Money saving recipes?

[moolie]

Most casseroles really stretch the meat part of a meal and also get good healthy veggies into your family diet.

Beans and rice is very filling and can be flavoured in a variety of ways by adding sausage chunks, bacon, or heading down a more "chili" flavour route with ground meat and tomatoes.

Cheap cuts or sale meat or buying in bulk also really help, and using the entire chicken/ham/roast by eating the roast, then making a casserole or pie with the leftovers plus soup from the bones is just good sense as well as good eating.

Pot pies are usually kid-pleasers because they like the crust and can't see all the veggies underneath, and pasta dishes don't need a lot of meat to be tasty and filling--you can add grated carrots or cooked squash to the sauce to bulk it up and also add nutrients and flavour.

Breakfast for dinner is usually kind on the wallet and can break up the monotony if you get stuck in a rut with meal planning--bacon & eggs, waffles with fruit and yogurt etc.

Check your local library or search around the internet for recipes for the "peasant" dishes of various cultures--these are usually super yummy and made with less expensive foods--many of the dishes I've already mentioned fall into the peasant food category.

Our family has an Eastern European heritage so we really enjoy Borscht (beet and cabbage soup made from a ham or beef bone stock), perogies (potato and cheese filled dumplings), cabbage rolls (wilted cabbage leaves wrapped around a tasty filling of ground meat and rice served with a tomato sauce), and various types of sausage (we buy from a pork producer at our local farmer's market so we know they are excellent quality).

We also enjoy home made pizza (super easy, just dough + sauce + cheese + whatever you have hanging around in the fridge as extra toppings), Vietnamese noodle bowl dishes (rice noodles plus lettuce/sprouts and some stir fried meat), Cassoulet (bean and sausage casserole), Bubble and Squeak (British meal of fried potatoes and cabbage served with cold meat), Toad in the Hole (dish of Yorkshire Pudding cooked with sausages in), and a few east Indian dishes (naan bread with a meat curry and rice etc.)

 

[the funny farm6]

We use a lot of noodles (always cheap) and whatever meat is close to the top of the deep freeze. Noodles and spagetti sause (normaly $1.00 a can- on sale for .65) cook the meat and noodles, mix them with the sauce and put cheese on top. Bake till cheese is melted. Wala spagetti bake. (If I have stale bread I make crutons and put them under the cheese)

And use pizza sauce for pizza bake.

Use cream of mushroom and hamb, and no cheese for a stroganoff type meal. (And a little milk)

Macaronni and cheese with tuna and peas. Some of my family likes the peas some pick them out.

And (not the cheapest but...) line a cake pan with creasant rolls. Cook 2 lb hamb, drain add 1 can enchalada sauce and 1 can cream of mushroom soupput on top of creasant rolls top with cheese and crushed doritoes bake in oven till cheese is melted and chips are browned. (I bake the creasant rolls before adding the meat mix, hate when the rolls are still gooey)

Walking tacos- meat with taco seasoning on doritos and shread cheese and lettuce.

Vegie soup- I take 1 can tomato juice, and several cans of mixed vegies (3-4) and peal and quarter some potatoes, and cut up either a beef or deer roast... I DON'T buy stew meat- wow have you seen the price of that stuff??? Cook slow till potatoes and meat are done.

And sludge sounds bad but is sooo good.

 

[angimw]

You all are GREAT! This is just what I needed to perk up my kitchen, thank you sooo very much!

 

[LilyD]

pretty much any meal that you cook that is made homemade is cheaper. Make your own pasta and sauce. Try and find a local butcher to get your meat cheaper since that's pretty much the only thing that is expensive and grow your own veggies and fruits so you don't have to buy those. The more you cook your own meals the cheaper your food bill will be.

 

[k15n1]

If you start with ingredients, and avoid large amounts of meat and cheese, the finished product will be cheap. Meat tastes great and is easy to stretch. You can make a a gallon of soup with a quarter pound of meat and feel like it's plenty. And you can use the bones to get more flavor and nutrients (crockpot, cover bones, overnight, 3x) without additional cost. I even feed the resulting bone meal to my dog, to save on dog food.

We aim for 2-3 vegtables with each meal. A lot if it was canned, but we do buy salad greens. The 7-$ box of organic greens is the most expensive thing on my weekly shopping list, so I've tried to grow some lettuce in a window box during the winter in MN. So far, it's worked, but the yield is low. During the summer, we have a very modest garden that produces a lot of leafy vegtables. This coming year I'm trying to stretch the growing season with cold-tolerant varieties so that I don't have to buy so much in the spring and fall.

Beans, potatoes, and pasta are all cheap. Carrots, beets, cabbage, and many frozen vegtables are cheap.