So how can I feed a family of five on £20 a week ?

[paddlinglikemad]

ok..have been put on very strict budget ( due to huge credit card bill!!) therefore after buying nappies and household stuff such as dog & cat food will have approx £20-£25 per week to feed all of us..including bbreakfast for all (weetabix me thinks) and lunch for DS2, DD and me and main meal for all ( ideally that can be split into 2 sittings as DH comes in too late to eat with kids..)
Thats me & DH, DS1 (5yrs) DD (2yrs) and DS2 (10months)...DH will only tolerate one meat free day a week ( but he may have to change!!) ..any ideas for main meals would be most welcome

My top tio is eat at your PIL's at least a couple of nights a week, especially for Sunday dinner, my MIL feeds us quite a bit really, I would never do rast beef or anything like that, kids like a change too as it is all pasta pasta pasta.

get some indian and other asian recipes on teh net, too.

oooo, we are now a family of dhal lovers!

i got a huge bag of dried yellow dhal for about £2.50.

cheap veg - tatties, carrots, onions - most root veg.

the fruit we eat is all tinned or frozen. fresh stuff is just too dear.

but we eat a lot of veg/pulses.

i agree about making your own bread, especially if you use storebrand bread flour and yeast.

Apart from MIL's I will be mostly eating homemade soup this winter. I make huge pots of the stuff and freeze it in those takeaway tubs so I can stack loads in the freezer. Take it to work in a flask too. Saves a fortune instead of supermarket sandwiches.

homemade fishcakes made with tin of tuna and left over mashed potato from the day before.

paddling - breadmakers are are easy
pour water in, put flour on top, stick butter in one corner, salt in another, sugar in another and yeast in the middle
stick it on for 3 hours

love this thread.
would like to cut down on food bill as we are a family of 6 , my older chidlren are teenagers and eat huge adult portions of food.

We also have some allergies to consider , but i am used to cooking from scratch.

How to I cut down my food bills with two teenagers ?, and avoid food like, baked beans ( all beans) yeast extract, and anything with a nut warning on? kiwi fruit is out as well! ( some yogurts are a pain)

Because of the bean problem ( although CAN use spit red lentils ) cheap souces of protein/iron are limited to green veg and meat.
We did have a problem with iron defiancy when he was younger.

I cook soups, stews, and make my own pies etc. So am open to some new recipes.

I plan my week to include one veggy meal, one fish, and the others are meat and two veg.

I was always brought up to buy one third of weekly food to include fruit and veg.

We also have a wide varity of cheap carbos, rice, pasta , potatos , cous cous, etc.

So keep those cheap recipes going!!

My favoruite is to use left over pasta, a packet of frozen spinach, and spag bol made with beef mince.
I layer the beef at bottom , top the spinach, then the pasta with grated cheese on top. bake in oven.

Anna888..its 2.5 miles each way with a big hill in the middle am very unfit though so would be good exercise...also not so keen on the walking in the middle of nowhere with the kids on my own ( I watch too much Crimewatch) it was okay yesterday as lots of walkers about

Think I will go for breadmaker option , tend to go to shop just for bread & milk during the week, which then turns into picking up this & that ....
Personally don't think the budget will last long with DH ( he doesn't want to sacrifice SKY & the like me thinks which is next on my list ..although the internet access is also threatened)if the food becomes too monotonous and the self imposed alcohol during the week ban , more money will appear I think ..we'll see as I said I am concentrating on the kids meals , we can eat whatever ( I need to lose weight anyway!)

all the ideas are great though am feeling quite inspired...although today I made biscuits and my DD's reaction was 'yuk'

lilospell the cats cost £1 a week to feed (dry only) they supplement this with their 'take out' of mice, rabbits and the odd squirrel, so thats okay
Dog is £7 a month and I feel better with the security being a bit isolated where I live, did think of taking him on the school run too , but far too stressful ( very giddy spaniel collie cross!)
As I said there are other non essentials like the internet & SKY ( but we do not get 'normal' TV reception here...so thats more like no TV) that can go if this budget doesn't increase or work out okay, we will have to see how it goes

1lb stewing beef
parsnip
carrot
sweed
shallots
tin of tomato puree
2 tins of tomatos
beef stock
1 tin of corned beef
pepper (i like lots do it to your taste)
and another tin of corned beef goes in 30 minuets before the end of cooking

that is a looovley stew recipie lasts us about 3 days first day we have mash with it 2 day we have it with bread 3 day will have it on a jacket.

have done the same just using corned beef before its still really nice doesn't taste like corned beef everyone asks you what it is.

Pasta with tuna and tomato sauce

Oil
1onion, chopped
2 cloves garlic (I use garlic puree though, a big squirt)
can chopped toms - I use tesco/asda value ones
1/4 tsp chilli powder
1 tsp sugar
500g pasta - i buy big packets for about £1 in asda/tesco
can tuna, drained

heat oil, thrown in onion and cook until soft. Stir in garlic, toms, chilli powder and sugar. Season and bring to teh boil
Give a good stir then reduc eheat and simmer for 5 mins
In a big pan coook the past.
Flake the tuna into the sauce and stir through. Drain opasta, return to apn and add the sauce to the pasta

paddling

Try freecycle for a breadmaker, slow-cooker and cloth nappies.

Use the library for recipes, and t'internet for instructions when you get your breadmaker and slowcooker without any.

Chocolate brownies

6oz butter or marg
2oz cocoa
6oz brown sugar (have used anything in cupboard)
2 eggs
2oz self raising flour
2 sultanas

Melt butter and sugar in a saucepan, add the cocoa and stir. Now take of the heat and add two beaten eggs, the flour and sultanas.

Place the mixture in a greased 7? by 7? tin and bake for 40-50 mins on gas mark 4

Now eat or put in tin we always seem to eat these and they never make the tin...

I have been shopping today at Sainsbury and made large savings.

Yogurts - do not buy small individual pots - get large pots, sainsbury own basic yogurt with nothing added is 39p. I can't tell the difference between this yogurt and stoneys natural yogurt at £1.19. Add your own fruit or honey. If you puree the fruit it is nice in the yogurt and have for a pudding or snack for children.

They had rasberries reduced to 59p from £2,99, I brought 4 punets and will freeze 3 pots and one pot for tonight for fruit salad for dessert.

Melon was also reduced to 39p excellent for pudding or starter to fill up on.

Flowers reduced from a whopping £15 to 50p my treat

sausages 2 packs for 4 pound in sainsburys for taste differnce large pack spuds 1.50 frozen mince will do spag bol or shephards pie sausages can do sausage and mash or toad in the hole and potatoes can do jacket potatoe spaghetti for spag bol is 16 p pack in sainsburys that can be 5 meals and you can get chicken breast for couple of pound and veg should only come to 20 pound and thats full weeek of dinner and you can get bread and fruit and sandwich filling with what is left as they do basics range on a lot of stuff and tasty too

i had to do this for a while and worked well

also, try to vary where you shop. I normally do our at morrisons but normally dh will pop into tesco on the way home once a week to see what they have on offer and will get bits that are cheap or good value. often do this with asda too.

Have only read OP, so apologies if someone has already suggested this, but is there anything you can do to minimise all of your outgoings (e.g. consolidate credit cards into a loan or switch to 0% card, change power suppliers, cancel subscriptions e.g Sky etc.)? This may give you a bit more slack on your housekeeping bill.

Lidl is excellent, can throughly recommend it.

Porridge is not only cheaper than weetabix but doesn't have all those added extra things we can do without. You can buy it in bigger bulk than weetabix too.

Buy a lot of raw carrots, potatoes, brown rice, tins of sardines, tuna. A large chicken will last a few days in various forms too. Also things like large baked potato with cheese and bacon or tuna fish in it.

Tuna fish pasta, another one!

I used to make a huge dish of this when I was student nurse, I still make it occasionally now as it's so quick!

1 can of drained tuna
1 can of chopped toms
1 can of mushroom soup
1 onion
Pasta
Grated cheese

Fry the chopped onion.
Add the tuna, toms, and mushroom soup, bring to simmering point.
Pour over the cooked pasta.
Put in serving dish, sprinkle cheese over and put under grill til cheese melts.

I quite fancy it tonight now I've thought of it

When you go to which ever supermarket - make sure you look down at everything on the bottom shelf - this is where they keep all the cheaper brands of the products you want.

Cambells soup - this was my main stay for casseroles and pasta sauces, it is 50p a can and makes a lovely cheap sauce for pasta or chx casserole.
www.campbellkitchen.com/

To make pasta I would boil the pasta as instructed, then in a frying pan fry some onion, bacon or chicken peices add garlic to taste and then add the condensed chx soup and a little drop of milk.

Chicken casserole bung in the pot one chicken thigh per person, add the condensed soup of your choice and some veg such as carrots/ onion/ peas - cook in a low oven for one or two hours very gently and the chicken will come of the bone. Serve with mash or jkts

Work out which days your local supermarkets clear out their shelves, cos then you get good reductions.

Our nearest sainsbugs has loads of reductions on Tuesdays (I hang about at around 11:00 if I'm not working, watching the staff stick reduced stickers on allsorts of stuff. We get loads of treats this way).
But Tesco do their major shelf clearing on Thursday (about 4:00 p.m. seems best time there). So on the weeks I have no work on, I try to swoop on those days.

Shop monthly or fortnightly rather than weekly, things are much cheaper in bulk.

Cook things in bulk too, like a large lasagne and freeze some of it. My freezer always ahs little bits and pieces that were extra, a portion of pasta, one of lasagne etc which can be reused to make four mismatched meals if need be.

Pick fruits like blackberries etc from local bushes, fill the family up with puddings, crumble is extremely cheap.

Buy cheap, tinned fruit and veg. You dont have to eat organic to eat the right things.

Is there anything of DH's you can ask him to cut spending on, if you have to do this? eg a packed lunch for work, rather than eating out? I dont know if he does any other activites, drinks, smokes etc.

oh and like clumsymummy says, get reduced bargains, fresh meat and bread will be reduced late in the day of the sell by date, but they are fine for freezing.