Can i feed me and a toddler for three weeks with £55?

[Fishwearwigs]

Im a regular poster and this is not a begging thread.

I have just done my sums for when i get paid on monday. After my bills are paid i have £55 to spend on food for me and a 14 month old for 3 weeks (18.33 a week)

Can this be done? Has anyone got meal ideas for me please? My toddler drinks 8 pints of milk a week and i drink 4 (in tea but i could give that up and just drink water) so there is a £4 of my £18 gone already. Im a good cook but just struggling for ideas. Ideally id like my toddler to carry on having fruit everyday as well. I have basic items in (pasta, frozen veg and frozen peas) but not much else.
Any ideas would be greatly appreciated.

cooking bacon (for flavour) comes in a big packet, and you can freeze it into meal portions

carrots, onions and frozen peas are the best combo for nutrition and cost.

dry value pasta and rice are your best carbohydrate for cost

Eggs and lentils are your cheapest protein. Personally I'd prioritise the the eggs for the toddler.

Value cornflakes and weetabix are the cheapest fortified cereal.

I don't imagine you normally shop at Sainsburys but just in case - don't. Aldi if at all possible - tesco has a good range of value items. Lidl cereal isn't fortified so don't buy it.

Sorry to hear things are so tight. I often buy frozen veg/fruit from farmfoods/heron they have pretty good deals and doesn't go bad as quickly as fresh.

Asda sell big bags of potatoes and onions for around £2.50 each. I Think they are 10kg. Also big bags of rice and pasta very cheaply. Sweet potatoes are now also very cheap. The basic range cheeses tend to be good value and sometimes there is a two for one offer. Asda fish is good value and supermarkets (including Sainsbury's) sell bags of frozen white fish very cheaply indeed. Great for fishcakes and fish-pie. Mackerel is great value and good for pates or baked potato filler with some cheese. Asian/Middle Eastern shops sometimes stock vegetables very cheaply and some other products. Vegetarian mince is very cheap, goes a long way, and I think is often better than cheap mince meat. Great for lasagna, cottage pie, pasta bolognaise etc. Buy fruit and vegetable in season and look for discounted produce and offers. Dried lentils are also great value and make lovely soups, dahls and the basis for vegetarian curries. Use powdered milk made up with water for cooking and/or buy discounted fresh milk and freeze extra. You can buy tinned white cheese in Middle Eastern shops (rather like feta cheese) very inexpensively and use it for salads, pizza topping and also great as a spread and in sauces. (Two large tins in my local shop for under £5). If you want a tea or coffee while out an about just take some in a thermos flask. Ditto snacks/sandwiches for lunch etc so you are never tempted to buy ready-made food from supermarkets. Scones, simple cakes, some biscuits and basic bread can be incredibly cheap and easy to make if you buy your own baking products and flour. Also fun and much nicer than ready-made. If you want a glass of wine at home for a treat, wine boxes can be good value and sangria is a lovely refreshing tipple for the summer which can be made with the cheapest red plonk (in a carton for instance) and some lemonade with lots of ice and some fruit.

Aldi do a whole chicken for about £2.50. I cut the legs and wings off (you can google how to if you don't know) - and sprinkle some spice mix on the chicken legs and bake and have with baked potato wedges. Or you can mix up a sauce or just have plain or whatever. The body gets roasted to make a dinner with spuds and veg but there will be cooked chicken left to stir into pasta or a stir fry. Cheap passata and a bit of herbs will make a nice pasta sauce. The wings and scrappy bits will make nice soup with a stock cube and a bit of veg or sweetcorn.

If you don’t mind repeating the same thing, here’s a shopping list and meal plan in your budget.

All from Tesco, but probably similar in Aldi as it’s their budget stuff.

15 eggs - £1.25
Bread - £0.55
Butternut squash - £1.50
1kg onion - £0.75
2kg potatoes - £1.35
Whole chicken - £3.25
1kg carrots - £0.47
Pasta bake sauce - £0.75
Bag of lentils - £1.15
500g of mince - £1.69
Bolognese sauce - £0.75
12 pints of milk - £3
7 bananas (14p each) - £0.98
500g spaghetti - £0.20
500g Fusilli pasta - £0.56
10 veg stock cubes - £0.50

Total = £18.70

Meal plan.

Monday breakfast - 1 scrambled egg each on toast
Monday lunch - butternut squash soup
Monday dinner - roast chicken, potatoes, carrots (add homemade Yorkshire puddings if you have plain flour and milk to spare. Use 1 egg).

Tuesday breakfast - 1 scrambled egg each on toast
Tuesday lunch - butternut squash soup
Tuesday dinner - chicken fried rice (if you have rice and soy sauce in) or chicken with pasta

Wednesday breakfast - 1 scrambled egg each on toast
Wednesday lunch - butternut squash soup
Wednesday dinner - finish the chicken with potatoes and carrrots.

Thursday breakfast - 1 scrambled egg each on toast
Thursday lunch - lentil soup
Thursday dinner - use half the mince for mince and potatoes, add a carro and frozen peas (if you have them) to the mince.

Friday breakfast - 1 scrambled egg each on toast
Friday lunch - lentil soup
Friday dinner - half the mince for spaghetti Bolognese

Staturday breakfast - 1 scrambled egg each on toast
Saturday lunch - lentil soup
Saturday dinner - pasta bake

Sunday breakfast - 1 scrambled egg each on toast
Sunday lunch - lentil soup
Sunday dinner - leftover pasta bake

Snack for your son - 1 banana a day, another slice of toast, carrot sticks.

This assumes you have butter. If not, use jam or whatever you have in. If you need to buy toilet roll, then skip the egg and just have toast for breakfast but some of this might be cheaper in Aldi so you mightn’t have to skip anything.

The onion, a few carrots, lentils and a couple stock cubes will make enough lentil soup for 4 days. The squash will make enough for 3. Just water it down if you need too. And let me know if you need the recipes.

And you won’t need to buy the pasta every week as it should stretch, or use what you have in the house. So it won’t be over £18.33 each week.

How very helpful of you Ava

Really sorry to hear that you are going through this.. it is shocking! No, I don't think you can feed yourselves. Yes, I agree you'll need to go to a food bank. I hope you'll be OK x

Maybe do the pasta bake first, incase there isn’t enough leftover.

If there isn’t, then stretch the chicken further with chicken in half the Bolognese sauce (you only need half for the spaghetti) and bulk with potatoes on the side.

And the potatoes MIGHT last 2 weeks, so you could buy a large Tesco’s Swiss roll for £1, which will give your son a puddding/treat each day and maybe a bit for you.

If you’ve got the pasta and stock cubes in the house, then get the Swiss roll so there’s a treat :)

Tesco have some quorn on offer, the mince is £1.50 for 500grams great for chilli and bolognese, the sausages are £1. Im not veggie but eat both of these, taste fine with spices or onion gravy in the case of sausages. Eggs and pasta are always a good staple.
Iceland often have good prices on frozen veg and some fresh stuff

I hope you will be ok, very stressful situation to be in

Is your DD eligable for Healthy Start vouchers? Do a quick Google?

any friends and family who can have you over for the odd meal? Would save s few £££ too.

If you contact your local council and ask for their 'Local Assistance Fund' they will give you a £40 Gift voucher for a supermarket of your choice.

ava thats amazing! Thank you for the taking the time to do that 🙂

Lidl and Aldi do sachets of pasta and sauce for 45-50p (cheese and ham, cheese and broccoli). They're surprisingly nice, not quite enough for 2 greedy adults, but probably plenty for an adult and a toddler.

I know people sneer at the "stretching a chicken", but we get 4 meals out of a £5 free range chook from Aldi, plus some veg/chips/beans/rice (roast, then cold with chips & beans, then risotto and finally soup). When one of you is a toddler, that might even make 5 or 6 meals.

I'm lucky to live near a fishing port, and the fish there is really cheap (3 small plaice fillets for £1). Worth checking out if you live near the coast.

Sorry about your friend OP. Sounds like you're going through the worst of times.

Here is my chicken suggestion. Roast a large chicken (Aldi sell them at good prices) and use in casseroles or with rice. Strip any remaining chicken off and put in the fridge. Then put the carcass into a pressure cooker or large saucepan with an onion, carrot and celery to make stock. Boil with lots of water and the simmer for about 2 hours. Reserve the stock and take out the bones. Once its cooled strip any remaining chicken off the bones (you need to use your hands and it's fiddly but you can get lots off).

Put the stock into a new saucepan and add all of the chicken you stripped (including what's in the fridge. Add diced carrots, celery, onions, potatoes and a couple of handfuls of rice. Then cook for about an hour and season and add peas and sweetcorn if you have them. Makes about 3 portions of soup/stew for 2 adults so should give you and DD at least 4 days worth of dinners. Nice with bread too.

Ava that is fantastic. I'm going to cut and paste it to hand out to clients who are struggling.

ava

Quorn is half price at Iceland atm handy for cheap protein, and makes a non greasy bolognese sauce
Cauliflower cheese with bacon bits
Batch cook vegetables with tomato, blend for soup or pasta sauce.
Scrambled egg/veg frittata.
The biggest issue is if toddler is fussy....
Iceland also sometimes does deal on mccain quick fries, they are just like McDonald's chips and cook in five mins, maybe if funds allow have them with egg and beans.
My toddler also goes through a pint of milk a day.
If you are changing tea to no milk try the fruit teas in pound land.
Hope all OK and is just a temporary issue.

home made pizza, also a fun afternoon. Check that a pizza base mix may be cheaper sometimes than flour and yeast

Get you your Aldi.

£1 for 10 eggs, bread is cheap, beans are cheap, their end of isle fruit and veg promotions are good value. Big bag of potatoes is 1.40 I think.
They do reasonably priced tinned foods and 6 pints carton of milk is about £1.40.
The bacon is £1.30 for a decent pack and they used to do cooking bacon for around 75p for a big pack. They do fish fingers in packs of 15 very cheaply.

I think the frozen veg in Aldi works out cheapest.
You can manage, it's very possible, but you need to meal plan.

I found that a red lentil bolognaise cooked with onions, garlic and Aldi passata (35p) made many good meals with jacket potato.

Red lentil and smoky bacon soup is very cheap and easy. That just keeps going.

I can't recall if Aldi sell red lentils. Most supermarkets sell them cheaply.

I think Aldi are £1 for 15 eggs.

some use a pitta bread as the base for a pizza

Have you a branch of the Real Junk Food Project nearby? They collect food that shops can no longer sell and offer it for donations (cash or ours say you can give items that can sell at bootsales etc or your time to help). No referral like a foodbank.