The cost of living has risen so much recently, and it feels like you can't go into the supermarket lately without coming away at least twenty quid lighter - even if you only got a few bits.
Over on TikTok, people trying to combat the cost of living have been trying to make a meal for a fiver - but the challenge has become even more tricky.
People are now being challenged to make a three-course meal for just £5. Reporter Anna Highfield from MyLondon thought that the task would be 'impossible', but she 'decided to give the challenge a go'.
Anna said: "As I set off for my trusty local Aldi branch, I clutched a five-pound note and thought nostalgically about how rich I used to feel when I acquired one in a birthday card. Alas, after months of record-level inflation, these days you'd be lucky to find a pint for £5, let alone ingredients for an entire meal.
"Determined as I was to complete the challenge, I strongly suspected my three-course meal would end up consisting of a jar of olives, followed by pesto pasta, and a single chocolate raisin to round it off if I was lucky. Busy wallowing in pre-emptive self-pity about the miserable meal I was about to have, little did I imagine the bounty Aldi was about to provide."
Rather than the meagre meal she thought she would prepare, Anna found a box of six free-range eggs for £1.19, and was 'immediately inspired' to make a Spanish Tortilla 'using onions for 79p and baby potatoes for 95p (and a very un-Spanish bistro side salad, 80p in Aldi)'.
Anna continued: "Stretching my fiver for all it was worth, I decided to stick with the Spanish theme by using some of the potatoes for my starter, too - bagging a 32p tin of chopped tomatoes to make a simple version of Patatas Bravas. With 95p left to spare for dessert, I cast my eyes hungrily around the fridge section, where they landed on the perfect pudding - chocolate eclairs for the exact amount."
Her total came to £5, so there was no change to spare and it was time to get cooking.
"Starting with my baby potatoes, I chopped half into long slices for the tortilla and quartered the other half for my bravas. While the bravas potatoes went in the oven, I fried up my sliced potatoes with a sliced onion to make Jamie Oliver's seductively simple Spanish Tortilla."
While the potatoes cooked, Anna says she made a bravas sauce by reducing the tinned tomatoes in a saucepan, "cheating slightly" by adding some chopped garlic and paprika she already had at home.
When this had thickened up, she put it over the cubed potatoes and baked them in the oven, before adding six eggs to the tortilla.
Less than an hour later, Anna reported that her three-course meal was ready to be devoured, saying she'd 'outdone herself'.
"Not only was the meal dirt cheap, it was also delicious, nutritious, and could probably have fed three or four people. This was truly a miracle, and it's all thanks to Aldi", she praised.
Aldi Shopping list
Chopped Tomatoes 32p
6 Eggs £1.19
Onions 79p
Baby Potatoes 95p
Bistro Salad 80p
Chocolate Eclairs 95p
Do you think you could make a three-course meal for £5? Let us know in the comments.
