Food Budget for Single Parent and 1 x Under 5- advise pls

Toonie

A lot of younger children tend to find eating meet tough-its a lot of chewing for quite a small mouth. Will he eat fish? Frozen cod fillets are good mixed with pasta and vegetables and don't need quite as much effort.

What sort of things do you have in your freezer?

elf06

Yep I agree with the others! My DS doesnt eat much meat but will eat things like mince, fish etc. He will take a bit of sausage (which I dont give him too often) and a tiny bit of other meat but I do mean a tiny bit. I tend to give him more pots, veg (whatever the meal is) and the littlest bit of meat.
As for the frozen food - is it frozen veg and homecooked things or did you meal kievs, pizzas, ready meals (which there is nothing wrong with so long as your not doing them for every meal - saying that most can be homemade and can often be cheaper). DS and I love doing HM pizza and he has fun helping with the dough!
Sorry for the rambling its a bit early for me yet!!!

desperate+determined

Toonie wrote: »

A lot of younger children tend to find eating meet tough-its a lot of chewing for quite a small mouth. Will he eat fish? Frozen cod fillets are good mixed with pasta and vegetables and don't need quite as much effort.

What sort of things do you have in your freezer?

I'm ashamed of my freezer:

contents:

Breaded Chicken Nuggets
Bread Chicken Burgers
Breaded Chicken Drumsticks
Breaded Chicken Kievs
Fish Fingers
Burgers
2 bags of chips ( son all of a sudden wont eat then)
Bread Rolls
Ancient Tub of Icecream (does this go off)
5 packs of Sausage - got them on offer only 8p per pack (son wont eat them)
Breaded Fish protions
2 x small steak pies (son wont eat them)
1 x bag frozen veg
3 x sml yorkshire puds
Ice pops
3 Pork Chops (son wont eat them)
1 x Mince
1 pk cauliflower burgers
1/2 pk sausage rolls - (guess what - son wont eat them)

Freezer question: - Most of this stuff has been in the months if not nearly a year - will it ever go off?

God, I feel useless at this.

elf06

You are not useless - just learning!
If you bought it frozen then it will need to be used by the use by date on the pack (unless it gets freezer burnt then it would need chucking before then). If you bought it fresh and froze it then its supposed to only be kept for 3 months but I dont know many people who follow that rule!!
My only concern (and I do think this is just me) is that a lot of the convenience foods like chick nuggets, kievs and burgers are quite hight in salt and under 5's need a much lower salt content in their diet. Most of these things you could try making yourself?

Toonie

Don't feel ashamed. I have a lot of similar stuff in my freezer, sometimes after being out and working for over ten hours you just don't want to cook.

Quick question, I noticed from you SOA on the Debt-free board your son goes to nursery, does he have a hot meal there? Many nurseries tend to give hot meals at lunchtime and I wonder what your son eats there.

The things that are "meant" for freezers will have a use by date...so you can check those out. I personally have eaten plenty of things which have been frozen for months-sometimes that's the way it works when you have little money.

My nephew won't eat most meat, but does eat cheese, eggs and drinks a lot of milk, so he gets plenty of protein. Quite often for dinner all he wants is pasta or rice with vegetables which isn't too bad as long as he gets his protein somewhere else.

elf06

Toonie wrote: »

Don't feel ashamed. I have a lot of similar stuff in my freezer, sometimes after being out and working for over ten hours you just don't want to cook.

Quick question, I noticed from you SOA on the Debt-free board your son goes to nursery, does he have a hot meal there? Many nurseries tend to give hot meals at lunchtime and I wonder what your son eats there.

The things that are "meant" for freezers will have a use by date...so you can check those out. I personally have eaten plenty of things which have been frozen for months-sometimes that's the way it works when you have little money.

My nephew won't eat most meat, but does eat cheese, eggs and drinks a lot of milk, so he gets plenty of protein. Quite often for dinner all he wants is pasta or rice with vegetables which isn't too bad as long as he gets his protein somewhere else.

Good question. My son eats at his nursery and they provide a weekly meal plan on a 4 week rota so I know what he has for his lunch (normally things he wouldnt touch if I made them :rotfl:).
Just to clarify I dont have anything against quick and easy food and think there is deffinately a need for them when time is short, I just meant that spending a little time making these things would make them healthier (you can still freeze them and then they are just as quick as if you had bought them frozen). Also agree with keeping things longer than a few months - like I said in my previous post I dont know many people who follow the 3 month rule

desperate+determined

Toonie wrote: »

Don't feel ashamed. I have a lot of similar stuff in my freezer, sometimes after being out and working for over ten hours you just don't want to cook.

Quick question, I noticed from you SOA on the Debt-free board your son goes to nursery, does he have a hot meal there? Many nurseries tend to give hot meals at lunchtime and I wonder what your son eats there.

The things that are "meant" for freezers will have a use by date...so you can check those out. I personally have eaten plenty of things which have been frozen for months-sometimes that's the way it works when you have little money.

My nephew won't eat most meat, but does eat cheese, eggs and drinks a lot of milk, so he gets plenty of protein. Quite often for dinner all he wants is pasta or rice with vegetables which isn't too bad as long as he gets his protein somewhere else.

My son won't eat cheese or eggs, extremely fussy.
Nursery do him a cooked dinner and a snack tea. Dinners he doesn't always eat as majority of meals has something he won't eat, i.e cheese or tomatoes. Or if they put gravy on he won't eat it. Thats why even though hes had b/fast, lunch and tea at nursery - he's still v. hungry when he gets home.

Work sounds like mine, i'm up at 6 and still on go at midnight. work 9-5 but the travel makes it 8-6 so can't be bothered to cook when get in.

Thanks for clearing the freezer situatio, from quick look in mine, lots needs to go. (what a waste :embarasse)

LilacPixie

My daughter announced today that she doesn't like cheese yet shehad mac cheese at lunch because I told her it was Macaroni. If you son is having 3 meals but is still pretty hungry how about trying to bake some things. You could make muffins with some cheee and grated courgette. Quite often disguise is the only way to get my daughter to eat a certain thing

johanne

im a single mum with a very hungry 15 month old and we spend between £80-120 a month (depending on whether we have a packed freezer and how often we eat at my mums etc)

Just so you know i work (and study) from home and even i have shop bought chicken nuggets, oven chips, fish fingers etc in my freezer for my daughter.... cos frankly some nights i just cant be bothered cooking fresh healthy things for her when ive been running round all day after her whilst juggling a uni book or organising stuff for work ! I think its only human.. us mums get tired... specially when your doing it alone and i applaud all the mums who manage to cook fresh healthy homemade stuff for every meal but i personally cant do it.

but way i see it aslong as its not every meal every day for their whole childhood i dont think its too bad to put the odd plate of chicken nuggets and oven chips infront of them for tea.... i remember a doctor telling my mum it was fine that my little bro would only ever eat breakfast cereal, bananas, skips crisps and fish fingers with chips every single day " aslong as hes eating its fine".

Once youve cleared out the freezer of the stuff that has to go come back and let us know what you still have left and maybe a list of what types of things you know you and your little one will eat?

patchwork_cat

As a mum with older children I will just say I do appreciate that little ones don't like to chew, but try to keep offering them as they do need to eat proper meat and not just pap.

Also freezer burn foods are supposed to be fine to eat, but they might not taste as good http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Freezer_burn