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Scrimping?
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Milo



Joined: 16 May 2005
Posts: 342
Location: Oop North-ish.
PostPosted: Fri Nov 03, 06 1:59 pm    Post subject: Scrimping? Reply with quote
    

Not a word I hear very often, but I like the word and in some instances I do it habitually and like doing it too. Here's an example I picked up from my mum (who was brought up during WWII as one of six children in a hard-up East End family):

Opening a tin of soup, (etc.), (if opening a tin is not in itself is not too profligate), I always run some water (not very much) into the tin and swill it about to get out all the remaining soup, then add the result to the rest of the soup. The process provides more soup!

I'd suggest that there's an element of green-ness about scrimping (in that not scrimping is quite possibly wasteful and un-green).

Do you have any favourite "scrimps"?

Behemoth



Joined: 01 Dec 2004
Posts: 19023
Location: Leeds
PostPosted: Fri Nov 03, 06 2:19 pm    Post subject: Reply with quote
    

Breakfast cocktail - all the piddly bits from the bottom of various cereal packets - usually stale and only marginally better than the cardboard box but it makes me feel strangely triumphant as I wave my spoon defianatly at consumer society

joanne



Joined: 28 Oct 2004
Posts: 7100
Location: Morecambe, Lancashire
PostPosted: Fri Nov 03, 06 2:22 pm    Post subject: Re: Scrimping? Reply with quote
    

Milo wrote:

Opening a tin of soup, (etc.), (if opening a tin is not in itself is not too profligate), I always run some water (not very much) into the tin and swill it about to get out all the remaining soup, then add the result to the rest of the soup. The process provides more soup!


I thought everyone did that - Do you mean people don't

Milo



Joined: 16 May 2005
Posts: 342
Location: Oop North-ish.
PostPosted: Fri Nov 03, 06 2:51 pm    Post subject: Re: Scrimping? Reply with quote
    

jocorless wrote:

I thought everyone did that - Do you mean people don't


Yes, they don't! I think you must be mixing with the right people.

I've thought of a few more:

1. Never use a tea bag only once.

2. Worn down bars of soap. Don't chuck, 'em, squish one against another and make one bigger bar. (My mum once had a small plastic discus-shaped thing with a mesh of holes in it - worn out soap was put inside it and it was then used instead of a bar of soap).

3. Eat the bread crusts rather than chuck 'em. How can people do that!!?

4. Leave the ketchup bottle upside down until the sides look clean and dilute the last of the stubborn stuff with a splash or two of vinegar.

5. Fruit and veg is hardly ever too mouldy if you cut off the bad bits.

Last edited by Milo on Fri Nov 03, 06 3:04 pm; edited 1 time in total

Rosa



Joined: 10 Sep 2006
Posts: 387
Location: Hampshire
PostPosted: Fri Nov 03, 06 3:02 pm    Post subject: Reply with quote
    

Adding water to end of washing up liquid, vinegar into last of sauce bottles. Turning shampoo/conditioner bottles upside down. Cleaning shoes when they are dirty, old tights to tie plants up with, and so on------- I wouldn't have thought I was a scrimper but I think I must be

jamsam



Joined: 21 Oct 2005
Posts: 2560
Location: erm....i dont know, its dark.
PostPosted: Fri Nov 03, 06 3:37 pm    Post subject: Reply with quote
    

i never use vinegar to swill out sauce bottles, i use water!!

if i have a pan or oven dish withoil or fat left in it, i leave it till the morning when i always get the crusts from the kids and chuck them in it. by tea time they have soaked up all the fat and i then put them out for the birds, clean dish and fat birds..what a scrimp!!

Bernie66



Joined: 14 Jan 2005
Posts: 13967
Location: Eastoft
PostPosted: Fri Nov 03, 06 3:38 pm    Post subject: Reply with quote
    

My MIL buys full fat milk and waters it down to add to the ones above. She is a joy.

hedgewitch



Joined: 26 Nov 2005
Posts: 5834
Location: Daft wench GHQ
PostPosted: Fri Nov 03, 06 3:44 pm    Post subject: Reply with quote
    

Bernie66 wrote:
My MIL buys full fat milk and waters it down to add to the ones above. She is a joy.



Northern_Lad



Joined: 13 Dec 2004
Posts: 14210
Location: Somewhere
PostPosted: Fri Nov 03, 06 3:50 pm    Post subject: Reply with quote
    

My gramdma used to be anti-scimping. She'd cook the bacon with the rid on and then spend 15 minutes cutting it off with a butter knife and feed it to the birds. She weighed about 3 pounds wet through.

madmonk



Joined: 08 May 2006
Posts: 835

PostPosted: Fri Nov 03, 06 3:54 pm    Post subject: Reply with quote
    

If my sister has any red wine left after opening the bottle she freezes it to put in her casseroles next time she makes one. left over wine in this house would be a bl**dy miracle.

joanne



Joined: 28 Oct 2004
Posts: 7100
Location: Morecambe, Lancashire
PostPosted: Fri Nov 03, 06 3:59 pm    Post subject: Reply with quote
    

madmonk wrote:
If my sister has any red wine left after opening the bottle she freezes it to put in her casseroles next time she makes one. left over wine in this house would be a bl**dy miracle.


Same in ours - which reminds me - need a bottle for this evening

Andy B



Joined: 12 Jan 2005
Posts: 3920
Location: Brum
PostPosted: Fri Nov 03, 06 4:03 pm    Post subject: Reply with quote
    

Wait till bananas go black, easier on the teeth!

2steps



Joined: 05 Sep 2005
Posts: 5349
Location: Surrey
PostPosted: Fri Nov 03, 06 4:19 pm    Post subject: Reply with quote
    

Behemoth, my OH loves the crumbly cereal box bottoms.

I rinse out cans, sauce bottles etc eat crusts, save cooking water to make up gravy or stock.

hedgewitch



Joined: 26 Nov 2005
Posts: 5834
Location: Daft wench GHQ
PostPosted: Fri Nov 03, 06 4:39 pm    Post subject: Reply with quote
    

I have always thought the crust is the best bit of the loaf - they were much fought over when I was growing up. Used to be very puzzled at other kids houses when they threw the crust away

Milo



Joined: 16 May 2005
Posts: 342
Location: Oop North-ish.
PostPosted: Fri Nov 03, 06 4:48 pm    Post subject: Reply with quote
    

Here (from my Tibet pages) is my favourite example:

My parents invited the group (of Tibetans) to our house for Christmas Day and my memory of the visit is of their happiness and uncomplicatedness. Balloons were excitedly and quite firmly patted around the sitting room. Some of them burst. With unreasonable poignancy, I recall our visitors showed resourcefulness way beyond our western squanderings and seized the balloons' blasted remnants and sucked, blew and twisted them into new mini-balloons with which to continue their celebration of our culture's big holiday.

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