Help! £40 to feed family for the month

got-it-spend-it

ffion wrote: »

any advice on cooking for vegeterian family with lentils or beans , desperate for any help

I'm veggie and I tend to add lentils to anything I make with Quorn mince. For example bolognese, shepherd's pie, chilli etc. A 300g bag of Quorn will stretch to three meals, each serving four people. I also add loads of grated carrot and courgette to bulk it out further. You obviously don't need to use the mince at all, but my OH prefers it. I personally like bolognese made out just lentils and veggies which is dead cheap.

As well as the lentils I usually add a tin of baked beans or kidney beans to my chilli. I've just made a bolognese with a tin of beans in too and it went down well.

I also make a delicious soup with an onion, peppers, a tin of tomatoes, a tin of kidney beans and some chilli powder. Cook it with some veggie stock for half an hour or so then blitz.

I hope that's useful.

tomtombeanie

i'm still only about half way through reading this thread, but just wanted to add my thanks - i try to be as careful as possible, but it's easy to slip.

so reading this makes me determined to stay on track - i've now got a sausage casserole in the slow cooker (trying it with a few small handfuls of oats - sadly no lentils in the house until i do my next shop!) and will be making homemade dough in the BM later on for DH, who doesn't like sausages and has gone to london today for work and threatened to "pick up a pizza" on the way home - noooooooo!

i will be keeping my receipts for october - we'll see how i do!

thanks again x

yelowee

Some great ideas here but don't forget

fried rice - a few eggs some rice and loads of veg and leftover meats tastes great and is cheap

A baked bean and potato pie is very cheap and not as bad as it sounds!

If you cut the sausages for a toad in the hole or sausage casserole before you add them no one will notice that you only put in 6 or 7 of the pack of 8 leaving you 1 or 2 to slice very small and put in your baked bean and potato pie

and at the moment Kellogs rice krispies only £1.09 at the co-op for the big box (I've picked up 5 already and they only went on offer lest week!)

Terrysdelight

Absolutley amazed by this link - have learnt so much from so many people. My young neice has just moved out and hasn't got a clue about food shopping - and she's already fretting because of her low budget. Will make sure she reads this link.

Thanks to everyone who has posted on this link.

Terri :j

ffion

please help how to cook more vegeterian food

elsien

Hello ffion, and welcome. Have you done a search of the forum - there's a few ideas floating around. Have a look at this thread for some ideas to be going on with.
http://forums.moneysavingexpert.com/showthread.html?t=907357&highlight=vegetarian+recipe

yelowee

Having just checked freecycle for the first time in a few weeks I found 9 local people (4 in walking distance from home) that are advertising free apples from the trees in there gardens - I've just been and got a whole carrier bag full and the offer to go back again if I like, just for the effort of walking for a few minutes and spending 5 minutes picking them!!!! Hmmmm....apple pie, apple cake, apple strudel, apple crumble, apples in lunch boxes, apple sauce mmmmm I'll by busy tonight but it'll be worth it!

I'm sure all you money savers know about the freecycle groups so if your like me and just don't look as much as you should it's worth a check! I'm gonna check out the 2 others offering plum's tomorrow!

got-it-spend-it

yelowee wrote: »

Having just checked freecycle for the first time in a few weeks I found 9 local people (4 in walking distance from home) that are advertising free apples from the trees in there gardens - I've just been and got a whole carrier bag full and the offer to go back again if I like, just for the effort of walking for a few minutes and spending 5 minutes picking them!!!! Hmmmm....apple pie, apple cake, apple strudel, apple crumble, apples in lunch boxes, apple sauce mmmmm I'll by busy tonight but it'll be worth it!

I'm sure all you money savers know about the freecycle groups so if your like me and just don't look as much as you should it's worth a check! I'm gonna check out the 2 others offering plum's tomorrow!

I've had so many lovely cooking apples off my tree this year- it's been an absolute joy and takes no work at all, unlike the other things I've grown in my garden! I've had plenty of apples myself and my grandparents have had several big carriers full. I think it's great that people take the time to advertise their excess on Freecycle. I would but I've got plenty of family happy to take them off my hands! Might make a crumble tonight, although I'm doing weight watchers so need to come up with a healthier version.

Tonight's dinner is veggie sausages, veggies and mash. Doing a double batch of mash and will make a shepherd's pie with the leftovers along with the leftover bolognese from last night's dinner.

dobs

Ffion i'm veggie and hate meat substitutes ie quorn soya etc, anything resembling meat. I use red lentils alot, i make lentil bolognese which evenmy two young meat eating kids love, also add lentils to vegsoup, basically chop up any veg plus spud or sweet potato makes it tasty, a tin of toms, stock and chuck in a handful of lentils.The lentil bolognese mixture goes great with pasta and is delicious with cheesy mash on top then grilled.

I use soup and broth mixture you can buy and make vegetable stew and dumplings, i make a big batch to last us three days and cook it on the hob with root veg, tom puree and herbs. Pm me if you'd like the recipes.

Also just wanted to say what a great thread this is, its helped me out with all the ideas and comments etc, usually on food alone we spend about £50 in our weekly main food shop, this week it came to just £30 plus Asda let hubby use all our coupons knocking our weeks total to under £23!A first for us in over 14 yrs of beingtogether lol!

joannakinley

Have you tried bread mixes. Tesco are selling hovis ones for about 28p at the mo (wouldn't be surprised if they have miss priced this) and they are so easy in a bread maker or by hand as all you have to do is add water. It's much tastier and a lot filling than cheap white sliced. I used to buy all the seperate ingredients for making bread but then I'd got through a patch of not making it and then go back to the cupboard to find half of it had gone off. Bread mixes solve this problem.

Also have a look around your area for any co-ops that are about to be refurbished as they are doing a lot of them at the moment. Our local one was done recently and to make lots of space for the refurbishment they sold off all their stock at really cheap prices. This was for the two weeks prior to the closure with fresh goods being sold off on week before. The prices were so rediculous it would be worth driving a few miles if you hear of one.

Hope this is some help and will make your £20 go further.