I was cooking dinner at the time my mum called and spoke to Chris. It wasn’t a dinner I’d planned ahead but I knew there were various left-overs and a lot of vegetables in the fridge so at some point during the day I had a vague notion of making a stir-fry using the chicken from last night, which is what I was doing when the call came.

Unfortunately, the plastic bagful of stir-fry prepared vegetables – the ones that I had earmarked for the task – looked decidedly limp and pink around the edges; for a moment or two I had wondered if Chris would notice… but we’ve been getting on very well recently… so, instead, I tossed the slightly strange smelling veggies into a carrier bag, along with some old cake, stale bread and peelings that I’d put back for Rosie’s goats on the farm (well, they do seem to love me). The chicken was already out on the worktop and the linguine was on the boil – there was no need to change tack because there were all manner of vegetables to throw into a stir-fry. I fried up some mushrooms and half an old onion, and in went some diced sweet pepper, the good bits of an aged broccoli (the rest went in the carrier bag for my beloved goats), two florets of perfectly nice cauliflower and half a carrot chopped finely.

Admittedly, the tangy fricassee remnants from two nights ago were rather soggy; therefore I refrained from adding the watery bits and the tomatoes, and settled for pulling out the best bits of courgette (the rest went into another carrier bag for my hungry friends – by now the original bag was full). The chicken, which was still covered in mushroom sauce, followed the courgettes into the mix and I wondered if I should have washed it first – too late. I was adding half the linguine into the wok when Chris finished his call with Mum.

“What did Mum want Darling?” I asked.

“She’s made some fresh sausage rolls with herbs and onion, and she wanted to know if we would like some,” Chris began, “but I told her you were cooking something gourmet and we did want any.”

“Really?” I asked with interest.

“Why? Would you like me to phone back and accept her offer?” Chris is often rather quick on the uptake and I could see he had an inkling that all was not like Masterchef in the kitchen.

While Chris scooted off  to my mother’s house down the road I had a brainwave – I would quickly boil up some shop bought tortellini and make a mushroom sauce to go over the top. Chris was amazed when he returned a few minutes later and found the new alternative to stir-fry was cooking and waiting for him.

“Ummmm, that smells nice,” he said, sitting down to dinner. “We like these tortellini things – don’t we?”

I took a bite first.

“We must have been very hungry when we enjoyed them last week,” I said, pulling a face.

“Oh no,” Chris trusted that look, “these aren’t the same – these came from Lidl’s and the others came from Sainbury’s.”

I took out another orange carrier bag and scraped my tasteless pasta things into it.

“Rosie’s dogs will love them,” I said.

“That’s good, they can have mine, too,” Chris enthused.

The pallid pieces of pasta, like unwanted aliens resting on the hob, also went into the doggie bag.

“I think I’ll just have one of Mum’s sausage rolls for dinner,” I suggested.

“What an excellent idea,” Chris agreed.

They were delicious. And for dessert we had an ice-cream with chocolate sauce. We do like simple fare in this house. Luckily Rosie has gourmand goats and dogs so we won’t feel guilty about any waste.