Feed a family of four for £20 a week challenge

Butterfly_Brain

You don't shop in Aldi or Asian food shops then
500g packets of egg noodles that serve four are 39p a pack in Aldi

tessie_bear

fwiw butterfly i find your recipes and ideas very helpful and thankyou for the time you have taken doing it....i think this thread has helped a lot of people and hope you continue to keep it coming

tessa

Feral_Moon

MrsLurcherwalker wrote: »

Keep the posts coming BUTTERFLY BRAIN they're helping so many more people than they're annoying. Brilliant idea to start this thread in the first place and such good ideas to help folks manage their food budgets at a time when EVERYTHING is becoming more expensive and the food spend is not increasing. Thank you, you've inspired so many of us, long may it continue!

I'm not criticising the ideas, they're are some very good ones in the thread. But BB just needs to keep it real regarding portion sizes and costings. Feeding a grown adult a portion fit for a toddler and producing 20 meals for less than £5 is hardly realistic.

BJV

Butterfly_Brain wrote: »

The noodles I use have eight servings to a pack.
You can add rice if you are very hungry. It is a guideline, many people are living on the edge and it is set to become worse.
I am trying to help people who are struggling with a few ideas. If Feral moon and and Happy MJ don't like what I post then maybe they should actually try living on £20 a week and post their own ideas instead of criticising try helping out!

I wish that I could feed my family for £20.00 per week. TBH I will not use all of your suggestions but some are very good and for me they have helped focus me on what exactly I am spending.


Like any idea not everyone is going to agree with everything you say but please keep your ideas coming, I know that they are helping me focus. I spend about £150 per week and sometimes still can not manage. I am not saying that I am going to reduce all the way down to £20 but my aim is to get to £100 so your ideas are an inspiration.


Thanks

[Deleted User]

You don't have to explain it to me pet, but BUTTERFLY BRAIN gives her experience, her inventiveness, her advice, her recipes and her time (considerable amounts of that I think) for free with only the objective in mind to HELP, and to make life better for us all,so I for one am grateful to her for all she does, we owe her!!!

RAS

Feral_Moon wrote: »

Also, how can you eat left over salad? It would be a soggy mess within hours, let alone the next day!

If you buy pre-packed washed salads in a controlled environment bag; it will go off very very quickly after opening. The controlled environment delays decay but once in oxygen, it rots. One reason I tend to avoid them.

If you buy (or grow) a lettuce and peel leaves from it as you need them, it keeps for a week even without a fridge, except in the hottest weather. Alternatively, pull the leaves off and keep cool under a moist cloth for several days.

Butterfly_Brain

How do you know my portion sizes?

I bulk everything out with vegetables or lentils. Food can be stretched and many of us have had to do it at some time or another.

I have even at times had to resort to a no meat roast, basically just roast potatoes, yorkshire puddings, vegetables and gravy and they don't even notice that there is no meat.

Another one that I do is roast dinner pie using the left overs from Sunday dinner put into a pie crust

My family never says that they are still hungry after a meal

If a meal seems a bit light then I make a dessert such as pancakes, apple fritters apple pudding rice pudding or crumble. Or we might have a supper of cheese and crackers, a toasted sandwich or pikelets and jam.

You come over as the sort of person who has never had to struggle.

Feral_Moon

Butterfly_Brain wrote: »

You don't shop in Aldi or Asian food shops then
500g packets of egg noodles that serve four are 39p a pack in Aldi

Ok, fair enough I haven't seen those as I tend to buy fresh noodles than dried. But even so, if the entire pack serves four, I don't understand why you would only use a 1/4 pack to serve FOUR ADULTS, especially considering how little extra veg/chicken was added to it. This is what I find unrealistic. It can't be more than a few mouthfuls of food each. Certainly not enough to call a meal.

Your ideas about stretching meals etc are brilliant, I'm not criticising those in any way. It was just that one particular meal which concerned me. Now if you'd said you used the whole pack of noodles, and added a whole pepper, a whole chicken breast, onions, mushrooms and whatever veg you usually put in a stir fry, I probably wouldn't have batted an eyelid and it would still have come in less than 50p per portion.

Soups and casseroles are far easier to pad out with veggies and lentils or pearl barley etc and is something I frequently do myself.

Butterfly_Brain

I use the meat from both legs in my hoisin chicken and I also do some rice to bulk it out which works out to an extra 10p if you buy a packet of basic LG rice.

[Deleted User]

Butterfly Brain I think you are amazing honey,you carry on doing what you do,you know if your own family are hungry or not.
I have spent the best part of the last 50 plus years feeding my family on healthy made from scratch meals that don't cost a fortune and I can live pretty well on my budget of £15.00 per week.I have just stripped the other half of yesterday's chciken to make a curry for tonight's dinner for myself ,my DD,son-in-law and three hungry boys.Time I have added extra veg, plus mexican wedges and boiled rice there is more than enough for 6 of us from the half a chicken,even a few scraps left over for the two dogs to mix with their kibble as a treat.

We have a left over half of a chocolate swiss roll to use up with either some custard or ice cream for pudding or some cheese and crackers if preferred.

I think we are both similar in outlook B/B as I too don't think you need to eat half chicken at one sitting for one person.We all like and enjoy vegatables with our food.My late Mum always gave us children either HM soup as a starter, or a pudding,never both, and I grew up with war-time rationing. In those days you ate what was put in front of you and I never went hungry no matter what Mum always managed to feed us on what was probably very little.