Low-cost Eats Week 4 (Heat Climate)

You’ve made it to Week 4 of a budget eats meal plan! By now, your pantry is totally stocked, your kitchen’s working like a well-oiled machine, and also you’ve bought three full weeks of home-cooked dinners beneath your belt. This week wraps issues up with one other spherical of easy, satisfying meals—all nonetheless beneath $3 per serving.

As at all times, this plan is supposed to be versatile. You don’t should observe it in actual order, and also you positively don’t must make all seven recipes if that doesn’t work to your week. Be at liberty to swap in one thing else, eat leftovers, or double up on a favourite.

Want to regulate parts or swap meals? Our customization tool remains to be in beta, but it surely’ll allow you to make modifications and generate a contemporary purchasing listing. It’s not fancy, but it surely does the job.

And if you’d like a bit additional assist in the kitchen, every recipe has a step-by-step video tutorial on our web site so you’ll be able to observe together with confidence.

A decorative image showing the menu for week 4 of the Cheap Eats Meal Plan.

Make sure to discover the total month of recipes, the pantry staples listing, and our different weekly plans. Whether or not you’re right here for only a few meals or the total month, it’s straightforward to customise.

Observe

This week’s meal plan is filled with taste! You’d be stunned by what you are able to do with our pantry staple spices and seasonings. This week, you’ll learn to make your personal fajita spice mix and the best way to season home made sauces. Your meals will style higher and also you’ll spend much less cash, too.

Grocery Haul

Your ultimate grocery journey is usually made up of contemporary components and a few dairy and meat. All these pantry staples you purchased in Week 1 are nonetheless pulling their weight, serving to you retain prices low and waste minimal.

Don’t overlook to obtain the Week 4 Shopping List PDF to take with you to the shop.

Groceries for the fourth week of the Cheap Eats Meal Plan laid out on a kitchen counter.

Receipt

Complete Spent: $137.49
Complete Servings: 52
Common Price Per Serving: $2.64

Week 4 offers you the very best serving rely of the month—and nonetheless is available in nicely beneath $3 per plate. This contains full family-style meals utilizing on a regular basis grocery retailer costs with no gross sales, coupons, or bulk offers.

Funds Saver

Massive batch meals like baked ziti, casseroles, and pasta salads are key to stretching components and decreasing meals waste. You’ll see some overlap in components throughout recipes, and that’s by design—every merchandise does double obligation so nothing sits unused within the fridge.

The Recipes

A photo of Rachel in The Stay At Home Chef Kitchen with the meals from Week 4 of the Cheap Eats Meal plan on display on the kitchen counter.

Up above, you’ll see what every of this week’s dinners appears like plated. We’ve included a snapshot of the serving sizes and a brief video that reveals the meals in additional element. It’s useful to see the true quantity of meals you’ll be working with.

Right here’s a fast breakdown of the week:

Monday

This baked ziti appears and tastes prefer it comes from a flowery Italian restaurant, but it surely’s surprisingly straightforward to make. And the ricotta and cream cheese topping takes this one excessive!

Best Baked Ziti Ever

That is significantly the Finest Baked Ziti Ever. Your loved ones goes to like the home made meat sauce, and ricotta and cream cheese topping!

Tuesday

Say goodbye to boring hen dinners with this hen fajita recipe. With our home made spice mix, you don’t should spend some huge cash to get a number of taste! One other profit to creating your personal spice blends? You’re not getting preservatives and anti-caking brokers in your meals—extremely advocate!

Sizzling Skillet Chicken Fajitas

Take pleasure in scorching hen fajitas, made in a single skillet in simply half-hour! Fajitas are at all times a simple weeknight dinner the entire household will love.

Wednesday

This pasta salad is an entire meal with hearty floor beef, cheddar cheese, and veggies. Southwestern taste mixed with easy and inexpensive components makes this one an everyday go-to, particularly throughout the summer season months.

Cowboy Pasta Salad

Cowboy Pasta Salad is filled with beef, bacon, cheese, and veggies, all tossed in a fast home made creamy smoky salsa verde dressing.

Thursday

Gown up your normal hen and rice dish with Mexican spices and gooey cheddar cheese. Prime with salsa and bitter cream so as to add a bit one thing additional with no complete lot of additional effort.

One Pot Queso Chicken and Rice

Flip your queso cravings right into a full dinner! Queso Rooster and Rice is creamy, tacky, filled with taste, and made in only one pot.

Friday

This isn’t your canned Manwich sandwich! Floor beef is mixed with a flavorful tomato sauce and bell peppers for a simple, home made sloppy joe recipe that’ll make you loyal to the true factor!

Best Homemade Sloppy Joes

Improve your Sloppy Joes with actual components, veggies for texture, and toasted buns. This restaurant-worthy model is prepared in 45 minutes!

Funds Saver

For this week’s meal plan, two of the recipes name for salsa verde, so we purchased two 16-oz jars of salsa. For those who’re trying to avoid wasting cash, simply purchase one jar and a 7-oz can for the enchiladas as a substitute of shopping for an entire second jar.

Saturday

Spaghetti by no means regarded higher with this straightforward, lemon and herb hen pasta. This recipe is gentle and contemporary and appears prefer it got here from an Italian restaurant, however with out the value tag.

Lemon Herb Chicken Spaghetti

This straightforward recipe combines tender, lemon and herb hen with contemporary tomatoes and olive oil for a light-weight and flavorful pasta dish.

Sunday

This isn’t your typical, bland enchilada casserole. The avocado cream sauce is made with salsa verde and jalapeño, which add a delicate kick of warmth whereas offering moisture.

Creamy Chicken Enchilada Casserole

This straightforward hen enchilada casserole is made with a scrumptious avocado cream sauce that can have you ever making it time and again!

Make It Work for You

By now, you realize the drill. If life’s too busy for seven full dinners, skip one or two and revel in a leftovers evening. If one thing on the listing doesn’t sound like your factor, sub in a favourite from earlier weeks.

Use the customization tool in beta to swap meals, change serving sizes, or generate a brand new purchasing listing that matches your actual wants.