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Make home-made versions of your favourite fast food classics with our cheap and simple recipes.

Pepperoni pizza with mozzarella-stuffed crust

There's no magic to achieving a garlicky, mozzarella-stuffed pizza crust — you just fold the dough over at the edges.

Makes two rectangular 16" pizzas. Cost per pizza: £2.97.

Ingredients:
•    1 x 345g pack ready-rolled pizza dough
•    2 ½ balls of mozzarella (125g per ball)
•    3 garlic cloves, chopped
•    Small handful flat-leaf parsley, chopped
•    A handful of chopped tomatoes (not the juice)
•    20g Parmesan, finely grated
•    8 pepperoni slices
•    A few slices of yellow or green pepper
•    Pinch of dried mixed herbs

Method:
1.    Unravel the dough and split into two. Lay out on a baking tray lined with greaseproof paper.
2.    Chop two of the mozzarella balls into small chunks and mix with the garlic and chopped parsley.
3.    Preheat your oven to 200°C. Scatter the mozzarella mixture around the edge of the pizza bases and fold over, pressing down firmly to seal. Scatter over the chopped tomato pieces (you don't need the juice) and tear off some mozzarella from the remaining half a ball. Top the pizzas with grated Parmesan, pepper slices, pepperoni and herbs.
4.    Bake for 15 minutes, until the pizzas are golden and the cheese has melted. If the edges start to unfold slightly during baking don't worry — the crust will still be cheesy, garlicky and moist.

Beef burger with bacon and cheese

A classic, served with all the trimmings. We've used maple-glazed bacon for a smoky sweetness.

Makes four. Cost per burger: £1.45.

Ingredients:
•    400g good-quality beef mince
•    1 egg
•    Salt, pepper and olive oil
•    4 seeded burger buns
•    Mayonnaise, ketchup, sliced gherkins
•    1 small onion, cut into 4 slices
•    4 slices mature cheddar, thinly sliced
•    8 rashers smoked, streaky bacon
•    3-4 tbsp maple syrup
•    1 tsp English mustard
•    1 small little gem lettuce
•    1 tomato, sliced

Method:
1.    Put the mince into a bowl, add some black pepper and crack in the egg. Mix with your hands until combined, but don't overwork it. Divide into four patties, drizzle with a little olive oil and season with a pinch of salt.
2.    Heat a dry frying pan and cook the burgers for four to five minutes on each side, until fully cooked.
3.    Meanwhile, drizzle a little maple syrup over the streaky bacon rashers and grill until crisp. Turn over, drizzle again with the remaining syrup and grill for one more minute.
4.    In a small bowl, mix two tbsp mayonnaise with one tsp English mustard. Slide the cooked burger into a split sesame seed bun with the bacon, cheese, gherkins, ketchup, onion and lettuce. Spread the top half of the bun with the mustard mayo and serve.

Seasoned baked chicken drumsticks

These seasoned chicken portions are oven-baked, rather than deep-fried.

Serves four. Price per serving (three pieces of chicken, coleslaw and fries): £1.49.

Ingredients:
•    12 skinless chicken portions (a mixture of thighs and drumsticks)
•    100g plain flour
•    200ml milk
•    ½ tsp sea salt flakes
•    ½ tsp paprika
•    ¼ tsp turmeric
•    ¼ tsp cayenne pepper
•    ½ tsp dried thyme
•    Black pepper
•    Half a small white cabbage
•    2 carrots
•    2 spring onions
•    2-3 tbsp good mayonnaise

Method:
1.    Preheat the oven to 200°C. In a large bowl, mix the herbs, spices, salt, black pepper and flour. Stir well.
2.    Dip each chicken portion into the milk and then into the spiced flour, shaking off any excess. Heat a large frying pan with two to three tbsp of oil and fry the chicken in batches, until golden brown.
3.    Transfer the chicken to a shallow baking tray and bake in the oven for about 30 minutes, until cooked through.
4.    To make the coleslaw, peel and grate the carrots, slice the spring onions and finely slice the cabbage leaves. Throw into a bowl and stir in the mayonnaise to coat. Serve the chicken with the home made coleslaw and fries.

Breakfast muffin with sausage and egg

This breakfast treat takes only around 10 minutes to make and would also work well with spicy sausage varieties.

Makes one. Cost: 94p each.

Ingredients:
•    1 breakfast muffin, sliced in half horizontally and lightly toasted
•    1 free-range egg
•    1 thick, good quality pork and leek sausage
•    1 slice of mature Cheddar cheese (optional)

Method:
1.    With a knife, make a slit in the sausage skin and remove the meat. Shape into a patty and fry in a little oil for about three to four minutes on each side, until golden and cooked through.
2.    Crack the egg into the same pan, and fry until cooked to your liking.
3.    Slide the cooked sausage onto the bottom half of the muffin, top with the fried egg, a thin slice of cheese and finally the other muffin half. Eat straight away.

Engr. Muhib Nabi

Production Engineer - Electrical

Gulbahar Tobacco International FZE

Jebel Ali Free Zone, Dubai, UAE.

muhibnabi@live.com

muhibnabi@gmail.com

Avengers assembled... Marvel Avengers Assemble (Copyright: Disney)

Hitch switch... Hitch could have been called 'The Last First Kiss' (Copyright: REX)

Executive horror... American Pie (Copyright: REX)

Engr. Muhib Nabi

Production Engineer - Electrical

Gulbahar Tobacco International FZE

Jebel Ali Free Zone, Dubai, UAE.

muhibnabi@live.com

muhibnabi@gmail.com

With millions of people contactable at the click of a mouse, social networking sites like Twitter and Facebook have become the go-to place to find out what your friends are up to.

The majority of this information is harmless, but ever-more personal details are being shared online as people simply forget that what they write is visible more than just their friends – putting careless users' personal and professional lives at risk.

And it's more than just a theoretical problem.

"Well I hate my boss, he's a little b***h". "Hey guys, my new number is 07***878***". After just a momentary check it is easy to find posts that not only pose a threat to personal safety, but could also see the author out of a job.

To combat this and raise awareness, a number of people have attempted to name and shame those who share about too much online.

One such domain is weknowwhatyouredoing.com, which shares public Facebook and Foursquare statuses from across the globe. Posted under categories which range from "Who wants to get fired" to "Who's taking drugs?", the portal highlights posts that probably should have never seen the light of day.

Callum Haywood, 18, has seen a huge reaction to his site, 'We know what you're doing'The site's creator, 18-year-old Callum Haywood, told Yahoo! News that the project was intended to highlight the growing problem.

"I was looking through Facebook's API [Application Programming Interface] and wondered whether I could get information out of it that people wouldn't necessarily want publishing," he said. "That's when I started to type in queries like 'new phone number' and I released then that quite of information then comes up.

"It came to me that this is a massive problem so I decided to set up a site to demonstrate this using real information."

By feeding this information into a site, Mr Haywood was able to give up to date posts from across the globe – complete with names and profile pictures.

"I think that has shocked a lot of people," he said. "The idea is that once people have seen the site they go back and double check their privacy settings. I've had a lot of tweets and emails to say that the site is really good as people were not previously aware of the ease in which this data can be accessed."

Despite a mass of information revealed, Mr Haywood stopped short of posting full phone numbers under the category "Who's got a new phone number?" – choosing to censor digits. Conversely, a Twitter account that has accumulated more than 6,000 followers has chosen instead to give full disclosure – in this case retweeting pictures of debit cards users have uploaded to the social networking site.

"Some people would regard this kind of thing as irresponsible," Mr Haywood admitted. "Others would argue that they are not putting it on themselves, they are simply retweeting what is already there. I was aware that if I simply just reposted this information it could end up in the wrong hands.

"It is simply shocking what people are putting up without a thought, users really need to be more aware of it."

Engr. Muhib Nabi

Production Engineer - Electrical

Gulbahar Tobacco International FZE

Jebel Ali Free Zone, Dubai, UAE.

muhibnabi@live.com

muhibnabi@gmail.com

1.Adele songs: Anything Adele- related means break up. Never post songs, statuses, or even wall posts about your most recent failed relationship. Although most of us think it's "not really that obvious", 95% of the time 100% of your friends can see right through your passive aggressiveness.

2.Friend hating: we all have that Facebook friend that we can't wait to "unfriend" (even in real life). No matter what the situation is; keep it to yourself because two words: SCREEN SHOTS!

3.Over-sharing: some people just like to tap dance all over that share button. Whether it's a link to their most recent written article (that's me of course), their favorite Yao Ming meme, or a friend's new business; nothing will stop the sharing hence causing what I like to call "severe unfriending syndrome".

4.Celeb-Look-Alike: If you looked like a celebrity, you probably wouldn't be wasting time on Facebook. Don't take the damn quiz and spare us all the significant dissimilarity.

5.Misquoting: If you like a certain quote, make sure you know who you're quoting before looking like a complete idiot. That applies to friends' statuses too.

6.TMI: Posting about your kid's playschool or favorite hangout is just an invitation to all the sexual predators of the internet world. Unless you want to get rid of your child of course.

7.ANYTHING from survey monkey: other than the fact that no one wants to EVER take a survey (especially in their free time); hackers can easily access information via these surveys to crack security questions and passwords.

8.Location, Location: Facebook accessed from certain mobiles; shares your location on every post you make. So avoid that insanely awkward moment when you have to explain to your boss why you were at Starbucks rather than on your desk!

9.Your number: DUH

10.TAGGED PICTURES: If it's something you wouldn't show your mum, don't post it on Facebook! Especially ever since family members started joining Facebook.

Production Engineer - Electrical

Gulbahar Tobacco International FZE

Jebel Ali Free Zone, Dubai, UAE.

muhibnabi@live.com

muhibnabi@gmail.com

1. Cribs

Cribs – especially the drop-side kind – are frequently on recall lists, and the reasons why are pretty terrifying. For example, in April, Nan Far Woodworking recalled their drop-side cribs for repair. The U.S. Consumer Product Safety Commission had this to say about it:

The cribs' drop sides can malfunction, detach or otherwise fail, causing part of the drop side to fall out of position, creating a space into which an infant or toddler can roll and become wedged or entrapped, which can lead to strangulation or suffocation. A child can also fall out of the crib. Drop-side incidents can also occur due to incorrect assembly and with age-related wear and tear.

So how do you know if that crib you're eying on Craigslist hasn't been recalled? You could check the U.S. Consumer Product Safety Commission's list of crib recalls, but you don't know if the crib was sent back for repairs or not. You'd just have to take the seller's word for it. It's better to play it safe and buy a new crib.

2. Car seats

The National Highway Traffic Safety Administration says car seats can be safely reused after minor crashes – if the air bags didn't deploy, no one was injured, and the car drove away. But it recommends car seats be replaced after moderate crashes.

So how do you tell the difference between a car seat in a minor crash, one in a moderate crash, or one that wasn't in a crash at all? You probably can't. The damage could be internal and not visible. Don't risk it. Buy a new one.

3. Helmets

In a crash, the thick foam inside a helmet absorbs shock and protects your head. After a crash, the helmet may look fine, but it often has breaks or tears inside the foam. The American Academy of Orthopedic Surgeons recommends replacing a helmet after any crash – even a minor one. Otherwise, the helmet might not protect you in the next crash.

4. Laptops

If you take great care of a laptop, it can last through years of heavy use – but you can't know how someone else treats their stuff. Maybe they dropped it or spilled coffee on it. The laptop could work great at first, but break down after you take it home.

I just paid $119.99 to replace the hard drive in my laptop – and it was working great until it wasn't. Had I sold the laptop to someone else, they wouldn't have known about the failing hard drive.

5. Video cameras

The same goes for video cameras. You may not see any visible damage, but it could have been dropped, exposed to water, or otherwise mistreated. Video cameras are costly to repair, so it isn't worth buying one used.

6. Mattresses

A used mattress can come with a lot of extras you don't want – dead skin cells, bacteria, hair, and every other gross thing you could imagine. It might also have bed bugs. The bugs are such a growing problem that Termini x has released a Top 15 Cities for Bed Bug Infestation list.

Bed bugs live off human blood, leave itchy bite marks, and can cause skin infections. And they multiply. According to Or-kin:

Females can deposit one to five eggs a day, and may lay 200 to 500 eggs in a lifetime. Under normal room temperatures and with an adequate food supply, they can live over 300 days.

Bring a bed bug-infested mattress into your house, and you'll pay a hefty fee to an exterminator.

7. Shoes

I believe you need a good mattress and a good pair of shoes – since you're usually in one or the other. The problem is, those used shoes may have been great for the original owner, but they've conformed to his or her feet. They might not be great for you. Used shoes that don't fit just right can lead to feet or leg pain and back problems.

8. Makeup

I see makeup at almost every garage sale I go to, but I'd never buy any. Cosmetic brushes and wands come into contact with skin and can't be cleaned very well. That barely used tube of lipstick? It might be hosting illness-causing bacteria. Considering drug stores and beauty shops regularly run makeup sales, risking your health isn't worth the savings.

9. Plasma and HDTVs

Old tube-style TVs held up a lot better than modern flat-screens. While MSNBC says TVs cost an average of $500 to repair, the repair costs run much higher for plasma screens and for more complicated issues.

Even at the lower end, it may be more cost-effective to buy a new TV under warranty than a used one.

10. Hats

The inside of that hat could be brimming with someone else's dead skin, hair, or worse – lice. Head lice feed on blood and cause itchy and painful reactions in the scalp. The nearly invisible bugs also travel quickly onto other people and your stuff.

Getting rid of lice requires two treatments of pesticides on everyone in the household. Then you'll have to clean your bedding, linens, clothes, mattresses, and any other soft fabric in the house. The treatment can take hours or days of hard work – all because you bought a cheap hat.

11. Swimsuits

Swimsuits hug the body. The close contact can transmit bacteria and other diseases – which may transfer to you when you wear the suit. Swimsuits are also fragile. If the washing instructions aren't followed, the straps might rip or the swimsuit might lose its shape. So you could be buying something that may fall apart after only a few uses.

12. Vacuums

Vacuums take a lot of wear and tear. (This morning I slammed mine into the wall three times trying to reach some dog hair in the corner.) That can lead to costly repairs. Considering you can buy a new vacuum for under $100, it isn't worth the risk to buy a used one.

13. Tires

Edmunds.com warns that thin tread isn't the only safety hazard for tires – old and used tires can pose a safety risk. As tires age, they lose elasticity. As a result, the tread could separate from the tire, causing an accident. Even if the tire isn't that old, it could have been treated poorly. Bottom line – you can't tell a tire's condition from the tread alone, so don't buy a used one just because it looks good.

14. Software

Software comes with a product code, and most software manufacturers put a limit on the number of times you can reload it. When you buy software used, you have no way of knowing how many times the product code has been used. For example, if the code has a three-time limit and the original owner used it twice, you'll only be able to load the software onto one more computer before it's no longer good.

15. DVD players

DVD players often cost more to repair than replace. For example, a friend of mine took her DVD player to a repair shop because the DVDs wouldn't load. The repair shop told her she'd need a new DVD drive tray. It would've cost $55 for the repair. She bought a new one for less.

16. Stuffed animals

Children love to stick stuffed animals into their mouths, dirt, and gooey substances. Since the stuffed animal has a fabric surface, bacteria and dirt are absorbed in the fibers. Do you really want your child putting that teddy bear in his mouth if you don't know where it's been?

17. Halogen lamps

Those old halogen lamps may look cool, but they're a fire hazard. Anne Ducey, the marketing coordinator for Seattle Light, told the The Seattle Times that halogen lamps have been linked to at least 350 fires, $2 million in property damage, 114 injuries, and 29 deaths across the United States.

Instead of buying that retro-looking halogen lamp at a thrift store, look for new CFL or LED lamps – they're safer and cheaper to use.

18. Blenders

Blenders are subject to loads of abuse. (I've broken two myself trying to force-feed frozen strawberries and ice through the blades.) Not to mention most blenders have not-always-invisible old bits of food stuck to the underside of the blades and in the blending bowl.

Since you can buy a new blender pretty cheap – I just paid $25 for one at Target – the savings isn't worth it for used ones.

19. Costume jewelry

Children and adult's costume jewelry can contain poisonous substances like nickel, cadmium, and lead. The problem was so prevalent that testing and subsequent legal action by the Center for Environmental Health in 2004 led to the recall of more than 150 million pieces of jewelry for kids. While lead testing is stricter now for new products, the used costume pieces you're buying may have lead or other chemicals.

20. Pet food and treats

A recent outbreak of pet food recalls has me worried – after all, salmonella causes serious health problems for pets that eat recalled food.

So why would I buy used stuff? Even if the food hasn't been recalled, open bags of dog food and treats can contain bugs and bug eggs. Where I live, it's not uncommon for pet food to become infested with roaches. The possibility of food poisoning and bugs isn't worth the potential savings.

Engr. Muhib Nabi

Production Engineer - Electrical

Gulbahar Tobacco International FZE

Jebel Ali Free Zone, Dubai, UAE.

muhibnabi@live.com

muhibnabi@gmail.com