Making do with two

I've heard three is the magic number, however I've found two to be more than ample.

I'll explain what I mean. I've been getting interested in brewing recently.

I haven't quite taken the plunge into buying a barrel and some yeast yet. But for my birthday my significant other bought me a book on the subject. I had a great time reading through it and feel much more educated and ready to take the plunge.

There were various helpful hints in the book, I now know what a mash is and that getting bladdered isn't necessarily a bad thing.

The best tip I got from the book was contained within a sloe gin recipe, as a lot of good things are, as you can imagine it went through the process of making the sloe gin (basically adding the sloes to a jar, covering them in some gin and leaving it to steep for a year), it was the last part that caught my eye. You have to leave it for a year!

This is where it added a handy tip, if you can't wait that long for your sloe gin, why not make two, then you can leave one to steep for the year and drink one pretty quickly to alleviate the pain of waiting.

I know this seems dumb, but I'd never even thought of doing this and then it hit me, some kind of internal revelation rushed through me, a resonation of sorts. This tip could be applied throughout life.

Looking to build up a handy store cupboard / freezer stock? Cook up double the amount for dinner one night, it's no more hassle than usual, then freeze/store half of the finished product.

Looking to create a savings pot, every time you go shopping for something, put the same amount into a savings pot (maybe it falls down a little here, as it's probably a little too aggressive, perhaps putting the change you get from the purchase into savings is more likely).

Looking to get ahead at work, create your monthly reports in one batch, then simply fill in the relevant data when you get to that period, rather than completely recreating the report each time.

So I'm going to look to put this into practice in other ways.

Any others you can think of just whack them in the comments, I'll admit this is not an exhaustive list!

if you'd like to pick up the book I got this from, it's here on amazon - but I think you can get it cheaper in your local  "The Works" bookshop.

Enjoy!

Pic by Malcom Murdoch