2020 Frugal Living Challenge

[Deleted User]

BelleBaluu wrote: »

Anyone got any ideas for some veggie meals I could cook, that teenage boys might eat. They are not overly fussy, eat most veg, but we’ve always been a meat n two veg kind of family. But I’m looking to include a couple of no meat nights in our week.

A few simple ones that I use are:
HM quiche with salad and/or chips

HM soup and pudding, often a chunky potato and lentil soup with apple or raspberry crumble

Baked potatoes with beans and cheese

Baked potatoes with HM coleslaw (Not had this for a while, might have to add it to my food plan next week)

HM bean pastries

There are loads of great recipes listed at the start of the Grocery Challenge thread that will give you more ideas. There is a link to recipes for bean pastries, these are a favourite of my OHs.

[Deleted User]

[Deleted User] wrote:

A few simple ones that I use are:
HM quiche with salad and/or chips

HM soup and pudding, often a chunky potato and lentil soup with apple or raspberry crumble

Baked potatoes with beans and cheese

Baked potatoes with HM coleslaw (Not had this for a while, might have to add it to my food plan next week)

HM bean pastries

There are loads of great recipes listed at the start of this thread that will give you more ideas. There is a link to recipes for bean pastries, these are a favourite of my OHs.

Love the sound of those bean pastries, allie:T. For some reason the link to the recipe wouldn't work for me:(

Frugaldom

To bulk out veg and add extra protein, I use lentils, beans and/or cheese. I tend to make soup and pudding meals all year round. At this time of year there seems to be plenty of cheap carrots and cabbages, so homemade coleslaw can be made very easily turned into fruit slaw by omitting the mayo/salad cream and adding in a handful of sultanas and a grated apple. I tend to do the apple slaw during apple season as we get so many windfalls. Adding in cheese, sultanas and an apple with carrots and cabbage portions can give you 4 of your 5-a-day

Soupmaking here: 5p for YS mixed veg and 6p for YS carrots, added in a couple of onions and some past best potatoes, scoop of lentil and seasoned it with coriander, salt and pepper. That's lunch sorted for the rest of the week at a cost of pennies per portion.

Does anyone else use Twitter? @Frugaldom It's great for sharing links to recipes for all sorts of cheap meals.

Siebrie

Last night we had pasta with a red sauce (I hesitate to call it bolognaise, as we just add whatever we have in the fridge ).
Ingredients:
some minced meat (fried in a separate pan)
half an onion (leftover from before Christmas, wrapped in aluminium foil in the fridge)
3 celery stalks (cut up and frozen before Christmas)
1 leek
1 tin of passata
1 tin of diced tomatoes
a handful of red lentils
1 liter of water
2 stock cubes
a spoonful of dried basil
a spoonful of paprika powder

Cut and fry the veg, add the tomatoes, fry a bit more, add the lentils, basil, paprika and stock cubes, add the boiling water. Simmer for 30 minutes.

Use a stick blender to hide the veg from dd2, add the fried minced meat. Tell dd2 it contains 'just a little bit' of veg . Enjoy the compliment 'this is really tasty, Mummy':rotfl:

[Deleted User]

Did anyone see BBC Breakfast this morning? There was a woman on there who has just brought out a book. How to feed your family for £20n a week (or a similar title). I didn't hear how many people are in her family though. She also said she has a website/blog but I haven't had the time to search for it yet. Her name is Lorna Cooper.


I know these sort of books come out with regularity and us old-hand frugallers find out little that we don't already know. Plus, we've had to fork out of our stringent budgets to buy it in the first place:rotfl:


Please don't get me wrong here, I'm absolutely NOT fat-shaming, but the lady was very much on the large side. I often find that these uber-frugal meal plans are certainly filling but it's largely on stodge and not necessarily on the type of things that we should be eating for our health.

3secondmemory

Too poorly to use my bus pass - I’ll have to book an Uber! So much for money saving.

That wipes out the fiver I found and then some.

Crafty_Lisa_Hampshire

There has been a lot going on on here since I last read. I caught up with everything on Friday evening just before I went shopping and I am pleased to say that because "frugalling" was fresh in my mind I didn't stray from my list. I actually did a meal plan for the week for the first time in a long time and it is certainly easier and it didn't take me too long. I need to try and keep that in mind. I have gone veggie now so I have two books to hand which I looked through. I did a chickpea and squash stew on Saturday which did two portions (one for Monday night) and stuffed peppers for Sunday with roast parsnip. Tonight is a homemade meal from the freezer and tomorrow I will shove the slow cooker on for a vegetable cobbler that will last me two days and a portion for the freezer. I need to stick to doing my main cooking at the weekends as I find by the time I get home from work and my exercise classes I just cannot be bothered to do more than bung something in the oven. So far I have stuck to the plan for the week. I do need to make some soup tonight for my lunches for the rest of the week.


On Sunday I went to a refill store and stocked up on washing up liquid and clothes washing liquid as well as shampoo and conditioner. I thought I would do that this month as my food shop should be quite minimal this month due to having a freezer full of meals so it should still be within my monthly budget. I wouldn't say the refill shop is cheaper but it is certainly comparable to the other products I usually by and it reduces the amount of plastic I have to throw out (I'm trying to be more environmentally friendly as well in my choices).


I also started a new exercise class yesterday as my gym membership has expired. This is pay as you go so if you don't go you don't pay. With the gym you are paying for the membership but they were frequently cancelling the classes I wanted to attend and I was just trying to make the membership pay by going to classes I didn't particularly enjoy which in my view was wasteful.


I suppose my main goal this year is to make my life simpler, more environmentally friendly and cheaper. The plan is hopefully this will make me feel happier.


I have also started a big declutter. I have done my craft stash (after finishing my newly built craft cupboard) and found a load of projects I need to get through. I have also found quite a few pieces of fabric to make some clothes out of and wool to make anything out of I can think of (I suspect baby clothes to donate) so I should be kept busy without having to buy new stuff for a while at least. I still need to go through my clothes and the kitchen. As to food stores I think I am fairly good at using stuff up before it goes off. I do have some quinoa which I don't really like so I need to use that up and I won't buy that again.


I also visited the library this weekend with my nephews and I borrowed a book. I recently joined again last summer and I am so glad I have. It so much more fun looking through books to read knowing that if you don't like it you haven't wasted your money although all the books I have borrowed so far have been thoroughly enjoyable. I can generally only manage one book a month but its good that I am actually being "forced" to read a book as my sense of wellbeing has definitely improved.


I've just realised the time - I better get back to work.

[Deleted User]

Finally_Solvent wrote: »

Love the sound of those bean pastries, allie:T. For some reason the link to the recipe wouldn't work for me:(

Apologies Finally Solvent, forgot which thread I was posting on! The recipes are listed at the start of the grocery challenge thread. There are loads of options for meals to make and I've made a few. They are mostly posted by other forumites so tried and tested.

The link to the January Grocery Challenge is

https://forums.moneysavingexpert.com/discussion/6085287/january-2020-grocery-challenge

And the bean pastries
https://forums.moneysavingexpert.com/discussion/comment/48112989#Comment_48112989

although quite often I just do simple bean pastries with beans and cheese or a tin of beans and sausages (I cut up the wee sausages) and cheese. My OH loves them in his packed lunch for work.

I will go back and edit my previous comment so I don't confuse anyone!

lilian1977

Please may I join the challenge?

Mum of one boy who is 9 in a few days, with a DH. We have been overpaying our mortgage for the past 10 years so now only have £26.5k left to pay. We're hoping to do this within 5 years.

We LOVE our holidays and have 8 planned this year (mainly Butlins/short weekend breaks in the UK but with week long trips to Barcelona and Jersey in the summer). We try to frugalise in order to pay for these as they are such wonderful family times. We're also trying to save for a 4 week holiday in the summer of 2022, which is the summer between our son leaving primary and starting high school; £3k in the bank for that so far.

So, the plan this year is to only buy essentials, saving the rest of the money for our holidays and our mortgage overpayment. I bought most of my 2019 Christmas presents using Amazon vouchers from surveys, and would like to do that again this year.

We don't eat out very much and if we do it's using Clubcard or discount vouchers. I don't drink and my DH barely does. Food is cooked from scratch, or if not it's a £1 pizza from Aldi! We do have Netflix, Sky, Amazon Prime Video etc, but as we don't go out much we think that's a worthwhile investment.

I'll be following and reading all your posts with interest! Thanks

A_Random_Man

Sorry for lack of replies of last couple of days, I have had 2 quite spendy days on food over last few days which I really need to cut down I have also got the reading bug again so have been flying few kindle ebooks which are quite expensive so need to refocus on reducing these. I am back to work tomorrow so hopefully being back will keep me organised on spending as little as possible