In the UK, yes, but over here almost no one has heard of “cottage pie” (at least not in the Midwest), and lamb/mutton is not a common item. Here, it’s “shepherd’s pie” regardless of what the meat is, just one of those regional language differences.
Fairy nuff.
With all the pizza talk recently, I’m surprised I only just now remembered that the profit margin on a chain pizza is roughly +300%. So, for a $20 pizza, the actual food cost is $5.
Of course, it depends on what you put on it, but the variation is limited only by your imagination.
In fact, I make a really good vegetarian “Shepherd’s pie” The closest it comes to lamb is when the shetland sheep dog licks the plate.
Beans and rice, as above.
Every now and again I cook up a pound of hamburger, then throw in a can of regular refried beans, a can of refried beans and some taco sauce*. This gives me burritos for about a month. Well, with a large package of shredded cheese, which lasts (and keeps) a lot longer than the “3-5 days” it says on the package. The only times I’ve had them go moldy on me is when they sit untouched or slightly open for 5+ days at a time. As long as you keep using it, you’re good for several weeks.
Chili, as long as you don’t get fancy. Same deal. Cook up a pot, freeze it, eat for a month.
- Buy taco sauce? You don’t have to! That’s what all those Taco Bell packets are for!
I do this somewhat frequently and can vouch that it’s a tasty meal and usually takes 25 minutes start to finish, with most of that time being the baking, so prep time is only a couple of minutes.
You can stir fry anything. Pick whatever vegetables you like add your favourite meat and any kind of oriental sauce you like and you’re there.
Home made soup is also a safe bet. Usually we make it with whatever meat is left on a carcass, but there’s nothing saying you couldn’t use any meat you want as long as you start with some sort of soup base. Don’t want noodles, then use rice instead.
Ditto stew, or even chicken cacciatore which can easily be eaten without any kind of pasta.
One of my favorite variations is Jamaican shepherd’s pie.
1-1/2 pound lean ground beef
1 medium onion, chopped
1 8 oz can mushrooms
1 11 oz can corn niblets (drained)
1/2 cup Blue Mountain Jamaican Jerk Sauce (although you can use any jerk sauce)
4 cups mashed potatoes
1/2 cup shredded Cheddar cheese
Salt & pepper to taste
Vegetable cooking spray
Spray a large skillet with cooking spray.
Brown meat together with onions. Drain.
Stir in Jamaican Jerk Sauce, mushrooms, drained corn, salt & pepper.
Cook 2-3 minutes.
Spoon meat mixture into 9 x 12 oven proof dish.
Top with mashed potato. Sprinkle with cheese.
Bake at 375° for 20 minutes, until cheese has melted.
This is the same advice I gave my son when he went off to college and cooking for himself.
Start with four basic foundations: Chicken, beef, pork and fish.
Then take three starches: potatoes, rice and noodles. Mix and match.
Now, pour tomato sauce over it, and voila, it’s Italian.
Put teryaki sauce on it, it’s Asian.
Put curry on it and you get Indian.
Put garlic on it, it’s French.
Put sour cream on it, it’s Russian.
Drench it with pineapples and it’s Polynesian.
That’s 72 variations right there.
Soup and sandwich, meat salad, Meatpies, gruel.
I use kunilou’s method of mixing and matching. Plus I make a lot of stirfries. I do tend to add some sliced or diced onion or garlic to most main dishes, because I think that this enhances most dishes. A lot of the time, I don’t have any specific recipe in mind, I just look in the fridge and see what we’ve got that will go well together.
kunilou, I love that! I’m going to pass it along to my college-age daughter.
I came to say that just about anything can be rolled up in a tortilla and called a meal.
One particularly easy and good recipe we use:
1 lb chicken breast
Taco seasoning
Pineapple (canned is okay)
Salsa
Chopped tomato
Sour cream
Guacamole or avocado
Lettuce
Cut the chicken into chunks and cook with the taco seasoning. We usually cook the pineapple as well, but that’s optional. Roll in a tortilla with any of the other ingredients that appeal to you. It’s a big favorite at our house.
Last night we had a steak salad, which made a little meat go a long way. Grill a nice small steak, slice it thin, and serve the strips on a big plate of salad with your favorite dressing and all the veggies you can cram in there. Maybe sprinkle on some cheese shreds as well. Last night we had this with biscuits and some fruit, and it was plenty for our family of five.
Pulled pork. Cook it in a slow-cooker and it doesn’t get simpler:
1.) Purchase pork shoulder.
2.) Purchase barbecue sauce.
3.) Dump pork shoulder in slow-cooker.
4.) Dump barbecue sauce in slow-cooker.
5.) Invite Opal for a candlelit dinner.
6.) Food!
I like to dump the pork shoulder and barbcue sauce in the slow cooker the night before I want it - I just leave it in the fridge, and start cooking before I leave for work the next day. Dinner’s ready when I get home.
This is all your fault - I looked at the list there of “65 Cheap, Healthy One Dish Meals with Good Leftover Potential” and we had Cheesy Eggplant Bake last night. Which was delicious.
And involved, I think, six or seven dishes. Grr.
Chicken cutlets! Buy one of those big packages of boneless, skinless chicken breasts and some freezer ziploc bags. When you get home, portion the chicken out, two to a bag and freeze.
In the morning, pull out a bag and put it in the fridge to thaw. When you get home from work, rinse the chicken, place it between two sheets of plastic wrap, and pound them to an even 1/4" thinness. (To pound them, you can use a special kitchen mallet, a rubber mallet from your tool collection, a sturdy bottle wrapped in plastic wrap, a heavy flat-bottomed glass or frypan, a can of beans, anything really.)
For breaded cutlets, arrange three stations: a shallow bowl or plate with a bunch of flour, another with a beaten egg or two, the last with either home-made or purchased breadcrumbs. Dredge the flattened breast in the flour (both sides) and shake off the excess. Then into the egg (both sides). Then press it into the breadcrumbs, both sides. Into a pan with hot oil, fry for 2-3 minutes a side. (They cook quick, which is nice.)
Want a piccata? Omit the egg and breadcrumbs, but do dredge the flattened breasts in flour seasoned with salt and pepper. When the cutlet is done, remove it from the pan, then add some white wine, lemon juice, garlic, capers, maybe some onion. Let this cook and boil for a bit to reduce, then add the cutlets back in and simmer 'till the sauce is as thick as you like.
Feel like italian? Dredge the cutlet in seasoned flour and fry up in some olive oil. Remove, then add some red wine, canned tomatoes, garlic, onions, maybe some oregano or basil (or both). Simmer 'till thickened. In an oven-proof container, layer the chicken cutlet, pour the sauce over, top with mozzarella and broil until melty and bubbly.
Serve any of these with mashed potatoes, rice, pasta, cooked veggies of your choice, and crusty bread.
I made a great pork fried rice last night that was delicious. Every ingredient is pretty much optional except the rice. (This recipe feeds a family, you may want to reduce the portion size unless you want a lot of leftovers):
1 lb boneless pork chops or pork loin, cut into small pieces or strips
3 cups cooked and chilled rice
1/2 cup diced carrots
1/4 chopped onion
3 chopped green onions
1/4 cup peas
2 eggs lightly beaten
1/4 cup soy sauce
Heat 1/4 Tbs oil in a heavy skillet. Cut the pork into small strips or cubes and add to hot oil. You can add pepper to taste). Cook pork in the oil stirring occasionally until cooked through; remove from pan.
Heat another 1/4 Tbs oil and add carrots and onions; saute 2-3 minutes until softened. Add green onions, saute another minute. Remove vegetables from pan.
Pour eggs into the skillet. As the egg cooks, pull it apart with into pieces but do not overcook. Add vegetables, pork, and rice and peas and mix thoroughly. Add soy sauce and continue to stir until mixture is heated through.
Microwave baked potato are cheap and nutritious. I just had one with some refrieds, salsa and a little sour cream on top. Yum.
Hamburger stew:
Brown some ground beef with some minced onion. Dust with flour and add a can of beef broth and a healthy shot of Worcestershire sauce. Add chopped potatoes and carrots and simmer until veggies are soft. You can also add some frozen peas or whatever other veggies you want. The broth will thicken into a gravy. Season to taste with salt and pepper. This dish is really adjustable to personal taste, it’s filling and it’s cheap.
Homemade cream soups are pretty easy too. For homemade cream of chicken soup, stew a couple of chicken breast fillets in a big pot of chicken stock (get one of the big cartons of stock at the store ) on low heat until they shred easily with a fork. Take out the chicken, shred with a couple of forks and set aside. Make a slurry of flour and cream, (or half and half or milk) and add it to the stock. The soup will thicken and get creamy. Add back the shredded chicken and season to taste (salt, pepper and poultry seasoning will do just fine).
You can also use this as a base for other cream soups – add wild rice, mushrooms, broccoli, etc.
Tilapia is one of the cheapest fish out there now, so I’ll post a recipe for that. It’s a big hit in our household, and it’s stupidly simple to make. (I may have shared it on some other thread at some point in the past.) I buy bags of frozen tilapia fillets and keep them in the freezer for emergency “what the heck are we having for dinner?” evenings. They’re so thin they thaw in no time flat.
Thaw a tilapia fillet and pat it dry with a paper towel. Season with salt plus whatever you like. (Onion/garlic powder, paprika, etc.) Slather mayonnaise (yes! I swear!) thinly but evenly over both sides, and then press the fish into some crushed nuts. Almonds work great, but whatever you like and have on hand will be fine. Just makes sure they’re raw and not already toasted. Lay the nut-coated fish on a foil-lined toaster oven pan and bake at 350 for about ten or fifteen minutes - until the nuts start to brown and toast at the edges. Serve with something green. (I always do it in the toaster oven since it’s faster that way and won’t heat up the whole kitchen.)
The mayo keeps the fish moist but is not detectable in the final dish. Fast, easy, delicious, and no prior thought or planning is needed if you have the fish sitting in your freezer.
I’ll throw into the “baked potato” suggestions the idea that a baked *sweet *potato is just as cheap and easy, and makes a nice change. More vitamin A, too.
Similar to a recipe posted above:
Brown 1 lb ground beef & 1 coarsely chopped onion; drain
return to skillet; mix in 1 lg Bush’s baked beans or Brook’s hot chili beans. Add 1 pkg taco seasoning, 1 cup frozen corn, 1 can diced tomatoes (do not drain) several dashes of Worchestershire sauce (to taste) and 1 cup shredded cheddar cheese.
Pour into a baking pan. Mix 1 box Jiffy Corn muffin mix up, addin a little extra milk to make it pour more easily. Pour over the beef/bean mixture, bake at 375* for an hour or till cornbread topping is done.
YUMMY!!