£40 for food for 13 days

[Gakatsbsk]

Hello

due to unexpected extreme expenses this month I will be living on a tight budget until pay day.

after accounting for all other expenses I will have £40 for food. If I bought nothing I could have enough food in my house for 5 days. I have lots of protein powders and meal replacement type things lying about too.

I do not eat meat or fish, I don’t use any milk or anything like that and I have enough margarine to last. I have all the basics like oils and seasonings.

Has anyone any tips for getting some nutrients in over the next few days. I have a limited appetite anyway due to medication and am 2 stone overweight so don’t need huge meals. I don’t have a blender but have all other standard appliances.

this is just for me, I have no dependents.

Buy a Lidl £1.50 fruit and veg box. You'll get stacks of stuff you can make meals/snacks with.

There's two of us here, our food spend is a max of £50pw, and usually includes a bottle of wine. Today we're both having cereal, jacket potato with last nights veggie curry (chickpeas included for protein) and stirfry with prawns (I know you won't eat prawns, but I get expensive things like this by constantly checking for offers, reductions). Inbetween meals, I guess we'll have a couple of cheap biscuits and fruit (at the moment we're eating nectarines that were on offer 6 for 59p). DH will probably have a glass of milk as well.

I often fry onions, add tomatoes and cook for 10mins. It's a great base and you can add whatever you have, lentils (very cheap in a bag), kidney beans, pinto beans, chickpeas, leftover peppers, sweetcorn and flavour appropriately with garlic, herbs, chilli. Add pasta or rice. If no protein included, cheese on top. DH sometimes make the pasta sauce, add a pulse, a couple of blocks of frozen spinach and tops potatoes - it's rustic, but very filling and tasty. Frozen veg are cheap, a great way of reducing waste and easy for someone on their own to just have the amount they need.

Forgot to say, if you've got veg and pulses, soup them - cheap, will make you 2-4 lunches. Add bread as a filler.

Dal and rice is the answer- add fresh veggies as a side if budget allows (make a cauliflower light pickle for instance. Brown basmati is £7 for 5kg, red lentils are £1 for a kg. You'll need onions, turmeric, I use frozen garlic. It reheats well in the microwave - dd makes a batch every few days at university and freezes in tubs, she doesn't mind repetitive meals. A different cheap option in chana dal (chickpeas)

I would bulk make some big meals, veg fajita, biryani/kedgeree, soup. In our household, that could be 9 days covered easily. Then intersperse with a jacket potato, pasta dish or toast meal.

I'd keep a basic meal plan:
Breakfast: porridge with fruit from a cheap bag of frozen berries.
Lunch: soup with the cheapest veg you can get carrot is usually cheapest.
Dinner: pasta with tinned tomatoes/garlic/herbs
Snacks: apple
That'll be under £20 I reckon.

I agree with PPs, that is actually a decent budget for your dietary requirements. You could get a lot of frozen stuff from Iceland for £40. Make smoothies for breakfast, have something like a frozen pizza and steamed veggies for lunch or make a soup with crusty bread. And then for dinner a baked potato with ratatouille or veggie mince.

What is your usual meal plan?

Yes! Very important to do this!

Planning some affordable treats will stop you from blowing money that you can't afford on impulse purchases. Everyone needs a treat sometimes.

Thanks everyone

I should’ve said tighter budget. Not tight.

I’m going to make lentil soup and borscht in bulk.

That combined with my stocks in the house already will do me.

I can easily spend £50 a week on a weekly shop just for myself because I buy all my toiletries from supermarkets as well.

I am vegetarian but find pasta with quorn mince and veg a good budget meal.