Cheap Meals!!!!

[nelson84]

I saw in the local flyer you can buy 7 packages of those noodles with the little seasoning packet 7 packs for $1 thats 14 cents a meal, not the healthiest but cheap. What is the cheapest meal you have made or have seen in a grocery flyer?

 

[Justsyd2]

That sounds terrible for a meal! Along that vein, the cheapest I've seen is a can of Campbell's Chicken Noodle Soup for 33 cents.

 

[nelson84]

That sounds terrible for a meal! Along that vein, the cheapest I've seen is a can Campbell's Chicken Noodle Soup for 33 cents.

Thats a better soup, I would rock that soup hard.

 

[DisneyBrat]

I loaded up on cheap chicken today at Foodlion Drum Sticks advertised in flyer for .77 cents ended up being priced wrong and I got them for .69 cents per pound and Thighs for .67 cents WHOO HOOO Yesterday I also bought whole boneless pork roasts for alittle over 9 bucks a piece I can get 3 or 4 meals out of each roast

Bargains are out there if ya search hard enough

 

[nelson84]

I loaded up on cheap chicken today at Foodlion Drum Sticks advertised in flyer for .77 cents ended up being priced wrong and I got them for .69 cents per pound and Thighs for .67 cents WHOO HOOO Yesterday I also bought whole boneless pork roasts for alittle over 9 bucks a piece I can get 3 or 4 meals out of each roast

Bargains are out there if ya search hard enough

Good score on the chicken and pork

 

[TheRatPack]

I know I'm the odd one in the lot, but I actually like those Ramen noodles LOL We never had them growing up and I lived with my grandparents so we ate heart healthy (no salt or low salt). When I had one of those Ramen noodle packets as an adult it was HEAVEN....LOL Salty goodness. Probably horrible for you....but it was still good. I haven't had one in years though....sigh.

A few things that are pretty cheap that we've eaten are:

*Spam, sliced and fried and made in to a sandwich.
*Chefboyardee pizza kits, we can make 2 large pizzas with these box kits, the kits run about 3.00 around here and we just add some extra cheese, onions, peppers...etc and it's a good cheap meal. We also bake a pan of those refrigerated bread sticks with a little butter and garlic on the top of them to go with the meal.
*Ballpark hotdogs, you can get a pack of 16 at the Walmart for under 4.00! That with a pack of 99 cent buns....cheap.

 

[nelson84]

I know I'm the odd one in the lot, but I actually like those Ramen noodles LOL We never had them growing up and I lived with my grandparents so we ate heart healthy (no salt or low salt). When I had one of those Ramen noodle packets as an adult it was HEAVEN....LOL Salty goodness. Probably horrible for you....but it was still good. I haven't had one in years though....sigh.

A few things that are pretty cheap that we've eaten are:

*Spam, sliced and fried and made in to a sandwich.
*Chefboyardee pizza kits, we can make 2 large pizzas with these box kits, the kits run about 3.00 around here and we just add some extra cheese, onions, peppers...etc and it's a good cheap meal. We also bake a pan of those refrigerated bread sticks with a little butter and garlic on the top of them to go with the meal.
*Ballpark hotdogs, you can get a pack of 16 at the Walmart for under 4.00! That with a pack of 99 cent buns....cheap.

I havn't had spam since I was a little kid, I liked it, I don't know about now, I should get a can and try it. I use to just slice it and eat it, I wasn't aloud to use the stove, I was about 4.

 

[Darcy03231]

I get the raman noodles and make lo mein with them. I cook them but don't put the seasoning pack in. Add a small package of frozen mixed vegetables (cooked) and cut up any left over meat into small pieces (usually chicken). I add about 1/3 a cup of low sodium soy sauce and voila - lo mein.

Another cheap one I made this week was country style spare ribs I bought for .99 per pound. I put them in the crock pot with a bottle of beer, small jar of salsa and an envelope of onion soup mix. Cooked on low for eight hours. I thickened the "sauce" when done and served it over egg noodles. Yummy!

 

[AntePrincess]

Ramen (those cheap noodle packets) in and of themselves aren't that bad for you. Yes, the noodles are deep fried, but that imparts surprisingly little fat to them. The seasoning packs are high sodium. That's it, nothing else either positive or negative, unless you count that a lot of ramen packs have dehydrated veggies with them for a positive. But is ramen really up to $0.17 a pack these days? Now I believe a recession is on! (For really good ramen, and a lot cheaper, most Asian groceries have a whole aisle of them in every conceivable flavor. They also sell the steamed, rather than fried, noodle bricks for a comparable price. Highest priced pack of ramen I saw was a family sized Tom Yum Gai at $0.33, and since it actually tasted like Tom Yum Gai, it was worth every penny.)

As for us, our average meal is pretty cheap (I priced out our breakfast at something like $0.34 for the family at the current price of ingredients, $0.74 at the highest price I've paid for them), and I rarely take advantage of sales on the ingredients because they aren't often offered on staples. That said, we did a meal recently with lobster at something like $2.99/lb. Pretty cheap for lobster in these parts! And I make a huge crock of chowder whenever potatoes and pork bones are on sale. I got three meals out of $0.69 of pork bones (they were $0.69/lb and I just happened to buy about exactly a pound) and maybe $0.25 of potatoes, because they were on excellent sale.

Out of curiosity: what do you all ALWAYS buy when it goes on sale, and is there a price threshold it has to beat before you'll buy it? My folks buy Coca-Cola when it's below $0.20 per can, for instance.

 

[Chicago526]

Whenever I make chili, I now put in two cans of beans (used to only put in one) and then add about 3 cups of cooked macaroni. It doubles the amount of food for about $1. If I don't think it will get eaten before it goes bad, I'll take about half and put it in a freezer for a night when I'm too tired or lazy to cook.

I'll make a batch of pancakes from scratch for about $2 worth of ingrediants. Add in some sausage ($1 for a roll after sale price and coupon) and I've fed four people for $3, or a bit more if you add in some fruit and a glass of milk!

 

[nelson84]

Ramen (those cheap noodle packets) in and of themselves aren't that bad for you. Yes, the noodles are deep fried, but that imparts surprisingly little fat to them. The seasoning packs are high sodium. That's it, nothing else either positive or negative, unless you count that a lot of ramen packs have dehydrated veggies with them for a positive. But is ramen really up to $0.17 a pack these days? Now I believe a recession is on! (For really good ramen, and a lot cheaper, most Asian groceries have a whole aisle of them in every conceivable flavor. They also sell the steamed, rather than fried, noodle bricks for a comparable price. Highest priced pack of ramen I saw was a family sized Tom Yum Gai at $0.33, and since it actually tasted like Tom Yum Gai, it was worth every penny.)

As for us, our average meal is pretty cheap (I priced out our breakfast at something like $0.34 for the family at the current price of ingredients, $0.74 at the highest price I've paid for them), and I rarely take advantage of sales on the ingredients because they aren't often offered on staples. That said, we did a meal recently with lobster at something like $2.99/lb. Pretty cheap for lobster in these parts! And I make a huge crock of chowder whenever potatoes and pork bones are on sale. I got three meals out of $0.69 of pork bones (they were $0.69/lb and I just happened to buy about exactly a pound) and maybe $0.25 of potatoes, because they were on excellent sale.

Out of curiosity: what do you all ALWAYS buy when it goes on sale, and is there a price threshold it has to beat before you'll buy it? My folks buy Coca-Cola when it's below $0.20 per can, for instance.

20 cents a can?????????????? Where is it at that price?

 

[AntePrincess]

20 cents a can?????????????? Where is it at that price?

Not so much "where" as "when." They stock up when Coca-Cola is the loss leader sale in the grocery flier. There are three members of the household, each with their own loyalty club cards, and they'll stop off on their way home from work and buy the maximum they can at the sale price, each day of the sale. The surplus goes into a closet until they need another pack in the fridge. There seems to be such a sale every other month. This is what I meant by "Out of curiosity: what do you all ALWAYS buy when it goes on sale, and is there a price threshold it has to beat before you'll buy it? My folks buy Coca-Cola when it's below $0.20 per can, for instance."

Don't you watch the sales too and buy when certain items are at a certain point?

 

[chrissyd1]

Pigs in a blanket are cheap, not necessarily healthy, but cheap and fast.

can of biscuits .99
pack of hot dogs .75

 

[nelson84]

Pigs in a blanket are cheap, not necessarily healthy, but cheap and fast.

can of biscuits .99
pack of hot dogs .75

I though pigs in a blanket was pancakes wrapped around breakfast sausages.

 

[Teresa Pitman]

I have to say that I wouldn't consider most of those things a meal. To me, a meal needs to include more nutritious foods, especially vegetables. I think the cheapest meals I make are things like bean and vegetable soup (starting with dried beans), meatless chili with beans and plenty of vegetables, etc.

Teresa

 

[nelson84]

I thought we were just trying to fill our stomachs? I'm sure everyone has a decent meal but these are some cheap meals when you don't feel like cooking a roast that will get you by until tomorrow.

team nelson

 

[luvsJack]

Ramen (those cheap noodle packets) in and of themselves aren't that bad for you. Yes, the noodles are deep fried, but that imparts surprisingly little fat to them. The seasoning packs are high sodium. That's it, nothing else either positive or negative, unless you count that a lot of ramen packs have dehydrated veggies with them for a positive. But is ramen really up to $0.17 a pack these days? Now I believe a recession is on! (For really good ramen, and a lot cheaper, most Asian groceries have a whole aisle of them in every conceivable flavor. They also sell the steamed, rather than fried, noodle bricks for a comparable price. Highest priced pack of ramen I saw was a family sized Tom Yum Gai at $0.33, and since it actually tasted like Tom Yum Gai, it was worth every penny.)

As for us, our average meal is pretty cheap (I priced out our breakfast at something like $0.34 for the family at the current price of ingredients, $0.74 at the highest price I've paid for them), and I rarely take advantage of sales on the ingredients because they aren't often offered on staples. That said, we did a meal recently with lobster at something like $2.99/lb. Pretty cheap for lobster in these parts! And I make a huge crock of chowder whenever potatoes and pork bones are on sale. I got three meals out of $0.69 of pork bones (they were $0.69/lb and I just happened to buy about exactly a pound) and maybe $0.25 of potatoes, because they were on excellent sale.

Out of curiosity: what do you all ALWAYS buy when it goes on sale, and is there a price threshold it has to beat before you'll buy it? My folks buy Coca-Cola when it's below $0.20 per can, for instance.

2 questions

1. .34 for the whole entire family or each member? Wow! And either way, what do you cook?

2. What is the recipe for chowder?

 

[AntePrincess]

1. .34 for the whole entire family or each member? Wow! And either way, what do you cook?

$0.34 for the whole family. I make a brown rice porridge using our rice cooker using 2/3 cup of brown rice, last bought high at something like $0.80/lb. or $0.21 for that 2/3 cup (that was a pretty bad buy on the rice, I can usually get it at $0.72/lb at a non-sale price without coupons, I buy it in 20 or 25 lb. bags at the Asian grocery), and 2 T of coconut milk, a can of which was last bought at $0.99/13.5 fl oz can which is the regular non-sale price at the Asian grocery as well, so about $0.13 of coconut milk per morning. I've been paying $1.60 per can at regular grocery prices. It's very tasty. Some days my husband wants almonds and my daughter wants frozen blueberries on theirs, adding about $0.10 to the total family meal, since we buy those at good price in bulk.

2. What is the recipe for chowder?

Well, we work from homemade broth, so I start with about a pound of meaty pork bones (Asian grocery again, only place I regularly see things like bones and chicken feet for making broth). First, I brown the bones quickly under the broiler, then I fill whatever crockpot is convenient with the bones and water and let it simmer until the meat has come loose from the bones and the liquor is dark. Then I strain with a loose cheese cloth, so I lose the bones, but keep the bits of meat. The resulting broth is actually concentrated, which is why I don't pay much attention to quantities. It will also form a firm gel as it cools, which is a good sign.

Next step is to slice potatoes thin and saute them with a little yellow onion in the bottom of your soup pot. You can use butter, I like to use some of the pork fat skimmed from the top of the broth because otherwise that fat will probably get wasted. When the potatoes and onions are cooked, throw in the broth gel and let it melt, add water to taste (how often do you hear that instruction?) along with salt and pepper. There's no salt in the broth itself, so it will be pretty bland, be fearless. You can serve it as soon as it's hot, that's your basic chowder. You can add milk or cream to make it rich, like a restaurant chowder. We almost always add corn.

Another tip for cheap meals: besides Asian groceries, I've found great deals at grocers that specialize in Eastern European food (I cannot believe the variety of jellies, jams and pickles they had!), Hispanic (some of the most unusual and cheap sodas I've ever seen, plus some really good cheese), Greek (actually, the one I'm familiar with is pricey compared to the others, except on feta of which they had about a dozen varieties), Italian (well, good prices on olive oil, vinegar, and semolina flours, other things aren't cheap, but you can't them as good elsewhere) and so on.

 

[frannn]

These are not as inexpensive as previous posts, but easy & cheap-ish.
The first is crab chowder...perfect for rainy, cold nights! I use chicken broth (boulion if the ready made stuff was not on sale), imitation crab meat (4 pkgs at B1G1), a can of corn, onion & garlic (already in the fridge), and cream. You can also throw in other leftovers or veggies to thicken it up. This week garlic bread was on sale for 1.50, so we had that with it. Cost me about 15, feeds 5 with enough for a second meal, so actual cost per meal for 5 was about 7.50.
Even cheaper is butter chicken curry. I buy the curry paste off Amazon when its on sale (which is often). I pay about 8 for a six pack, but only use 2to make a big pot. I add butter, water, 2 lbs of raw chicken, a can or 2 of peas, and 2 cans of potatoes. I make pasta on the side, and we have enough for dinner and leftovers. Costs about 12 total, so about 6/meal.

 

[WDWHo]

One of my cheap go to meals is egg salad sandwiches. The kids love them and they get alot of protein. I buy eggs when I can get them 99cents a dozen. So dinner usually works out to about 1.25 for 5 of us. I usually dont serve anything else as the sandwiches are filling.