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.

Home made soup and a cheese and ham toastie is a regular round here.

Good choice!
I made the ones for my daughter in a frying pan yesterday. Fries off some onions, buttered both sides od nice sourdough. Put cheddar and feta on bread, added fries onions. Assembled sandwhiches and put in the frying pan with a lid on until golden with oozy cheese.. Got to admit, they looked tasty!

I can't believe you didn't make one for yourself! Sourdough is the best for toasties, I agree.

I was heading out, so fed everyone else instead!
I'm off out again tonight, not sure who is around so got some chicken curry out of the freezer. Also popped into the co-op, bought some ground coffee, which was really cheap, tea bags and a meal deal, as an emergency tea. Meant I could remove some items from tesco, who will be coming tomorrow. Still, £20 in co-op, including some razors. These things always add up

I refuse to pay the pink tax on razors, bog standard bic do the job. Much cheaper.

They were for husband. The best ones ive found are from Sainsbury's, he likes them too.
And they're cheap, despite being pink.

Today is miserable outside. The shopping has been delivered, so a cooking spree was had.
Todays shop was £81. So, including yesterday, ive spent £100 this week. But, theres more than 1 weeks worth of food, easily.
Today i made:
Paprika mushroom.spuo
Courgette, dill and cottage cheese soup
Roasted a gammon, along with potatoes and carrots. Half for tea, half sliced for sandwiches.
A sausage, bean and lentil casserole
Chicken curry
Baked potatoes
Boiled eggs
Dahl

Tomorrow I'm going to make date slice,a cake and possibly a pudding, not sure what yet.

I just wanted to say thanks for the inspiration :) I came across this thread whilst drinking my coffee this morning. I don’t have the time (or energy!) for batch cooking on this scale at the moment, but my husband is away next week and I always end up just eating whatever I can find in the back of the fridge once the kids are fed when he’s away. So instead today I’ve cooked up a big pan of soup, some roast veg, jerk chicken and new potatoes - should keep me well fed while he’s away. Also made a gnocchi bake for tonight’s tea as well as one for the freezer.

I had a lovely meal yesterday made by DH.
mash up a tin of mixed beans, add some grated cheese, tomato purée, spring onion and chipotle paste and mix up.
Get a large tortilla and put some of the mix on half of it, fold in half and pan fry 3/4 mins each side. Do in batches as many as you want. Cut each into 3/4 triangles.
serve with sour cream and a wedge of lime.

I loved it. So meat but high protein.

You're welcome! Sounds like you're sorted for next week. Week chicken sounds good, do you have a recipe?

That sounds like a weekend brunch, thank you! X

Lunch out and a walk today.
Curry, baked rice, naan, poppadom with cucumber and yogurt for tea.
Followed this recipe, but with chicken breast. The yogurt split, but tasted good all the same.
https://www.instagram.com/reel/DOoWe5bjSW1/?igsh=MXJpZmVmOTExZnBzNg==

Ooh that dinner looks good.

No recipe for the jerk chicken I’m afraid - I was just using up a tub of spice mix that’s been languishing in the cupboard for a very long time…

Thanks @SpamIAm , it was. Just a shame it split, I need to work out what happened.
For some reason jerk chicken is never on my menu, but I think I will add it to next the next shop. Thanks for.the inspiration.

Today we are having lamb curry, probably rogan Josh as I’ve got some paste. This will be meal three from Sundays leg of lamb. I think it will do 8 portions with some lentils and squash chucked in.

@FurForksSake alas, my husband is not a fan of lamb at all. That does sound delicious though.
We.are having sasuge and lentil casserole from Sundays cook off. I think i will use the veg from the emergency meal deal I bought, as that didnt get used. Unless it can be frozen.
Today is feeling like a good day for baking. I think chocolate cake and date slice to start with. Plus some Halloween decorating, teen daughter is holding a party and naturally I jumped at the chance to decorate the house.

Interestingly, my husband didn’t like lamb before he met me. I cook it long and low or short and rare. He was used to his mother’s dry, grey offerings.

My children had steak on Easter Sunday as they refused lamb, but actually wolfed it down on Sunday and in wraps yesterday.

@Seaside3 you sound like a great mum.

Haha, ut may seem that way. But my 18 year old was still un the house at 11am, because he slept in, and i didnt even realise. So yeah, not exactly winning.

Today i made a chocolate, peach and cream cake. Followed this recipe, used peaches from a can. Drained them, added a bit of peach liqueur as a drizzle. Chopped 1 tin of peaches into wipped cream, a sprinkle of salt. Cream on the top, peach slices as decor.

Also, 3 variations of date slice. (1 x recipe split 3 ways). 1 lot ginger, 1 x roasted nuts and cinnamon, 1 x toasted sesame and sumac.

Lunch i made cheesey scrambled eggs, ham and avocado wrap.

Tea was sausage, bean and lentil casserole (freezer), with potatoes and vegetables from the meal deal.

Sorry, links to above recipes...

Chocolate cake

Date slice

Today: Paprika mushroom Soup for my husband and I. The last- of-the-ham wrap for my daughter. Who knows what my son ate, he was home whilst we were out.

His tea was chicken curry and rice. Ours was baked potato with cheesy leeks, courgettes and peas. Enough left for my lunch tomorrow. Forgot a photo, but it was good.

that sounds like a great setup for a proper budget-friendly thread. £70 a week for four is tight but doable with meals like that, asian-style pork stretches really well. slow cooker stews, lentil curries, and traybakes with chicken thighs are good too. i’ve found making one big batch meal (like chilli or pasta bake) for lunches helps keep costs down a lot

@JollyMintWasp it is tight, and to be fair we all eat out at some point in the week or we might pick up something like sour dough. But as much as possible I try to stick to the £70 ish mark.
Im a fan of a couple of batches of soup for lunches, they can always be made more interesting with something chucked on top. Herbs/seeds/cheese etc.
I've also decided that all the "food noise" may as well be put to good use, so finding cheap and easy recipes is a good use of the clatter.

@yikesthatwasit inspired by your idea, we just had baked bean, cheese and crispy onion 'quesadilla'. It was delicious.

Food shop arriving today. We still have plenty from last week, as i spent around £100. But we needed dishwasher tablets and a few other cleaning products, so placed an order. In the freezer I still have 3 veg mash, dahl, 2 chicken breasts and some soup.

Plans for this week are:

Roast chicken for tea tonight as the family are over. Will make a cauliflower cheese, roasted vegetables, potatoes and yorkies from freezer. Left over veg for lunches, chicken will be made into noodle soup.
I think i will use the mash from the freezer to make this beef pie, looks delicious.

This sticky pork is on the menu.

And this pork and potato dish screams autumn

Also on the list, beetroot soup, boiled eggs, feta and courgette fritters, some kind of pasta dish. Baked potatoes.

Im making the chocolate cake (above) again, it was so good. But this time im trying orange and chocolate, instead of peach.

And this bran cake

Also lots of oats for over night oats, porridge and flap jack.

Lastly, I got loads o oranges and lemons free from work, so ive made a lemon syrup for lemonade and in the process if making orange juice with ginger, chilli, garlic, honey, Paprika and turmeric in as we are all feeling a little blah.

Photo = the only one I've taken at the end of the week. Was baked potato with cheesy leeks, brocoli and peas. It was far tastier than it looks!