Help with shopping

earthmother

I'm going to keep an eye on this thread as I was about to ask a similar question

I'm looking for some new cooked meal ideas - we have quite a limited range of meals (8 to be precise - and that's only if you count beans on toast and pizza :eek:), and I need to expand our range.

I've bought some meatballs and pasta sauces and I'll give that a go as eldest did try it at Beaver camp, and whilst he didn't eat it there, did say he'd give it a go if we got a different sauce - so I'm holding him to it, lol.

But I'm a bit stuck as to where to go next - after almost 15 years of living with the most picky eater I've ever known (which has unfortunately affected the kids once they got aware of food - and I got such a good start when they were weaning ), I've lost my confidence to cook - so any ideas would be great. I'll consider anything.

lynzpower

Earthmother

I always think for those stuck in a rut, to think about what sort of meals youd like i you were to be taken out.

Or browse posh sites like waitrose recipes to get inspration
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Theres also a menu plan thread running on here, nice to see how others thriftity use ingredients.

Eg this week were having
stirfry
tomorrow im going to do curry ( from freezer) rice & nan
Southern fried chicken drumsticks, chips/jacket , salad, onion rings
chicken ceasar tortilla salad bowl - hot chicken fresh leaves from the garden, mushrooms, peppershot with a ceasar dressing,croutons ( HM) and a dollop of lovely Sour cream in a baked tortilla crispy bowl ( my summer fave)
Sausages, pitta, salad, wedges

loshypops

Hi!

Do you know anyone who has a Makro card? we have saved a fortune each month by buying a box of chicken breast (roughly 22 per pack) for £20.00 and they are huge and fresh too. We used to spend say £4.00 per two/three in Tesco and they were tiny.

I would ask around with friends and work, we currently buy through a friend who hasa business card there and i could not thank him enough for how much it has saved us.

Butterfly_Brain

We have found a freezer trade /shoppers club locally and it has saved us a lot of money.
I can spend £50 and have enough meat, fish and veg for 2 months

culpepper

we sometimes have a tin of pilchards as our 'meat' element in a dish.
Pilchard lasagne or pizza,sometimes just as a stew with potatoes and veg.
A bit of grated cheese can liven things up.
You can freeze sliced apples and pears.
I keep bananas in the fridge if we have a lot. The skins will brown with the cold but the fruit is perfectly white and fresh looking inside.
Tinned pineapple is handy to add to homemade pizza or to just eat as a desert or for making pineapple sponge.
Check fruit carefully when buying, things like apples should last around a week but if they are bruised they will deteriorate very quickly and if you dont check the bowl, will contaminate the sound fruit too. Some shops just lump all the fruit into the shelves haphazardly so every piece has a bruise.

Primrose

A lot of cheap foods which save money like soups, stews, caseroles, meat sauces use onions and are probably rather tasteless without them and I wonder whether you could try using leeks as a substitute to expand your range of cheaply cooked foods. Stir fries use very little meat or chicken so stretch it well, as do pasta sauces. Baked vegetables (buy seasonal when they're fresh and cheap) in a cheesy sauce with grilled bacon also make tasty meals, as do various mixtures of canned beans with tuna, fried bacon or chicken pieces, chopped peppers, etc. Often the most interesting tasty meals are a combination of unlikely 'Ready Steady Cook' ingredients thrown together as an experiment. Visit the Cookery Book section of your local library, and scour charity shops for cookery books. Am sure you will find a lot of inspiration from these sources. Vegetarian cook books will also provide some ideas for cheap meals without meat. Rose Elliott's "Bean" cook book, and "Not just a lot of old lentils" is full of ideas too.