anyone taking up the live below the line challenge?

GlowGirl

Not sure if you're all aware or not, but the value/smartprice pasta is 9p a bag right now

7_week_wonder

ceridwen wrote: »

So - have you - or anyone else either - got any ideas as to cheap (but healthy! - ie no cheapie breadspreads) things to use on toast instead of butter. Would peeps try making homemade peanut butter from Value peanuts - or what else could peeps use (as butter would be deemed too expensive)?

I'm still tweaking my menu for the week - but it will certainly feature a half quantity of Weezl's homemade peanut butter, although I will have to miss out the pumpkin seeds to stay in budget:
http://www.cheap-family-recipes.org.uk/recipe-pumpkinseedbutter.html?opt=rbreakfast

I make a half quantity every couple of weeks (using value salted peanuts) and have it in my packed lunches - yummy!

7_week_wonder

Ok here goes - this is for two of us:

Breakfast: porridge (75g for two) sweetened with honey
Lunch: peanut butter sandwiches (days 1 & 3); veg soup with bread (if enough) (days 2, 4 & 5)
Dinner: chickpea curry & chapattis; sardine pasta; red dragon pie (made with kidney beans not aduki beans); chickpea & garlic pasta; lentil dahl and chapattis
Snacks: apple or raisins

porridge 500g 33p
honey 1 jar 67p
peanuts 200g 30p
chickpeas 2 tins 74p
tomato puree 2 tins 50p
sardines 1 tin 34p
pasta 500g 9p
red kidney beans 1 tin 18p
lentils 500g 88p
bread mix 1 pkt (2 loaves) 99p
plain flour 1.5 kg 52p
olive oil 250 ml 98p
veg stock cubes 1 pkt 10p
raisins 500g 64p
carrots 500g 33p
potatoes 500g 20p
onions 750kg 38p
swede 750g 38p
garlic 1 26p
apples 1kg 97p


£9.78


A couple of comments: I'm using my extra 22p for curry powder (I think they said you didn't actually have to buy spices, you could just use your store cupboard and work out the equivalent price)
The oil is 250 ml of olive oil - the smallest quantity I could find: in practice I'd rather use veg oil
The extra lentils and pasta will be used to pad out the soup
The extra oats will be used to pad out the red dragon pie.

destroyerofdebt2011

Tempted to have a go at this, like someone else said the link to the tv presenter clearly showed he could have bought more for his money. Personally i would probably buy the following most of which i buy already on a regular basis.

Tesco value orange squash 0.22
1% fat Tesco Milk 0.75
Tesco value cornflakes 0.31
Tesco value pasta 500g 0.09
Tesco value white pitta 0.25
Bag of value apples 0.67
Baked beans X 2 tins 0.60
Pack of 8 value sausages 0.50
Value 1kg rice 0.52
Raisens 0.39
Onions 0.39
Value rice pudding 0.17

£4.86 on the above i doubt i would be hungry and would more than likely have pasta and rice left over after the 5 days. I am really inspired by people who do this week in week out without so much as a grumble. Good luck everyone.

dibblersan

well for the two of us I've had to do something like this in the past before now when the pay cheques been just a little too long away.

buying all from scratch all from tesco and no woopsies.

500g beef mince - 2.00
1kg oats - 75 (use 100g)
500g lentils - 88 (use 100g)
2x tin kidney beans - 36 (tesco doesn't seem to have dried)
500g cannelli beans - 79 (use 100g)
500g black eyed beans - 84 (use 100g)
2 x tin value baked beans - 28
100g tub chilli powder - 86 (use maybe 5g)
500g carrots - 76 (use half grated)
500g passeta - 29
2kg onions - 1.18 (use 200g)

before soaking the beans a weight of more than 2kg of food with 4 veg and a good amount of fibre and protien (200g per serving for 10 servings not including the 50% increase in bulk from rehydrating the beans)

total cost 8.81

leaving 4/5 of most of the staples and 1.29 for a bag of rice if you want it (we often don't as I have trouble cooking rice) or to save for a sack of potatoes that we can buy here for £5/25kg (30p/kg) and would be my investment for next week.

this makes a huge chilli that could feed me and my other half easily for a week (and has done including lunches with potato wedges more than once) oats for breakfast if one wants, spiced lentil (+carrot) soup for lunch.

Frugalista

7_week_wonder wrote: »

Dinner: chickpea curry & chapattis; sardine pasta; red dragon pie (made with kidney beans not aduki beans); chickpea & garlic pasta; lentil dahl and chapattis
apples 1kg 97p

Your dinner menu sounds delicious - would you post your recipes, please?

7_week_wonder

They probably sound grander than they are, but here are the recipes. The chickpea curry is my favourite - in fact we're having it for dinner tonight!

Chickpea curry (for 2)
1 onion chopped
2 cloves garlic, squashed
Veg oil
1 tsp curry power (or more to taste)
½ small tin tom puree
1 tin chick peas

Fry onion and garlic in veg oil for about 5 minutes. Stir in curry powder and fry for another minute. Add tom puree and a splosh of water. Cook for about 5 minutes, add chickpeas. If I’m feeling flush I add some mushrooms at the beginning and serve with a dollop of yoghurt on top.
I think this originally came from a student cook book, but I’ve seen very similar recipes on here.

Sardine pasta (for 2)
1 onion chopped
2 cloves garlic, squashed
Olive oil
1 tin sardines in tomato sauce
150g pasta

Put pasta on to cook. Fry onion and garlic in olive oil for about 5 minutes, add tin of sardines (making sure to add all the tomato sauce) stir and cook gently for another 3 or so minutes (until pasta is ready). Drain pasta and add to sauce. Mix thoroughly and serve. Again if it’s not for the living below the line challenge you can add sweetcorn or olives when you add the sardines.

Red Dragon Pie
I usually use this recipe (which serves 4):
http://www.unicorn-grocery.co.uk/recipes.php?i=4
For the challenge I’m going to replace aduki beans with kidney beans; instead of the soy sauce and mixed herbs I was going to use a veg stock made up quite concentrated plus some honey and I was going to mash the potato with olive oil rather than butter.

Chickpea pasta (for 2)
150 g pasta
1 onion chopped
2 cloves garlic
Olive oil
1 tin chick peas
Black pepper

Put pasta on to cook. Fry onions and garlic in olive oil for about 5 minutes. Add chick peas and cook gently for another or so minutes (until pasta is ready). Drain pasta and add to sauce. Add some black pepper, mix thoroughly and serve. The secret is to use quite a bit of olive oil. For a bit of variation you can add some tomato puree, a splosh of water and whatever herbs (dried or fresh) you have lying around

Lentil dahl
The recipe here is as good as any!
http://www.livebelowtheline.org.uk/workspace/downloads/cookbook.pdf
For the challenge I was planning to add an onion and just use curry powder rather than individual spices

Reverbe

Never heard of this challenge but tend to eat 10p meals anyway.. does this includedrinks ie tea and coffee etc and does it prohibit spending because as we have no fridge we have to buy milk every day?

dibblersan

I'd be interested in seeing your 10p recipies - if that includes drinks is it 10p a day? or do you get a drink with a meal? I ask as one of the cheapest protiens I can think about is either beans (around or a little under 5p a serving) or eggs (and I think caged work out at 10p each) so it would be hard to make a day's food, or a meal, for me work out at 10p a person.

Was wondering with my excess budget if I should consider a sweet snack to take our minds of the repeated meals.

If I were to buy a value jar of jam at 29p and some tesco baking fat at 55p I could make jam flapjacks with excess oats (jam means no added suggar needed) and have sant bit of jam in my porrage of a morning for an added cost of 84p.

45p leftover?

If I were to drop from tesco's own mince to market value mince (or do the sensible thing and switch to the soya mince for about the same price that would last us 6 or so meals) I'd gain 80p and go back up to 1.25

I'd prob spend 52p of this on 1L value uht milk to make my porrage and the remaining 73p could be saved or buy us the blackcurrent and apple tesco fruit tea (64p) that I really like.

so a filling and fairly healthy mainmeal with lots of protien carb and some veg (onion, carrot, tomato and more pulse than you could shake a stick at), plus a choice of breakfast (jam flapjack, porrage, porrage and milk, porrage and milk and jam :P) and lunch (lentil soup, spiced lentil soup, carrot and onion and tomato soup, lentil and carrot soup, dahl (but no garlic), spiced lentil and carrot soup :P all thickened with a few oats) and 2 fruit teas each a day (assuming you don't double dip) and all the water you can stare at.

raphanius

First draft shopping list and menu for me OH and DS

Value Strawberry Jam 454G 0.38
Value Penne 500G 0.09
Plain Flour 500G 0.42
Caster Sugar 500G 0.79
Scottish Porridge Oats 500G 0.62
Value Baked Beans In Tomato Sauce 420G 0.28
Value Table Salt 1Kg 0.23
Sieved Tomatoes Passata 500G 0.29
Fast Action Dried Yeast 56G 0.67
Strong White Bread Flour 1.5Kg 0.68
Creamfields 1% Milk 2Ltr 0.75
Loose Oranges Class 1 Each 0.28
Value Lard 250G 0.40
Market Value Apple Pack 0.64
Loose Brown Onions Class 2 0.17
Value Eggs Minimum Weight Box Of 15 1.48
Value Cooking Bacon 500G 0.75
Value Grated Cheddar 500G 1.85
Butter Me Up 500G 1.00
Spicy Potato Wedges 750G 0.52
Value Chicken Nuggets 320G 0.75
Gold Coffee 100G 1.68
Value 80 Teabags 250G 0.27

Guide price (23 items)£14.99

Notes:

Everything from Mr T

OH insisted on decent coffee he can just about manage Mr T's gold coffee.

Sometimes 'value' packs are more expensive than the normal brand because they are larger.

Theres no money for wholefoods, diet products, fairtrade, organic or higher welfare foods.

Multibuy offers become irrellevant.

The most rediculous item on this list is the salt. I had to choose a 1kg pack to get it cheapest.

All bread will have to be homemade.

Suggested menu:

Breakfasts:
Porridge with strawberry jam
Toast with butter and/or strawberry jam
Pancakes with fresh orange juice

Lunches:
Day 1 - Beans on Toast
Day 2 - Leftover Bacon and Egg Pie
Day 3 - Scrambled Egg on Toast
Day 4 - Leftover Quiche
Day 5 - Eggy Bread

Dinners:
Day 1 - Bacon and Egg Pie with Baked Beans. Chicken Nuggets and Potato Wedges for DS
Day 2 - Cheese and Tomato Pizza
Day 3 - Quiche Lorraine with Potato Wedges.Chicken Nuggets And Wedges for DS
Day 4 - Tomato, Cheese and Bacon Pasta Bake. Cheesy Pasta for DS
Day 5 - Omelettes.

Treats/Desserts:
Apple Pie
Apple Crumble
Jam Tarts
Cheese Biscuits made from pastry trimmings.
Orange Biscuits from leftover zest.