To ask for food suggestions?

[WhyCantIuseTheNameIWant]

Finally, I have saved enough money to buy a new fridge-freezer.
One that works.

Mine has not been much good for several years. Most days it keeps the milk cool. Or frozen, in the fridge bit.

Anyway, next week, we are getting a new one.

What are some good staple foods to keep in?

We are a family of 3.

Me. A reasonably non-fussy adult.
12year ds, who eats everything in sight.
2 year old dd, who can't eat wheat.

Obviously, if I buy things like fish fingers, I will get normal ones and wheat-free ones.
Burgers/sausages, we get nice quality ones, with apple or leek in. We can all eat those (unless they have changed the recipe again

We all love vegetables, so will grab a few bags of them.

And I am going to buy a box of icecream that has more than 3 in!

What can make a quick, fairly decent meal on school nights?

I get big boxes of free range chicken breasts from my butcher and bag-freeze in pairs.

Frozen fruit for desserts and smoothies.

Ready diced onion to speed up making sauces and soups.

Mince for cottage pie, burgers, chilli etc etc

Frozen peas for veg and for using when accidents happen

Bread - wheat and wheat free

We live out in the sticks so our freezer has lots in it!

We have:

Butter
Bread
Part-baked rolls
Pizza
Sliced lemons and limes (for G&Ts!)
Sliced mushrooms
Sweetcorn
Peas
Spinach
Broad beans
Sausages
Lots of joints of meat (we raise our own lambs for the freezer and have pork from a local farmer)
Loads of mince (pork and beef - for spag bol, chile, meatballs etc)
Pasta sauces (the ones from the chilled section in the supermarket)
Cartons of soup
Salmon fillets
Raspberries from the garden
Ice lollies (in the summer)

The meals we tend to eat a lot of are the sloppy kind; spag bol, chile con carne, curries, risotto, spaghetti and homemade meatballs etc. There's always mince in the freezer for this reason, and lots of pasta and rice in the cupboards.

In the fridge there's always lots of milk, veg (potatoes, celery, onions, carrots, broccoli, other seasonal veg as appropriate to the season), yogurts, leftovers, creme fraiche, natural yogurt, mascarpone, grana padano, philadelphia (I use the last three as a cheat's cheese sauce for cauliflower cheese or lasagne!), a plethora of condiments, pickles and curry pastes.

We do eat a lot of the same meals - I really must do some more experimenting! I have IBD though and so tend to stick to my 'safe' meals where I can. I should make the effort to try and find some more of them though!

I like

Cheese
cheese
cheese
cheese
cheese
cheese
cheese

Did I mention that I like cheese?

Keeps the prosseco cold too!

Buy some tupperware boxes and make twice the amount you need when you cook something like a chilli or a lasagne then you have home made frozen meals to hand if you have a day when you don't feel like cooking or time is short.

Also, have a look in the reduced section of the supermarket when you go shopping. I always snap up reduced priced salmon and freeze it.

You can also freeze fresh herbs in ice cube trays and freeze grapes to pop into wine instead of ice cubes.

Fatmomma, are you my ds??

Thanks for the suggestions

Yes, to chicken/mince. Had forgotten about meats!

to Fatmomma

Can I come over please?

Either visit a butchers, Costco or somewhere like this and buy large joints of beef/pork that you can cut into steaks and freeze portions. Same with bacon, chicken breasts etc. We also like to buy things like frozen onions and peppers so that when needed they can just be grabbed & chucked into the pot with minimal fuss!!

However no suggestion will EVER top stocking up fully on cheese

Loaf of bread, butter and milk are always in here (as are ice cream and some sort of dessert for unexpected visitors). Usually a few frozen meals that I've made double of (shepherds pie and sausage casserole right now) and spare soup from using up veg. We have a whole drawer of fruit fo4 smoothies.

Mince, for spaghetti or cottage pie

Chicken thighs, lemons and basil for this v quick Nigel Slater recipe, (scroll down)

www.theguardian.com/lifeandstyle/2002/may/26/foodanddrink.shopping

Kale and cavolo nero are both nice with chorizo stirred in (cooked first)

Chips
A few frozen ready meals for emergencies
Chicken
Burgers
Sausages
Loads of different types of vegetables

i have a chest freezer once or twice a month we buy meat at the market ,mince meat ,big packets of sausages , and 5kg of chicken breast and divide them into portions for meals lots of bread and oven chips ,frozen veg etc.