Your favourite 'lowish cost' family meals

[longshot]

I need to shave a substantial amount of our monthly food bill and easiest way will be by reducing the spend we make on evening meals. I have calculated that for the 4 of us most evening meals cost us approx £8-16 currently, occasionally more. Once a week we have something 'cheap' like baked potatoes but even then it's probably approx £8 with salad, tuna etc. I do all the usuals eg bolognaise, pasta bakes etc but we have one who needs GF pasta etc which increases the price a bit. Also we are 4 adult size portions so one 500g portion of mince is for 4 of us. Kids are teens and eat a lot as does my sporty DH!

Please can you list any top meals you make that come in as quite budget? Happy to do some veggie but mostly meat / fish ideally.

Big pack of chicken thighs/legs as a tray bake - serve with rice or similar - seasoning, peppers, mushrooms, tomatoes, chorizo, anything chucked in.

My DC would have eaten jacket potatoes, grated cheese and baked beans every night of the week given the chance.

Homemade veggy soup with bread is cheap. Use up any bits of veg in the fridge, add some lentils. Try to buy yellow sticker bread or rolls and freeze until needed.

Do you actually need a cooked meal every day, especially in warmer weather? Once or twice a week sandwiches or toast are fine, even if you have had packed lunches. Add some salad and it's done.

When I make bolognese I bulk it up with celery, carrots, onions. We are 5 - including a very hungry teenager and two children, so similar to your four adults, and can make 500g stretch two meals. The second day I often add beans, peppers and chilli to it.

Dal is super cheap, alongside veggie and meat curries.

Big chicken to roast, seasonal veg and roast spuds. Then, use left over chicken for e.g. fajitas, or curry next night.
That's 2 meals for about a tenner, depending on the chicken you get

Sorry, I missed the bit about needing meat. We are a vegan/vegetarian family so never had to factor meat costs into the food budget.

Chicken things - bone and skin on are super cheap. It’s not hard to skin and debone yourself. Use the bones for broth. Old fashioned recipes are the most thrifty.

I make chilli con carne with two cans of tomatoes and kidney beans to 500g of beef mince. It bulks out really well.

Cheap meals:

macaroni cheese with some crispy bacon crumbled over the top

turkey mince burgers - I look out for yellow sticker mince, then mix with equal amount of breadcrumbs, lemon peel, diced onion which I’ve pre-fried with garlic and cumin and toss in some chopped coriander leaves. You can make the patties in advance and even freeze ( if the meat wasn’t pre frozen) then to cook, shallow fry the defrosted burgers very slowly or pop in the airfryer. Serve with iceburg lettuce, burger buns or homemade flatbread and you could also add a yoghurt sauce if you like it

I bought chicken thighs in lidl the other day, 600g was about 4 quid, slow cooked down with cheap chopped veg like roots, or baked slowly with herbs and spices out of the cupboard, with potatoes or whatever

Dhal has to be the cheapest, bag of red lentils, spices, onion, soffrito, I put cherry tomatoes in mine but you dont bhave to, frozen spinach is a lot cheaper than fresh, in fact most frozen fruit and veg is cheaper than fresh and much 'fresher'.

Fabada which is Spanish white bean stew, butter beans, cooked for a long time, chuck the Aldi pork belly strips in so you get a porky flavoursome broth that cooks the beans, cook for a long time, chuck in some cheap veg/roots/onions and smoked paprika, serve with potatoes or rice but potatoes are cheaper

If possible dried beans and pulses/lentils are much much cheaper, although you do need to prep by soaking and I never remember to get them out

Tinned fish like sardines/pilchards/sild, serve with pasta or potatoes or on toast with cheese

Egg on toast, beans on toast, nothing wrong with that as a meal.

Soups with lots of bread, cheeses, ham.

my Mum used to make a dish she called “scallops” which was just sliced potato and onion slowly fried in a huge pan until the onions had caramelised. We ate it hot with good quality white bread and butter and a liberal dash of malt vinegar and salt.

very filling!

I'd think about ingredients that are cheap, but healthy and filling and go from there.
Things like potatoes (jackets, wedges, chips, mash), eggs (omelette, Spanish omelette, scrambled, baked), pasta (Bolognese, pasta bake, macaroni cheese), lentils (use to bulk out bolognese and chili, Daal, soup), beans (again use to bulk out existing meat dishes like chili or fajitas) etc.

We live on homemade soup for dinner a lot of the time. We don’t eat meat or fish though and when I do mum’s shop for her it shocks me how much it is. Tonight Ds and I had lentil soup and dumplings. Tomorrow he’s asked for broccoli and cheddar soup. I’ll get a Demi baguette from the shops tomorrow to go with it.
I also make homemade pizzas, macaroni cheese but add broccoli and cauliflower to it or spinach. Soup is such a cheap and cheerful dinner with the bonus of being very healthy.
We eat porridge for breakfast which again is very cheap. Leaves us more money for our Lego obsession 😃

riverford butternut and bean chilli is v good and is substantial so don’t miss the meat

Not a meal as such, but pulses have become my best friend over the last year.

Try adding a tin of lentils to your beef, and removing some for the freezer before serving. I then use those portions for lunches or to have with wraps, salad and wedges another day.

There are 4 in our house, 2 adult teens, so same as yours. Tonight we had vege pie with white beans (shop bought puff pastry) and feta, homemade chips and broccoli. I think the whole meal cost maybe £4/5... 1 courgette, 1 leek, 2 carrots, half a pack of soft cheese, 1/2 pack of salad cheese (cheap feta), 1 tin of white beans, seasoning, pastry. New potatoes 1/2 a large broccoli.

Tomorrow morrocan beef casserole. 1 pack of stewing beef, seasoning, 6 carrots, 2 onions, 2 tins toms, about 10 prunes, beef stock, borlotti beans. Half put in freezer. Half tomorrow with cous cous and some veg.

I spend in the region of £80 per week (with some meals out), I've got a thread on here with loads of ideas. Let me know if you want a link.

Look up 'The Pauper's Cookbook' by Jocasta Innes. It's a classic because it addresses exactly your quest. And it's all delicious! 😋

I agree with pulses. It stretches meat further and tins are usually less than a £1.
Handily, it also helps make meals healthier too by increasing the veg and fibre content. Baked beans are good in shepherds pie, chick peas or butter beans go in curries (often with frozen butternut squash too so that a pack of chicken chunks makes 2 meals) and Mexican dishes usually include beans anyway.

DH often talks about one of his favourite family meal growing up being baked beano, and I’m sure MIL invented this dish of baked beans topped with mashed potatoes and cheese with an eye on her housekeeping budget.

Other thoughts; Chicken, sweetcorn, peppers, tinned tomatoes and Mexican spices would work with rice or gluten free wraps.

Bacon & peas with GF pasta - or made into a frittata with leftover veg.

Pork mince is often cheaper than beef and makes good meatballs. A good tinned tomato sauce only needs onion, garlic, herbs and time.

these are great ideas - thank you!

someone asked if we need a hot meal every day, and no definitely in summer I do a lot of salads and wraps and sandwiches. But I guess I’m planning more winter at the moment.

DC’s get a proper hot lunch at school (good and sizeable). But DH and I less so as both work from home so lunch tends to be a bit rubbish a lot of the time so I guess I make sure one meal is good and substantial, or it’s leftovers which is obviously good. Today I had leftover shepherds pie for lunch but usually it’s a wrap, a toastie or soup.

but some good ideas here and I probably just Ned 2-3 ‘cheaper’ meals a week to reach our new budget.

Groundnut stew.
1 onion
1 scotch bonnet chilli
1 tin tomatoes
1 tin white beans
2 massively heaped tablespoons of peanut butter.

Chop the onion, fry in a little oil until translucent. Finely chop scotch bonnet chilli, add to pan, fry for a minute. Add the tinned tomatoes and rinse out the can with half a can of water. Stir together and bring to boil. Add peanut butter. You may need a bit more water or peanut butter if you think it needs it - the sauce should be thick but not too thick. Add beans and fold in gently. Taste - you will almost certainly need to add salt. Warm through gently and simmer for five minutes. Serve with rice. This serves 2-3, double quantity for 4-5.

I can also recommend not neglecting pudding!

Rice pudding is cheap, filling, hot and delicious and very easy to make. You can have a small main cooked in the oven, with the rice pudding simmering away at the bottom of the oven.

Semolina - much derided - is also beautiful if cooked well.

If you you are making soup - don’t overlook pearl barley in a stock-based soup. It makes the consistency of the soup very smooth and it is incredibly healthy and filling.

We do sausage pasta a lot - tinned tomatoes, frozen peas / sweetcorn, sausages. Fills everyone up.

A chicken roast one day, and then chicken pie the next day with leftovers.

penakkity is a northern thing I think, but Chuck any roast leftovers in a roasting dish and bulk out with veg. Add gravy and sliced potatoes on top, chuck in the oven and roast. Good with mash.

I make a rainbow Bolognese. Basically, to the 750g minced beef I add 3 tins of chopped tomatoes, 3 chopped up peppers, a grated carrot and an onion finely chopped, a squirt of garlic puree, tomato puree, origami, basil and seasoning. It feeds 4 teens/adults two days. If necessary I add a bit of pasata on the second day and serve with wholewheat pasta and grated cheese on the top. The portions are large as 3 late teens all very sporty.

someone asked if we need a hot meal every day, and no definitely in summer I do a lot of salads and wraps and sandwiches. But I guess I’m planning more winter at the moment

MN is weird about hot food as if more than one hot meal a day is ridiculously greedy, indulgent, luxurious, I don't know what.

While in reality the temperature food is served at has no bearing on any of these things and cooked meals with pulses, grains, spices and seasonal veg can be very cheap and healthy.

But to save money, try using pork or turkey mince instead of beef and loads of veg and beans in a chili.

Get your spices from the Asian aisle, much cheaper than tiny jars.

Add a tin of lentils to make mince go further, you cant see them 😉

We had vegetable and chorizo stew today , cheap but very tasty and you could serve with crusty bread to pad it out if you needed to . Chicken casserole with any leftover chicken , again cheap but filling . We’ve been having a lot of stews lately not because of cost but because my husband has been keeping odd hours so it can be ready for whenever he appears .

Paella works out relatively inexpensively for us. I make about 8-10 portions, and we have it for three nights in a row.
I use chorizo, chicken thighs and prawns, with onion, pepper, frozen peas and paella rice. Plus onions, garlic, tumeric, saffron (just a small amount), paprika and one thing else, possibly cumin. And chicken stock.