to ask you for your best skint meal ideas please? And what to buy at lidl to help this?

[Margaritte]

I did ask for lovely, budget, impressive looking meals last week.

However, the shit hit fan for us, financially, for the next month or two. So now I really need to know what I can buy & cook. Now it just needs to be healthy & dirt cheap and less impressive . Taste buds haven't died in this shit situation, so if its fairly yummy will help too, although I realise that's not the main priority.

I have to figure out breakfasts, lunches and dinners. My dc & dh take packed lunch with them, & dd & I eat at home. I have a bit in already, which I'm so grateful for, as it gives me a 'head start'.

I have got advice from StepChange today and they were great, so that bits sorted.

Just a bit of back ground ( so I'm not drip feeding) I am recovering from PND (mostly good days for a while) However, during having it, cooking / meal planning etc would cause me a lot of distress. I'm starting to get back into cooking now, and sometimes enjoy it. I don't want to slip back into the upset & frustration I used to have around the weeks meals, so as easy as possible would be helpful too.

I would steer away from anything pre packaged if you can...so cereals, cakes, biscuits, I know it's hard
Noodles are cheap.
But pasta and sauce and garlic bread is a filling meal.
You can get really cheap basic frozen pizza and add more toppings and cheese.
Jacket potatoes are yummy and lots of things can go on them.

This is a big hit in our house and ridiculously cheap- feeds 4:

Ingredients
1 tin value baked beans
1 tin value chopped tomatoes
2 onions
Garlic (a couple of cloves, you can change to suit your taste)
Grated cheese of some description

Method
Dice onions and fry with garlic til soft
Add beans and tomatoes and simmer for five minutes
Put in an oven proof dish and put cheese on top. Put under grill til cheese is bubbling
Serve with toast or jacket potatoes.

Discovered as a student, still love it and so does DH and DC.

When in this situation we plan meals for the week and stretch them out over the days.

Usually based around these items:

Bag of porridge oats, milk, weetabix,beans, bread,mushrooms,tuna, pasta, sweetcorn, bag of salad, cheese, ham, Jacket potatoes, veg, chicken, rice, spaghetti, salad, gammon (2 small steaks for 1 in Aldi not sure the price elsewhere, turkey mince, pitta bread, new potatoes, a family pie?

All items that can be mixed and matched and cheap aswell

I get free lamb bones once a week for making soup from our butcher - it's always worth asking. We have it with noodles, veg and lots of spices for taste.

My other cheap healthy fave is daal and rice, both super cheap and you can buy in bulk to save because they just go in the cupboard.

Brown rice salad for lunch is also filling and cheap, just add whatever you have, I like it with chopped celery, apple and tomato and the first two are dirt cheap at our market.

Hi Margaritte. I have been in this situation many times and ones thing I would say is make sure you build in a treat or two. It's much easier to stay in budget if you feel like you are getting fun stuff!

We do a fakeaway friday, different thing each week:

Quick curry and rice and buy popadums/mango chutney, make naan and bhaji - both very very cheap and easy.

Fajitas - chicken and peppers etc, bulk out with kidney beans and rice then serve with grated cheese, salad and homemade wraps (very easy too and the kids really like rolling them out)

Pizza - homemade pizza dough can be made and frozen or if you want to make it easier the frozen pizzas in Aldi are lush. You can get 3 x cheese and tomato for £3 then add your own toppings. The frozen garlic bread is also lovely. We then add homemade coleslaw and potato wedges.

I have a drawer in my freezer for any leftovers - I freeze them into portions in old chinese takeaway cartons or freezer bags and that is lunch for whoever is in the house. Packed lunches are sandwiches or filled rolls or pizza slices (I always make extra) and crisps/mini cheddar type things, fruit, veg sticks, flapjack etc

Have you got a budget to stick to or is it just as little as possible? How many are you feeding? I am happy to do you an Aldi based meal plan with as much or as little cooking as you like.

Eggs cooked in chopped tomatoes with herbs/cheese with a carb. One of my favourite

Pasta sauce with an aldi aubergine fried up with a bit of chopped bacon and an onion.
Rather than buying shop pasta sauce use a tin of tomatoes and a squirt of tomatoe purée.

I do a version of that too Clare, it's a Friday favourite. I used rehydrated dried beans though and add lots of smoked paprika and chilli and scoop out with tortilla chips. Mmmm.

Have you got a market near you? Fruit and veg are much cheaper off a stall especially if you go when they are near to packing up and looking to offload as much as possible. Also some boot sales have stalls selling fresh produce, I bought an enormous bag of peaches for just £1 on Sunday at our local one.

Jacket potato with lidl grated cheese, a pack of lidl bavarian ham (99p and its lovely!) and salad.

Lidl meatballs with their pasta sauce

Cook a large chicken and use half for a roast and save half to have with a lidl curry sauce.

Lidl breaded chicken is lovely. I do it with new potatoes and salad.

Lidl packs of part baked bread 39p are brilliant for filling up at dinner time.

Chicken thighs and legs are really cheap in aldi. Crush couple of cloves of garlic in a pan, add teaspoon paprika and fry off chicken. Then put in a casserole dish, Chuck on a tin of mandarins and put in the oven till chicken fully cooked. Serve with broccoli and rice. Cheap and yummy it's from a girl called Jack book, by Jack Monroe lots of good cheap ideas in it. Some recipes available online.

1. Homemade potato rosti topped with poached eggs, and served with either baked beans, tinned tomatoes, salad or vegetables (depending on what you already have in/what's on offer).

To make the rosti grate one potato per person, plus an onion if liked. Put the grated potato into a tea towel and squeeze hard to get rid of as much water as possible. Mix the grated potato with one beaten egg, some salt and pepper and some garlic or herbs if liked. Cook in an oiled frying pan until golden brown (about 20 min), turning half way.

1. Homemade soup (using whatever veg you have) with warm homemade cheese scones.

1. Lentil dahl with rice or homemade flatbreads ,and stir fried greens (kale, spring greens or cabbage).

1. Homemade pizza topped with tomato puree, grated cheese and whatever leftover veg/ meat scraps you have.

1. Sausage and bean casserole made using veg, stock, tinned beans (cannelloni, butter beans, baked beans, or whatever is on offer) and sliced sausages. Personally I would go for one good quality sausage per person rather than 2-3 cheap ones.

Porridge with milk for breakfast every day: cheap, filling and good for you. Add some smart price/value raisins to make it more interesting.

Keep an eye on Lidl half price weekend offers. Round here they're doing 250g packs of lean mince for 94p this weekend (get in early!). Bulk this out with veg and lentils and you can make a family sized chilli, shepherds pie or bolognese.
I like Lidl baked beans (4 for £1), tomatoes, onions, chickpeas, kidney beans, curry sauces, chocolate, pasta, chorizo, bacon, cooking/olive oil, bagged salad, mushrooms, biscuits. Cleaning products like washing up liquid are cheap and good. Washing powder is very good for the price(we have clean clothes anyway). My cats like their foil trays and pouches and they are about 30% cheaper than big supermarkets.
And, when you need cheering up, a nice bunch of flowers can be had for £2-3. There are regular offers on beer and wine.

Good luck with sorting things out.

For the price of 1 jar of basics pasta sauce I can buy 3 boxes of passata. Chuck in a bit of garlic & some herbs & it's a dirt cheap pasta sauce (my kids prefer it to jars & it doesn't have any of the added sugar crap in it. If you can stretch to tuna or mince as well that gives some protein.

Cheapest mince you can get - 250g is fine for 4 people. Brown with some chopped onion then add garlic, ginger and soy, and some chilli if you like. Add some shredded cabbage till it softens a bit. Add cooked super noodles and mix together

Total cost about £3

Here are a few blogs that might help
www.agirlcalledjack.com
www.thriftylesley.com
www.budgetbytes.com
The last one is American, so prices will be different of course, but there are some nice recipes with beans and lentils and things.

Thank you for all the lovely ideas.. So many!

Wellwellwell A rough plan would be great, thank you

Its not so much the idea of a meal plan that stresses me. I imagine its lovely to know what I need to make for dinner. Its the actual planning it that stresses me. Trying to work out what can be made with what we have in, the packed lunches. (I actually started following the week plan for packed lunch on the Aldi recipe page) Not sure that would fit in my budget now.

I have about £50 per week to spend. For the next 2 months.

Egg on toast - if I'm short of eggs I make scrambled as it stretches further

I don't like porridge but agree its a very cheap breakfast & filling. Adding raisins which you can usually buy quite cheap in big bags is popular with dh & dd. Dd prefers vanilla essence in hers but that's probably a luxury at the moment.

Pasta with a spoonful of cream cheese mixed in & a handful of frozen peas is a favourite of ds's (usually with sausages )

Grating cheese on sandwiches makes it go further.

beans and cheese on toast. tinned tomatoes and bacon on toast. egg fried rice. souffle omelette. jacket potatoes. hmmm thats all i can think of at the min. rice pudding if you fancy something sweet?

Lidl frozen wedges are cheap and the best ones I've tasted.

Their half price weekend offers can be brilliant - we had 4 lovely burgers for £1.49 on Saturday.

Is that just food or food and toiletries? How many of you and what ages? and are there any foods you don't eat?

I love Tuscan bean soup.

2 potatoes
2 carrots
1 onion chopped up and all sautéed together with some garlic to taste
Rosemary and oregano (I use dried) and salt and pepper to season and flavour
Add in water and stock cubes and 1 tin tomatoes
Any other veg chopped up you want to use up from the fridge

Cabbage / kale chopped up added in plus tinned mixed beans

Bring to gentle simmer for 20 mins,
Because my kids are a bit funny fussy about seeing too many veg together I blitz it with the stick blender a bit before serving

serve with bread it s very

Also tinned chickpeas, flour, some garlic and cumin = falafel serve with pita breads and salad

Also, you can buy super-cheap baked beans and just rinse them in a colander to get rid of the orange sauce. Then you can use in any recipe that requires plain beans. Much cheaper than a tin of any other kind of beans.

Iv got no food in tonight and I've cooked for tea stuff that's lurking in the cupboard;

A tin of potatoes, fried with an onion, bit of salt and pepper,
Topped with 2 fried eggs and eaten with a crusty stale roll
Was bloody lovely

I hope things work out for you

Food & toiletries.
I have a stock of nappies, and they cost me £12 for 3 packs at Asda. (As far as I know, they are cheapest so go in there)

There is Dh & I, plus 3 dc. Ds1 is year 7, ds2 is year 1 & dd is a toddler.

No food restrictions, except for my ds2 who is either extremely fussy or has food issues (half way through the process of looking into autism ) He wont touch a fruit or vegetable despite my best efforts and hates food touching . Everyone else is fine and can eat what they are bloody given