeighbourBlog like our crazy weekend ideas and would like to actually do some of them time to time. So we've come up with 10 money saving tips to help you achieve your own crazy ideas!

1.       Create a Budget

Assess your income and your outgoings and create a budget! Sounds so simple right? This will keep you living within your means and staying in the black. You’ll be amazed at how much you can save by doing something this simple.

2.       Recycle, Recycle, Recycle!

And I'm not talking about your Pot Noodle empties. Clothes, Shoes, Handbags even old furniture. Places like E-bay and Gumtree are great ways to get rid of old stuff. Plus you’ll be surprised at how much money you can make. Always research the item you’re selling first to check how much others are selling it at.

3.       Bargain Hunt

In London we are spoilt for shopping destinations! But don’t let London’s hidden gems pass you by. London has some great Charity Shops hidden around the place; you never know what you’ll find in them. Most of the stuff given in is as good as new and you’ll only pay a quarter of the price whilst helping out the world too. Win win!

4.       Clever Cooking

Create a meal planner to plan the family’s weekly meals so you don’t end up throwing anything away that’s past it’s used by date. Also if you make too much, don’t throw it away, freeze it! One day a week, leave the meal planner blank and have a rustle through your freezer!

5.       Online Shopaholic

Who doesn't love shopping in their PJ’s? Ordering your food shop online is a great way to make sure you stick to your list, that and the kids can’t start putting those unexpected pack of chocolates into the trolley. Ask your Neighbours where they shop too, if you do it at the same place, do your order together and halve your delivery cost.

6.       Bulk up

If things are on sale, buy them in bulk! Things like nappies, toilet roll and washing up powder will always get used. So save yourself the money and get a load of it when it’s cheap.

7.       Say NO to brands!

Considering buying the value brands of some items, you’ll save more than you think and you’ll hardly notice the difference!

8.       Save like a Superstar

Open a savings account (Tax Free ISA, hint hint) and pay into it as often as you can. When creating your budget planner try and set aside a direct debit with what you can afford to go straight into it. At NeighbourBlog we found that setting a goal really helps, be it new shoes, a holiday or a wedding – seeing the amount go up will give you a great feeling.

9.       Choo choose your transport wisely

Yes we all love the tube (when it’s working), it’s by far the quickest way to get around the city. But wait, it’s the most expensive too!

Start stretching those legs and get walking; you’ll see some great sights of the city and find out a lot more about it! To get to places outside of walking distance, hop on the bus. They’re cheaper! And remember it’s still cheaper to use an Oyster card no matter what in London.

10.   Do I REALLY need this?

Imagine the scenario; it’s lunchtime. You find yourself in a department store and there’s a sale on. You pick up a beautifully packaged BBQ tools set, it’s so shiny. Then you spot a decorative flamingo that would SO look great in your garden – and they’re half price! STOP NOW!! Ask yourself: Do you honestly need these? Exactly. You live in a flat. It doesn’t even have a back door. Put it down and walk away. 

The only BBQ Recipes you will ever need

Hey Neighbours! 

We at the NeighbourBlog HQ do love our food, and now summer is just around the corner it’s coming up to BBQ season! The great British BBQ has a lot of variations, but below we have listed our (tried and tested!) best recipes for the perfect British BBQ, Enjoy!

Homemade Beef Burgers

Ingredients:-

1 Large White Onion

1 Slice of Bread (Crust is best) or a handful of Breadcrumbs

500g Minced Beef

1 Egg Yolk

½ tbsp Ketchup

1 tbsp Worcestershire Sauce

Salt and Pepper to taste

This recipe makes at least 4 pretty big burgers, but can stretch out to 6 pretty easily.

Now the easiest way to do all of this is to put it all in a food processor and just blitz it until the ingredients are nicely mixed and you can’t see any big chunks of Onion! If you don’t have a food processor – get those hands ready! This recipe is pretty easy to do with your hands, although it doesn’t feel the nicest, just make sure you chop the onion as finely as possible.

Now the easy bit, shape them into patties, you want them around 1.5cm-2cm thick. The easiest way to stop them from being so sticky is to dust them with a light coating of flour. This holds it all together and stops them falling apart. Give them around 5 minutes on the grill on each side, and enjoy!

Homemade Vegetarian Burgers

Ingredients:-

2 ½ tbsp Olive Oil

1 Large White Onion finely chopped

1 Garlic Clove crushed

300g Grated Carrots

300g Grated Courgette (Aubergine works well too!)

1 ½ tsp Ground Cumin

1 ½ tsp Ground Coriander

3 tbsp Crunchy Peanut Butter (Weird we know but it works)

2 tbsp Chopped Fresh Coriander

100g Breadcrumbs

1 Egg Beaten

Salt and Pepper

This recipe will make 4-6 decent sized burgers.

Start by adding the oil to a frying pan and put it on a moderate heat, add the onion and the garlic and cook until both are starting to soften. Next add the carrot and courgette/aubergine and cook until softened (around 10mins on a moderate heat should do it). Next stir in the Cumin, Coriander, Peanut Butter, Fresh Coriander and seasoning to taste. Make sure it’s mixed well. Then set it aside to cool slightly. Once it’s cooled add in the egg and the breadcrumbs. At this point the mixture will be starting to blend together nicely.

Shape into 4-6 patties, around 1.5cm-2cm thick, then stick on the grill for around 5 minutes each side and enjoy!

BBQ Marinade

Ingredients:-

3 tbsp Ketchup

2 tbsp Clear Honey

2 tbsp Sweet Chilli Sauce

1 tbsp Soy Sauce

1 tbsp Olive Oil

1 tbsp White Wine Vinegar

1 tbsp Cajun Seasoning

1 De-seeded Red Chilli, finely chopped

½ tsp Onion or Garlic Salt

This recipe for a marinade is great; you end up with perfectly seasoned sticky BBQ with any meat! This is especially good for wings and ribs (we tested this one a few times it was so good). We found the best method is putting all of the ingredients in a sealable bag with the meat of your choice and if possible marinating in the fridge over night. This makes it super juicy when you get round to cooking it!

NeighbourBlog’s BBQ Sauce

Ingredients:-

2tbsp Olive Oil

1 Large White Onion, finely chopped

3 Garlic Cloves, crushed

400g Can of Chopped Tomatoes

90g Brown Sugar

3 tbsp Malt Vinegar

2 tbsp Worcestershire Sauce

1 tbsp Tomato Puree

Dash of Tabasco

Sprinkle of Smoked Paprika

Firstly start by softening the onion in the olive oil, then add everything else in and give it a good stir. Keep it on low-moderate heat and simmer for a good 20-30 minutes stirring regularly.

This sauce is great chunky, but if you prefer it a little smoother, leave it to cool and give it a blitz with a hand blender or in a food processor.

Homemade Cheese Slaw

Ingredients:-

50g Cheddar Cheese (or any other type, we at NeighbourBlog like the strong ones!)

½ White Onion

2 Carrots

½ White Cabbage

6 tbsp Mayonnaise

½ tbsp Dijon Mustard

Tsp White Wine Vinegar

Your best friend when making Slaw is your Grater! Grate all of these magical ingredients and add the vinegar, mayo and mustard – tada! Awesome homemade slaw.

NeighbourBlog’s Potato Salad

Ingredients:-

6 Medium Cooked and Diced Potatoes

1 Small Onion, finely chopped

2 Stalks Celery, finely chopped

1 tsp Salt

6 Hard Boiled Eggs, diced

Dressing:-

2 Beaten Eggs

25g White Sugar

1 tsp Corn flour

4 tbsp Vinegar

1 Can Evaporated Milk

1 tsp Dijon Mustard

50 g Butter

6 Heaped Tablespoons Mayonnaise

Toss the potatoes and eggs together in a large bowl.

For the dressing, whisk together the eggs, sugar, corn flour and salt into a saucepan. Stir in slowly the vinegar, milk and mustard. Cook over a moderate heat, stirring frequently until the sauce has thickened. Then remove from the heat and stir in the butter. Once it’s cooled for a few hours in the fridge, stir in the mayonnaise and add to the Potatoes and Eggs. Best. Potato. Salad. Ever.

Burger Relish

Ingredients:-

6 Tomatoes with the skin peeled (do this by boiling them whole, skin will peel right off)

1 Onion, finely chopped

1 tsp English Mustard

25g Brown Sugar

1 tbsp Worcestershire Sauce

150ml Red Wine Vinegar

Dash of Tabasco (Depending on how brave you’re feeling)

Salt and Pepper to season

Finely chop the tomatoes and add them to a pan with a little Olive Oil and the Onion. As they start to soften add in the Brown Sugar. Once the sugar starts to get a little gloopy (scientific term), add in the rest of the ingredients. Then leave this to simmer for around 20 minutes on a moderate heat until it’s thickened. Then add to a juicy Beef Burger. Then you have one fine NeighbourBlog Burger.

BBQ’s aren’t just an excuse to eat good food and sit your garden with a few drinks, they are also a great excuse to meet your Neighbours! So why not take some of our wonderful recipes, and host a get together. It is almost summer after all!

The NeighbourBlog Team

Is Buying better than Renting?

The Telegraph has recently released a calculator, helping first time buyers figure out if financially it's better for them to buy or rent. There are undeniably many benefits of owning your own home, but with the recent housing prices being extraordinarily high here in London, we here at NeighbourBlog thought it best to weigh up some pros and cons for our lovely users.

Buying a home

1.Stability

The main reason we all want our own home, stability. Being able to call somewhere your own, and not having the constant doubt that your Landlord could decide to sell at any time. Owning your own home means you don't have this constant worry, something that with renting we all have in the back of our minds.

2. Live by your own rules

Buying your own home gives you a sense of privacy that you don't necessarily get from renting. You aren't bound by monthly checks from the Landlord/Agency, you don't have to panic if you get a slight mark on the wall and you can hang what you want, where you want! You can live in it exactly how you want to, have as many pets as you can fit in, paint the walls crazy colours and furnish it with your own things. You can live by your rules, rather than an agents or landlords.

3. Cost effective living

Renting over long periods can become crippling financially. With inflation inevitably rising the rent each year, it just ends up costing you more each year.
Where as with a mortgage you are paying it off, rather than the money going to a Landlord. And rather than your mortgage going up such as rent does, over time it will go down. Also, financially owning a house has huge benefits, such as being able to take out secure loans, and being considered more stable by potential lenders. Not to mention, if you have a spare room or an annex, you can rent it out, providing you with an extra source of income.

4. Investing - Not spending

Another bonus of buying your own home is that you aren't paying rent each month to a Landlord or Agency - money you will never see again - you are paying off a mortgage and building equity, so at the end of your mortgage term you can live rent and mortgage free.




Renting a home

1. Flexibility

If you aren't ready to settle down, or if you don't plan on staying in the area long - then renting is the best thing to do. When you buy a home you make a huge commitment to staying put. If something changes and you need to move, it's much easier to wave goodbye to your Landlord than it is to try and sell your home.

2. Budgeting

When it comes to renting you have a fixed rate that you pay each month, you look at it and figure out if you can afford it. If you can? Great! You know exactly what your housing will cost each month (excluding bills!). You know exactly what will be coming out of your account and when. You won't have to deal with additional costs, additional interest like you would when you buy a home. This makes it far easier to build your savings in the long run.

3. Less expense initially

When you go to rent a property, you do have some pretty hefty expenses to pay up front. Usually these include a deposit, reference checking fees and then the agents fees. Say you are renting a property for £1000 a month - the initial costs could get up to £2500 before you've even moved in. This can sometimes be a pretty large amount to cough up out of savings, but the benefit is that the deposit you get back (as long as you return the property in good condition!), so this cost if you continue to rent, should always be pretty much covered by your previous property. And the best bit? It's A LOT cheaper than the initial deposit to buying a property!

4. Less risk

When you take ownership and responsibility for something, there's always a risk of losing it. If anything happens and you can't make your mortgage repayments, there's the possibility of your home being repossessed. Where as with renting, if something happens you can just move to somewhere more within your budget. When buying a house a big mistake people make is they take on a mortgage that they can afford at the time - but not necessarily for the future. The same goes if you take out a loan against your home, you're putting it at a big risk if you can't keep up the repayments. With renting you can keep to below your budget, making sure each month you know you will still have a roof over your head.

5. No maintenance costs

When renting a property, it's the landlords duty to keep the building in good condition. It's not your duty to fix the leaking tap or the crack going down the wall. This saves you from any costs coming up in a case such as flooding. Also if you are provided with furniture, as long as it isn't damage you have done, it is also the landlords duty to replace and or fix the item. When you have your own home, if the boiler goes down - that's something you personally are going to have to find the money for. With renting the only thing you need to care for will be your personal objects - so contents insurance is always a good thing to look at.

The importance of communication - are you talking with your neighbours?


We here at NeighbourBlog believe communication between neighbours and communities is
essential. We have tried to improve this by creating our site, a tool that means you can
talk to your whole street, without even stepping outside! Here we have a seperate forum
for every street in London, to get us all talking with eachother. Strong communication is
important for a whole host of different reasons; neighbourhoods need to reach inward to
enable residents to get to know eachother better, take care of eachother, do things
together and improve their quality of life. In addition, they need to be able to tell
their story externally, which helps attract their next neighbour. We at NeighbourBlog
believe it's really important for neighbourhoods to have the skills to be able to utilise
technology to communicate well within their community. This is where our site comes in.
By communicating with eachother, we can cut down the risk of crime, anti-social behaviour
and other factors which may cause us distress in our homes. NeighbourBlog is a great
place to join a growing community in which we all aim to make our neighbourhood a safer,
friendlier and happier place to live.

Why sense of community is important: the recent slavery case

Following the recent news about 3 women kept against their will for 30 years in the house of an elderly couple in Brixton, it raises concerns and questions: was there anything that could have been done to prevent it? If yes, then what?

In big and diverse cities like London it has become common to live for years without knowing our neighbours. Many of us find it easier to just ‘mind our own business’ rather than mixing and socializing with people as it requires more effort. But maybe sometimes we shouldn't ‘mind just our own business’ and be more open to our neighbours, our community and people in general.

The neighbours of the responsible couple were shocked to find out what has actually been going on under their nose for so many years. They never suspected anything and didn’t have even a tiniest clue about such a cruelty in their neighbourhood. It is evident, that this was the case of ‘minding their own business’. If the whole neighbourhood and community in Brixton were closer, it is much likelier that the neighbours of the culprits’ would have suspected that something was not right and maybe we wouldn't be reading about this story only now, after 30 years.

There has to be more focus on bringing local communities and people together. That’s what NeighbourBlog aims to achieve. Of course, it didn't exist 30 years ago when the women first lost their freedom, but it may be a starting point to prevent similar events from happening in the future. It is designed with YOU and YOUR NEIGHBOURHOOD in mind.

London is a property developers' paradise. And ordinary people are being priced out

Tower blocks, once considered an evil social experiment foisted by bureaucrats and architects on the working classes, are being built at a rapid rate in London today. They're not called that any more, obviously – they're apartments, residences, stunning developments or luxury living solutions – and they lack the things that tower blocks used to have, such as open space, double-aspect flats, lots of storage space or low rents. But residential, tower-shaped buildings are, after a short gap from 2009-2012, rising. On the Isle of Dogs, the 74-storey Hertsmere Tower has just been unveiled by the Irish developer Tom Ryan, which will actually be taller than the adjacent office blocks of Canary Wharf. Given that London is in the middle of a housing crisis, with rents rising as fast as they were during the boom, an argument might well be made that this could ease the problem. The simplistic call of "build more homes!" appearing on both benches of parliament, is visibly being answered, as the cranes from Vauxhall to Woolwich erect the latest concrete-framed high rise. Is all this conspicuous construction going to solve London's housing problem?

The answer is yes, if you think that the crisis is undersupply of buy-to-let flats aimed at the affluent, but no, if you entertain the notion that the crisis might be one of rising rents, pressure on social and council housing and its tenants and rampant gentrification. None of these towers are social, affordable or (obviously) council housing, but explicitly for private renters. Naturally, their defenders might say, these things cost public money, and in this time of heightened austerity we have to let the market sort it out for us. So you might be surprised to find that these towers are being specifically encouraged by the government, and are often in receipt of rather large sums of state subsidy. The government recently introduced, along with Help to Buy to encourage homeowners, a scheme called Build to Rent, which offers loans or equity to "a varied mix of developers" to build private homes to be sold at market rents. Some 43 developers have already applied for the scheme, and £1bn is being allocated for this purpose. Several housing associations in the north of England that were initially keen to sign up to the scheme have pulled out, citing regulations that require that the Homes and Communities Agency receives annual returns on their investment, something which is hardly certain with social renting. It's becoming clear that this is basically an equity scheme for yuppie flats, underwritten by the state at preferential terms.

It's doubtful they'll be funnelling money towards a developer like Tom Ryan and his Canary Wharf skyscraper, as they cater for millionaires rather than the merely upwardly mobile; but dozens of more mundane developers are getting money from Build to Rent already. One recipient is Genesis Housing Association. Its delightfully named Stratford Halo, a few stops away on the DLR, was not built with Build to Rent funds but is representative of the sort of development the scheme was set up to fund. It has a rent of £1,700 per month for a two-bedroom flat. In order for this to qualify as "affordable", (defined by Shelter as 35% of income), a family would have to be earning £76,000 a year.

This is what made it a target for Let Down, a group bringing together several tenants' rights organisations across London, who occupied the Halo on Saturday, by posing as potential tenants – as one of them pointed out, "in order to be allowed to view this publicly subsidised zone 3 flat, four of us had to pretend to have an annual income of more than £150,000". On seizing the tower for a day, they unfurled banners across it, one of which reads "£90m public fund for unaffordable housing scheme".

As always, the invisible hand is being given a great deal of help in London, with the current demographic shift where the rich move in and the poor move out encouraged first by the restrictions on council tenure, then by the bedroom tax, and now by a fund being thrown at private developers. The Hertsmere Tower is the more obviously gross part of this equation, its most luxurious end, towering over a borough with 23,000 people on its waiting list, where neighbouring social housing such as Balfron Tower and Robin Hood Gardens are both being prepared for a better class of resident. This isn't happening automatically, inexorably or accidentally – it's public policy. Londoners are literally paying for the transformation of their city into a property developer's paradise.

The original article can be found here: 

http://www.theguardian.com/commentisfree/2013/nov/18/london-property-developers-paradise

What are your views?