I know this is more popular on American groups but I kind of accidentally started buying rice and beans in bulk due to good offers. Tesco had 2kg of red lentils and 2kg of chickpeas on offer at half price, so £2 for 2kg. Farm foods also have chickpeas for 99p a bag (think its 1kg) and red kidney beans for £1.49. Then Tesco had jasmine rice at £5 for 5kg. £1 a kilo of these is now my bench mark.
I then put in an order with Wilton whole foods, 5kg of black beans and 5kg of pinto beans plus a couple of large containers of curry powder and onion powder for less than supermarket prices. (Delivery for this was £1.58 but could be free depending on your order and delivery service used) We are plant based so will use these things every day.
Heads up, farmfoods regularly have 1kg reg lentils for a quid so no need to wait for deals.
I have lentil Bolognese, or tomato and lentil risotto, or dhal pretty often and it's so cheap!
Yeah and it's great to have an easy meal always in the cupboard, I made a pasta sauce tonight with red lentils and a tin of tomatoes.
Also, farmfoods *always* have vouchers on the go - enter an email address on the website to get some.
Never pay full price at farmfoods, you should always be using a voucher.
Thanks for this, do you have any recipes?
To be honest, the things I mentioned are all I do with them.
It's all variations of "boil lentils with flavouring and vegetables". I'm a lazy cook so it's simple. Simmer lentils in veg stock and experiment with your flavourings and carbs.
Lentils + tomato + onion/garlic/herbs = Bolognese
Lentils + onion/garlic/spices = dhal/curry
Bolognese can be served over pasta or add risotto rice to make a lentil risotto. You can add coconut milk to the curry to make it richer
Lentils also lend themselves well to soups. I used to make an amazing carrot and lentil soup with ginger and chilli which is great when you have a cold but I haven't done it in ages
Edit you can generally use red lentils anywhere you'd use minced beef so you could do lasagne as well
I use my instant pot a lot, these are some of the recipes we use
https://www.slimmingeats.com/blog/4-ingredient-quick-lentil-curry
https://www.melaniecooks.com/instant-pot-lentils-brown-rice/18033/
https://nutsaboutgreens.com/easy-instant-pot-lentil-bolognese/
https://aplantifulpath.com/instant-pot-vegetable-stew/
For some good recipes using lentils check out rainbowplantlife, her curry recipes on youtube/her website are particularly good.
Thanks great tips. This is my absolute fave lentil curry and so cheap to make I always have a pot of it in the fridge or freeze in portions x
https://www.recipetineats.com/lentil-curry-mega-flavour-lentil-recipe/
Lidl have 10kg bags of basmati rice, not sure how cost compares.
Could also try Asian supermarkets.
lidl bags are pretty expensive just goto the world food aisle in tesco sainsbury’s and there’s always some brand on offer that will be better quality too
I do stuff like this sometimes. I have been buying industrial laundry detergent in 5 litre jugs for years, works out about 30p a wash which is way cheaper than anything in a supermarket and it doesn`t smell like a perfume shop either.
Edit.
Actually just under 6p a wash not sure why I remembered 30p
I don't want to be contrary but I've found powder from aldi to.only be 10p a wash. Less as I don't need the full dose in our soft water area
Unless it's branded stuff you're after?
I was wrong about the cost per wash, it is actually £31.95 for 20 litres which is 568 washes, so just under 6p a wash.
Where do you buy it?
Normally ebay, I buy 4 jugs at a time which probably last us a year. The stuff we use is called ProLine I think.
Found it, thanks!
I don’t know about OldOllie but we get it from a local country store. Can’t remember the last time we bought detergent 😅
Is the tesco jasmine rice good? When cooked is it dry like basmati or sticky (asking bcos I like sticky rice).
It's sticky, the one I have is Mai Thai brand .
Wow. Great to know. I hope I get this from my shop. Thanks!
The big shops have regularly good offers on Basmati the 10 or 20Kg bags, and they get even better around Ramadan and Diwali.
I’ve found some great Chickpeas offers in Amazon 5kg for £5.72 at the moment so was quite please with that.
If you have any near you, South Asian bulk stores are a great place to go for lentils of any kind (bulk packs and cheap prices) and rice.
I think a £1 a kilo on dry beans is the best Im going to get. Will look out for rice deals around Ramadan and Diwali, good tip.
https://www.recipetineats.com/jamaican-rice-and-peas/#recipe
I absolutely love this recipe it’s so full of flavour and I was totally blown away when I first made it. I add in an extra tin of black beans when I make it. You can get the Cajun seasoning from Aldi at a great price
You tried fish and a rice cake ?
And after that, a rice cake with maybe some fish
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Btw the rice is often cheaper on the smaller bsgs but if u prefer jasmine rice of jusst plain white rive then go for it
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I like having a healthy colon, yeah