As my children and I were all labouring under the effects of persistent colds, I remembered a "recipe" for herbal steam tablets in the January edition of Daphne's Diary. Made using bicarbonate of soda and essential oils, these tablets are intended to release lovely smelling vapours to invigorate while you shower and they're very easy to make at home.

Here's how we made our own herbal steam tablets, along with a few tips we learned along the way.

What you'll need:

• 250g of Bicarbonate of soda (Often found cheaply in a box of this weight in pharmacies and hardware stores)
• Your favourite essential oils (we used eucalyptus, rosemary and lavender). About 20-25 drops of each type
• A little water
• A cupcake/bun tray with 12 moulds
• 12 cupcake liners (or small rounds of greaseproof paper to line the tray)
• A large mixing bowl

Improvements on the original recipe

For anyone who is having issues with these being "crumbly", try using 1 cup of baking soda and 1/3 cup of water (plus maybe a few tbslp more) and baking for 20 minutes at 350.  THEN add a few drops of each essential oils to the cooled "puck".  That was a suggestion from a commenter and I tried it this morning with great success!  I'm a quick shower taker (less than 5 min), and my "disk" was only about 1/3 gone at the end of the shower.

We haven't tried this yet, though intend to later this week when I can source another box of soda to make them with! Just don't be tempted to add the oils before baking lest your oven (and kitchen) become infused with the scents!

Final thoughts

About the Live Below The Line Campaign

We're passionate about equipping people to make a real difference in fighting poverty, and so we focus on connecting people up to the organisations and issues that have the biggest impact. We run Live Below the Line because we think that to really fight poverty, we've got to try to understand it - and what better way than by spending just a few days below the poverty line.

In 2013, Live Below the Line is running in the UK, Canada, Australia and the USA simultaneously, with more than 20,000 people spending 5 days living below the line including celebrity participants Hugh Jackman and Ben Affleck.

I discovered the campaign (albeit belatedly) via Jack Monroe, a blogger famed for her £10 a week food recipes which she devised to feed both herself and her young boy through months of living well below the line right here in the UK. Although used to living on a consistently low food budget, Ms. Monroe will be taking part in the challenge too, making it even more difficult by "getting back to basics" and not allowing use of any growing herbs or store cupboard stocks during her five day challenge.

What can we buy (and eat) with just £5?

The Global Poverty Project has produced a guide for the challenge which includes sample shopping lists and recipe plans for single people. Whilst one of the sample weeks includes a pack of 99p sausages, these plans generally don't include any meat since a pack of meat could cost most (if not all) of the allowance for the whole five days!

Here's an example of a five day shopping/recipe plan. Though no specific supermarket is mentioned, I'd guess all ingredients are sourced from the Basics range at Sainsbury's.

Shopping List:

1 box of 15 eggs – £1.25
1 bag of apples - 71p
1 pack of baking potatoes - 60p
1 bag of frozen vegetables - 73p
1 bag of rice - 40p
1 jar of curry sauce - 17p
1 jar of sweet and sour sauce - 27p
1 tin of kidney beans - 18p
1 loaf of bread - 47p

Day 1:

Day 2:

Day 3:

Day 4:

Day 5:

I had approached the week not really having thought about the cost of food, or even the amount of food we consume on a daily basis. I even made an unconscious mistake early in the week when I put butter on toast without accounting for the price. It was a reminder of how little I equate food with cost, and a reminder one of my work colleague’s didn’t let me forget as I added 10p onto my total.

The week was surprisingly hard, more so than I had prepared for, as my energy began to wane and I felt constantly tired. Poverty hits children the hardest as it fuels a situation that is detrimental to a child’s development – imagine trying to concentrate in school when you haven’t eaten all day.

How you can help

Although it may be a little late to take the challenge this year, but you can still help by raising awareness of Live Below The Line or by contributing to one of the thousands of participants.

For health reasons, I won't personally be taking part in the challenge this year, though I am supporting others who have chosen to take part and hope to help raise awareness through this post and other social media outlets.

Join the conversation

Are you participating in the Live Below the Line challenge this year? What are your thoughts on the sample menu and the possibility of living on just £5 for five days' worth of food? Please feel free to add your experiences and commentary below.

Photo credit: SashaW, via Flickr

Bananas are the one fruit I know my children will happily eat. They're a staple item for our weekly online shop, great both as a snack or served as a quick dessert with squirty cream and sprinkles.

Unfortunately I often buy more bananas than we can eat, or they ripen too quickly and are left in the fruit bowl with their skins growing blacker. While overripe bananas are incredibly sweet, their appearance is a great put-off - after all, children far prefer their fruits to be brightly coloured and fun!

Feeling frugal, I dug out an old recipe for banana bread yesterday to use up those unwanted fruits. It went down so well I deliberately ordered more bananas than we need for this week's shop so I can make it again at the weekend.

Here follows our fabulous frugal recipe for sweet banana bread, which tastes wonderful on it's own or can be served for dessert with a generous dollop of crème fraiche.
Ingredients

• 190g self-raising flour
• 150g caster sugar
• 1 egg, beaten
• 2 (very) ripe bananas, mashed with a fork
• 60ml milk

Recipe

1. Preheat your oven to 170°C/325°F/ Gas Mark 3
2. Grease and line a 2lb loaf tin
3. Melt the butter and sugar together in a saucepan over a low heat. 
4. Remove from the heat and cool slightly. Add the mashed bananas and mix well.
5. Add the egg and combine until all ingredients are incorporated.
6. Gradually add the flour, followed by the milk and combine.
7. Pour into your prepared loaf tin and if desired, sprinkle a little more sugar on top to give it a little crunch.
8. Bake for about 35 minutes, or until a skewer comes out clean. Leave to cool, slice and enjoy!

As your baby grows to a walking talking little person, she may well become develop fussy choices about what, when and how much she wants to eat. Rather than sit quietly in the high chair, she'll likely want to feed herself and make choices about what she will - or won't - put into her mouth.

Eat together

Avoid too much fruit juice (as well as sugary drinks)

Offer a variety of foods (even if your toddler doesn't want to eat!)

Join the discussion!

As compulsory food technology lessons have been phased out of the compulsory curriculum, more and more teenagers leave school unable to cook a simple meal.

To encourage children to learn these basic skills, Leon Restaurants have set up the Cook5 campaign to challenge school-aged children to cook five simple savoury meals and share their experiences on the website.


I personally feel the Cook5 campaign is a wonderful idea. Children who learn to cook at home develop skills which will serve them well in later life and in addition develop a better relationship with food and nutritional choices.

Successful participants will be awarded with a certificate and free eBook for their commitment, and will also be entered into competitions to win cash prizes and cookery facilities for their school.

The campaign suggests 15 fairly simple recipes, categorised by age groups. For those aged eight and under, there is "perfect scrambled eggs" and herby chicken salad. Older participants might like to try lentil soup or homemade sushi.

Any savoury dish can be entered for one of the five meals to be cooked, even those which are considered "failures", and participants are encouraged to post photographs of their creations to share on social media sites Twitter and Facebook to receive votes which will help their chances of winning a cash prize.

Check out the Cook5 campaign website for more details or to register your child to take part - you may even find a new favourite family recipe!

Through these Easter holidays the weather has been as lousy as our finances: many rainy days, the temperature too cold to play out, and not enough spare cash to fund excursions to brighten the mood.

Then Princess had a wonderful idea: "We could have a tea party" she said. Since I always keep a stock of baking supplies in the cupboard, I realised it would be a wonderful idea. We spent the morning baking treats and enjoyed a wonderful afternoon having a picnic-style tea party spread across a blanket on the floor in our lounge.

In this post I'll share three recipes for delicious treats which we made for our tea party, all of which were so cheap to make with more than enough left (even after guests) to enjoy for the rest of the week.

Classic Victoria Sponge Cake

This classic British recipe is so easy to make and produces eight generous portions. We had half a bottle of squirty cream and a few leftover strawberries to hand which we used to decorate our cake, though it's irresistible when filled only with strawberry jam and dusted with a little sugar.

Ingredients:

• 110g self-raising flour (7p)
• 1 level teaspoon of baking powder (5p)
• 110g soft margarine, at room temperature (15p)
• 110g caster sugar (15p)
• 2 eggs (24p)
• 4 heaped tablespoons of strawberry jam (8p)
• Icing sugar for dusting (2p, maximum)

Recipe

1. Preheat your oven to 170°C/325°F/Gas Mark 3
2. Lightly grease two 7 inch cake tins with butter and line with a disc of baking parchment.
3. Combine all of the ingredients into a mixing bowl and whisk for about two minutes (with an electric hand whisk, about 4-5 if doing by hand) until everything is thoroughly mixed and the texture is light.
4. Divide the mixture evenly between your two tins and level off. 
5. Bake in the centre shelf of the oven for approximately 30 minutes until golden brown. 
6. When cooked, turn out onto a wire rack to cool after only 30 seconds - any longer and the cakes will stick!
7. Once cooled, sandwich together with the strawberry jam and dust the top with icing sugar.
8. Store in an airtight tin to prevent the delicate cake getting stale too quickly.

For a special treat, add a layer of buttercream icing or whipped cream between the layers in addition to the jam; spread a little more across the top and decorate with slices of strawberries or whole raspberries.

Tip: If you have paper doilies handy, place one over the top of the cake before dusting to create a pretty decorative effect.

Cheese Scones

We chose to make this delicious bread as we had a few overripe bananas in the fruit basket (which no-one wanted to eat as they were beginning to go black). It tastes wonderful served fresh and slightly warm with a dollop of crème fraiche or toasted with butter if it's gone a little stale.

What are your favourite tea party recipes?

Many of us feel the need to cut down on our daily living costs in order to make ends meet. Cutting down on the amount we spend on food is one of the first ways we reduce our spending, though often we find that cheaper foods are less appetising or nutritious than the (more expensive) choices we may prefer to buy.

For much of my adult life I have found myself having to budget well in order to make ends meet. Making sure I can prepare and cook meals within my budget has always been top priority, and I'm proud of the fact that my children have always been well-fed and enjoyed their food, no matter how little money I may have in my purse.

In this post I'd like to share some of the tips and tricks I've learnt over the years to make cheap food more appetising to help you prepare meals for your own family which look and taste great, no matter how little you have spent in making them!

Making cheap meat meatier

I know that in current times many will baulk at the thought of buying cheap meat which is neither organic or free range, but as our budgets shrink so grows the allure of cheaper alternatives. Unfortunately, cheaper meats may not taste so good, or may be bulked out by water or added fats.

Here are some tips to help ensure budget meats taste almost as good as the more expensive alternatives you'd prefer:

• Always marinade meats before grilling or frying. Even a simple combination of lemon juice and oil can make a cheap steak or chicken breast taste great!
• Leave cooked meat to rest for at least ten minutes before eating. This gives the meat a chance to pull back in the juices, ensuring the meat stays tender and moist.
• When cooking minced meats, do not add oil to the pan and be sure to strain off the fat which cooks off before adding other ingredients. Most budget minced meats (particularly beef, I've found) have been bulked out with added fats which can spoil the resulting dish.
• Prick sausages all over with a fork before cooking to allow all of the fat to drain out. 
• Crumble stock cubes into meat-based dishes to enhance the flavour, when cooking bolognese, shepherd's pie or casseroles, for example. 
• Another great tip is to crumble stock cubes and rub over joints of meat before roasting which results in a much meatier flavour.
• Skim off the foam from the surface of the liquid when stewing or casseroling meats. This foam comes from impurities in the meat, and removing it makes the dish taste much nicer, as well as ensuring the liquid remains unclouded. 
• When cooking cheap or frozen chicken portions, strain off the excess water which comes out during cooking before adding sauces or other ingredients. 
• A mixture of soy sauce and honey is an excellent marinade to use when roasting chicken. Try painting it all over the chicken with a pastry brush before popping in the oven - the glaze not only tastes wonderful, it helps keep the chicken moist!

Penny-saving pasta, rice and noodles

Pasta, rice and noodles form the base for many cheaply sourced meals, without the need for an accompanying dish. Here are some ideas for making these frugal foods more appealing.

• Try stirring in soft cheese and slivers of ham for a budget alternative to carbonara.
• Melt butter (or margarine), tear up some spinach leaves and cook until just wilted, then stir on cooked pasta and serve with tomato sauce for a delicious easy dish.
• Crumble a vegetable stock cube and stir into the water used for cooking rice to give it a delicious taste. You could jazz it up even more by adding cooked chopped vegetables.

Most supermarkets stock a line of budget pasta (usually shapes or spaghetti) which is considerably cheaper than even their own brand. In addition to being of plain appearance, these pasta types take longer to cook but can still be conjured into nutritious delicious meals. Similarly, long-grain rice can be found in "budget" ranges and substituted for Basmati in many rice-based dishes.

Packet noodles (Ramen) are a great frugal food which can be dressed up for a delicious meal or snack. My eldest particularly enjoys adding eggs just before the noodles are cooked to make a substantial snack (when he's particularly hungry he tops the dish with grated cheese and ham).

You can find dozens of Ramen recipes (almost all of which are very cheap to make) over at The Official Ramen Homepage including this recipe for Noodle Salad which I'd particularly recommend.

Making vegetables more appealing

What are your tips for making cheap food taste better?

Often we find that the most interesting and satisfying projects are free! Re-growing vegetables from shop-bought producer is one such project which is not only fun, but a frugal investment to the kitchen garden!

It takes far less time for the vegetables to be ready for harvesting than when growing plants from seed! Kids will love watching the plants quickly develop to maturity, while you can enjoy the satisfaction of saving on grocery shopping by harvesting vegetables grown naturally at home.

Here are three ways you and your family can grow vegetables from the leftovers of shop-bought produce which you can start at any time of year and in many cases grow on the windowsill if the climate is too cold. I've also added links to more projects found across the web - just in case you and your family develop green fingers after trying these ridiculously simple and gratifying ideas!

What you will need

Virtually everything required for these projects can be found around the home. Be creative and recycle containers such as empty soda bottles or cleaned paint cans for when your plants mature.

• Small containers (for rooting) - cups or jars are ideal for most projects
• Toothpicks
• Water
• Larger pots (for planting out if growing indoors)
• Compost (again, for growing indoors)
• Leftovers from vegetables - see below for project details
• Patience!

Growing celery from the heart

Photo by Feli

Never-ending spring onions

Photo by Feli

Sprout new potatoes

Photo by Jessicareeder

Grow lettuce from stumps

Photo by Kerrryj.com via Flickr

More great resources for regrowing vegetables from kitchen scraps

The first time I tasted chocolate fudge brownie was last year, when I bought one on a whim as part of a meal deal at Boots. I didn't even eat it right away, instead saving it in the fridge to have as an evening snack. To be honest, I didn't think I'd enjoy it any more than a piece of chocolate cake...

More about this recipe

This chocolate fudge brownie recipe evolved from one published in the first edition of The Simple Things which included fresh raspberries and vanilla essence. While I liked the idea of using fresh seasonal berries, I found the recipe a little too sweet and dainty.

The next time around, I substituted the raspberries for chopped, then whole preserved Amarena cherries in syrup (a delectable bargain I found on offer in Aldi) and left out the vanilla altogether. This resulted in a gorgeous brownie (which was quickly whisked off for approval by my Other Half's co-workers) though it still didn't quite hit the mark with me.

When asked to make a version of my brownies without fruit, I decided to swap the cherries out for chocolate chips instead. I like having something extra in the mix to add a bit of texture, and it was at this point that I decided the recipe was perfect. In fact, there was none left of that batch for my Other Half to test on his co-workers as me and the children (okay, mostly me) had polished off the entire batch within a day!

I hope you enjoy making, eating and sharing my best recipe for chocolate brownies! Do you have any suggestions for alternatives or improvements? I'd love to read your thoughts in the comments section below!

I originally wrote this post and eBook back in 2009. Since then our food bills have become even more expensive, but the advice offered remains as useful. 

So I've decided to re-publish this post and (hopefully) rekindle a little interest for Glamumous readers who may find it useful in 2013.

As I'm sure we're all aware, the cost of our family food bills has skyrocketed these past few months! According to the price comparison site, MySupermarket, the average weekly spend for a family of four has increased by as much as 25%.
Shocking, isn't it?

While we have little control over the rising cost of fuel, housing and other household bills, we can control just how much of our hard-earned cash we part with to feed the family. Switching over to supermarket own brands is not the only solution: there are many more ways we can choose to save money yet feed our families healthy and satisfying meals.

I've always considered myself a frugal mum. Compared to my friends and family, our food shopping bills are positively miniscule, and yet we always have food on the table, in the cupboards, stored in the freezer... In short, we are never hungry and I often feel smug in my knowledge of thrifty ways which are helping us survive this credit crunch.

So in response to encouragement from my friends (and all the articles in magazines which seem to teach us nothing new about saving on food bills), I decided to write my own ebook: Fabulous Frugal Food Bills.

This ebook offers useful tips, tricks and a scattering of family-friendly recipes to help you save money on your family food bills. From learning how to organize your food stores for maximum efficiency to saving money at the supermarket and even growing your own, I hope you will find something useful to lessen the burden of your weekly shopping trips.




In the spirit of sharing and of embracing thrifty ways, I offer this ebook for free. No cost, and certainly no advertisements! You can download this ebook in PDF format to read on your computer or ebook reader, or simply flick through the pages in the embedded ebook further down this page.

Licensing

Frugal Food Bills is licensed under the Creative Commons, Attribution, Non-Commercial lisense (which is to protect my rights as the author, and to prevent profit-makers from selling this free guide when it's intended to be free!). Feel free to download, share, re-use and redistribute this ebook however you like. All I ask is that you adhere to these simple conditions:

• Attribution: please credit me as the original author of this ebook.
• No commercial use: do not sell this ebook!

Please feel free to get in touch if you would like to discuss this license or any other aspect of Fabulous Frugal Food Bills, and I'll be happy to help.

Download this ebook

This ebook is presented in PDF format. In order to read this offline, you will need to use Adobe Acrobat (or other PDF reader) which you can download free from Adobe.

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When I first saw those TV adverts suggesting we could feed a family of four for £50, I naturally assumed this meant a week's worth of evening meals only. So it did come as a pleasant surprise to find this cost includes breakfasts and lunches too. For a whole week!



Sainsburys have developed an efficient, cost-effective meal plan and recipe guide to cover a week's worth of meals for the whole family to enjoy together. The plan does require sticking to portion sizes and does not include any snacks between meals, though undoubtedly it is a cost effective means of feeding the family on a budget.

Not all of the recipes appeal to my family personally, though there's nothing too OTT in there which they would particularly turn their nose up at! It makes me happy to know that in this climate of budgeting and moneysaving, even the big name supermarkets are offering a helping hand to families feeling the pinch.

I'll definitely be looking out for future meal plans from Sainsburys for more thrifty meal ideas and would love to see if the idea catches on with other supermarkets too.

Lately my kids have developed a taste for muffins. The chocolate chip variety to be exact. Since these seem to cost so much in the supermarkets (around £1 for four, which I personally think is extortionate) I decided to work out a tasty recipe for us to make together at home.

As the title suggests, this recipe is foolproof! Each and every time I've attempted this recipe, the kids devour the muffins faster than I can say "wait for them to cool". Which, when you consider how fussy my son can be, is a rather great achievement!

This recipe should provide enough batter to make 12 muffins if using the larger muffin cases, or 18 small ones if you only have cupcake cases to hand, and costs around £1.20 for everything (working out between 7p and 10 each muffin, depending on the size).
Here's what you will need:

• 250g Plain Flour
• 100g caster sugar
• 2 teaspoons baking powder
• A pinch of salt
• 1 medium egg, beaten
  
• 200ml milk
• 80ml vegetable oil
• 100g pack of chocolate chips (or two bags of chocolate buttons, crushed)
• [Optional] a tablespoon of brown sugar
  

Here's how to make your foolproof chocolate chip muffins:

1. Preheat your oven to 200 degrees Celsius (gas mark 6)
   
2. Mix all of the dry ingredients together in a large bowl
3. Beat all of the wet ingredients together in a jug, then pour over the dry products in the bowl. Mix well until everything is combined.
4. Divide your mixture between your muffin/bun cases, making sure each case is about 3/4 full.
5. For extra special muffins, sprinkle a little brown sugar over each filled case (optional, leave out of you're worried about the sugar content!).
   
6. Bake in your preheated oven for about 20 minutes, or until brown and risen. To be sure your muffins are cooked, stick a toothpick in one muffin and see if it comes out clean.
7. Remove from the oven and leave to cool on a wire rack. Then try to hide the muffins or they may well disappear before you have time to try them yourself!

You could make some variations to this recipe, such as:

• Reducing the milk to 180ml and adding a chopped banana
• Using plain wholemeal flour instead of white
• Use brown sugar instead of white
• Try berries instead of chocolate chips

I love making these muffins, especially as these are so cheap to make! I've found these can store for up to a week when in a sealed container, and they also freeze well, so if you're short of time double up on ingredients, use an extra muffin tray and make some in advance.

Hope you enjoy these as much as we do!

Image credit: wentongg, via Flickr Creative Commons.

Lately my kids have developed a taste for muffins. The chocolate chip variety to be exact. Since these seem to cost so much in the supermarkets (around £1 for four, which I personally think is extortionate) I decided to work out a tasty recipe for us to make together at home.

As the title suggests, this recipe is foolproof! Each and every time I've attempted this recipe, the kids devour the muffins faster than I can say "wait for them to cool". Which, when you consider how fussy my son can be, is a rather great achievement!

This recipe should provide enough batter to make 12 muffins if using the larger muffin cases, or 18 small ones if you only have cupcake cases to hand, and costs around £1.20 for everything (working out between 7p and 10 each muffin, depending on the size).
Here's what you will need:

• 250g Plain Flour
• 100g caster sugar
• 2 teaspoons baking powder
• A pinch of salt
• 1 medium egg, beaten
  
• 200ml milk
• 80ml vegetable oil
• 100g pack of chocolate chips (or two bags of chocolate buttons, crushed)
• [Optional] a tablespoon of brown sugar
  

Here's how to make your foolproof chocolate chip muffins:

1. Preheat your oven to 200 degrees Celsius (gas mark 6)
   
2. Mix all of the dry ingredients together in a large bowl
3. Beat all of the wet ingredients together in a jug, then pour over the dry products in the bowl. Mix well until everything is combined.
4. Divide your mixture between your muffin/bun cases, making sure each case is about 3/4 full.
5. For extra special muffins, sprinkle a little brown sugar over each filled case (optional, leave out of you're worried about the sugar content!).
   
6. Bake in your preheated oven for about 20 minutes, or until brown and risen. To be sure your muffins are cooked, stick a toothpick in one muffin and see if it comes out clean.
7. Remove from the oven and leave to cool on a wire rack. Then try to hide the muffins or they may well disappear before you have time to try them yourself!

You could make some variations to this recipe, such as:

• Reducing the milk to 180ml and adding a chopped banana
• Using plain wholemeal flour instead of white
• Use brown sugar instead of white
• Try berries instead of chocolate chips

I love making these muffins, especially as these are so cheap to make! I've found these can store for up to a week when in a sealed container, and they also freeze well, so if you're short of time double up on ingredients, use an extra muffin tray and make some in advance.

Hope you enjoy these as much as we do!

Image credit: wentongg, via Flickr Creative Commons.

As I'm sure we're all aware, the cost of our family food bills has skyrocketed these past few months! According to the price comparison site, MySupermarket, the average weekly spend for a family of four has increased by as much as 25%.
Shocking, isn't it?

While we have little control over the rising cost of fuel, housing and other household bills, we can control just how much of our hard-earned cash we part with to feed the family. Switching over to supermarket own brands is not the only solution: there are many more ways we can choose to save money yet feed our families healthy and satisfying meals.

I've always considered myself a frugal mum. Compared to my friends and family, our food shopping bills are positively miniscule, and yet we always have food on the table, in the cupboards, stored in the freezer... In short, we are never hungry and I often feel smug in my knowledge of thrifty ways which are helping us survive this credit crunch.

So in response to encouragement from my friends (and all the articles in magazines which seem to teach us nothing new about saving on food bills), I decided to write my own ebook: Fabulous Frugal Food Bills.

This ebook offers useful tips, tricks and a scattering of family-friendly recipes to help you save money on your family food bills. From learning how to organize your food stores for maximum efficiency to saving money at the supermarket and even growing your own, I hope you will find something useful to lessen the burden of your weekly shopping trips.

In the spirit of sharing and of embracing thrifty ways, I offer this ebook for free. No cost, and certainly no advertisements! You can download this ebook in PDF format to read on your computer or ebook reader, or simply flick through the pages in the embedded ebook further down this page.

Licensing

Frugal Food Bills is licensed under the Creative Commons, Attribution, Non-Commercial lisense (which is to protect my rights as the author, and to prevent profit-makers from selling this free guide when it's intended to be free!). Feel free to download, share, re-use and redistribute this ebook however you like. All I ask is that you adhere to these simple conditions:

• Attribution: please credit me as the original author of this ebook.
• No commercial use: do not sell this ebook!

Please feel free to get in touch if you would like to discuss this license or any other aspect of Fabulous Frugal Food Bills, and I'll be happy to help.

Download this ebook

This ebook is presented in PDF format. In order to read this offline, you will need to use Adobe Acrobat (or other PDF reader) which you can download free from Adobe.

Share and enjoy

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If you're looking for a helpful way to encourage your kids to learn to cook, here it is: the Real Meals cookbook which was recently published by our government in an initiative to teach 11 year olds the basics of healthy cookery.

Available for all Year 7 students through their school, this booklet offers 32 healthy and delicious recipes with easy instructions which is designed especially with young teenagers in mind. The Real Meals recipes were chosen after the public was asked to nominate the basic dishes every child should learn how to cook. What's more, the booklet has been endorsed by the celebrity chef Phil Vickery:

Cooking is a skill and often it is not learned at an early enough age. Once you can cook the basics you will have the best survival tool in the box to take you into adult life. Eating good quality meals made from basic ingredients should be part of everyone’s daily experience and by learning how to prepare simple and nutritious meals we will make this a reality (Source).

 
What I love most about this booklet is that the recipes are simple, easy to follow and based on frugally priced ingredients! Besides offering this to your children, you may well be inclined to cook a few of these yourself!

You can purchase a hard copy of the Real Meals booklet for £7.99 by calling 0845 60 222 60 (as it's only available for free distribution through schools). However, you can read/download each individual recipe online through the Teachernet website, or download a full PDF copy from the Direct.gov website using the link below:

Download the Real Meals Cookbook (PDF)

I hope you enjoy reading through these recipes as much as I did!