Simple and budget-friendly family meal ideas to reduce food bills

[FireBreathingDragon]

Trying to cut down our horrendous food bills of a couple of hundred pounds (plus!) per week. That’s around £1000+ per month.

It’s my fault for getting into the habit of the same meals and perhaps being a little excessive.

So, I aim to at least try some simple and cheap nutritious meals for most of the week. So far the ideas I have:

Jacket potatoes with salad, cheese, beans etc

Beans or eggs on toast followed by a lovely fruit salad

Soups with a sandwich or pitta

Salads with boiled eggs

Spag Bol

Sausage, mash and peas

What else can I add to this repertoire? Nothing spicy as we have intolerance and a toddler. Family of 5.

I am making a batch of cookies and homemade iced sponge cake this week for nice desserts / tea time treats as I don’t want to feel my meals are so bland that I’m not getting excited about them! Yes, I am very
spoilt. 🤭
A simple iced sponge or batch of cookies only costs a couple of pounds each and is plentiful ( also gives a nice ending to a simple supper).

Stir fry veg and noodles, plain with soy sauce & garlic.

I think you’ve covered my basics there.

So going with the ‘simple’ part, you can freeze grated cheese, cooked pasta with sauce, homemade sauce, homemade soup, biscuit dough (split into biscuit sized balls) and a cake that doesn’t have fresh cream (slice it first). So they’re good batch cooking options, maybe take out of the freezer in the morning unless you’re like me and sit there with a frozen block of soup cursing because you forgot to take it out of the freezer.

Chilli (with beef/ turkey or veg)
I make this regularly and skip the chilli ingredients… my daughter loves it https://www.bbcgoodfood.com/recipes/sichuan-style-pork-green-bean-stir-fry
BLTs
Roast chicken and then the next night make fajitas/ pie etc with leftovers
Pitta bread pizzas

Omlette.
Ceasar salad - but use grilled halloumi rather than chicken, and serve with boiled potatoes.
Pasta with homemade tomato & vegetable sauce
Homemade ministrone soup

Child-friendly kedgeree (rice with slices of hard boiled egg, tomato wedges, parsley and a smoked mackerel fillet broken up and mixed through it). Make two batches of rice and use half of it this way.

Then the following night use the cold rice to make egg fried rice - use a wok, fry chopped onion and chopped red pepper plus some broccoli or peas, then scramble an egg per person in the hot pan, then add the rice, breaking it up actively in the pan.

Grilled sardines on toast with slices of tomato.

Chicken pie. Leftover roast chicken with plenty of carrots and other veg, and make a shortcrust pastry lid.

Patatas bravas, Anglo style. You can dial the spice down or up.

We've all got into the habit of the protein element of a meal having to be the main thing, but it never used to be like that - where I live, Yorkshire pudding was served as a starter so you'd more than taken the edge off your appetite before the meat was served, and thus didn't need/take so much. So make the carbs the main thing and add a smaller amount of the expensive stuff. Also have good bread on the table for everyone to mop up with - like we used to.

We spend approximately £150- £180 fortnightly in aldi with a top up £25 weekly for kids lunchboxes for 2 children and 1 toddler daily and adult lunches daily.

We are vegitarian so no expensive meat. We cook everything from scratch and bulk with lentils, sides of rice or noodles. Tofu is also very versatile now.
Examples:

Lentil dhal
Omelette and homemade chips
Toad in hole
Bean chilli/ bean based casseroles
Veggie hotpot
Pitta pizzas/flatbread homemade pizzas
Soups - parsnip and carrot is very cheap
Vegtable lasange usually pretty cheap with extra for lunches next day.
Onion bhaji burgers are cheap and a bit of a treat.
Homity pie with salad.
Jacket potatoes
Sweetcorn or Courgette fritters with dip

Adult lunches are often salads, leftovers or noodle based meals.

We dont do desserts however I bake oat baked snacks with fruit as oats are again very cheap and fruit as snacks. Kidney bean "choco" slices are very cheap and children think they are brownies but secretly got a fibre hit!

We never feel hungry but definitely feeling the financial pinch with food prices recently!

Some great ideas- thank you
would you be able to share the kidney bean brownie recipe please 🙏

For sweet treats shortbread is really easy. You can also make a savoury cheese biscuit version by swapping the sugar for grated cheese and adding a bit of mustard powder. I make the dough, roll it into a log in cling film then freeze it and you can just cut slices off the end and bake them straight from frozen whenever you want fresh shortbread.

Egg fried rice is a staple in our house for using up any odds and ends from the fridge. Chop up whatever veg you have, meat too if you have it and fry in sesame oil with garlic and ginger. Mix through cooked rice, soy sauce and crack a couple of eggs in to cook through just before serving.

We always bulk out meat with pulses or vegetables. I will use half of the meat suggested in a recipe and make up the extra with beans, lentils, oats or grated veg. We eat mostly vegetarian as I'll only buy high welfare meat so I'd rather eat less but better quality.

Toad in the hole

I have a rotation based on
Monday - A curry night (basically chicken curry mild for dc3 with lots of veg to bulk out), but it can be varied.
Tuesday- bean night (could be beans on toast, jacket potato, bean burrito, all day breakfast, egg and beans),
Wednesday - Rice night (savoury rice with chicken, Jambalaya, nandos rice, stir fry) with protein,
Thursday- soup and a sandwich night (make a vegetable soup and leftovers i have for lunch in the week), a bag of carrots at 69p makes 10 portions with an onion, bit of ground corriander, herbs and stock cube.
Friday- chilli night.
Saturday - Pasta night (bolognaise, chicken, sausage or vegetable),
Sunday - Potatoes could be sausage and mash or roast dinner or fish with new potatoes and salad depending on season/ whats on offer. At the moment we've had pork last two weeks as I had a joint on offer cooked and froze it.
I have an £80 budget every 10 days for 1 adult, 2 older teens and by keeping to this I get variety and flexibility when things are on offer but budget. We often have the same for a few weeks so this week I'll make a chicken pasta sauce enough for 3 weeks and freeze. I bulk buy herbs and spices and dont use brands. If I make chilli I add two tins of really cheap beans not nice on toast but fine in a chilli and gives me and extra 4 portions.
Down grade where you can, buy frozen vegetables. I make a cake, biscuits or flapjack once a week for snacks or puddings. Always have fruit, yoghurt and bread for snacks. Also freeze milk for emergencies so you don't shop between your main shops.

Recipe from whatmolly.eats on Instagram.

Ingredients (makes 6-9 big slices or 12 smaller ones) 2 tins kidney beans, drained 140g honey 60g olive oil 2eggs 80g oats 30g cocoa powder 40g self raising flour 1 pack of mini eggs, smashed or choco drops
Recipe
Preheat the oven to 165 degrees (fan assisted Blend your beans in a blender with olive oil and honey until smooth

• Transfer to a mixing bowl then whisk in the eggs, cocoa. flour and oats Optionally add half the mini eggs to the batter then sprinkle the rest on top- you can also sub for 100g dark chocolate chips too! Bake for 22-24 minutes
• Leave to cool before slicing

So true - thanks for that x

Some great ideas thanks x

Some great ideas thanks 🙏🏻

It’s taken OH two days to notice the menu has dropped from five star five dining to a more basic spread.

We only eat high welfare meat so are reducing meat consumption in favour of cheaper protein alternatives. I must admit I’m laying in bed with a rumbling tummy so I had to nip down for a banana.

Buy cheapest realistic option - eg whole lettuce rather than bagged, frozen veg, frozen berries, dry pulses, and use up leftovers.

When dc younger, we used to have a vegetable or salad starter. Not fancy, obviously, but homemade hummus with carrot sticks, or a green salad or homemade soup or whatever. Then a smaller main course. I think we'll restart that again as cheap & healthy!

If you have a slow cooker, then onions, oil, butter, and a tiny pinch of sugar cooked on low until onions completely caramelized. Make a pastry pie case, add the onions and some cheese (feta or parmesan style). Serve with salad.

Oh, dont go hungry!!! I do find some recommended meals are quite small, so know what you mean. More protien? Dairy?

Asda do 3 for £12 so do that (a chicken / 500g mince to make into something / pork joint) then add a pasta dish, a sausage thing and a veggie one. Thats it, not super difficult.

our menu this week has been -
roast chicken, chips, salad (fattoush, tabbouleh and chick pea salads)
we mage the leftovers chicken into chicken and mushroom risotto for lunch.
Then we had frittata with the left over salads (Aldi do one or a tortilla? ) with salad.
i wasn’t here yesterday but they had carbonara- garlic bread - veg
tomorrow we are having fish cakes and the kids will have chicken tempura.
we will have a curry with Dahl, kachumber, poppadoms, bhaji eyc

pick a carb (rice/ spuds/pasta) and then make it a pasta / something with mash or jackets or chips night.

buy the biggest chicken you can - we’ve not hit being on a tight food budget (I’ve only just started to look at chickpeas again having spent years throwing them into everything!)

have yoghurt / rice pudding / custard and bananas and cake to fill up.

A healthy starter is a wonderful idea thank you I will think about that x

I like the healthy starter plan.
I always give my kids a plate of chopped veg - cucumber, tomato, carrots whatever is in the fridge and the eat it alongside or sometimes after dinner.

They love:
lasagna - leftovers can be eaten next day
Rissotto - bit of chicken or prawns but filled up with things like leeks, frozen peas etc… loads of cheese
Rice with mince - fried up in various spices - homous can go with this too
Wraps - fried up veg n spices, cheese, beans, plain yogurt
Sausage and mash and any veg
Beans on toast with cheese
Omlette and salad
Tuna pasta
Pesto pasta

I'm doing the same as you. This week we've had macaroni cheese with broccoli, bean and roasted red pepper chilli, pasta with homemade red pesto, cream cheese, pepper and onion and tomorrow will be Thai pork mince and rice.

Beef mince biryani - I get away with using 250g of beef for four of us. The recipe is on BBC good food.

A chicken and gnocchi pesto tray bake, mixing the pesto with yogurt. I use two chicken breasts in small strips for four.