Eat well, spend less 1: the basics - The Jewish Chronicle

As the cost of living crisis escalates, pressure continues to mount on the Jewish community.

The increase in the cost of kosher food has exceeded those incurred by mainstream food and drink. We all need ideas and solutions on ways to save money.

While many of the items in our budgets are often fixed, food is one area we can reduce. Many of us spend a large percentage of our budgets on food, and we also waste a lot of what we buy. In the UK we throw away almost 20 per cent of food purchased. Something as simple as factoring in a meal that consists of food just from our fridges, can reduce this percentage.

Plan, plan, plan:

The more we can plan, the better off we’ll be. So work out the following:

Weekly menu — stick with what the household like to eat. It’s nice to experiment and try new recipes, but if people won’t eat it, it’s wasted food and money in the bin.
Weekly food shop — make a list before going out and stick to it. When you shop can impact spending, eg: certain kosher butchers offer 10 percent off your meat shop on a Monday.

Never shop hungry —it can lead to impulse purchases.

Special occasions — plan ahead for big meals in the month like birthdays or Shabbat — if you have 10 guests coming for a special meal try to plan in advance to make cost effective choices. Consider dropping a course from the menu, many people get too full by the time the main course comes around and you’ll end up taking untouched plates back into the kitchen.

If time allows, try baking challah — some homemade challah recipes yield enough challah for all Shabbat meals plus spares for the cost of one large challah in the kosher bakeries. Plus challah freezes beautifully so it can be done ahead.

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Leftover roast chicken makes perfect pot pies Photo: Inbal Bar-Oz

Stock take tip:

Make a weekly kitchen inventory before planning a menu and prior to writing a shopping list.
List food that is in the kitchen in this order: fridge (shortest sell-by date), then freezer, then pantry. If there is a surplus of courgettes in the fridge for example, make sure to plan them into the week’s menu.
‘Sell by’ and ‘best before’ dates are for guidance. ‘Sell by’ is when the shop needs to sell it and ‘use by’ is when it’s recommended you eat it by so make sure not to throw it away before the best before date. Many foods, especially some fruits and vegetables often last longer than the ‘use by’ date. Tinned and frozen food lasts much longer than the manufacturers’ advice so (where you can afford to) stock up on tinned items when on offer, a tin of lentils can cost as little as 60p and be used in soups, stews, and rice dishes to bulk out a dish and add protein.

Menu makeover:
Start with leftovers. Make them the base for one meal. Roast chicken or Bolognese sauce/mincemeat is great in pies and pastries. Maybe make Sunday the night you use up any Shabbat food. Cooked chicken and meat sauces should be ok for up to 4 days if properly chilled in the refrigerator, and in the freezer for up to 6 months.
Use up ageing fruit and veg in soups and smoothies. Make a frittata with whatever vegetables are at the bottom of your fridge. Blitz up herbs with olive oil and freeze in ice cubes to add to future recipes.
Plan your proteins: most of us base each meal on a protein but it doesn’t need to be meat. Legumes and pulses make an affordable alternative — chickpeas, at approxmately 65p a tin (up from 40p this time last year) can be used with cauliflower for a cheap and flavourful midweek curry. (They work out even cheaper if you buy them dried and prep them yourself.) Perhaps make Mondays meatless and use cheaper vegetarian ingredients such Quorn mince for a veggie Bolognese or eggs for shakshuka.
You can eke your meat over a couple of meals, by using grilled chicken breast in salads and wraps for example. Rather than buying cuts, pick a whole bird and learn how to cut it into pieces. There are thousands of YouTube videos on how to joint a chicken at home. It’s an instant money saver, and easier than it looks.
Never throw away bread. If you don’t have space to freeze it, use it up in alternative ways — ie: salad croutons, bread puddings, as crumbs for burgers or meatballs. Try Silvia Nacamulli’s bagel panzanella for past-their-best bagels.
Do include all meals and snacks in your weekly menu. The place many of us falter is by only planning dinners, and forgetting everything else on our shopping list. Once in the supermarket we can end up throwing these items into the basket without much thought.

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Use up veggies for budget friendly salads Photo: Blake Ezra

Top shop tips:

Shop your own kitchen first. What do you have and what needs to be used up first? Build your meal around those items.
Make gains in chains by visiting chain supermarkets before the kosher shop. Use the KLBD ‘isitkosher.uk’ app to find loads of products that are approved or supervised as being kosher.
You can make simple wins by swapping your regular brand of cereal for a KLBD, Federation or SKA approved supermarket own brand of the same product.

All savings, no matter how small add up to big ones over the year and it will become easier to eat good food while spending less.

Over the next few weeks, we’ll be sharing tips like these plus recipes to give us the best tools to manage food costs in your home. Some may take some initial planning and effort, but in the long term the saving benefits will become second nature and ease our day to day living costs.

There’s help out there:

If you are struggling, GIFT supply weekly food packages designed to help supplement weekly shopping as well as meals.

Mesila UK provides a coaching service, workshops, and seminars on the basics of financial stability. Watch out for Ilana’s video tips on their website and at TheJC.com

GIFT and Ta’am are part of the Jewish Futures family of organisations.

Find more money-saving recipes at TheJC.com and Ta’am.org.uk

Brought to you buy The JC in partnership with Jewish Futures, GIFT and Mesila:, helping you eat well and spend less

Topics:

Cost living crisis

Food budget

Eat well spend less

Budget friendly recipes