If you only had £8 to buy food/drink with, What essential food/drink would you buy?

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As the title says, What types of food would you buy?

How long is the £8 meant to last - how many people/children?

Really need more details.

This is to feed 2 adults an 8 yr old and a pre-schooler.

For how long?

Cheapest stuff that I can think of would be

Oats for porridge
Tinned tomatoes
Pasta
Flour
Cheese
Potatoes
Lentils

Is this for a day? One meal? A week?

Definitely not drink-water in the tap!

Pasta
Porridge
Veg

not cheese-way too expensive!

Around 10 days. We do have some food in the house, just wondered what type of food will stretch out IYSWIM.

I'm thinking : bread, potatoes, milk, eggs.
need more ideas.

TIA

But it depends what you have in already.

Milk, pasta, cheese, tinned tomatoes, bread, baked beans, bananas. Some cheep veg (inc potatoes) to make soup.

I couldn't manage that. Do you have some nectar points or something similar? What food do you have already?

carrots, onions, apples.
Some stock cubes to cook the lentils with.

Baked beans

Dried beans - the type that need to be soaked over night - v cheap.
frozen veg - leeks/peas/spinach - to be cooked in a curry/stew -much cheaper than fresh equivalent.
Potatoes

Eggs are quite expensive at the moment.
Milk is cheaper sometimes if you buy the longlife economy stuff.

Bread flour and a sachet of yeast.
Frozen veg.
Lentils or dried pulses.
Tinned toms.

Without a well stocked larder cupboard and freezer I know I'd find it impossible to feed that many people for that length of time. Is there anything you have in that could be used to make bland ingredients tastier?

Also, go shopping right at the end of the day and pick up fresh items for next to nothing eg fruit & veg, dairy items, bread. Don't be embarrassed to stand around with the other bargain hunters waiting for the lady with the yellow sticker gun!

Go to a supermarket about an hour before closing and buy what you can that is reduced, ie bread for freezer and any cheap veg you can.

Also all the other posters' suggestions. Buy the value brands, eg tinned tomatoes for 19p.

Think you have one hell of a challenge here, really wish you luck. Will be back if I think of anything else.

Go to a market, bowl of potatoes for £1
3 cabbages for £1
Asda smartprice pasta 20p
Sainsburys basics sausages 8 for 51p
6 eggs for 99p
Cheapest baked beans 25p
Cheap Tesco bread 47p
3 tins of tuna 99p store

Cheap own-brand pasta and lots of it.

assuming you have flour, pasta and rice and frozen veg

definatly oats - we survived on that for ages and if you have cupboard ingredients you can make flapjack as well as porridge
eggs
powdered milk
potatoes, onions, leeks and carrots (casserole will last for days)

I'd buy all the veg at the local market though as it's so much cheaper

I have the following tinned items:

4x baked beans
2x new potatoes
2x spaghetti
1x mushy peas
1x sweetcorn
1x chopped tomatoes
1x carrots
4x tuna chunks
pasta

not much in freezer:

3 pizza fingers
2 beefburgers
2 fish fingers
sausages
7 potato waffles
1x bag of casserole veg
1x bag of carrot & swede
1x diced onions

Forgot to add I have flour, marge and cheese and enough cereal.

I'd go to the supermarket an hour before closing, you can get bread for 10p a loaf.

I do it, theres no shame in it.

powdered milk
red lentils
massive bag of value pasta
value tinned tomatoes
market veg

Make and freeze soup (red lentils, tinned tomatoes, carrots, potatoes) and pasta sauce. Your biggest problem is going to be bread - get value flour, some yeast and make your own will be the best solution, I think.

Keep bread in the freezer so it stays fresh and just take out what you need so there is no waste!

I agree cheese is expensive.

I would go with pasta and tomato sauce dishes, sandwiches, rice, noodles, stir-fry... the freezer supplied you have should help to keep you going!

Cats do you have a food bank near you? They will give you food.

Also I have read on MN that Milk and More deliver food to your house and you odn't have ot pay for it until upto a month later.

Bananas are 68p a kg at the moment in most places- cheap and full of nutrition.

Tinned pilchards are cheap in terms of the amount of nutrition you get.

Bread flour is very cheap (59p for 1.5kg) and surprisingly good in Lidl. You can get enough bread to last 4 people at least 6 days from that.

You can make cheap but very wholesome soup from many of your cupboard and freezer ingredients.

Good luck, it is a challenge but you do have a decent amount at home.

From what you've listed I would try to make a large casserole ( 3 days from veggies) add potatoes

Potatoes can make jackets a couple of days with either your beans/ tuna/ spaghetti hoops.

Pasta and tin tomatoes with onion/ garlic/ herbs if you have can be another few meals

Or pasta and tuna

More potatoes cut up with skins on drizzle with oil/ herbs and chuck in oven for potatoe wedges, can also roast carrots if get some

So basically get pasta/ big bag of potatoes/ cheapest veg/ milk/ oats

I would pretty much stick to vegetarian apart from what's in cupboard as cheaper to get nutritious produce.