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...
Pitta with egg mayo and tomato
Pitta with fig chutney, brie and cucumber
Half and half with husband

Made a dahl whilst renovating some furniture, had rice, butter chicken massala, dahl and half a naan for tea.

Tomorrow I think I'll swap to courgette and feta pasta, its been a very orange week so far!

Still have the butter chicken massala left, along with loads of dahl and rice, so another meal there.

I love this, we too try to stick to around 70/80 a week for 2 adults, 2 kids (9 and 5) and 2 cats and also use Tesco for our main shop, however there's now a lidl near my office and I do pop there sometimes for bits like Nespresso compatible coffee pods (2.99 for 20) and greek yogurt (1.99 a tub for the proper stuff) as we seem to go through these like you wouldn't believe!

I'm loving your recipes so following with interest.

this week so far we've had freezer Bolognese on Monday night (need to replace that at some point this week with a batch cook) i now use 500g beef mine + 500g pork mince and usually get 2 nights of Bolognese plus a packed lunch for ds1 and a lasagne for dinner plus a portion for a work lunch out of that.

Last night was sausage and mash with green veg

Today while at work I've had a whole chicken in the slow cooker, will shred this when I get home and have chicken tacos, then a thai style curried fried rice tomorrow.

little has school lunches, big takes a packed lunch half the week. DH WFH and mostly makes a sandwich. This week my work lunches have been crackers and cottage cheese with some kind of fruit.

I'll make scones at the weekend so next week will mostly be cheese scones with tomato soup for the lunches.

@QforCucumber I was thinking about scones yesterday. I LOVE them! I think my bakes this week will be a carrot cake and some date slice. But that may end up as scones...

Tonight has been swapped again! Still got lots of yorkshire puddings from daughters work, so having the leftbover Somerset chicken, yorkshire pudding, broccoli and courgettes. Son is working so has taken some rice and chicken from last night.

Lunch was soup for husband and son, dahl and rice for me and chicken mayo with sweetcorn sandwich for my daughter. A right old mix!

Placed my order for Tesco, should be delivered Saturday. I could have held off until next week, but trying to keep out of the corner shop!

Will share next week's shop and menu ideas in next post.

Fabulous thread, thank you! I am following with interest. And wishing I produced food half as interesting.

Thank you, and @Seaside3 who posted a link to her thread.

Some excellent ideas here - it always helps me to see what other people are cooking.

Great thread.

Our weeks follow a rhythm

Sunday - usually a roast
Monday - leftover meat (I ring fence 1/3 of the meat, I serve the roast and there is always stuffing and a range of veg and a hot pudding, so no one goes hungry) turned into wraps, I vary the seasonings but it’s invariably bulked out with a couple of peppers and an onion. Sometimes Indian, Mexican or Chinese (if Chinese flavours I’ll do green peppers and spring onions) depending on my mood
Tuesday - we have more time typically, so this is often a curry or Asian dish, pork mince with ginger, garlic and chilli with spring onions, honey and soy is good.
Wednesday is a busy in and out evening so it’s jacket potatoes and salad. I make a massive chilli in the pressure cooker and freeze it in 4 person portions, I usually get 5-6 dinners worth. I use a whole bag of frozen soffrito, 1kg 5% mince, 2-3 peppers, 3-4 types of beans, 2 tins of toms, half a tube of puree, beef stock cubes and then smoked paprika, cayenne, chilli, cumin, garlic, oregano. I sometimes chuck in some chickpeas. I finish it with a tablespoon of dark cocoa powder.
Thursday - pasta night, I like a sausage, leek and crème fraiche pasta sauce with lots of Italian herbs. I use really nice Italian sausages, either m&s Tuscan or Sicilian. Finished with a big squeeze of lemon. Kids like a good tomato sauce with garlic, onions, passata and lots of herbs.
Friday - this is often frozen dinner night, so either something I’ve batch cooked or nuggets, chips and beans
Saturday - involved dinner / treat night. We have pizza oven that we use through out the year and I also use for steaks and veg in a grill pan. Sometimes I’ll make a lasagne, steak pie, steaks, pork belly (Korean style), hunters chicken, homemade burgers, toad in the hole.

We find having a rough plan means I don’t have to think too hard. We also have several very good Asian supermarkets that sell proper frozen soup dumplings, bao etc and that makes life easier with bigger kids who are fussy.

I am totally loving this thread and the ‘cooking in one go’ vibe. Sadly we are veggie so a lot of the meat chat is over my head but if you do a veggie week OP I’d love to see the results!

If I was doing a veggie week I’d do

day one - vegetable and lentil bolognase - make double
day two - add mushrooms and marmite and make it into a cottage pie
day three - spinach and chick pea curry make double
day four - use the curry to make wraps, I’d add grated carrot, coriander, Greek yoghurt and some lime
day five - big roasted veg tray bake with cubes of halloumi (soak it in boiling water for 15 minutes before cooking), make extra roasted veg.
day six - pasta with roasted veg, add some passata to a pan with the roasted veg and cook it out a bit
day seven - I’d make jacket potatoes and a three bean chilli, I’d make a vat of the chilli and freeze it in portions.

Thanks!
I scour Instagram for ideas, I'm pretty good at imagining what flavours might work together, so can substitute if needed. There are some links to what I make, or feel free to ask if you want any recipes.

I think most of what I make could have pulses/meat substitutes/cheese in place.

@FurForksSake your plans sound great! Thanks for sharing. Please feel free to keep sharing.

This week's shopping should come to £71.
I'm planning on pork meatballs with cucumber, yogurt, salad and cous cous. Based on this recipe.

A version of these beets for lunches

This celeriac and apple salad.

Roast chicken with all the trimmings

Chicken with mushroom sauce and pearl barley

Baked potatoes and some kind of soup.

Carrot cake and date slice are also on the menu for next week.

Not so much a recipe but a tip.

Not food banks, but look for community food waste points. Or if there is not one, get together and start one.

we are a small community, but all the local supermarkets now give anything on date, from pasta and tinned goods to fruit and flowers.

food banks do not take out of date, on date produce.

this is often mountains of veg, mountains of bread, seasonal fruits from fallen trees, apples at moment, and even eggs. On date but fine to float and check.

again I must stress this doesn’t take away from actual food banks but is more a campaign against landfill.

we literally spoke to local store managers and it’s all delivered two nights a week to our bus stop. We dispense with anything not taken. Gardeners hand things in, veg from greenhouses, apples from trees in community land.

@pteromum I love those places, theres one in my town, but I never get around to going. Must make an effort!

Love this thread, thank you!

my contribution is today’s lunch which started life as a plan for soup to use up a sweet potato and a couple of carrots, roasted in air fryer. Chopped and softened a red onion. Then thought it needed a bit of something more so decided to add red lentils. Then wondered if a tablespoon of red Thai curry paste might be nice, which led to coconut milk, but only had coconut cream so I made it up into milk (was so much better than a tin of coconut milk!).
added in the roasted veg and some more water but not quite enough and it became a bastardised dahl and is possibly the best lunch I’ve had for weeks! Loads left, some frozen, some for lunch tomorrow.

@cupidsabsolutepsyche oh, now that sounds delicious. And exactly how i cook! I set off on one direction and then suddenly I'm in a whole other continent.

Tonight, I must confess, my husband and I got a take away! Realised both kids were out (I had provided tea for both) so we grabbed our chance.

Lunch was soup for husband and son, a different soup for daughter. I bought a loaf of nice sour dough and took some chicken i roasted earlier in the week, mixed with mayo, mango chutney, cucumber and capers.

Last night's tea was pearl barley chicken and veg, broccoli, sweet potato and Yorkshire pudding.

Yesterday's lunch was the same as Thursday, chicken sandwich. Made a greek salad for daughter.

She went to her friends for tea, son had Somerset chicken, carrots and rice from the freezer at work. We had morrocan style beef with pearl barley, from the freezer.

Yesterday I was lucky enough to work at a crop share, we were allowed to bring a few bits home. So lunch today was...

Pearl barley topped with courgette and feta fritters, tomato sauce, roasted hazelnuts and a side of pepper. It was amazing.

Argh, forgot to move money and the email went to junk, so no food delivery until tomorrow now.

That meant husband twisted my arm for curry from the co-op yesterday. Theres food in the freezer for tea, just need some thing for lunches. 2 courgettes and not much else in... may need to hit the corner shop.

@Seaside3 do you have a recipe for the courgette and feta fritters? They look/sound lovely!

Even cheaper if you use dried lentils, no need to pee-soak just rinse and add at the swearing an onion stage.

I made it up, so no recipe.

I grated 2 courgettes, sprinkled with salt and let them drain in a sieve to remove moisture.
Finely chopped a chilli, added this and the courgettes to a bowl. Added about half a pack of crumbled feta. Salt, pepper, 1 egg and I would guess around 150g/200g of flour. I had some bread crumbs, so put them in too. Heat oil until hot, fry until almost burnt. I find this makes courgettes taste better!
You could add any cheese/garlic/onion/spices. Or use a different vegetable. I served these with a drizzle of honey, a tomato sauce (fried red onions, cherry tomatoes), toasted hazelnuts and pearl barley which i cooked last week and kept in freezer.
I've made fritters with sweetcorn, carrots, broccoli or cauliflower before. Theyre good as a main or a side.

I often swear at onions, feel it's fair as they make me cry.

Sorry, couldn't resist.

But you reminded me to try this recipe, thanks!

I'm on my own, one thing I do is try to build leftovers in to my cooking. So I wouldn't bake a single potato, I will do a few. I will have one as a baked potato, use a couple to make gnocchi (just take the potto out of the skin and mix with flour) and then I might have potato skins with bacon and cheese - heated in the air fryer or microwave.

It doesn't save on the cost of food but does save on fuel.

@sashh I'm going to give potato skins a try. I can't get on with gnocchi, something about the texture that I just don't like, even when fried.
But I could use the potatoes for mash and then have the skins.

Another tip I've found is to remove at least one serving before dishing up. If there's food left, people will go back for more. If it's already in the freezer, they can't!

Shopping finally on its way, thank goodness. Had a random lunch of spaghetti with panfried courgettes, garlic, brie and capers. It was tasty, but would have been better with a dash of lemon.

Tea will be some chilli from the freezer and rice as shopping arriving between 7 and 8.

No dates, so need to think if another snack/treat. I did get some apples when I volunteered on friday, so maybe a crumble. Carrot cake, and then perhaps so oaty biscuits/flapjacks with added dried fruits. I've got some sesame seeds, so will toast them to throw in.

Shopping total attached, and glad I made a note of what I'm planning to make as I had forgotten!

I'll likely do a big cookathon tomorrow, watch this space.