Help! £40 to feed family for the month

ffion

thanks for your tips am learning from scratch on receipes so dont know how much to what . any further help would be grateful ffion

nia1972

Hi to everyone. I'd just like to say its absolutely fantastic what you have achieved mbaz. I also thought i was very much alone in respect of the lentil bulking techniques. My meat and 2 veg eating OH has absoluteley no idea and has tucked in with gusto for the last 6 months. Will give the oats a go tomorrow:j :j

grecophile

As a former veggie ( can't resist bacon or Greek hospitality) I still use lentils, spilt peas and beans a lot. Here's a favourite from the Cranks recipe book. It's great hot and slices well cold to put in lunchboxes.

Lentil and Cheese wedges

8oz red lentils
450ml/3/4 pint water
large onion
1oz marg /butter
4 oz grated cheese
1tsp mixed herbs ( optional)
1 egg
1oz breadcrumbs ( not dried ones)
salt and pepper

cook the lentils in the water till soft and the liquid has been absorbed. chop and fry onion gently in butter/marg till soft. Combine everything and press into 9inch sandwich tin. Bake at gas 5 190 deg C for 30 mins. ( I do this when the oven's on to cook other stuff to save gas.)

This thread is brilliant- it saves the 'what are we eating this week?' headache moments. thnak to all who contribute!:D

grecophile

whoops- I don't use 'spilt' peas.....I meant split peas!:o

Wobbledoos

i've had this window open reading this thread for the last 3 days!!!

my fiance doesn't think it's possible, regardless of the fact that you have (more or less!) managed it!!

so inspiring, really has made me think about how much we (I) spend on food shopping - this week alone i have spent over £60 in M & £90 in Mr T...... shocking!!! my fridge is overflowing, my freezers are ram packed, and my larder is overflowing with tins & such like... my baking cupboard is also totally chocablock, and i am now "not allowed" to go shopping!!!

we are me & fiance, 15 y/o son (who eats more than me & DF together!), 9 y/o dd & 15mth old son...

popped to M last night (having read about all the RTC & YS possibilities!), and got

1 cooked chicken @ 99p
3 spicy drumsticks @ 19p
6 Cumberland sausages @ 49p (they overpriced them on the sticker, should have been 19p!! grrr!)
2 french sticks @ 9p each
a HUGE steak for £4 (is about a foot long lol)

so tonight we are going to have french bread pizzas with the drumsticks, and the rest i have to find some room in the freezer!!

does anyone know of a website where you can input all your cupboard/fridge/freezer contents, and it tell you what meals you can cook?

mbaz well done to you, VERY impressive!!

we are getting married in april 09, so trying to save every penny... i start FT work next week so time is going to be shorter than ever, but will try & try & try to keep up with all this MS ways!

have pasted 4 pages into word to get printed off for my recipe collection,

thanks to EVERYONE who's input on this thread,

shall shush now lol, and also go check MY local freecycle for fruit going begging!

Wobbles
x

oystercatcher

grecophile the lentil wedges sound yummy . Thanks !

Oystercatcher

skintmumof3

does anyone know of a website where you can input all your cupboard/fridge/freezer contents, and it tell you what meals you can cook?


try out the bbc recipe web site. there is a section where you put in three ingredients and it comes up with loads of recipes containing whay you type in..
http://www.bbc.co.uk/food/recipes/
good luck
skint
x

pennypinchingmum

When my oh and i were first together we had very little money. We lived on noodles and this was our favourite recipe-

2 packs of value noodles, = 14p
1 tin value toms, = 26p
1 value beef stock cube, =2.9p
1/2 tsp of chilli =1p
Total= 44p
I would cook the noodles in plenty of water then add the reamining ingriedients obviously chilli is to taste. if we were feeling extravagant we would add a tin of sweetcorn. the other day i made this for my now family of 5 and we all thoroughly enjoyed it. I just increased the noodles. For junk foor at least your getting one of your 5 a day.

Wobbledoos

skintmumof3 wrote: »

does anyone know of a website where you can input all your cupboard/fridge/freezer contents, and it tell you what meals you can cook?


try out the bbc recipe web site. there is a section where you put in three ingredients and it comes up with loads of recipes containing whay you type in..
http://www.bbc.co.uk/food/recipes/
good luck
skint
x

very helpful, thanks skint... have used that site MANY times when planning menus, just hadn't actually registered usable with cupboards full!

duuuuuuuuhhhhhhhhhhhhhhh!

Wobbles
x

shopndrop

Wobbledoos wrote: »

does anyone know of a website where you can input all your cupboard/fridge/freezer contents, and it tell you what meals you can cook?

I use this site http://www.cookingbynumbers.com/frames.html