140+ Frugal Meals for Tight Budgets (Quick and Delicious!) - Boss Single Mama (2024)

Last Updated on September 4, 2023 by Rebecca Lake

Preparing frugal meals can be a great way to save on your grocery budget, especially if you’re trying to feed a large family. When funds are tight, it helps to have a list of go-to easy meals to make without spending a lot of money.

​As a single mom living on one income, I know the struggle to keep your grocery bill in check. Over the years, I’ve become an expert on the best ways to save money, which includes adding frugal recipes to our weekly meal plans.

Today, I’m sharing some of my favorite frugal meal ideas and recipes to help you feed your family for less!

What Are Frugal Meals?

A frugal meal is any meal that you can make without spending a lot of money. That’s a simple definition, but here are some things that frugal meals usually have in common.

• They have a simple ingredient list.When you’re looking for cheap dinner ideas, the fewer ingredients you use the better. Using less ingredients is a simple way to bring down the total cost of making meals for your family and it might involve less prep time as well.
• They use lots of pantry staples.​Some of the best frugal meals use lots of cheap pantry staples, which is a great thing if you already have them on hand. You might be surprised at how easy it is to make a cheap, simple dinner with some canned veggies, pasta or spices from the pantry.
• They yield large portions.​If you’re trying to make a family dinner for multiple people on a tight budget, then bigger portions are the way to go. And you can easily repurpose leftover portions for lunch or dinner the next day.
• They taste and look good.​It doesn’t matter how cheap a frugal meal is if you don’t want to eat it after you’ve made it. Frugal meals have to be visually appealing and they have to taste good too, which is a must if you have picky eaters.

Why Try Frugal Meals?

There’s a really simple reason to include frugal meals in your menu plan: they can save you a ton of money.

While grocery inflation is slowing signs of cooling down, food prices are still high. And if you’re trying to feed a family on a small budget, then it’s important to make every dollar count.

Frugal meals can ease the strain on your grocery budget because they don’t cost as much money to make. And making frugal dinners, lunches, or breakfasts doesn’t mean you have to skimp on eating tasty or healthy foods either.

​140+ Frugal Meals to Save Your Grocery Budget

Ready to dive into the list of frugal recipes? I’ve broken them down by category for easy browsing. And be sure to bookmark this page to keep track of all your favorite frugal meal ideas!

Meatless frugal meals

Incorporating meatless meals into your weekly menu plan is a simple way to save money when you grocery shop and it’s one of my favorite frugal food hacks. Cutting out even one or two meat dishes from your weekly routine can make a big difference in your overall food budget.

If you’re looking for some delicious meal options without the meat, here are some of my favorite easy recipes:

• Easy cheese broccoli casserole| Kid Tested Recipes

• Easy bean and cauliflower rice enchiladas| Spabettie

• 3-ingredient creamy tomato lentil pasta| Salt and Spoon

• Delicious meatless baked ziti (with mushrooms)| Kid Tested Recipes

• Easy cheese 5-ingredient pizza pasta bake| Two Healthy Kitchens

• Air fryer keto zucchini lasagna (vegetarian, eggless)| Easy Flavorful

• Fried spaghetti with eggs| The Short Order Cook

• Focaccia bread pizza| A Bride on a Budget

• Authentic pasta fa*gioli| Lynn’s Way of Life

• Baked tortellini casserole| Recipes From a Pantry

• Tomato tortellini soup| Recipes From a Pantry

• Fideo con papas| Thrift and Spice

• Bean and cheese tacos| Thrift and Spice

• Chickpea spinach curry| The Stingy Vegan

• Gluten-free tostadas with honey lime sauce| The Helpful GF

• Easy gluten-free slow cooker cabbage soup| The Helpful GF

• Budget-friendly homemade refried beans| Attainable Sustainable

• Turmeric lentil soup| An Off-Grid Life

• Savory cheesy tomato casserole| Healthy Christian Home

• Vegan white chicken chili| Planted 365

• Longhorn Steakhouse crispy brussel sprouts copycat recipe| Cooking Frog

• Slow cooker black bean soup| Flavorful Eats

• Sauteed beet greens| Maria Ushakova

• Whole masoor dal brown lentil curry| So Yummy Recipes

• Aloo matar potato and green peas curry| So Yummy Recipes

• Pumpkin and sweet potato soup| Aussie Home Cook

• Mushroom aglio olio| Aussie Home Cook

• Zucchini slice| Cooking With Nana Ling

• Roasted zucchini and potato soup| Green Bowl 2 Soul

• Simple vegetarian potato soup| Green Bowl 2 Soul

• Baked corn mac and cheese| Mrs. Jones’s Kitchen

• Meatless stuffed manicotti| Southern Home Express

• Best egg salad recipe| Joy Food Sunshine

• Savory oatmeal risotto| Foxes Love Lemons

• Crispy pan-fried gnocchi| The Littlest Crumb

• Vegan Thai green curry| Vegan Huggs

• Pastina soup| Christina’s Cucina

• Black bean meatballs| Fox Love Lemons

• Pasta and beans| Christina’s Cucina

• French onion soup| Budget Bytes

• 20-minute garlic chipotle pasta| A Little and a Lot

• Easy pita pizza 3 ways| Health My Lifestyle

• Chili sin carne| Health My Lifestyle

• One pot coconut lentil curry| Health My Lifestyle

• Greek vegan aromatic spinach risotto| Kopiaste

• Easy Mexican bean salad| She Goes Vegan

• The best slow cooker vegan chili| Happy Kitchen

• Lentil potato soup| Nibble and Dine

• Butterbean stew| By the Forkful

• 10-minute cauliflower fried rice| DIY Candy

• Creamy paprika pasta| Urban Bliss Life

• Creamy vegan sweet potato lentil soup| Happy Kitchen

• Pasta with ricotta and tomato sauce| End of the Fork

• Risotto-style pasta with pumpkin or winter squash| The Pasta Project

• Quick vegan flatbread pizza| Epic Vegan Eats

• Anti-inflammatory veggie soup with turmeric| Nutritiously

• Cannellini bean kale soup with carrots| The Rustic Foodie

• 6-ingredient lemon orzo pasta| Healing Tomato

• Rustic minestrone soup with rice and kale| The Roasted Root

Need help with meal planning?

$5 Meal Plan is a weekly meal planning and prep tool that can help you save money and time in the kitchen. For just $5 per month, you can get a made-to-order meal plan to feed your family for less than $2 per person, per meal!

get your first meal plan!

Frugal dinner ideas with beef

​Ground beef is a key ingredient for many simple meals and if you’re a savvy shopper, it’s usually pretty easy to get a good deal on it at your local grocery store. If you’re looking for some inexpensive ways to incorporate red meat into your list of easy dinner ideas, here are some of my favorite recipe options.

• Old fashioned sloppy joes| Salt and Spoon

• 3-ingredient sloppy joes (gluten-free)| The Short Order Cook

• Ground beef burrito skillet| I Heart Eating

• Instant Pot hamburger soup| Eating In an Instant

• Mexican zucchini skillet| Zucchini Zone

• Cheeseburger zucchini boats| Zucchini Zone

• Instant Pot frozen beef stew| Emily Fabulous

• Honey garlic meatballs| Healthy Christian Home

• Classic Italian stuffed peppers| Healthy Christian Home

• Sour cream noodle bake| Not Entirely Average

• Traditional Irish cottage pie| Not Entirely Average

• One pot taco pasta| Flipped Out Food

• Poor man’s stew| Cook at Home Mom

• Easy keto meatloaf without bread crumbs| Kim + Kalee

• Slow cooker ground beef stew| The Lazy Slow Cooker

• Meaty marinara baked pasta| Lynn’s Way of Life

• Slow cooker taco soup| Joy Food Sunshine

• Hearty mince pasta bake| Katy Kicker

• Easy skillet dish with ground beef and rice| Thrifty Frugal Mom

• Slow cooker pasta bolognese| Hezzi D’s Books and Cooks

• Ground beef taco casserole| The Roasted Root

Frugal meals that use chicken and poultry

Chicken is one of the best simple ingredients for making frugal meals because it’s so versatile and you can prepare it in so many different ways. And you can almost always get good deals on chicken thighs or chicken leg quarters at the grocery store.

You’ll pay more for chicken breasts or wings but buying a whole chicken is a great trick for saving money. And if you have extra, you can repurpose leftover chicken to make multiple meals throughout the week.

Besides chicken, you can also make some delicious frugal meals with ground turkey as well. Here are some of the best cheap family meals that include poultry.

• Cast iron chicken skillet drumsticks| Two Pink Peonies

• 3-ingredient crock pot chicken tacos| Two Healthy Kitchens

• Slow cooker chicken burrito bowls| Drugstore Divas

• Easy Instant Pot chicken fajitas| Recipes From a Pantry

• Instant Pot chicken parmesan pasta| EatingIn an Instant

• Buffalo chicken mac and cheese| Budget Delicious

• Crockpot chicken ranch casserole| Budget Delicious

• Ranch sheet pan chicken and veggies dinner| Budget Delicious

• The best chicken soup recipe| The Forked Spoon

• Chicken potato pasta| Feasting Not Fasting

• Slow cooker buffalo chicken sandwiches| Recipes Simple

• Crockpot ranch chicken and potatoes| Hearts Content Farmhouse

• Egg roll in a bowl| Whole Lotta Yum

• Healthy turkey tacos| Feasting Not Fasting

• Puff pastry chicken| Juggling Act Mama

• White chicken chili| Attainable Sustainable

• Frugal homemade chicken salad| Southern Savers

• Chicken corn salsa black beans casserole| An Off-Grid Life

• Tomato basil balsamic chicken thighs| Healthy Christian Home

• Simple chicken parm stuffed peppers| Lynn’s Way of Life

• Easy 30-minute chicken noodle casserole| An Edible Mosaic

• Easy baked chicken parmesan casserole| Dancing Through the Rain

• Grilled boneless chicken thighs| The Food Blog

• Chicken minestrone soup| The Food Blog

• Creamy chicken enchilada soup| A Grateful Meal

• The best jerk chicken rasta pasta| Simply Scrumptious

• Lemon pepper wings| My Kitchen Serenity

• Panko baked chicken| Nibble and Dine

• Healthy chicken stir fry| DIY Candy

• Baked chicken and rice| Mediterranean Latin Love Affair

• Boursin chicken| The Dizzy Cook

• Crockpot Tuscan chicken| The Dizzy Cook

• Crockpot ranch chicken sliders| Intelligent Domestications

• Instant Pot southwestern chicken and rice| Meaningful Eats

• Oven-baked ranch chicken thighs| A Cedar Spoon

• Yogurt-marinated chicken| A Cedar Spoon

• 20-minute pan-fried chicken tenders| Dizzy Busy & Hungry

• Slow cooker whole chicken| Dizzy Busy & Hungry

• Dutch oven chicken and potatoes| The Rustic Foodie

• Taco stuffed sweet potatoes| Whole Lotta Yum

Need help with meal planning?

$5 Meal Plan is a weekly meal planning and prep tool that can help you save money and time in the kitchen. For just $5 per month, you can get a made-to-order meal plan to feed your family for less than $2 per person, per meal!

get your first meal plan!

More frugal meal ideas to try

Aside from chicken and ground beef, there are plenty of frugal dinners you can make with pork or seafood. When you’ve had a busy day or you’ve fallen behind on meal planning, being able to whip up a simple meal is a great thing.

Here are a few more delicious dirt-cheap meal ideas to try when you need something tasty and easy.

• Schinkennudeln(German ham and egg pasta) | Maple + Mango

• Slow cooker sausage casserole| Daisies and Pie

• Old-fashioned tuna casserole| Two Pink Peonies

• Miso ramen inspired by Chaplin’s| Life of 2 Snowbirds

• Easy tuna noodle casserole| I Heart Eating

• Air fryer brats| Recipes From a Pantry

• Bacon and potato layer bake| Fab Food 4 All

• Country-style pork ribs| Gluten-Free Homestead

• Mussels fra diavolo| Nutrition Starring You

• Impossible quiche| Cooking With Nana Ling

• Devilled sausages| Cooking With Nana Ling

• Slow cooker marmalade pork tenderloin| Southern Home Express

• Salmon casserole| Southern Home Express

• Cheesy pasta mostaccioli| Twin Cities Frugal Mom

• Easy pepperoni pasta bake| Dancing Through the Rain

• Toad in the Hole| In the Kitch

• Tuna tomato pasta| Neil’s Healthy Meals

• Pasta with bacon and peas| Urban Bliss Life

• Sausage curry| Mrs. Jones’s Kitchen

• Kielbasa and cabbage skillet with buttered rice| Hezzi-D’s Books and Cooks

• Gramigna alla salsiccia| The Pasta Project

• Sausage and squash skillet| Planted in Arkansas

• Spaghetti napolitan| Just One Cookbook

• Kimchi fried rice with spam| Drive Me Hungry

Tips for Saving Money With Frugal Meals

If you’re trying to keep your cost of living in check, then getting smart about grocery shopping is a good way to do it. These tips can help you eat well–and frugally–so you can save money.

Meal plan

​Meal planning is one of the first things to master if you’re trying to stretch your grocery budget. When you plan meals, it’s easier to stick to a shopping list. And it also takes the stress out of putting dinner together.

You can sit down on Saturday or Sunday with your local grocery store sales flyers and plan out meals for each night of the week. Once you’ve got your meals planned, you can make your grocery list and do your shopping.

If you’re new to meal planning or you just don’t have time to do it in your busy day, you can use a service like $5 Meal Plan instead.

With $5 Meal Plan, you can get custom meal plans delivered to your inbox. It’s perfect for small or large families who want to make dinner less of a hassle.

Need help with meal planning?

$5 Meal Plan is a weekly meal planning and prep tool that can help you save money and time in the kitchen. For just $5 per month, you can get a made-to-order meal plan to feed your family for less than $2 per person, per meal!

get your first meal plan!

Shop sales

Limiting your grocery list to what’s on sale that week is a simple way to cut down on food spending. Getting to know your store’s sales cycles can make it even easier to meal plan.

​Does it make sense to shop at multiple grocery stores? It could if different stores rotate what’s on sale at different times. Just keep in mind any extra money you might spend on gas driving from one store to another.

Stick with cheap ingredients

If you’re trying to feed your family on a budget, then you’ve got to make some choices about where you spend your grocery money. This is where cheap foods and cheap ingredients come in.

Some of the cheapest foods to buy include:

• Dried or canned beans (pinto beans, black beans, kidney beans, etc.)
• Rice
• Pasta and pasta sauce
• Canned tomatoes
• Other canned vegetables, like green beans or corn
• Flour and cornmeal
• Bread crumbs
• ​White sugar and brown sugar
• Chicken thighs
• Bread and tortillas
• Seasonings
• Olive oil
• Peanut butter
• Shredded cheese and cream cheese

Those are all items you can add to a cheapest groceries list. Sticking with basic ingredients that you can repurpose into multiple meals is a perfect way to save money on food.

For example, leftover rice can be used to bulk up bean burritos for lunch the next day. Stale bread is perfect for making your own bread crumbs and extra veggies can be incorporated into pasta dishes, stir-fries, or casseroles.

Shop seasonally

​Buying fruits and vegetables in season is a smart way to save money, especially when you have a big family to feed.

Seasonal produce is almost always going to be cheaper than buying out of season. And buying seasonally is also a good way to change up your weekly meal plans.

For example, there’s roasted butternut squash or pumpkin soup is perfect for cold nights in the fall. Come summer, you can pick up ripe tomatoes to make your own marinara sauce or some fresh salad greens for a light meal.

Skip the processed foods

Convenience foods may save time when you need to make a quick dinner but they can also be pricey, not to mention packed full of junk. Buying whole foods might mean a little more prep time but they’re healthier and you can still save money if you’re shopping strategically.

Use cash-back apps

Cashback apps pay you back a percentage of what you spend. Using cash-back apps is one of my favorite ways to save money as a single mom.

You download the app and then link it to your bank account. As you shop partner deals or offers, you can earn cash back on purchases.

The best part is that you can earn cash back on more than just groceries. There are also apps that will pay you back when you shop for clothes, fill up your gas tank or even book travel.

My favorite cash-back shopping app is Rakuten. Rakuten pays you up to 40% back when you shop online or in stores at partner merchants.

You can also extra cash when you refer friends and family. And if you sign up now, you can earn an introductory $10 cashback bonus!

Clip coupons

​Clipping coupons might seem a little old-fashioned but it’s one of the easiest ways to save money on groceries. If you don’t want to cut them out by hand, you can collect digital coupons instead.

Plenty of grocery stores offer loyalty programs that let shoppers clip coupons and load them onto their loyalty cards online. And they can also offer special savings and promotional deals throughout the year for even more savings.

Final thoughts

​Feeding a growing family can put a strain on your budget. But the good news is that you don’t have to let high food prices eat up all your money. Adding a few frugal meals to your recipe rotation can help you keep everyone’s hunger satisfied without breaking the bank.

Need more money tips? Read these posts next:

• 55 Things to Stop Buying to Save Money
• How Does Rakuten Make Money? Is It Free to Use?
• How to Make Money With Rakuten
• Living on a Tight Budget? 15 Simple Ways to Save Money

Which frugal meals are your favorite?