Need Inexpensive Recipes!!

HI, I didnt read anything, but we are trying to get out of a pickle. first I started clippin coupons. second, ad matching, this really helps. third, we started eating hamburger helper. there are 5 of us (one being my very big husband)(notfat) so I use two. ad match this they are 99cent. apiece. and I also get those banquet meals in a box. sounds gross, but quite tasty. they are only $3 a box. we use two. so I have been spending about $40 to $50 dollars less aweek. I get salad stuff for a veggie. hope this helps. we are so poor to and needed something.

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For one of your roasts try Italian Beef:
One roast in the crock pot, add
1 beer (or 12 oz water if you don't have one)
1 package dry italian dressing
1 jar mild peppercini's
Cook on high 8 hours, low for one.
Tear apart the meat with forks. Serve with crusty bread and a slice of provalone or swiss cheese...so very good!

1 mom found this helpful

Hi N., it looks like you have some wonderful suggestions. Here is another website that you may want to take a look at:
http://www.tasteofhome.com/Recipes/Budget-Recipes

When I was receiving Taste of home magazine I remember LOVING their "Meals on a Budget" segment, where most of the meals were under $2 per person. GOOD LUCK!!!

1 mom found this helpful

OK, for some of my family recipe's that are yummy, easy and inexpensive...Or at least to us.

Spaghetti Soup - This is one that you make as little or as much as you would like, so I will give the basics of it and then you can adjust for your family.
Spaghetti
Browned hamburger
canned diced tomatoes
beef bullion
onion
salt & pepper
garlic - powder/salt or fresh-your choice

cook your spaghetti, do not drain, once to desired doneness, add all other ingredients to your taste. I usually will saute the onions and garlic into the meat. before adding to the soup part. I have also been known to add the beef bullion to the spaghetti as I cook it. We serve this with either corn bread, biscuits or regular bred & butter.

Tuna or Beef noodle casserole
again adjust to your family's taste.
Tuna or beef
basic macaroni and cheese

prepare the mac'n cheese as directed, add tuna or beef. When we do the tuna, we serve it with biscuits and grape jelly.... I know sounds weird, but they just go together.

Fancy Pants
This is a fun one...
hamburger
tomato sauce
Cheese
pickles
optional diced tomatoes, canned diced mushrooms

pat out a thin hamburger put some cheese, pickle, onion or whatever you desire on the thin patty, then add another thin patty on top and seal the edges. Place patties in the pan and brown both sides. Once brown cover them with tomato sauce, cover and simmer until you feel the meat is done to your family's liking. We serve this one with mashed potatoes, because the tomato sauce makes a nice gravy.

SPAGHETTI PIZZA -My kids LOVED this one, especially helping make it.
8 oz. spaghetti
2 tbsp. butter
3/4 c. Parmesan cheese
1 egg
Spaghetti sauce
Shredded cheese
Your choice of any pizza toppings

Cook spaghetti and drain. Melt butter on spaghetti, add 1/2 cup Parmesan cheese, add egg (raw) and mix well. Put mixture onto greased pan. Top with spaghetti sauce, cheese, then your favorite toppings. (Pineapple is great). Top with remaining Parmesan cheese. Cook at 350 degrees approximately 20-25 minutes until bubbles in middle. Serve

Easy Enchilada casserole
Ground beef - browned (can saute onion in with this)
cheddar cheese shredded
onion
corn tortillas - torn into pieces
tomato sauce
chilli powder

Mix in a bowl the tomato sauce and chilli powder to your desired taste. Less chilli powder not as spicy. In a greased pan layer the ingredients ending with cheese on top. Bake at 350 until heated thru and serve. Can serve with a homemade Spanish rice as well (instant rice cooked with chili powder) or a can of refried beans.

Another thing I do, is to make cornbread casserole, basically follow the cornbread recipe and add any cooked ingredient to it and then bake until done, I usually always will add cheese and meat and a few veggies.

The thing I have learned over the years, do not be afraid to just try throwing something together, they usually turn out to be favorite meals at our house. To get comfy with it, have an ingredient and want something different to do, then go to google or any search engine and put it in and look at the recipe results and then alter to your family taste.

Also, shopping at Aldi is great too, they now take debit cards as well as cash, so it is really easy, plus they have a nice selection of basics and fresh and frozen fruits and veggies.

Good Luck! & Let me know if you have any questions about the above recipe's....& forgive typo's!

1 mom found this helpful

National Public Radio did a series asking chefs to create meals for $10 or less and they have included a place for others to include recipes. You can find it at: http://www.npr.org/templates/story/story.php?storyId=1034...

Also, if you have a farmer's market where you live, you can get relatively inexpensive foods that are natural and more filling for the family. Of course, use coupons and sale bills to help plan your meals.

Hope this helps!

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I really like this website. It has a lot of good ideas for some very tasty meals at an affordable price. Good Luck!

family.go.com

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Check out www.moneysavingmom.com - she had GREAT ideas for both shopping on a budget and menu planning. I use her ideas quite a bit along with shopping the sale ads to plan my weekly menu.

Another source I use is a cookbook called "Saving Dinner" by Leanne Ely. She is a registered dietician who has dinner ideas for every day of the year broken down into seasons. (That way you can buy fresh produce according to when it's in season & hopefully on sale!) Her website also has pre-planned menus - www.dinnerdiva.com - that come in different "themes". (Such as Heart Healthy, crock pot, etc - she has a Low Budget one as well!)

Hope this helps!

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Check out the Hillbilly Housewife. She has some great ideas on ways to save money including some GREAT recipies that are inexpensive.

Here is her website http://www.hillbillyhousewife.com/

Check her out!

J.

1 mom found this helpful

just want to say thanks for asking this question and thanks to all who responded! i've been on a manhunt trying to find cheap recipes and haven't seen most of the recipes and websites people here have thrown out.

My husband likes to make "eggs and potatoes" - basically chop up a few potatoes and brown in a skillet, then pour in 1-2 eggs per person scrambled up. The eggs cook quickly and stick to the potatoes. Sometimes, he'll through in an chopped onion or pepper or sausage or hamburger, but the eggs and potatoes are filling and get a good balance of carbs and protein. It's good for any meal.

Grilled cheese is always a cheap lunch, especially if you can get bread from a discount bakery (like Hostess or Dolly).

We like hamburger soup. 1lb of hamburger (cooked) and a can of veg-all. Just cook it in a pot for an hour or so. Should feed your whole crew with just one batch.

Also check to see if you qualify for food stamps (or WIC) if your ex isn't paying you probably will.

I agree with other pps. Clip coupons and watch the ads (most places will price match). Do you have an Aldi's near you? Also find a bread store. you can get cheap bread and other stuff.

Hi
I can help :) my family lived on a very tight budget (I am talking powder milk insted of real milk tight budgeting)
If you have a good amount of beef thats good but dont use it up to fast. Go to the store and get lots of dryed noodles...you can cook almost anything if you have them, Also get penutbutter and dryed beans that way wont go through the beef to fast. Also look around your town for a type of dented can store...Its where you towns big stores sells its surplus items and things that are about to ((maybe expire)) Trust me there fine I lived off of it for 5 years and my family still gose there to get good deals.
Also go to any type of church/community service dinners around your town normally they are only asking for what you can donate, so that way it wont cost much to feed all of you...Also get a buck sized oatmeal it will go a long way.
Please if you need anything else shoot me a message and i will do what ever i can to help....I know its hard

I don't have recipes, but I have heard about Angel Food Ministries, it's a service where you can buy a box of food cheaply and pick it up at a church near you, they use the power of bulk buying to save money and don't mark up as they do in the stores. I just looked online and you can place your order or just look at what's available in this months box of food, I noticed you have several choices in meats or fruits and vegetables.
They also have a section of recipe's that must be budget friendly as that is there goal.
I do have a suggestion, our family likes the Hamburger Pie Recipe off the Busquick box, very fast easy and good!

It looks like you already have some great ideas. Here are a few that work for me:

Buy the fruits and veggies that are the most bang for your buck, and always keep them on hand for snacking. (Much healthier and more filling than "junk" food.)
Buy the big yogurts. Last night I looked and it was $2.75 for 32 oz of yogurt.
Breakfast hot cereals are a great deal. Oatmeal, cornmeal (by the flour), and cream of wheat are all inexpensive. My mom would make cornmeal mush for breakfast (like cream of wheat, but with corn), and she would make too much... on purpose. Then she greased a bread pan and put the extra in the refrigerator. The next morning, she cut a slice, fried it up, and served it with an egg. It was awesome!
There are so many things to do with canned pasta sauce. Make pasta (obviously), use it for pizza sauce, make "toast pizza" (make toast, put pizza sauce on it, top with cheese and anything else you like, put it in the oven for 5-10 minutes at 350), use it for lasagna, etc.
A quick meal that my husband and I love... a jar of salsa, a can of corn (drained), a can of black beans (drained), mixed together. Eat with tortilla chips or taco shells. This is actually pretty cheap and healthy... it just doesn't sound like it!
Other ideas: Go to a bread store like St. Louis Bread Co. at the end of their day and see if you can have some of the bread they would normally throw out. (I've done it before, and they usually are very nice about it. I go the idea when I was a customer one time and they just started handing out loaves to the people that were still there at the end of the day.)
See if there are some people who are harvesting from their gardens and have too many vegetables. A great way to save money!
Good luck!

This idea was sent to me by my sister-in-law. Have you heard about the Duggar family? They have 18 children in their family, so I imagine they know how to stretch a dollar! Well, here's their website:

http://www.duggarfamily.com/recipes.html

Hang in there!

www.kraftfoods.com has some great inexpensive recipes and most of which consist of few ingredients or at least easy to find ingredients that you use regularly. If you sign up on their website they also send out their magazine quarterly for free. Hope this helps!

I know you're looking for recipes, but something that can help your grocery bill is the Angel Food Ministries...they provide food for people struggling financially. My mom uses this service and swears by it. I've eaten their food, and it's no different from what you get at the store, but it's considerably cheaper!
Check out their site: http://www.angelfoodministries.com/
You'll be surprised as to how much good food you get for how little!
Hope this helps. All the best to you and your family.

just made this last night:
mix hamburger meat about 2 lbs
1 small onion
garlic salt or powder to taste
salt
pepper
1 cup water
1 cup instant rice -uncooked
1 jar spaghetti sauce

You're supposed to make meatballs but mine fell apart, so I ended up just "pan frying" what was left of the meatballs then once the meat was cooked poured the sauce over the top and boiled - add a little water if it is really thick. I than fixed elbow noodles to serve it over. Sort of a spaghetti with meat sauce, but a little different. It was good and made a lot!

You should also shop at Aldi. We are on a tight budget too and they have very affordable food, and good stuff too. Check out allrecipes.com you can put in ingredients and it'll bring up recipes. Good luck

I am a mother of 4 and a grandma of 8. This is a recipe I invented when my children were young and we were struggling financially. I went to the refrigerator and had to "create" dinner with only leftovers and pantry items. I had leftover spaghetti sauce but no noodles. I had minute rice, eggs, and canned mixed vegetables. So, I watered down the sauce to a soupy consistancy, added mixed vegetables, and minute rice and microwaved it as on Minute rice box directions using spaghetti sauce as my "water" amount. Then I hard boiled the few eggs I had and sliced them and put them on top of the rice. To this day, my children request this dish when they come home for visits. I hope this helps. Also, as a general Casserole creator, you can use this BASIC recipe to create casseroles:
List "A": ANY SAUCE like cream of mushroom soup, spaghetti sauce, pizza sauce, cheese sauce, chicken or beef gravy...
LIST "B": ANY PROTEIN like eggs, cheese, chicken, tuna, hamburger, sausage, pepperoni...
LIST "C": ANY STARCH like potatoes, rice, noodles, bread cubes,tortillas, tortilla chips....
List "D": ANY VEGETABLE like canned corn, frozen peas, fresh herbs...
LIST "E": ANY TOPPING like chips (tortilla, doritos, potato...),chinese noodles, corn flakes, onion fries...

take any item from list "A","B", AND "C" and mix to create your own casserole them you have the option of adding an item or items from list "D" and garnishing with an item from list "E". bake, if desired, at 350 or assembly in microwave as I did with my original "Spaghetti Rice" dish which I gave you above. You could add corn, olives, mushrooms,bell peppers, etc.with and/or instead of the mixed vegetables. I hope this helps you!

I would check out motherindotcommune. It's been awhile, but I've seen great threads from moms to other moms on their cheap healthy meals. I hope things get better.

K.

Making meal plans and sticking to them is the key. I am not a big coupon clipper, I watch ads to see what is on sale but I prefer to meal plan around what I know are already low prices. I do shop Aldi's and they have some good deals, comparison shopping takes some time but the end result is the ability to meal plan and budget down to the penny, sounds labor intensive but jot down prices and in no time you will be able to do this = ) We have a couple family favorites and although personally I am getting sick of them we have a spaghetti night and a sloppy joe night = ) One of the articles I read was to get away from the tradition of meat with every meal...very hard for us...but I will tell you quite a hit is the nights where we have "breakfast" for dinner. The closest thing I have for a recipe for you is we buy sausage in the 1lb roll and brown it, drain it and set it aside...then get a box of wild rice ( I do not like the fast cook kind, it has a different texture when it is cooked ) add the sausage to the rice and prepare the rice according to the directions. I serve the sausage and rice with either corn or carrots and either bread and butter or blue berry muffins, we also usually have applesauce = ) It is not a very expensive meal and with sides to round out the meal it is very satisfying.
There are lots of sites you can look at that have great ideas, penny pinchers and tons of others, I have gone so far as to look up depression era recipes ( some of them are so good! ) Lots of luck
B.

Hi N., Tator Tot Casserole-brown 1lb or less ground hamburger add a can of green beans drained, can of cream of mush soup,put some shredded cheese in mixture add tator tots on top once you've placed the mixture into a 9 x 13 pan add more cheese if you like & bake according to tator tot directions.Meatballs- Get a pack of armour meat balls, can of jelled cransuace & Heinz chilli sauce, mix together in crock pot & serve with veggie. Good Luck!

Three of my very favorite cheap ones that kids love:

Tuna casserole: 1 pack of mac and cheese and make accordingly, frozen peas, one can tuna, 1 can cream of mushroom soup and mix together in baking pan and crush crackers on top and bake. Can also make with hamburger and skip the peas and add onion and gr. pepper.

Tater tot casserole: ground meat, 1 can condensed cheese soup, 1 can cr. of mushroom soup, 1 cup milk, 1 cup grated cheddar. Tater tots on top and bake.

With stew meat, soup goes a long way and is SO good: Fry stew meat, add 2 cans of beef broth, 2-3 cans of tomato sauce, frozen veggies of whatever you want (corn, peas, carrots), cut potatoes, a couple packs of beef gravy mix, a 1-2 bay leaves (spice section).

Also sometimes get pizza dough mix in package and put either pizza sauce or use small can tomato sauce with Italian spice and garlic salt added (whichever we have on hand), add whatever cheese I have with whatever meat I have on hand (good way to use leftover meat and veggies).

Oprah had a chef on (can't remember when) but she had pretty good menu samples for keeping things cheap but still interesting..

Hope these links work for you:
http://www.oprah.com/menu/food/menus/20090227-tows-celebr...

http://static.oprah.com/pdf/20090227-tows-cat-cora-shoppi...

Hi N.,

Meat loaf was always a great way to make hamburger stretch in our family. My mom makes a great meat loaf, easy and inexpensive. She mixes in a packet of Lipton Onion Soup Mix and a can of evaporated milk (we use Pet Milk) into 2 lbs of ground chuck. You can mix bread crumbs in it also to make the meat stretch a little more. Form it into a loaf and bake at 375, I bake mine for about 45 minutes, but it is however you like your meat loaf. Left overs can be used for sandwiches or put into tacos or pasta.

Have you ever had taco soup? It is so good and will easily feed a family of five!
1 lb. of hamburger
2 cans of corn
2 cans of black beans
1 can of mild rotel
1 can of diced tomatoes
1 package of ranch dressing
1 package of taco seasoning
Mix all ingredients (except for hamburger) in a huge pot. Brown hamburger and add to pot. Heat it on the stove until boiling. Then, you can scoop it up with tortilla chips or crumble taco shells in it or just eat it like soup! i like to add cheese and sour cream to make it a little thicker and it helps if it is too spicy for the little ones. Enjoy!

Check out allrecipies.com

you can even search my the idgrediants that you have/want to use

Pasta and rice dishes are cheap and easy. hamburger stroganoff, chicken garlic paremsan chicken (pasta) rice with kielbalsa and chicken (made in crockpot)-let me know if you would like any of these recipies and I'l pull them out and type them up :)