I need cheap meal ideas

[midlight21]

I need cheap meal ideas that are healthy and are good as leftovers for lunches and stuff. Any ideas?

[robex]

Re: I need cheap meal ideas

I buy packages of pasta for 66 cents, throw together sauce from a can of tomato paste for 33 cents, and add in whatever leftover vegies are in the fridge...good way to use up little bits of cheese, too. This will feed my family of 5 with lunch leftovers for the next day and everyone loves it.

Another favourite is fried rice. I pre-cook the rice, put it in the fridge to get cold (sticks less when frying) and then add all the little leftover bits from the fridge and fry it up together. At the last minute, I stir in 2 eggs and some soy or teriyaki sauce. Yum!

I really like to use up leftovers rather than throw them out!

[Tree0164]

Re: I need cheap meal ideas

Stir Frys are cheap and you can add more veggies and less meat. Pour over noodles or rice.

Crockpot is easy. You can get less expensive pieces of meat and they come out tender.

We use leftovers all the time. I plan for them. It makes my life easier as well as cheaper too.

[PrincessPerky]

Re: I need cheap meal ideas

breakfast is often cheaper than dinner, so switching the order of the day can help (I don't personally cook in the AM so we would never get pancakes if I didn't use them for dinner!)

Ramen noodles can be 'spiced up' (literally) for super cheap meals.

'cheesy terriakki rice" is a favorite, cooked rice, sheese, vegetable, and terriakki. pretty cheap, cheaper if I used white rice.

[Ima saver]

Re: I need cheap meal ideas

My husband loves noodles and eggs, scrambled together. Now that I have tried it, I do too.

[katwoman]

Re: I need cheap meal ideas

Omlettes(sp)

Oatmeal, cream of wheat & other hot cereals

Cold cereal w/fruit

Pancakes

Potato dishes/potato salads

Pasta dishes/pasta salads

Yogurt w/fruit and/or granola (layered, like at McDonalds)

Tuna sadwich/tuna salad

Egg sandwich/egg salad

Lentil soup

Mac & Cheese w/broccoli florets and a can of mushrooms

[Thrifty Ray]

Re: I need cheap meal ideas

Soup is always good....most of my concoctions start with a chicken stock, broth or boullion, cooked hamburger, veggies (I use alot of onion, celery and carrots), tomotoes (canned or fresh) tomatoe paste if you have some, toss in a couple handfulls of pasta, season to taste...(sometimes I add a can of beans- whatever is in the pantry) Sprinkle with parmesan (or not)....great the next day too.

I keep hearts of romaine lettuce and tomatoes...easy to cut up for salads...cut up leftover chicken and some ceasar dressing and you have a yummy chicken ceasar.

Take a whole chicken, put in crockpot...sprinkle with curry, salt and pepper....and let it cook all day...

Try Googling "Living on a Dime" and look for the Not Just Beans sample recipes. This site has some sample recipes for cheap meals...

Good Luck!

[midlight21]

Re: I need cheap meal ideas

Cool, thanks for all the ideas. I need to start making cheaper meals.

[SuzeOFan]

Re: I need cheap meal ideas

Everyone's style and needs are different. And although I can cook, I usually tend toward time-saving meals more than money-saving meals. I'm sure someone can come up with better ideas but here's some things I do.

1. Establish days of the week for certain meals. Knowing what you're going to cook on certain days helps you to plan ahead and be better prepare to spot bargains. Wednesday is spaghetti night at our house. Spaghetti is cheap but good! If you don't like to cook - it's Barilla or Ragu for sauce. A salad, and garlic bread for sides. To break up the monotony, I will sometimes use bowties, or elbows etc. If you like to make you sauce from scratch, this would be a great thing to make in volume and freeze for future meals.

2. Pasta, rice, and instant potatos are great low-cost bases for many meals.
My six kids favorite cheap dish is Pasta Tuna. It's what it sounds like. Boiled pasta spread out in a cassarole dish, butter, 3 cans of tuna and sometimes peas or broccoli added. Whips up in no time. And of course there's always Mac&cheese. It's great mixed with chopped hotdogs or brocolli.

3. Eat more chicken. Chicken is still pretty cheap per pound. I like to buy a large roaster for Sunday. I like to make Sunday dinner the big meal of the week. If you buy a large enough roaster chicken (say 7lbs or more), you can make other meals, soups sandwiches that will last through the week. Freeze the leftovers.

4. If you have kids, invest in a freezer and buy bulk!
Even with the Costco, BJ's and Sams, I find that you can still get some pretty good deals buying bulk from your regular super when theres a sale.

5. If tuna is on sale, I buy it by the case.

6. Here's one that really helped me save $. Budget your food bill. Save receipts and keep track of everything you buy for 1 month. From that, you can see where the leaks are and where you can cut costs. Then have a food allowance for the month. If you have kids in school, making their lunches - even a day or two a week can save more than buying from the school.

7. Grow your own produce. A little victory garden patch in your yard can produce more than you can use in veggies. Give the rest away to your neighbors or freeze and save the rest. And you can have lettuce in winter if you have a nice sunny window.

8. If you want to make a little extra $ with your home grown veggies, the easiest way is just set up a small table near the road with a secure change box and have the veggies in bags or small boxes with the price. They'll sell themselves.

9. Think bulk when buying often-used items. And think generic. I find that even with coupons, generics more often than not beat out name brand products. And it's a HUGE time saver too. I hate clipping coupons - only to have to spend twice as much time in the supermarket searching for the coupon items - which sometimes the store doen't even carry.

Ug! Sorry for going on so long! Too much coffee this morning!
Maybe you're doing much of this stuff already. I'd love to hear other people's ideas too!

[SuzeOFan]

Re: I need cheap meal ideas

Sorry, just one more thing....

Someone here mentioned breakfast being the cheapest meal. Along those lines....We're such creatures of habit and prisoners of culture! Break free of the chains that bind...! ... and save money!

Why not have a French Toast or Pancake night???

Talk about a cheap dinner! Once your family gets over their initial shock they might just warm to the idea!

Works for me!

[Fizgig]

Re: I need cheap meal ideas

My absolute favorite cheap meals start with ham on sale. When it's on sale for $0.50/lb, I'll buy a few 10 pound bone in hams. ($5 each. Way cheap) One goes in the freezer, and I roast the other one. There's one dinner and a few lunches during the week. I freeze the rest in 2lb packages, and freeze the bone with a fair amount of meat left on it.

Now you have fodder for lots of soups, ham and beans, etc.

Here's my favorite recipe for ham and beans:

~6 cups*dried*pinto beans(2 1/2 pounds)
1 ham bone
olive oil
~2 onions, cut into 1/4-inch dice
~2 large jalepeño peppers, chopped
~1 large serano pepper, chopped
~6 cloves*garlic, minced
~1 cup*light-brown sugar
salt (~1 small handful or ~1 1/2 tablespoons)
freshly ground black pepper (Several turns of the peppermill)

First wash & sort all dried bean. Discard any beans that float or seem swollen or rotten. Those that don't sink to the bottom are questionable. Wash beans by the cupful in a bowl of water and pick through by the palmful to find any that look bad.

Put all the good beans in a stockpot or Dutch oven, cover beans with cold water by about 4 inches. Soak 8 hours or overnight. If you don't have time to soak the beans overnight, place them in a large pot and cover with 2 inches of water. Bring to a boil, cover, and turn off heat. Let stand 1 hour. A combination of boiling, standing and then overnight soak with the pot of beans in the refrigerator also works nicely.

Next drain all the old water off the beans and cover with freshwater by 2inches. If cooking with ham bone, put the ham bone in the pot as well. Cover the pot with a lid and bring to a boil, then turn down to simmer over low heat for about 2-3 hours. Stir occasionally.

After a few hours of cooking the beans, heat the olive oil in a heavy skillet. Sauté the diced onion, the chopped jalepeño & serano peppers and the minced garlic until the onions are soft.

Add the onion mixture, the brown sugar, salt and pepper to the pot of beans, stirring in. (Note if using a honey-baked ham bone - may want to decrease the amount of sugar slightly.) Continue to simmer the beans over low heat in a covered pot for another 3 hours. Stir occasionally and make sure the water doesn't boil completely away. Serve warm.

[lrjohnson]

Re: I need cheap meal ideas

Great ideas from a lot of people, I second a lot of them, and some were inspiringly new.

I mix cooked rice, bulgur, with a can of condensed sup, usually 50 cents for the coup, and pennies for the rice/bulgur. The soup can be a cream of, or tomato, or pretty much anything but preferably no noodles. Mix to taste, I like one cae to a BIG pot of rice, enough for two for dinner and five or six frozen lunches. Easy to add frozen, canned or fresh veggies.

Bread thrift store pizza shells, with a bit of sauce and cheese: almost instant convenience food that can also be dressed up. I keep them in the freezer and only buy when 99 cents or less for the big guy.

We do lots of breakfast for dinner: pancakes, biscuits, omelets, breakfast burritos. Oven fried potatoes (cube raw potatoes, toss with salt, pepper, maybe worcestershire or soy sauce or your favorite spice of the moment, a little oil to coat, put in oven a 400, stir once or twice, 20 or so minutes). The potatoes can be paired with fried eggs, or frozen or fresh vegies, sliced tomatoes, whatever's available.

[contrary1]

Re: I need cheap meal ideas

I too have the breakfast for dinner plan here. At least once a week.

Also plan at least one meatless meal per week, along with having soup for dinner weekly.

My favorite help for the kitchen budget, both money & my time.......is the large chunk of meat thing. Either a turkey, big roast or the ham as previously mentioned..........Have a big dinner off of it the first night, then process the leftovers right away.
Slice some for sandwiches, or make a sandwich spread
Dice up some & put in the freezer for a strata later in the week, or to add to omelettes
Freeze some slices with leftover gravy for a FAST meal.
Save any bones in the freezer for soup day

I don't ever figure the cost of my meals here, but I can tell if I'm feeding everyone over & over, basically, the same hunk of meat..........it has to be one of the cheapest things I do. The price for the original hunk of meat seems to be high, but when you figure out how many meals you get out of it, then how many servings.........there is just no way to beat it.

[DivaJen]

Re: I need cheap meal ideas

I just posted this link on another thread - sample recipes from LivingOnADime.com

[midlight21]

Re: I need cheap meal ideas

Thanks Jen. Another person mentioned Living on a Dime too so I think I'm going to buy the book.