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Day 1
Breakfast:
Baked Beans and Toast
Lunch:
Quiche
Dinner:
Chicken Carbonara
In a pan sautee some chicken and onion in butter
Add 1/2 cup of milk (or cream if you have it)
Bring the milk to the boil, then add a cup of cooked pasta.
While the pasta is still warm, crack an egg into the pan
and stir gently until it makes a thick sauce.
Serve.
I am doing 2 menus this week. The Week 3 $25 menu plan and also the 1st week of the $50 fortnight. All meals that are photographed, I did actually cook. Sometimes there will be repeat photos of dishes that repeat (Beans on toast, Poached eggs leftovers for lunch etc)
$25 per week Stand Alone Menu 3 - Day 1
Breakfast
Porridge (disclaimer I did NOT cook this.. Honestly porridge is just something I just cannot eat, but I know a lot of people do and it is a very budget friendly product.)
Lunch
Soup and Toast
Dinner
Bacon Carbonara
In a pan saute some bacon and onion in some butter. mix up a heaped dessertspoon of cheese sauce mix in 1/4 cup of milk. Ad to the pan and stir until thickened. Add in a cup of boiled pasta and mix until the sauce coats the pasta well. Serve.
And now for something COMPLETELY different. Cupcakes make with packet cake mix and lemonade. I came across this idea on Pinterest. Just 2 ingredients... Cake Mix and soft drink. (I used Vanilla Cake Mix and Lemonade)
Well I just had to try it. Homebrand Cake Mix is 80c and soft drink just 75c.
In mixer, mix the cake mix and 350ml of softdrink.
Mix for 3-5 minutes and bake in cupcake liners for 15-18 minutes at 180 degrees.
I didn't think it was going to work as it made a very wet batter. It did rise, but I think next time I will turn the fan off in my oven as they got blown around a bit as they rose.
They taste like a normal cupcake. I am pleasantly surprised with the result of these.
Well the $25 a week challenge has morphed into a $50 per person a fortnight challenge.
I have had quite a few comments saying that people would prefer a fortnightly shopping list as that is how Centrelink is paid.
I do think this will be slightly easier as we can now take advantage of some bulk buying. Hopefully we can start building a bit of a pantry stockpile. Once again, for this first week, I have started from scratch.. Any carry over food items will be noted in next fortnight's budget.
I am looking forward to this next couple of weeks. I hope you will like what I have come up with.
The shopping list and menu plans are in the Resources section on the right hand side of your page.
Wow what a week... Than you so much for all your comments and encouragement.
This week saw a lot more variety and some red meat. Looking deeper into the supermarkets, I can see it is difficult to incorporate red meat into a stand alone $25 per week budget :(
I know I am particularly blessed to live in an area where we have lots of quality bulk butchers around us. Consequently we eat lots of red meat at a budget price... we are most definitely carnivores here :)
For those of you following who may be near the Sunshine Coast, we actually travel down to Morayfield once every 3 months or so to Meat City and stock our freezer.
We are due to go possibly next weekend, so I will do a post showing what we buy.
I have had some questions that I will answer..
I can't buy the items at my supermarket for the prices you list. How can I stick to $25?
I have priced all items from Woolworths Currimundi on the Sunshine Coast in Qld.
I realise that some items will be priced differently in other areas. In many cases you may be able to get items (especially fresh items) even cheaper that I have done from Woolworths.
Even if your area is more expensive, the shopping list should still be a budget shop. Don't be to concerned if my $25 basket costs you even $30. These plans are not meant to be followed religiously. If you get the basics from my plans and can now afford add some ice-cream, chocolate and luxury items,,GREAT!!!!
You have not listed snacks or drinks, what are you having?
I am a tea drinker and have 5 or 6 cups of tea with milk but no sugar everyday.
This amount of tea means I go through a full 2 litres of milk every week. I also drink 2 liters of water most days. I have an old 2L cordial bottle on my desk at work and do try to get through it each day.
I am not normally a snacker, but I have bought the 57c packet of wafer biscuits each week and have had one or two with a cup of tea after dinner. There are 14 in the pack and I can recommend them as a really nice little snack.
Are you really having that many eggs?
Eggs have been my "go to" breakfast since I was a child. I really don't like cereal and find if I do not have a protein breakfast, I will feel headachy and hungry by 10:00 or so.
I do often have baked beans as well and will often make a pot of beans and add chopped onion and bacon to the beans. Eggs to me are breakfast though and I don't usually have them as a quick dinner like a lot of people do. Generally the only time eggs show up outside of breakfast is in a burger or maybe a ceaser salad.
You don't have any fruit.
I am not normally a fruit eater. I do not have much of a sweet tooth. We do eat a lot of vegetables and rarely have dessert. I was quite surprised to see the prices of fruit while shopping and realise that fruit is a luxury item for many :(
So what is next??
I have devised 3 more stand alone $25 per week menus that will be in the resources section on the right hand side of this blog.
I may do some more stand alone menus in time, but now I will concentrate on fortnightly menus at under $50. Why? It has mentioned by many that Centrelink pays fortnightly so it makes sense to have a fortnightly shopping list. This will allow for a stockpile of ingredients to begin as well.
These $50 menus will be in 6-8 week blocks which should allow for ingredients to be used up.
I think this style of shopping is closer to real life, while still aiming for my goal of proving that you CAN feed yourself on just $25 per week.
So, please, keep following me and we will see how we go :)
YAY!!! Friday....
Easier day today meal wise as a lot of the prep has been done earlier in the week.
Breakfast
Poached Eggs on Toast
Lunch
Leftover Chicken and Rice from earlier in the week.
I had this in the freezer and just took to work and microwaved until hot.
Dinner
Meat Pie
Back on Wednesday, I cooked up the last of the mince.
That night I made the rissoles for dinner, the meat patty for Thursday's Burger and
the mince mixture for my pie for tonight.
I figured it was easier to just chop the last of my onion and use up the tomato and have everything ready to go.
It proved a good thing as I had tonight's pie on the table in about 15 minutes.
I had originally planned on doing some chips, but decided to mash all the potato last night and used half under the chicken casserole yesterday and topped my pie with the other half today.
Here is the pie step by step.
Make the mice mixture. Lay a piece of buttered bread in a pie dish, fill, top with mashed potato, top with a bit of butter, bake until the mash is golden and the pie is hot through.
Serve with gravy. Enjoy!! Yummm
Sorry people... Life and work got in the way.
Anyway...some new posts coming up for you.. :)
Breakfast:
Baked Beans on Toast and Tea
Lunch:
Burger
Meat patty on toast spread with a tablespoon of tomato from
your tinned tomato, add grated carrot, salad leaves and an egg.
Dinner:
Chicken Casserole.
In a pan seal some chicken pieces in butter along with carrot and onion
Add in 1/4 can of tinned tomato and simmer until the chicken is cooked
through and the carrot tender. In the last few minutes, add in some broccoli
pieces. You don't want them to go to mush :)
Serve on a bed of mashed potato.
Check back tomorrow for next week's meal plan. Also, did you know we are on Facebook?
click here to go to our facebook page and like the page to get updates in your feed.
Menu Plan for the day...
Breakfast
Scrambled Eggs on Toast
Lunch
Cheese Salad Sandwich
Dinner
Beef Rissoles with Vege with Gravy
I have used the last of the mince today. (I also cooked up the mince for my pie for later in the week, but more about that in the coming days)
After adding a chopped onion and a tablespoon of tinned tomato to the mince, I formed 3 rissoles.
Two of the rissoles I had for dinner and I flattened the 3rd one to make a hamburger patty for my lunch tomorrow. I put the small potato in the bottom of my steamer, and in the steamer basket went broccoli and carrot. Serve the meal up with a drizzle of gravy.
