Skip to Content

21 Budget Family Meals and a £16 Aldi Meal Plan

21 Budget Family Meals and a £16 Aldi Meal Plan

Sharing is caring!

Including cheap meals for a week for a family

If you’re having trouble feeding your family for less, then below you will find an easy to follow cheap family shopping list and meal, which includes a £16 meal plan and shopping list.

You don’t have to stick to it, but by just using a budget meal planner like this once a month, you could be saving your family around £90 a month easy. But if you need any financial help, not just with your food, then you can go online to see what MaxCash Title Loans can do for you!

If you are looking for more budget saving meals then have a look at:

The Ultimate £1 Per Head Budget Meal Planning List – If you are looking for £1 a meals that are easy to make then look at this post here. It’s our full list of meals that we cook ourselves to save money.

£18 a Week Food Budget Shopping List UK – This is an £18 a week meal plan and shopping list. It’s not for every week but for when you are on a very limited budget.

The Best Fakeaway Recipes For Under £1 a Head – This is our huge list of budget fakeaways that you can make from home. They all come in at under £1 a head for four people and help take that craving for a takeaway away.

Budget Family Meals

So how can you save money on your shopping? A few quick things you can do are:

Use Your Slow Cooker

Having a slow cooker to hand means that you can cook loads of meals while you are out. You can also make bulk out slow cooker meals easily with cans of kidney beans or baked beans.

Don’t worry if you’ve never cooked before or need homecare help. These are really easy recipes that you can chuck in and leave until you are ready to eat.

Have a look at our 31 Aldi Slow Cooker Recipes For The Whole Family that has loads of ideas.

If you don’t own a slow cooker then we use this one, which is a Morphy Richards Slow Cooker Sear and Stew 460012 3.5L Black Slowcooker*. 

Go Through Your Store Cupboard

Before you go shopping, make sure you check what you have already. Can you make a meal out of what you have? That’s a few less things to buy.

Use Cashback Sites

It’s always best to check the cashback websites before you go shopping anyway. They offer loads of deals and you can really get money off by using them!

Our favourites are:

OhMyDosh – OhMyDosh is really to use and free! Search it before you shop for anything to see how much money you could get back.

Use our link here and get £1* added to your account for free!

Read our review here of OhMyDosh and what we think about them.

Quidco – Is great for getting the family treats at really low prices. Anything goes from takeaways to days out.

Sign up here free using our link.

Swagbucks – Another great site that’s easy to use. You can also earn money by filling out surveys and watching videos.

Use our link here to join for free.

Free Resources

Come join our free Resource Vault that is packed full of over 20 money saving printables that you can download as many times as you like.

Everything is included from meal plans to shopping lists and other budget ideas.

Join our Free Resource Vault here.

(By joining giving us your email address you are consenting to us emailing you about our other money saving ideas. You can unsubscribe at any time by clicking the link at the bottom of every email.)

Go Down a Scale

Wherever you shop, there’s always a cheaper level of food. Start from the bottom and work your way up. If you don’t like the cheapest version, then go one up and try that. Chances are, with most products, the family won’t even be able to tell the difference.

Eating More Veg

Meat and fish are currently pretty pricey. Try grating vegetables into everything to try and bulk it out then freeze any leftovers for the next day.

Have a Meat Free Day

On weeks’ things are really tight, leave out meat. Eat Vegetarian. Swap all your favourite meals for veggie ones. Try veggie stir fry, fajitas or a Spaghetti Bolognese all meat free. It still tastes lush, but costs almost half as much to make.

Have a look at our 31 Cheap Vegetarian Meals That Are Under £1 a Head meals here.

Know What’s in Your Kitchen

Check the cupboards and the fridge before you go shopping. Is there anything you could use for next week? Is there anything in your freezer that could go with a meal? Any leftovers that need to be used?

Incorporate all these into your meal plan to bring the price down.

Buy Frozen

Frozen fruits and vegetables are just as good for you as their fresh counterparts. Everything can be bought frozen, from pineapples and strawberries to peppers and mushrooms.

Waste Nothing

Easier said than done with kids, but by being really strict, you can reduce what goes into the bin.

Anything that goes on your shopping list needs to have a meal allocated to it.

If your kids don’t eat much, then try serving everything all together and getting the kids to pick how much they want.

They can always come back for seconds, but it means you can freeze whatever isn’t eaten for another time.

Write a List

Plan what you’re going to eat and stick to it as much as you can. You can swap and change meals around, so as long as everything is eaten, it doesn’t matter when it’s used.

A list or meal plan just stops you going crazy at the supermarket!

Use our 101 Aldi Recipes That Will Give You Dinner Ideas For Tonight list for some inspiration.

If you’re still stuck for ideas, have a look below and join The Resource Vault for FREE, where you can download pre-made meal plans and shopping lists, plus get plain templates you can use, so the whole family can see what you’re making.

Cook from Scratch

No more tins or jars, it really is just as quick to make up a pasta bake sauce or homemade soup then opening one.

Have a look at our £1 meals here that you can make from scratch:

Easy Chickpea Curry That Costs Under £1 a Head

Epic Vegan Tacos Recipe For Under £1 a Head

Easy Creamy Chicken and Pepper Pasta

Easy Chicken Fajita Recipe: A Family Meal for 94p a Person

Low Cost & Healthy Slow Cooked Traditional Spaghetti Bolognese 97p a head

Cheap & Easy Sweet Potato & Carrot Soup for 44p

Turkey Stir Fry with Brown Rice: Feed Four for 67p a Head 

Beginner Chilli Con Carne Recipe for Just 95p a Head

Vegan Shepherd’s Pie For Just 82p Per Portion

Spaghetti Meatball Recipe For 73p a Head

Easy Chicken Fajita Recipe: A Family Meal for 94p a Person

Budget Aldi Meals

Vegetables in a wok steaming

If you’re looking for cheap family meals that you can make from Aldi ingredients then have a look at our £1 a head meal idea list below. These are budget recipes that are easy to cook and make as a family.

101 Aldi Recipes That Will Give You Dinner Ideas For Tonight – This post will help you to fill up your meal plan for less.

49 Aldi Slow Cooker Recipes For The Whole Family – We love our slow cooker. All these meals are easy to cook and you can pre-plan by adding the ingredients to the freezer the night before.

These dinner recipes can help you save money on your meals and could be swapped in from the meal plan below.

Cheap Easy Healthy Meals

If you are struggling to make your family healthy meals then have a look at Spicentice. They offer easy to follow meals with a shopping list, and their spices to help you make home cooked meals from scratch.

They are really great if you are short of time or unsure of how to cook your family favorites from scratch.

Laura Light showing the Spicentice packets

We tried them and made everything from homemade burgers to curries to kebabs!

Use our link here with our code LASAVE20 to get 20% off every purchase*.

Family Meal Planner on a Budget

So here’s an example of what you can eat for under £16 for four people. It does assume that you have a few of the cupboard kitchen staples in, like herbs, flour, oats and pasta.

Everything is cooked from scratch and some can be prepared in advance or leftovers be frozen for the following week.

This family weekly meal planner was done at Asda and with fresh vegetables, but to lower the cost a bit more, you could even swap to frozen vegetables.

Check out our huge list here of £1 family-friendly meals:

The Ultimate Budget Meal Planning List: 31 Meals Under £1 Per Serving

Monday

Porridge

Grilled Cheese Sandwiches

Vegetable Fajitas

Tuesday

Toast

Omelette

Lasagne

Wednesday

Scrambled Egg

Crackers and Cheese

Egg fried Stir fry with Rice

Thursday

Fruit Porridge

Cheese Sandwiches

Mince Pasta Bake

Friday

Over night porridge oats

Homemade Tomato Soup

Jacket Sweet Potato & Beans

Money Saving Challenge

Join our free money saving challenge and learn how to save your family money

If you are struggling to save money then come join our free six-week money saving challenge. It’s a free email course that gets sent to you weekly.

Come join our free Money Saving Challenge here

(By joining giving us your email address you are consenting to us emailing you about our other money saving ideas. You can unsubscribe at any time by clicking the link at the bottom of every email.)

Saturday

Boiled eggs

Homemade Tomato Soup

Egg noodle stir fry

Sunday

Toast

Crackers and Flapjack

Homemade Pizza

Related Posts: 

Family Shopping List on a Budget

Wraps (8 pack) 89p

Frozen peppers 1kg £1.25

Onions 1 kg 59p

Fajita seasoning 35g 88p

Bread 800g 50p

Milk 4pt 99p

Cheese 500g £2.50

Mince 500g £2.10

Eggs 15 £1.19

Chopped tomatoes 400g 90p

Crackers 300g 40p

Bananas 5 pack 87p

Sweet potatoes 1kg £1

Noodles 300g 90p

Frozen mushrooms 600g £1

Total: £15.96 (All prices are correct from Aldi at time of publication)

No drinks are included here, as we would normally drink just water in our £16 or £18 shopping weeks.

You may be missing comfort food from this list. If you are then why not try:

Eggless Pancakes: Vegan Pancakes For Just 56p

The Very BEST Chocolate Cupcakes for 88p

Cheap and Easy Pancakes For Just 86p An Easy Sweet & Sour Chicken Recipe For Just 58p

Laura x

If you enjoyed this post and would like some more family friendly budget recipes or meal plan ideas, then head over to the budget food section here on Savings 4 Savvy Mums where you’ll find over 30 cheap posts dedicated to helping you cook and shop wiser for less. There’s enough tips to help you save over £300 a month! You could also pop over and follow my family food Pinterest boards for lots more ideas on how to eat well and spend less; Family Meal Plans on a Budget, Budget Family MealsBudget Slimming World Recipes for Families.

Love this post? Then why not save it to Pinterest so you can easily find it later.

If you're having trouble feeding your family for less, then try our easy to follow £16 Aldi meal plan, which includes 21 budget family meals by Laura at Savings 4 Savvy Mums #budgetfamilymeals #AldiMealPlan #MealIdeas #CheapMealIdeas

What the * means

If a link has an * by it, then this means it is an affiliate link and helps S4SM stay free for all. If you use the link, it may mean that we receive a very small payment. It will not cost you anymore that it would normally.

You shouldn’t notice any difference and the link will never negatively impact the product. The items we write about are NEVER dictated by these links. We aim to look at all products on the market. If it isn’t possible to get an affiliate link, then the link, or product is still included in the same way, just with a non-paying link.

Sharing is caring!

Anita

Sunday 4th of August 2019

Loved the ideas. Brilliant