Cheap easy meal ideas please

kilo of chicken thighs with bones + skin, marinade them then bake on top of a layer of veg

nom nom

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^This. You can also make meatballs the same way (if you’ve frozen some patties it’s easy to reshape them on defrosting if you don’t fancy burgers. Just add salt and pepper to the mince, roll them into balls, chuck 'em on a baking tray at 200, cook till brown. Boil some pasta, heat up some tinned tomatoes with some herbs and maybe some chilli flakes/powder or hot sauce (it’s better if you can also fry some onion & garlic with them but just the toms will do if you need to keep cost/effort down) and and you’ve got some nice pasta and meatballs. Do a cheapo garlic bread (aka the best garlic bread) on the side and you’re laughing.

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Oven chips, mix some frozen peas into that Mayflower curry sauce mix you get and pour it over the top. Can do rice too if you want. Add any other veg you want too if you like. Adding meat will obviously raise the price.

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The best work lunch is just sandwiches imo.

You can make homemade salads and pastas and stuff and that’s all nice, but just a nice homemade sandwich will hit the spot every time, and is easy to prepare, carry and eat.

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Yeah sarnies will be standard. I need to get in the habit of doing it before bed though anthers is no chance of ot happening in the am.

I love me some sharp cheddar and branston

But would like some other suggestions for a bit of variety :thinking:

Chick pea stew - I got this from a recipe book years ago (can’t remember who) and modified it over the years.

Chop up some chorizo (or similar cured sausage from the supes, doesn’t need to be fancy) into cubes and dry fry it in a decent sized pan.

Remove the cubes and add a chopped onion and garlic to fry in the oils that got released with a bit of salt. (You can also skip the first step and start here with some cooking oil)

Add a good squirt of tomato concentrate to the pan and fry a bit.

Chuck in two tins of chopped tomatoes and put the chorizo back in.

Dissolve a stock cube as per packet instructions (I use chicken but veg is also good) and pour it in.

Chuck in a tin of chickpeas (drained) or two if you really like chickkers.

Optional few drops of tabasco if you like it. It’s a pretty versatile base so you can add in other flavours you like of course

More salt, probably.

Let it boil down and reduce, sometimes it’s good to occasionally top with water to keep it cooking longer. Low heat and occasionally stirring does the job. Taste it from time to time and conclude it could handle a little more salt.

Can eat this just on its own in a bowl. I used to buy packs of chicken thighs on the bone and with skin (i.e. the cheapest decent bit of meat I could get) and roast 1-2 to have with it. The rest of the chicken and stew I’d freeze in individual portions.

It’s also good with a bit of cous cous on the side.

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Thanks everyone. I’m gunna make my way down this list and will find my favs :slight_smile: keep em coming x I really appreciate the help

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Recommend this from the Hairy Bikers diet book if you like thighs. You can tell it’s good by how messy the page is and even an idiot like me can make it! It feeds me and my wife two dinners each and we probably take portions that defeat the dieting goal.

Feck that’s actually quite hard to read. Here’s a link

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I’m a massive fan of cooking stuff in the oven in a big pot with a lid. This sounds silly but it makes loads of stuff taste amazing. Great way of doing mini-roasts too. If you can get some potatoes, carrots, brocolli, and sausages, chop veg and put it on the bottom with the sausages on top (seasoning and oil as you like it), roast that with the lid on, then you get a super-flavoursome mini-roast plus the base of a tasty soup that’ll go for a bunch more meals. Very tasty, cheap and easy too, only takes the time it takes to wash and chop the veg really.

If you don’t have a big pot with a lid you can do it with a roasting tin or baking tray with foil (or indeed a saucepan if it’s all metal)

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I’m a big fan of this recipe as it’s so easy that I used to make it when I was working away and would get in from work exhausted at 9pm to a kitchenette with not much stuff in it

The empty coconut milk tin can be used to measure out the water and lentils (I use more lentils than the recipe says to make it thicker) so you don’t need measuring cups, then just bung in as much spinach as you want at the end

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Jacket potatoes with tuna and cheese, or baked beans. - always cheap and easy

BBQ chicken quesadillas made with chicken thighs Mob — BBQ Chicken Quesadillas - really yummy

I use MOB for a lot of meals that I do. Some are cheaper than others but on their website they have the symbols for something which is cheaper and you can search by ingredient/money at the top of the page. I’ve also got their cook book ‘comfort mob’ and for each recipe there is a budget hack.

We usually bake in bulk and put meals in portions and eat for lunch — though this can be a bit tricky if you don’t have the freezer space.

Homemade soup is quick and easy - chop up vegetables e.g. mushrooms and onions, put in a bit of flour and then some milk and voila!

I think risottos are easy except I have no idea how cheaply you can get the rice these days.

Otherwise it’s basically just oil rice and stick but you can make loads and it’s even nice cold IMO. And obviously you can pimp it with anything on top/through it.

PLEASE BE REALLY CAREFUL WITH COLD RICE

Big bags of all sorts of frozen veg is cheap and good for your stews, etc. Have a look in Iceland. Cuts down massively on waste too.

Curries are quick, healthy and easy to make once you have a decent range of spices and can be portioned out and frozen.

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Another vote for Jack Monroe, and lentil curry and chickpea/ chorizo stew.

I’d be guaranteed a like from ccb if he was still posting but Jack Monroe’s website is full of very good recipes made from budget ingredients. Tin Can Cook is a very good and useful book if you’re interested in longer term change.

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Yeah all true of course. Whack it in the fridge to cool it down quickly and have it cold from the fridge if you’ve no time to properly heat.

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honestly, big bag of spuds, big packet of pork or chicken fillets and some frozen veg will do you nicely in dire times. know its dull, but it gets less boring quickly than something fancier and more flavorsome, if that makes sense. and its also filling, easy to do and relatively healthy if you load up on the veggies. find its one of the cheapest ways to live, especially if you see a deal on meat and can freeze a load of it.

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acknowledge that if left to my own devices, i’ll basically eat like a WW2 frontline soldier or a prisoner in the 70s however.

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We generally make one or two massive batches of something us and the kids can eat over two or three nights - stews, soups, lasagne etc. Don’t want to give you advice that basically results in you having to spend more on additional stuff but getting a good mix of herbs/stock cubes helps. We also bought a £20 food blender wand which is great for making soup or thickening sauces, it came with a little plastic container for blitzing stuff which is great.

Minestrone is a good call as it is really cheap - get a pack of bacon lardons and fry them in a big pot, chop up onions, garlic and vegetables & what not and add to pot, then simmer for a bit before pouring in one or two tins of chopped tomatoes, pasta pieces and tin of borlitti beans, add loads of pepper and some water/stock cube (herbs as well) and continue to simmer until ready (usually half an hour or so)

2 likes for this and none for my identical recipe idea smh just a popularity contest with kids these days smh i want off this planet smh

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