As families struggle to make ends meet during a worsening cost of living crisis, any tips to make the most of household budgets is a boost.
No more so than when it comes to help in feeding a family with healthy, nutritious food without breaking the bank.
The Record reports how more and more families across the country are grappling with higher prices on everything from household bills to food.
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Many have no alternative but to slash the weekly grocery budget in the hope of keeping more hard earned cash in their pocket for emergencies.
So a challenge undertaken by Edinburgh Live sister title MEN's family writer Emma Gill to make a full family meal from budget supermarket Aldi for less than £1 a head could be just the ticket.
Her only requirement was that there be at least one vegetable in there that can count towards their five a day.
The end result was a "rather tasty and satisfying cottage pie" that came out at just 71p a head and here is how she managed it.
The 70p a head meal
We headed to budget retailer Aldi with a shopping list of all the ingredients needed to make the family favourite. The only extras we added from the cupboard were the cooking oil and the salt and pepper.
Altogether the ingredients cost £7.60, but that was for the entire packs of products, including stock cubes, gravy, Worcestershire sauce and thyme, all of which would be used in many further meals. I didn't even use all the potatoes or carrots, I only used two small onions from the 1kg bag and there was around two thirds of the full block of butter left over.
Admittedly I went for the cheapest options on everything, but who cares what wonky shapes your potatoes and carrots come in when they're being chopped up into pieces anyway. Apart from the odd sticky out bit on the carrots, they weren't actually that wonky at all.
And the potatoes were surprisingly good, given the fact I usually go for the more expensive Maris Pipers after being told they 'make better mash'. If you wanted a healthier version, you could pay extra for the lower fat beef mince -while it's £2.49 for a 500g pack of 10% fat, it's £2.99 for the 5% fat pack of the same size.
With the healthiest option it would bring the cost up to 95p per head, still a very reasonable price for such a hearty meal, which was wolfed down by us adults and two children, with one portion leftover. My other half even approved and he's a chef so not always easily pleased - although he did ask why I hadn't run a fork through the mash to give it a pattern like he does. I won't tell you what I suggest he do with his fork.
My son on the other hand dared to suggest the dish was 'nicer than when dad makes it'. Now that's karma right there!
Here's the full list of ingredients and cost, with the amount we used and what that equated to
- Potatoes 2.5kg 89p / we used 2kg 71.2p
- Carrots 1.5kg 45p / we used 800g 24p
- Onions 1kg 69p / we used 170g 11.7p
- Beef mince 500g £1.79 / used full pack £1.79
- Stock cubes pack of 12 37p / used one 3p
- Gravy granules 300g 79p / used 45g 11.8p
- Worcestershire sauce 150ml 65p / used 10ml 4.4p
- Thyme 15g 49p / used 1g 3.26p
- Butter 250g £1.48 / used 80g 47.36p
Total shopping list £7.60 / total used £3.53 (serves five / 70.6p per head)
