Marita Moloney
Reporting from north London

Back at the hostel in north London, the first batch of meals are ready for delivery to a nearby community fridge, a social space where people can meet others and enjoy some food.

Aurelija Jancak has arrived with her bike and is loading up the lunches - today it’s vegetable pasta made in the Feast With Us kitchen.

She and her business partner at their delivery company NEKO began volunteering at several charities, including here, during the pandemic.

“It’s nice…it’s a way to give back to the community,” she says.

Jamie Moreland
Reporting from Leeds

Image source, .

Funmilayo Akinriboya runs BME Suffolk, a support group helping local African, Caribbean and Portuguese communities in Ipswich.

She’s grabbing beans, soup and cereal off the food bank shelves and every hour the racks of goods become emptier as her team fills food parcels.

“We stock it every week, but the demand has increased, so within a few days everything is gone”, she explains.

“People think those who come here are on benefits, but now it’s working people. We used to make 40 food parcels a month. Now we’re making 70”, she says.

The 39-year-old distributes goods like bread, pasta and milk, blackeye beans, plantain, red lentils and chili pepper.

“We have gari - a very popular food - and the best noodles ever. You can fry plantain with egg or cook it with beans, garlic and chilli pepper”, she describes.

Funmilayo says at home her family eat the same meals she distributes and doesn’t “give out any rubbish food”.

“When people come to you distressed and worried, it makes you feel fulfilled that you’ve made people’s life better.”

“The smile you see on people’s faces, that really matters.”

Justine Pattison
Food writer and home economist

Image source, Getty Images

Without changing what you eat too much, it’s possible to make some easy tweaks to your existing recipes and cut your costs.

• Go for the value ranges at the supermarket instead of branded products. Retailers are keeping their essential/everyday products at lower prices and tend to price match each other too.
• Choose cheaper cuts of your favourite meats, chicken and fish. Use chicken thighs instead of breasts, cook a thin frying steak instead of a sirloin, roast a pork shoulder instead of loin and pick pollock instead of cod.

• Reduce the quantity of meat in your recipe and add extra beans or lentils instead. Adding just a handful of red lentils to a Bolognese will make it stretch to an extra portion.

• Buy the less perfect or ‘wonky’ vegetables and fruit. Buy seasonally and stretch meals with extra vegetables. Make more use of frozen vegetables and fruit and keep an eye out for special offers. Any leftover vegetables can be made into hearty soups for the freezer.

• Canned tomatoes can cost up to £1 a tin. Swap for value cans at around 28p each and add a couple of tablespoons of tomato puree. One 200g tube of tomato puree holds enough to enrich 10 cans of cheap tomatoes.

• Use dried herbs instead of fresh for cooking. And look for blends of dried herbs and spices instead of buying the individual jars.

Colletta Smith
Cost of living correspondent

I’m pooling wisdom with Dr Rupy Aujla today to see if it’s really possible to cook good, healthy food with cheap ingredients and low energy use.

He’s a GP and a professional chef so thankfully his culinary skills are considerably better than mine!

We’re making a golden curry, it’s vegan but those lentils and chickpeas don’t just have a lower environmental impact than meat.

“Lentils, pulses, fresh and frozen vegetables are much cheaper and are really convenient options as well,” says Aujla.

“You can still get good amounts of fibre and proteins from those as long as you combine grains and pulses together.”

As the oven is the biggest energy guzzler I’ve told him to steer clear. We’re cooking on the hob today, and doubling up portions so it can be re-heated in the microwave tomorrow for a second, even cheaper meal.

More and more people are trying to cook from scratch as a way of saving money.

“I think it’s going to encourage more people to become confident in the kitchen," he says.

"Out of necessity people will have to think about ways to rely less on convenience food to be cheaper and perhaps more nutritious in the long run.”

The curry gets a big thumbs up from me and each portion costs just over £1, so if you want to try it yourself, here’s the recipe on BBC Food.

My five kids have different tastes - how can I cook affordable meals?published at 13:30 Greenwich Mean Time 2 December 2022

13:30 GMT 2 December 2022

Justine Pattison
Food writer and home economist

Jade is a single mum in Manchester, with five children aged 16, 13, eight, six and five. She says: “Everybody has different tastes, two eat red meat but the rest don’t. One is vegetarian, so I’m making slightly different meals for everyone.”

She wants to know how to make affordable healthy meals which meet all of her children's needs?

It sounds as if you have your hands full, Jade, so anything that makes life a little bit easier for you is essential.

Gather the family together and work out a weekly meal plan. Getting the kids involved will take some of the pressure off you and mean you can plan and shop more cost effectively.

Write the menu for that week on a board and get the children to join the cooking – and clearing up – if you can. Perhaps the older ones can even take charge of one of the meals each week.

See whether you can combine some of the meals. Are the meat-eaters happy to eat vegetarian meals two or three times a week? Cutting back on meat and eating more vegetables and pulses, or bulking out meaty meals with beans and lentils, are easy wins.

Are there meals that you can adapt to suit everyone? Making basic sauces and adapting to different tastes will be a real time-saver for you. My easy chicken korma might suit, as the sauce is made in a separate pan. You could add extra vegetables or mushrooms for the vegetarians and some stir-fried chicken to the sauce for the meat-eaters.

If you have a slow cooker, use it to make big batches of basic sauces in advance and then freeze them. If you have a large enough freezer, you can also rely on it for bags of frozen, cooked chicken pieces, veggie sausages or extra veg that can all be added to your basic sauces.

You can find more ideas for flexible recipes here.

Justine Pattison
Food writer and home economist

If using the oven, make sure you make the most of all the shelves and use the fan setting so the hot air can circulate to cook the food most efficiently.

For example, a roast dinner could have the chicken on one shelf, all the vegetables on another and a fruit crumble for dessert on the third(if you have a third shelf!). Instead of making one baked dish, such as a lasagne, make two instead and cook one above the other. Eat one and cool and freeze the second.

Image source, .

Justine Pattison
Food writer and home economist

Small changes can make your time in the kitchen more cost-effective.

By using your freezer more effectively you can batch cook, save waste by freezing leftovers and store a range of freezer-friendly ingredients that can be used for a variety of meals.

Your microwave is the most cost-effective way of cooking or reheating food, so use it whenever you can. If you are purchasing a new microwave oven, look for one with combination functions so you can grill or bake with it too. Stir-fries, stews and curries that can be cooked on one ring save energy and washing up. Bulk out any casserole-type dish with additional vegetables and pulses, like beans and lentils.

Use a cast-iron casserole dish (if you have one) to cook them in as they retain heat better. Stir fries are quick to cook and can be stretched with extra vegetables such as shredded cabbage. One pot pasta dishes are good too.

If cooking anything on the hob, make sure you use a ring of the appropriate size for your pan. Using a lid means that more of the heat is retained to cook the food and you can turn down the temperature down even when simmering.

Michael Race
BBC Business Reporter

Households are finding all sorts of ways to save money, according to the boss of Tesco, and that includes swapping what meat they eat.

Ken Murphy tells the BBC that more people are swapping pricier red meat for cheaper white protein. And shoppers are seeking out frozen veg instead of the fresh stuff to help make their money go further.

He says the UK is living in "times of turbulence and times of change" and people are worried about the "affordability of life today".

The Visual and Data Journalism Team

UK food prices have been rising at their fastest rate in 42 years – jumping 16.4% in the year to October, according to the Office for National Statistics.

That compares with overall inflation - the rate at which UK prices rise - of 11.1% in the same month.The prices of many key items in the average household's food shopping basket, including milk, pasta and bread, went up by even more, the ONS says.

Image source, .

Marita Moloney
Reporting from north London

Making sure things run smoothly today and donning an apron is Caroline Monkhouse Flower, the Chair of Trustees at the north London community hub FEAST With Us, from where we've been reporting this morning.

After taking up the role in August, she’s been using her skills from working at a tech start-up to come up with a strategy for the “young, scrappy organisation”.

Her role is “full on” but fulfilling, she says.

“It feels so tangible and practical, volunteers don’t need to have any specific [skills], you just need to come and bring your hands and your warmth to help the people who need it,” Caroline adds.

As a volunteer, she also regularly gets feedback from service users, some of whom must decide between a hot meal or keeping the heat on.

The charity is talking to other services about providing meals at Warm Hubs, areas where members of the community can escape the cold and socialise with others.

Michael Race
BBC Business reporter

Image source, Reuters

People use hand-held barcode scanners when they shop so they're not "worried about being embarrassed at the till", reckons the boss of supermarket giant Tesco.

The hand-held scanners allow shoppers to zap the barcodes on food and other goods as they pick it up - and keep an eye on the running total - instead of waiting until the checkout and potentially discovering they can't afford their groceries.

Ken Murphy, who has been talking to the BBC on Friday from a Tesco store in Hammersmith, London, also says the scanners are "really popular" because they allow shoppers to stick to a specific budget.

And that is a focus for customers at the moment: "People are managing their budgets much more tightly," says Murphy, adding that they are changing their behaviour by "trading down" to cheaper food.

How can my freezer save me money?published at 12:45 Greenwich Mean Time 2 December 2022

12:45 GMT 2 December 2022

Justine Pattison
Food writer and home economist

Kate in Somerset wants more information on how freezing foods can cut costs.

When it comes to freezing, you really need to know three things to keep your food in top condition.

• Wrap whatever it is you are freezing really well to keep the air out and label it clearly
• Make sure the food is cool before you freeze it
• Don’t freeze for too long – I reckon that three months is long enough for most foods

For extra advice on freezing click here. If you buy a pack of sausages or bacon, take out what you need for that meal, portion the rest up and freeze it. Or, make four or more servings of a recipe, eat one and freeze the rest.

It does mean that you will still need to buy the whole pack, but spreading it over several meals will help. If you look at your food budget across a month rather than a week, it might feel a bit more doable.

Is it cheaper to cook with an Instant Pot?published at 12:36 Greenwich Mean Time 2 December 2022

12:36 GMT 2 December 2022

Justine Pattison
Food writer and home economist

Diane in Edinburgh wants to know if it is cheaper to cook on the stovetop or to use an Instant Pot (a type of multicooker).

It really depends on what you are cooking and how long it takes, Diane.

If you already have a slow cooker and a microwave, you have two appliances with all the benefits of a multi-cooker (plus your stovetop and oven) without spending money and having a bulky appliance taking up space in your kitchen.

I have a feeling that many gadgets, for that matter, will end up being something we are drawn to as the cost of energy rises, but may be consigned to the back of the cupboard after just a few uses.

But I also know that some people swear by them, so perhaps the best idea is to borrow one from a friend and see how you get on.

We're live from a hostel in north London with FEAST With Us, a charity helping to tackle food poverty.

Volunteers and staff are starting to arrive for a busy day ahead, with preparations under way for a festive lunch in the kitchen.

It’s all hands on deck to whip up the party snacks for later, with the smell of gingerbread men cooking wafting through the kitchen.

How can I save on a food shop for one?published at 12:25 Greenwich Mean Time 2 December 2022

12:25 GMT 2 December 2022

Justine Pattison
Food writer and home economist

Marion Beatty wants advice for individuals living alone and cooking for one - who don’t have the money to buy prepacked fresh produce that's often sold in quantities aimed at larger households, such as a whole cabbage or big packs of bacon.

Yes, it’s a really tricky one, Marion. The larger packs are better value but can easily push you over your weekly budget.

You could think about shopping on the high street, if you are fortunate enough to have one nearby.

Local butchers and green grocers will be able to sell in smaller quantities. Any local markets should have a fruit and veg stall too. The cost per item could be more expensive than a supermarket but if you need to spend less money up front, it could be the answer.

Or, make the most of the meat, fish and deli counters at your supermarket if it has them. Another idea is to shop with a friend and then divide up certain foods and split the cost.

Planning your meals for the week could really help too. Think about how you can spread those ingredients across the week.

That cabbage you mention doesn’t just have to be served plainly as an accompaniment to something else - you could use it for a quick stir fry, or make into a colcannon and top it with bacon and egg for an easy supper.

For more budget meal ideas for one, click here.

We want to hear your tips on how to eat healthily on a budget. Tell us how you feed your family whist saving money. Do you have any food hacks you can share?

You can also get in touch in the following ways:

• Email: haveyoursay@bbc.co.uk, external
• WhatsApp: +44 7756 165803
• Tweet: @BBC_HaveYourSay, external
• Please read our terms & conditions and privacy policy

In some cases, a selection of your comments and questions will be published, displaying your name and location as you provide it unless you state otherwise. Your contact details will never be published.

What’s the most cost-effective way to buy groceries?published at 12:08 Greenwich Mean Time 2 December 2022

12:08 GMT 2 December 2022

Justine Pattison
Food writer and home economist

Robin Taylor in Shrewsbury wants to know the best way to shop to maximise the food you can get.

It’s best to plan what you want to eat over a week before going shopping and then write the most accurate list you can and stick to it!

Don’t forget to check your cupboards before you head out to make sure you don’t buy what you already have in stock.

Buy what you need or what you can freeze easily - not just if it's on offer, or if it doesn’t work with your meal plan.

Online shopping is useful, but I think it’s easy to be tempted to overspend as adding to a virtual shopping basket is much easier than lugging a real shopping basket around a supermarket. And you are probably just as likely to be enticed by items you don’t really need.

Buying larger packs will give you the best value, but the upfront cost will be higher. Spread over a few weeks, you will benefit from the reduced cost of these items. You’ll need to make the most of your freezer and also ensure you have room in your food cupboards.

Things like large bags of spices, or jars of sauces with a shorter shelf life aren’t worth buying in bulk if you don’t use them regularly, as their quality diminishes over time.

Here’s an article about budget food shopping you might find useful.

Justine Pattison
Food writer and home economist

Cook several items in the oven at the same time and choose a smaller turkey, or even two breast pieces, so they cook more quickly. Make sure you use the fan setting if you have one – it uses more energy but the cooking time and temperature will be reduced.

Use your microwave for cooking frozen vegetables and reheating. And take advantage of a slow cooker if you have one, for cooking the gammon and making slow cooked casseroles or curries for family meals over the festive season.

For a Christmas feast on a tight budget and lots of my money saving tips, read my article for BBC Food here. I’ve also done a vegetarian version, which you can find here.