Cheap Family Dinners: 20 Easy Meals for Tight Weeks

These cheap meals on a budget lean on the same handful of staples: rice, dried or canned beans, eggs, pasta, potatoes, onions, frozen vegetables and the cheaper cuts of chicken. If those are in your kitchen, you can make most of the 20 dinners below with one or two extra items.

Prices vary a lot by region and store, so no meal here comes with a price tag. As a rough guide, bone-in chicken thighs and drumsticks are often cheaper per pound than boneless breasts, and rice, dried beans and potatoes tend to be among the cheapest things in the store.

Keep these on hand

You don’t need every item, but the more of them you have, the less you’ll need to buy each week.

• Rice, pasta, oats and flour tortillas
• Dried or canned black beans and pinto beans, plus a bag of lentils
• Eggs, a block of cheese, butter and milk
• Potatoes, onions, carrots and a head of cabbage
• Frozen mixed vegetables, peas and broccoli
• Canned tomatoes, jarred salsa and chicken bouillon
• Garlic powder, chili powder, cumin, Italian seasoning and soy sauce

If you’re starting from an empty pantry, the grocery list on a budget shows how to stock up over a single week of shopping.

Chicken dinners

1. Sheet pan chicken thighs and potatoes

Toss bone-in thighs, potato chunks and carrot sticks in oil, salt, pepper and garlic powder. Roast at 425°F for about 40 minutes, until the chicken is cooked through. Roast extra chicken for tomorrow.

2. Chicken fried rice

Use leftover chicken, day-old rice, frozen peas and carrots, two or three scrambled eggs and a splash of soy sauce. It’s one of the best ways to use up the end of a roast chicken.

3. Slow cooker salsa chicken

Put chicken thighs in the slow cooker with a jar of salsa and a little cumin. After a few hours on low, shred it and serve over rice, in tortillas or on baked potatoes. It freezes well.

4. Chicken and rice soup

Simmer chicken pieces with onion, carrot, bouillon and water until tender. Shred the meat, add rice and cook until soft. A pot this size often covers dinner plus a couple of lunches.

Ground meat dinners that stretch a pound

One pound of ground beef or turkey can feed a family of four when you bulk it up with beans, lentils, rice or vegetables.

5. Taco rice bowls

Brown the meat with onion and chili powder, then stir in a can of drained black beans. Serve over rice with shredded cabbage, cheese and salsa.

6. Spaghetti with meat sauce

Brown half a pound of meat with onion, add crushed tomatoes and Italian seasoning, and simmer. Grated carrot or a handful of lentils in the sauce stretches it further, and picky eaters often don’t notice.

7. Sloppy joes

Cook the meat with onion, tomato sauce, a spoonful of brown sugar and a splash of vinegar or mustard. Serve on buns or toast with a side of frozen vegetables. Swap half the meat for cooked lentils if you like.

8. Cabbage roll skillet

Brown the meat with onion, add chopped cabbage and canned tomatoes, then stir in cooked rice. It tastes like cabbage rolls without the rolling.

Meatless dinners

9. Bean and cheese burritos

Mash pinto or black beans with a little cumin, wrap in tortillas with cheese and bake until crisp. Make a double batch and freeze them for school lunches.

10. Black bean soup

Simmer black beans with onion, garlic powder, cumin and bouillon, then blend half of it so the soup is thick. Top with cheese or a spoonful of plain yogurt.

11. Pasta e fagioli

This is an Italian pasta and bean soup. Cook onion and carrot, add canned tomatoes, white or pinto beans, bouillon and a cup of small pasta. Simmer until the pasta is tender.

12. Lentil sloppy joes or lentil tacos

Cook brown lentils until soft, then season them like ground meat with chili powder and cumin for tacos, or with tomato sauce for sloppy joes.

13. Baked potato bar

Bake a potato for each person and set out toppings: beans, cheese, steamed broccoli, salsa and plain yogurt in place of sour cream. Everyone builds their own, which helps with picky eaters.

14. Veggie quesadillas

Fill tortillas with cheese, beans and whatever vegetables need using up, like peppers, spinach or a little leftover corn. Cook in a dry skillet until golden.

Breakfast for dinner

These are fast and use eggs, which are usually one of the cheaper proteins in the store, though egg prices can swing quite a bit.

15. Pancakes and scrambled eggs

Make pancakes from scratch with flour, milk, eggs, baking powder and a little sugar. Serve with eggs and sliced fruit.

16. Frittata with leftover vegetables

Whisk eight eggs with a splash of milk and cheese, pour over sautéed leftover vegetables or potatoes in an oven-safe skillet, and bake until set.

17. Breakfast burritos

Scramble eggs with diced potatoes and onion, wrap in tortillas with cheese and salsa. Extras wrap well in foil for the freezer.

Clean-out-the-fridge dinners

These are for the last few days before payday, when the fridge is getting bare.

18. Fried rice with whatever’s left

Any cooked rice, any vegetables, a couple of eggs and soy sauce. Leftover meat is a bonus.

19. Everything soup

Sauté onion, add bouillon and water, then add the odds and ends: half a bag of frozen vegetables, a potato, a can of beans, leftover pasta or rice. Season and simmer.

20. Tortilla pizzas

Spread pasta sauce on flour tortillas, add cheese and any leftover toppings, and bake at 425°F until crisp, about 8 to 10 minutes. Kids like making their own.

Plan a tight week from this list

Pick five dinners and let leftovers cover the other two nights. Choose meals that share ingredients so you buy less. Here’s one week that works:

• Sheet pan chicken on Sunday, with extra chicken saved for fried rice on Monday
• Taco rice bowls on Tuesday, using part of a big pot of beans you cooked over the weekend
• Bean and cheese burritos on Wednesday with more of those beans
• Black bean soup or everything soup on Thursday
• Tortilla pizzas on Friday

That plan runs on one pack of chicken, a pound of ground meat, one batch of beans, one pot of rice and a pack of tortillas, plus the staples above. Write the five meals on the fridge so everyone knows what’s for dinner, and swap nights around when the schedule changes.

How to keep cheap dinners from getting boring

Eating rice and beans three nights a week gets old fast. A few small tricks help.

• Change the seasoning. The same beans and rice taste different with cumin and salsa than with soy sauce and frozen vegetables.
• Give nights a theme. Taco Tuesday and Friday pizza make planning easier and give kids something to look forward to.
• Keep a few cheap toppings around, like a block of cheese, a jar of salsa, hot sauce or green onions you regrow in a glass of water.
• Let everyone pick one dinner a week from this list. People complain less about a meal they chose.

For more ways to cut the food bill, see the full list of money saving tips.

Put the grocery savings somewhere

When a cheap week leaves a little extra in the grocery budget, move it before it disappears into the next takeout order. Even $10 or $15 a payday adds up over a year. The free Bi-Weekly Savings Challenge gives you a tracker and a Google Sheet that works out what to set aside each payday, so the money you save on dinners has a place to go.