Meal planning, sharing recipes and ideas to make the weekly budget go further.

[Seaside3]

Ok, snappy title, I know.

Having recently loved a thread where the op bemoaning the price of minced beef, (i didn't love that) and seeing how helpful people were, I decided to start my own thread.

We are a large family, but currently just 4 of us live at home. 2 adults, 2 teens who eat adult portions.

I aim to spend around £70 on average a week, we do eat out a couple of times a week, but £70 should roughly cover it.

New shop arriving tomorrow, hoping it will cover the week.

To start though, tonight we had Asian style pork, rice and garlic broccoli.

Asian pork - minced pork, onion, grated garlic and ginger, Chinese five spice, carrot, courgette broccoli stem, sweetcorn, peas, dark soy, chilli flakes Fry, add a little water if required.

Garlic and ginger broccoli... fried sliced garlic and root ginger, red onion, broccoli florets. Added a couple of splashes of water, soy and a sprinkle of sugar. Would have used honey, but didn't have any. Fresh coriander leaves.

Basmati rice

Added a fried egg.

Served 4 for dinner, 2 extra servings for lunches.

Would love to hear others go to family meals.

Today: a bougie brunch of vef, salad and steak pita for my daughter and I.
Tea was just me, ao I made chicken noodles and stir fry. Loads left for my son's lunch tomorrow.
Picked up somw reduced price sausages and bagels for the freezer too.

Last night's soli meal today's lunch with my daughter.

Breakfast was protein bagels (yellow sticker) with eggs, tomatoes amd cottage cheese.

Tea, more salad requests - this time from my daughter - salad, home made hummus, homemade courgette, sweetcorn and chilli fritters, cous cous, ham, cottage cheese.

A level results day for my daughter tomorrow, so breakfast out, then who knows what. She's off to London to celebrate a friend's 18th. Think it will be just the husband and I, so I may resort yo something from the freezer.

Your meals in your last posts look absolutely delicious!

Good luck for tomorrow - if it isn't what you wanted please remember that clearing and applying after a gap year with grades in hand do work out for our DC.

Thank you! Salad is easy to make pretty to be fair.
And the added bonus ia our electricity usage has been minimal today.

Thank you. She's planning a year out already, which will give her time to save and decide where and what she wants to do.
She's the last of 4 and to be honest, I'm nervous for her. She has worked far harder than the others so deserves amazing results, but you just never know. I'm predicting a restless night all round!

those bagels look so good

I hope your daughter gets the results she deserves

Thanks @FlorenceBlack , scrambled eggs are a family fave.

She got great results, really proud of her. And our son (restarted after a failed year at a levels) is off to uni too. So a good day all round.

Breakfast out together morning, followed by daughter leaving for a weekend away and husband/son off to work. Left over salad with nectarine for my lunch.

Tea for husband and I was dahl from the freezer, shop bought samosa and naan, rice. A portion left for someone tomorrow.

I think sausage and mash tomorrow as I've got potatoes and onions to use up, plus reduced price sausages from earlier in the week. Will save some for lunch on Sunday.

At some point i will have to actually order a big shop, but for now popping tk the shop to fill in the gaps is just about working.

Today I FINALLY went shopping! It wasn't in the plan, but husband had a collection for work next to lidl so I took my chance.

Spent £70 and got quite a surprising amount of food. A lot of basics- beans, rice, pasta and the fruit and veg. Only one lot of meat (pork mince), but trying to keep costs down by eating more vegetarian food.

Having said that, we did have breakfast out!

So lunch was just fruit. Tea was oven chips, salad and omelette. Just husband and I, so some salad and omelette left for for lunch/someone else.

Tomorrow I will make the sausage amd mash i didn't make today. Other plans include a curry, bean chilli, tomato pasta, beans on toast, stuffed peppers. I'm sure I will come up.with something more exciting too.

Hope everyone has some lovely planned for the weekend.

Delighted to see you posting again! No deliciousness to add but always enjoy and am inspired by your thread!

That's very nice to hear! Tbh i think I need to give through the thread for inspiration sometime soon!

A couple from yesterday- home made baked beans on a bagel (left over omelette for husband), rice cracked with cream cheese and grapes.
Today- sausage, mash, cabbage, roasted carrots, onion gravy.

After our super cheap shop at Lisl last week I decided I better cook some food as cheap = ingredients, not meals. Plus, I was walking past my mums fig tree and as she never eats them, I decided to pick them. There were loads, so I decided to make a family favourite- fig chutney. Once in the kitchen i was off.

Today I made - lentil dahl (enough for 8 portions easily), tomato sauce - for pasta and likely use some for eggs. I roasted some peppers, use undecided. Baked some rice, made a crumble and date slice. For tea I made pork mince with cabbage and egg rice, cucumber salad.

Do you have a recipe for fig chutney @Seaside3 - one of my neighbours has a tree in his front garden and we are allowed to help ourselves.

I read a couple on Google and then winged it.
Basically I gently fried 1 onion until soft, then added dates - i wanted less sugar - about 6/8 finely chopped. Added salt and chilli flakes. Roughly chopped around 10 very ripe figs, added aome sugar and some balsamic vinegar. Sorry, no idea how much. Just until I felt the balance would be okay. Cooked away for around 45 minutes or more. Just on a gentle bubble. Potted it up and that was that.

Today, I used the left over baked rice as a base for salads for 4 lunches. Added a tin if mixed bean salad, the roasted peppers from yesterday (chopped), sun dried tomatoes, salad, feta, pine nuts. It was delicious.

Then, impromptu birthday dinner for son 2, trying to see all the kids before university/holidays.

So the tomato pasta sauce from yeaterday came in use. Made it a little fancier by adding some cooked bacon and cheese. Served with salad and garlic bread. Left over pasta and salad leaves for 2 lunches tomorrow, some tomato sauce left for other lunches tomorrow.

Also made a black forest gateau, which was fun and delicious.

Tomorrow will be dahl, I need to add the halloumi and chickpeas. Naans in the freezer, rice to cook.

Not sure what Thursday brings yet, I think it's just my husband and I, so possibly something like eggs, chips n beans!

Today Turkish style eggs with the leftbover tomato sauce and beans. Finished with feta and some toast.

I made some nectarine and peach jam with some ripe fruit.

Tea I added halloumi and chickpeas to the dahl. Served with rice, naan and yogurt.

Remembered I have aomw courgettes ans cream cheeae to use up, so will serve them with pasta for tea tomorrow.

Then I guess a shop will be on the cards again at some point, but everyone's working lots next week and they tend to get fed at work... so maybe another week of winging it.

I may be doing Turkish eggs today.

We love them in our house. Yesterday's were not very authentic at all, they had a real.mix of things in, including being topped off with crispy onions! But even the super healthy conscious gym fanatic is happy to eat them, so that's good.

I have looked at a few recipes so I may try a few

Be sure to share the best you find!

Porridge with nectarine and plum jam
Cheese toastie with fig chutney
Black bean beef and spring rolls (Bought a ready meal, regretted it).

Today I have made some smoked mackerel pate to go in the freezer. It was the last in the pack and I'm done with mackerel for a while.

I've also roasted the last quarter of a tin of chickpeas and sprinkled some gunpowder spice mix on it. These I will snack on or use as a salad topper.

One portion of aubergine and 'nduja lasagne that I made last night has also gone in the freezer.

I have some lemons that are going over too, so may squeeze juice into ice cube tray.

I love my adult DSs a lot, but it is so much easier meal prep wise now it is back to the two of us.

@DiggoryVenn that lasagne sounds interesting. I'll keep that one locked away in my memory for inspo!

Been a busy few days, with a mix of eating out and home.

Friday was an M & S salad selection for lunch. Whilst there i found some really nice jarred beans for 55p each! Bargain.

Yesterday i made courgette, lemon and white bean pasta, using cream cheese as the sauce.

Today - salad. The left over leaves from Friday, tomatoes, cooked courgettes, toasted pineapple nuts, figs, toasted chickpeas, a sprinkle of cheddar. It was rather nice!

Broccoli and cheddar soup today, with 1/2 jar of chickpeas, some peas and some cream that needed using up added. Delicious, and 4 large portions.

The shopping arrived today, £70.

I'm planning a chicken roast, then chicken stir fry the following day.

I've got pork mince, so thinking that with wraps and sweet potato wedges.

Friday will be curry for everyone, then the husband and I are going away for a few weeks. But only after Saturday brunch.

Lunches will be salads and soup, maybe some sandwiches.

I may have to cook some stuff off for the kids to eat whilst we are away, or for the freezer. They can cook, but both are working weird and wonderful hours. Plus I'd rather make something than it go to waste. Watch this space.

What's on everyone's menu this week?