Budget-friendly meal plan

✅ Uses storecupboard and low-cost ingredients

✅ Pre-prepared shopping list to save you time

Feeding a family on a budget doesn’t mean you have to compromise on a balanced diet. These delicious recipes make perfect family dinners and use storecupboard essentials and cheaper ingredients to keep food costs low.

Whatever your budget, cooking for a family can be a challenge, so we’ve chosen everyday crowd-pleasers, like our cheat’s frying pan pizzas. Simply add a salad to top up your five-a-day intake.

Red meat like beef and pork are excellent sources of protein, as well as vitamins and valuable minerals, including iron to keep you energised. For many, sausages and bacon are firm favourites, however eating too many of these foods may pose a health risk. UK guidelines suggest we limit ourselves to no more than 70g or less per day, and we have made sure that our budget meal plan keeps within those limits. If your family love these foods, they won't be disappointed – we’ve included them in our sausage, chorizo & leek hash with fried eggs and sausage & lentil cassoulet.

Meat can consume a large part of your food budget, but with a little know-how, you can select cost-effective cuts and make a little go a long way. Our sweet potato cottage pie combines beef with iron-rich lentils to top up your five-a-day count and boost fibre levels. And, that’s not all: this recipe helps save you time, too, as the filling and topping are used later in the week to make our savoury curried beef pasties.

More flavoursome and richer in minerals, chicken thighs are the budget shopper’s friend. We’ve used them in our Italian garlic chicken with white bean & rosemary mash and our simple chicken & spinach curry with easy flatbreads. Be sure to enjoy your curry early in the week – that way, you’ll have pre-made your pizza dough for a well-deserved Friday night in.

Simply use the shopping list and weekly overview below. Tap, zoom and discover what's for dinner in the week ahead.