Saving Money on Groceries

I am not sure if anyone has a copy of the $21 Challenge book - but if you are a family on a budget I can highly recommend it. See $21 Challenge Link for info on how to buy the book.

The idea is that by using what you have in the fridge, pantry & freezer, you should be able to occasionally do a shop quite cheaply, which not only reduces food waste but saves you a bit of cash. I used their strategy this week when we only had $100 in our everyday account (don't worry - we had money in savings but I refuse to dip into this unless necessary) and we still had a few days until pay day.

By using what we had already, we only spent $75 on groceries for our family for the week, including buying cat/dog food and batteries.

Our menu this week looks like this:
Sun - Pizza (using leftover ingredients - just needed some chorizo sausage from the deli counter - $2)
Mon - Stirfry with noodles - found some steak for $4.50, already had noodles, broccoli, carrot, onion
Tue - Spag Bol - just needed mince - It was $7 but this will make two meals as I will freeze half of the cooked meat mixture - just needed spaghetti (69cents) as we already had tinned tomato & mixed herbs.
Wed - Chicken drumsticks & home-made fried rice (had all ingredients in freezer/pantry)
Thurs - Hubby is out so the kids will have frozen fish fillets, pasta/sauce packet mix & frozen veg (already had this), I will have a frozen dinner ($4).
Fri - Takeaway - Budget $30 - We allow this once per fortnight - to tell the truth I am not the biggest fan of takeaway but I would say that the family aren't the biggest fans of budgeting either so I give in an allow a treat!
Sat - Either pizza again as we will catch up with friends or crumbed chicken - have all ingredients in fridge/pantry

Note: We make our own pizza bases - they are ridiculously cheap and much tastier - I will plan to post a recipe in the future as they are quite easy.

Baking - Jam drop biscuits (using up the bits of jam in a few jars in the fridge) & Chewy Choc slice. I will post the recipes later in the week - both were made using ingredients that I already had.

Lunches will be sandwiches or leftovers, as for example fried rice is perfect for leftover lunch. Breakfasts consist of whatever cereal we had already or toast. We also bought fruit for the children's snacks.

Whilst this does not occur every week, I try to do this about once ever 4-6 weeks. It helps us use up what we have already and helps to teach the kids that sometimes you have to make do with what you already have. If you haven't yet seen the $21 Challenge book then have a look at the website (there are a few chapters that you can sample for free) or perhaps see if the book is available at your library. What have you got to lose?

Grandma's old-fashioned style curried sausages

This dish is total comfort food - fairly old-fashioned and perhaps a bit daggy, but my kids almost lick the plates clean they love it that much! It is also a meal that can make using items from the pantry/freezer and is a cheap way to feed a crowd.

Grandma's Old-Fashioned Curried Sausages

Serves 4-6

Ingredients:

8-10 sausages

1 tsp olive oil

2 x brown onions, peeled & sliced

1 tbs Keens curry

2 tbs plain flour

1-2 carrots, peeled & chopped

2 cups chicken stock (made with stock cube or powdered stock to save $$$)

2 tbs tomato sauce (ketchup)

1 tsp sugar

1-2 cups frozen mixed vegetables

1/4 cup milk

Plus mashed potato or rice to serve (you could serve it with extra vegetables if desired)

Method:

1. Brown sausages in a large frying pan, remove and chop into bite-sized pieces.

2. Add olive oil to pan (if needed) and fry onion for 2 minutes.

3. Add curry powder to pan and cook for 1 minute. 

4. Add flour and stir, add sausages, carrots, stock, tomato sauce and sugar. Bring to boil, reduce heat and simmer for 15 minutes. 

5. Add frozen vegetables and milk, simmer for 5 minutes.

6. Serve with mashed potato or rice. 

Recipe - Meatless Lasagne (AKA - I never thought my husband would eat lentils)

Last night, we had our traditional "meatless Monday" night. For health and budgetary reasons I try to put at least one meatless dish into our menu per week. It's not that hard - think spinach & ricotta lasagne, basic pasta dishes etc....

We have been eating this recipe for a few months - I have calculated that it costs about half the price to make compared to using mince, and it is in the oven in under 10 minutes. The white sauce is made in the microwave (I KNOW - how did I not know this could be done) and we serve it with a salad and perhaps some garlic bread if we have some. Due to the refried beans the recipe has a slight Mexican flavour - but it is still yummy - so much that we are tempted to serve it to friends to see if they realise that there is no meat in it! 

Note - when you make the lentil/bean mixture as per the recipe - it does look a little like dog food - but don't be worried (I was the first time I made it), as it will look different when cooked. 

Link to recipe: http://www.stayathomemum.com.au/recipes/i-cant-believe-its-not-mince-lasagne/

Let me know what you think!