£12.50 per week - healthy menu ideas for 2 + 1 please :-)

honeythewitch

BitterAndTwisted wrote: »

cheap-family-recipes.org

This will probably be all you need.

Or the recipes from the "Live below the line challenge" which gives some very good recipes at under £1 a day. http://www.unicef.org.uk/Documents/FIT-documents/Recipe%20Guide.pdf

bess1234_2

I think I get the confusion over the tax credit thing. They just refuse you based on last year. But they don't tell you that you now phone up, say my income this year has dropped, and they re calculate based on this year and you get it. If your budget is so tight and you are not eligible this year, then you need to have a good root round the debt free wannabe board for ideas of where to make other savings to use for food.

Rainbow82

Eating meat free as often as possible will help as will finding a day when your OH can look after your Baby for a few hours so you can batch cook. We have tge same budget but there are only two of us but here are some of the things we eat.
Eastern stew: pasata 29p lidl, quarter if a savoy cabbage 10p (cabbages 39p at aldi at tge mo), 200g potato chopped up, 10p (smartprice potatoes 1.20 for 2.5 kg asda) 100g carrot 4p (39p kg at aldi at mo) onion 4p (37p kg at lidl yesterday) 100-200 ml stock 1p (sainsburys basics 10p fir 10.
Whack it all in the slow cooker with a teaspoon of smoked paprika. Makes 3 portions at about 20p per portion serve with rice.

We use quorn to make bolognese, £2 a bag, grate 4-5 medium carrots, dice 4 onions and 3 garlic cloves about 100g of frozen peppers and mushrooms if you have any in. Adding 2 passata thus will make 10 portions fir about 35p per portion, split into five tubs and freeze.
Make chilli the same way but use chilli powder instead of garlic.

Veggie roast is also quite cheap, yesterday we boiled 1/4 cabbage, 1/4 Briccoli (39p at aldi), 2 carrots a 400g potatoes. 1/2 pack if smartprice stuffing and made Yorkshire puddings with gravy it worked out about 40p each.

Easiest way to save money is meal plan and batch cook and stick to cheap breakfasts like basics cornflakes, porridge made with water or toast, fir lunch stuck to cheap meals like a jam sandwich and homemade fairy cake.

quintwins

When my little boy was young i made all his meals myself, i went to tesco's on a sunday afternoon and got lots of reduced veg, threw them in the slowcooker and mashed them and froze in portions, that was his lunch and any dinners on days we didn't have dinner, i would also portion off little bits of stew, sheperds pie or soup if we were having it and freeze it, i didn't even have to go every week because we always ended up with more than enought for 2-3 weeks for very little, and i'm not talking later reductions either we went before dinner and bought things around half price, i never pureed anything other than apple because my twins had only jars and we struggled to get them from puree to lumps so we jumped to mashed then slowly things got lumpier. I remeber trying to give him a jar at a wedding because it was an old barn and there was nothing to warm one of my dinners in and he hated it for breakfast he had generic readybrek at the time we found it had less salt than the proper stuff, he wasn't all that keen on porridge-but loves it now

For yourself i would suggest going mostly veggie, if you google a girl called jack she feeds herself and her son on £10 a week, she has alot of tomatie and bean based meals and soups and makes her own bread but as you at home it really only takes a few minutes to shove something on the slowcooker, this was my savour with a newborn baby and even more demanding toddler twins! i had a travel cot in my kitchen that i could pop the baby into when sorting food, aslong as i constantly spoke to him and came over and played every few minutes he was happy enough most of the time.

hereigoagain22

I have a 2.5year old and a 6month old. If someone had told me when my eldest was a baby that I could do better and find time to cook I'd have smacked them! Well done on the breastfeeding and cloth nappies - I've done both and they are hard work!

Admittedly it has become much easier and I am now a single parent to both of them and I manage with the slow cooker and batch cooking for 3 or 4 meals a week, one "quick" oven meal for emergencies and a couple of home-made meals.

My little one never naps more than 30mins at a time and he doesn't sleep well at night so I tend to rest whenever I get the chance! You do get into a little routine.

How much do you spend on food shopping at the minute? I think you need to make changes gradually. We used to spend a ridiculous £90-£120 per week on food and my mistakes was always trying to cut it drastically then failing badly.

I have cut it down to £40 for myself and the two kids (we don't buy nappies or formula either) which I think is doing really good - I still buy a lot of prepared snacks etc. I know I could cut it so much more by growing my own veg, making my own bread and doing even more batch cooking but I simply don't have the time with the kids and I'm proud of what I've done so far - so should you be!!

Towser

Shop online, that way you can swap your shopping about, until you are on budget (whatever level you choose for each product) then check out.

You will not be tempted then.

Save a little for bread and milk and then buy them when you are not hungry. But make sure you buy, when you can go and check out the YS whoopsies at the same time. Or when you buy your Aldi Super Six or when you buy the Lidl half price weekend offers.

My meals are: Shep pie, Spag bolognaise, casserole, curry, omelettes, eggs, chips and beans, Most of these you can pad out with vegetables. I do, much healthier and veggies readily disguised for the kids. Make use of all Aldi Super Six offers chop and freeze if need to and then just as and when stuff needs padding out.

Good luck with it. It is hard but once you have seen a few strategies work, you will be hooked and looking for more ways of saving money. Lol,

missladyannie

Hi OP, I saw this thread and thought it might be of interest too - about mums with young babies managing around the house! Hope it helps xx

https://forums.moneysavingexpert.com/discussion/4402261

mel48rose

BitterAndTwisted wrote: »

cheap-family-recipes.org

This will probably be all you need.

I can recommend this site it's absolutely a godsend.

RAS

lizzyshep wrote: »

Teagan, we get child benefit but no tax credits at the moment, because I was working full time before I went on maternity leave. I think they review it in April, so I might get some then, when I tell them my new hours, I'm not sure though.

Have you rung tax credits and advised them that you salary has declined massively? They can re-assess you for this year if you do that. They probably need details from your most recent pay slip.

And have you checked https://www.turn2us.org,.uk to find out if you can get any help with council tax etc?

phizzimum

Hi Lizzy

I think I know where you're coming from...I have similar views on eggs/chicken/pork and i'm happy to economise in other areas.

I've found that meat is the most expensive part of our diet so I stretch things as far as possible. So a pack of mince beef will give us 3 meals (spag bol, cottage pie, chilli) because I also add red lentils and oats and lots of other veg. I cook up a big batch and freeze the rest (saves time too). A free range chicken is expensive but as well as a roast will give us a pie, risotto and stock for soup. Then with a couple of meat free days the budget seems to stretch.

The secret is to hide the leftovers quickly - in the freezer is best I find, otherwise DH will eat the lot!

we are a family of 4 (2 kids but with big appetites). planning is key, I wouldn't be without my slow cooker (keep trying with it, you'll soon get the hang of it). getting into good habits now whilst you're on maternity leave will make your life much easier in the future.

and let us know how you're getting on (and as I read your post I think you were saying that you didn't have lots of time to trawl the internet, not that you didn't have time to cook)