We've just bought half a lamb to put in the freezer from a friend who keeps sheep. It is the first time we have done this. The one time we had some cockerels (bought in error...) that we fattened and then put in the freezer as soon as they started crowing, the meat was a revelation. The cockerels got to be about 5 months old instead of the not quite 5 weeks of standard supermarket birds. So they had actually developed a bit of muscle which required one to chew properly, unlike standard supermarket ones who are genuinely only babies. And the flavour was incredible. So we quite liked the idea of trying homegrown lamb. I don't think our friends knew what to charge us because they have only grown meat for themselves before, so I think they probably gave us a bargain and diddled themselves. I shall have to provide some jam for them to make up for it. they will appreciate that. Even so, the meat will have to be rationed out because each meal from it will probably cost more than we usually allow.

The lambs that I probably played with when they were newborn and our cockerels all enjoyed a bit of life and had both rain and sun on their backs, as they say. So I was looking forward to trying some lamb for dinner this evening. It will have to be shop bought mint because I seem to have killed off my mint as it has not reappeared this year. If I have got lamb in the freezer, I need some mint growing. Shop mint and homegrown lamb just don't sound right together.

So we took delivery of the meat, repackaged it into two people size portions where necessary, relabelled it and my husband volunteered to go and put it in the freezer in the shed. He came back in and said that the reorganising of the jigsaw (chest freezer) to fit it in had gone a lot better than he had expected. So yesterday evening, I go out to fetch something from the shed and spot that he had taken a whole tray of frozen food out, put it down beside him and forgotten all about it... so it is completely thawed in this warmer weather. Last night's dinner, lunch today and dinner this evening now needed to be whatever is considered vaguely salvageable. The rest of the tray has been binned. NOT frugal and my half a lamb has become an extremely expensive purchase. Grrr!