Hello, my name's Santasha Nabananga Bamblet. I'm a proud or
the Order Kerni Whaltbury and a waddery woman. And before we get started on She's on the Money podcast, I would like to acknowledge the traditional custodians of the land of which this podcast is recorded on a wondery country, acknowledging the elders, the ancestors and the next generation coming through as this podcast is about connecting, empowering, knowledge sharing and the storytelling of you to make a difference for today and lasting impact for tomorrow.
Let's get into it.
She's on the Money, She's on the Money.
Hello, and welcome to She's on the Money. That's here to help you save money without feeling like you have to give up everything you love. If you've ever walked into the supermarket for just a few things and walked out wondering, if you've accidentally financed a small car, or if you've found yourself arguing with a self served check out because surely that total cannot be right. Well, my friend,
you are not alone. Recent research shows that grocery costs were up eleven percent in twenty twenty four, and look there's actually no signs that that is going to be slowing down. I'm Victoria Devine, and today I am on a mission to tackle the grocery bill madness that is making us all questioned if food is now considered a luxury item or not. With the cost of living absolutely soaring, we're all looking for ways to eat well without spending a fortune, and lucky us, we have the absolute queen
of budget friendly meals joining us today. Chelsea Goodwin from ten Dollar Meals, is here to spill her best secrets on slashing your grocery bills, making food stretch further, and proving that cheap eats doesn't have to be sad eats. Chelsea, I am so excited to have you on the show. This is like a fangirl moment from me.
Oh my gosh, right back at you, Victoria, I am so excited to be here. I absolutely love your community and everything that you're doing in the finance space.
It's the best my community. You're obsessed with you. So they introduced me to you, and then I was like, this woman is a queen. Your recipes are like not only cheap, but like good, and that is a hard thing to manage, especially when we're trying to buy ten dollar meal, like it's just it's exorbitant. Nowadays, Chelsea, your community is booming, Like your community ten dollar meals has
completely taken off. People are obsessed with all of the recipes you have, including me, and all of your budget meal hacks. But can we rewind just slightly? How did this all start? Who were you before you were ten dollar meals?
Well, it actually wasn't that long ago. We have to go sort of all the way back to twenty twenty two.
It does feel like a lifetime ago, though it does.
I feel like a lot has happened in that time. But I was and still am, a single mum with three kids. I'd previously been working in marketing, and at that point I'd gone from full time work to part time work. My income had harved, I was homeschooling one of my children and just really really struggling to pay the bills. I was living week to week. And that was at a time where I'm sure you remember everything had just started to go up. Food, electricity, ranch, It was.
Like that post COVID, not post COVID. Not sure what's going on, but why is everything more expensive? This feels rude.
Year.
Yeah, it was so tough. It was tough for everybody. So I think I got to a point where I'd already cut out all of their really frivolous expenses, you know, streaming subscriptions, stop buying clothes for a year. And I realized that the only part of my budget that had any give and where I was still I guess potentially
overspending was food. So I just started tracking spending. I realized that dinners were my problem area, and I thought, you know what, I'm going to sit down, I'm going to put my problem solving hat on and figure out a strategy to get this under control. And that's what I did, and I stuck to it and it worked. I kept my budget at about one hundred and fifty dollars a week for food.
That's crazy in this economy, Like that is crazy talk.
I know, I know. So yeah, it was a ride, but I got there. It made a huge difference, like stress, finances, everything.
So talk to me about your Facebook community. She's on the money. Also started with a Facebook community blowing up, and then we became a podcast and I feel like we have such a beautiful, engaged audience and I feel like you are probably one of the other people that might be able to resonate with me, going like, it's
just it's so much more than a Facebook group. It's a whole community, Like and I run into people, you know, you probably run into people at the supermarket who were like, oh, my goodness, you're Chelsea, So talk to me about your Facebook community. What do you think it is about ten dollar meals that resonates so much with so many people.
I think it's just that people are looking for solutions, you know, it's a combination of fact is I think it's the times that we live in. So many households are dealing with financial crisis and they're just struggling the same way that I was. And I think they're sick of being told, oh, stop being junk or but I'm not. Yeah,
I know, and that's what they're saying as well. And I kept at the point I started my group, it was because I kept seeing people posting in groups like yours, in other groups on Facebook saying I don't know what to do. I'm spending five hundred dollars a week. I've got, you know, two kids, we don't eat junk. We've cut out takeaways. What more can I do? And I thought, hang on, I've been here. I found a solution.
I can share this with you.
Yeah, maybe this will help people. So that's how my groups started. And I think it's just the fact that I'm short of showing people exactly what I'm doing. I'm like living it. It's not sort of and I'm not cosplaying being poor. I'm not, you know, I'm genuinely in this situation. And I found a solution that works for me. And it's also a solution I think that is working for a lot of other people that they can sort of copy and paste.
I love it, and I think I also love it because they're just easy. Like we're not talking about you know, having sixty million different ingredients and collecting pine cones and you know, steeping them in water to get stopped like all of this stuff, you know what I mean. Like sometimes you think that to be super budget, you've got to really cut back. Like I find them so easy because I'm like, Okay, cool, a mom has made these, they are tried, they are true. I can put them
in the fridge and like I'm not worried. I just feel like they resonate with so many people, and I want to know, like ten dollar meals, are we saying that we are actually cooking meals for ten dollars, because like, let's be real, you and I have both seen the Curtiss Stone memes where nowadays like you know, maybe back in the day, and when I say back in the day,
I'm in twenty nineteen. Back in the day you could have done a ten dollar meal, and now curtistone is probably like, oh, you can buy maybe a packet of grated cheese for ten dollars. In fact, the other week I was at the supermarket, why was a bunch of like four Broccolini's five dollars? Are you joking? Like that should be illegal?
I know, And I think this is what people are seeing, and they're getting so frustrated because they're thinking it's impossible right to put together a budget meal because they're looking at all of these ingredients that have doubled, some of them have tripled in price over the last five years.
Not only that, but they've reduced in size, so we're getting less for more.
Again illegal, it's not fair, And yeah, it is very difficult to go into the supermarket and put together a meal for ten dollars if you have to buy every single ingredient, and it was even difficult back in twenty twenty two when I first doing this. But I think, and I'm very transparent about this. I'm not giving people individual ten dollar meals their meal plans. And I think
that's the secret there. Well. I mean, I think it's something that people have been doing for generations, right, but I think somewhere along the lines it's gotten lost that sort of art of meal planning and making things stretch
and making sure there's no waste. And what I do is I will make sure that ingredients are shared across all of the meals, so therefore the cost is shared across all of those meals in the week, so you know, and if you have to buy that ten dollar bag of cheese, maybe you're using it in three or four different meals and that way it's only you know, two dollars or three dollars per meal worth of cheat.
And I think that that's a really good point as well. I feel like over time we have lost I don't know if we call it the art, but like having a well stopped pantry and that actually being really valuable and that's where all of your herbs and your spices and your flour and all of those things live that actually make up the bulk of some of these meals. And yeah, like that bag of cheese I was talking about,
I'm the same. Yes, it's ten dollars, but like, I don't know if you're like me, but I always keep my cheese in the freezer because I don't want it to go moldy in the fridge and I need it to last longer. Like all of these things that I've grown up with, I feel like slowly, over time people are forgetting. And I mean I keep my bread in the freezer. I think that's an old habit that is never going to die hard because I'm like, I don't feel like I can get through a loaf of bread
before it starts to go moldy. And there's no way I'm throwing that out. So now I just have frozen bread and I put it straight in the toaster and it's fine, guys, it works out really well.
I'm with you there.
Do you know what some of my friends are like, I'll have someone sleep over and I'll be like, oh, yeah, yeah, toast is it's in the freezer and they're like sorry, what And I'm like, what sour dough? Come on exactly. I'm not spending seven dollars on a loaf of bread to have to, you know, throw away the last four slices because I didn't eat it quick enough. Absolutely not, my friend, So I need to know, are you an Audi queen? Is that the secret to keeping meals at
ten dollars or serve? Or can you make it work shopping at all the major supermarkets as well?
Like?
What are the secrets?
I love Aldi, but I've recently moved from Brisbane to Tasmania.
Welcome. There is no Aldi here, So no, no, there's not I don't have.
A choice right now. And that's fine because something I decided when I first started my group, because I used to shop initially before I started sharing recipes, I would shop between supermarkets, so I would sometimes shop specials. I'd do part of my shop maybe at Audi and part of Woolworks or Coals. But when I started my group, I realized pretty quickly that not everybody has access to Aldi, but most people do have access to one of the
major supermarkets to do their major grocery shops. So I committed to only shopping at those supermarkets because I do share my receipt.
You are in a like you are just so kind. You could have been saving more money, and you're like, I know it could have, but that's not as accessible and I just want to make sure that everyone gets the benefit here, like you're an icon.
No, honestly, it's just like it's transparency as well, because I think it's unfair if I'm like, I've got this great, little, you know, budget supermarket down the road for me, I'm gonna do all my shopping there, and you know, ninety percent of Australia's like, well, we can't shop.
There, must be nice Chelsea, Yeah.
Exactly, and then they start to think, well it can't be done where I live, so.
And you're like, no, I actually came here to prove a point and I will provide receipts, thank you.
And literally providing receipts I think has been a really big thing because people love seeing the behind the scenes stuff and like exactly what you're spending money on, and then they start comparing to their receipts and.
Girl, that's me, Like, I'm screenshotting your stuff, I'm zooming in, I'm looking at what you got. I'm like, oh, what a win that was on special this week? Like why am I so.
Perf Yeah, we all do that, don't worry.
It's like when people post, like, you know, a photo of them at work or something and there's a whiteboard behind them, and I'm like, do you really think I'm not gonna try and zoom in on that? Like, come on, we.
All do it. And then you're trying to decipher what's written on that, what's your plan?
I love that. I feel like that is super kind and I got so many questions. But so now we know how Chelsea does keep meals more affordable. We need to know what actually makes your groceries go further, because it's not just about making them affordable and putting together quota ten dollar meal. It's about making your groceries stretch. So after the break, we're going to chat about the
biggest mistakes people make at the supermarket. Then we're going to talk about simple swaps to save money, and then how to cut down on food wastage. And it's not just my tip of keeping bread in the freezer. Soo, guys, that don't go anywhere. All right, my friends, we are back and before the break, we're talking about keeping meals affordable. But now let's actually dive into it, because we haven't told you any of the ways to keep meals affordable,
and I'm assuming that's why you have come here. So let's talk about some easy ways that you can save even more at the checkout, make your groceries go further, and cut back on food waste. Chelsea, When you're putting together the meal plans that you have, where are you starting? Because honestly, if you said start from scratch, I'd be like, I do not have a scratch. I do not know where to begin, and like that just feels like half the task, right, Like that feels like the hardest bit.
Yeah, and that's exactly how I felt when I first started meal planning. So I know myself and I know how much I love variety and my family love variety. So I will generally start with whatever I'm craving or whatever my kids have requested. So it might be like, oh, my gosh, I really really need to have Mexican this week, so I'll start with that, and I'll think, okay, let's go red meat. Let's get a cheap cut of red meat. And let's use that for multiple meals in the week.
So I'll just build out from the first meal. Be okay, let's do burrito bowls on the first night, and then I'll think about what I need for that, Like I'll need limes. Okay, great, Well what else can I use those limes for? If I can get away with using half a lime for this, can I use half a lime high food later in the week?
One hundred percent. We don't need the whole lime. We do not need the whole line. That is a privilege that you currently do not have.
Exactly. So we're just trying to stretch these ingredients. And obviously, I guess I have an advantage in that I can develop the recipes to sort of fit in with each other, which is great. And starting with the Mexican then we'll go to, Okay, what else could I use that beef for? Because I'm getting a big piece of beef.
Yeah, we're not just buying, you know, some steaks to chop up.
Yeah, exactly. We can't go and buy eyefill it or anything like that. It'll be like a chuck roast or a blade roast that we can slow cook. But you can also use cuts like that for sturfries, which I think a lot of people don't realize. If you tenderize them properly, they're beautiful and sturf fries. So I then
have a beef stir fry that week. I think, Okay, then we'll do some chicken, We'll do one vegetarian meal, and I'll just build these meal plans out until I've used up all of those ingredients and just yeah, making sure it stays under the budget. So using affordable cuts of meat, using vegetables that are in season, also looking at what I have at the time in the pantry or anything that I need to use up, or herbs
that I'm growing. But for the purpose of sharing my meal plans, I generally don't include any of that stuff. I'm like, no, we have to go buy everything, and we have to do it properly so people can replicate it.
You care so much about your community that you're like, I don't care that we have basil at home. With buying basil, I don't even care. You guys are going to tell me that I'm privileged because I've got my basil at home. Absolutely not.
If people see you taking shortcuts, they start to think that it's not something they can do, So I have to make sure that it's something like that people can literally copy and paste for themselves.
Yeah, and I think that that is one really beautiful but also just really keeps it relatable. It's like, Nope, this is exactly what it costs, Chelsea. A really big part about making meals budget friendly is really about knowing where to spend and where to save. And so many of us are overwhelmed with that, like what are we spending on? Where are we saving? Like you just mentioned big cuts of chuck roasts, Like I've never bought that.
That honestly feels a little bit overwhelming. So if someone is really struggling to lower their grocery bill, where should they start.
Yeah, I think meat is a big one, especially if you have somebody in your family, Like a lot of people say to me, oh, my partner just cannot give up meat, so we can't do any vegetarian meals. Or I have teenage boys or teenage girls that do a lot of sport and they need lots of proteins, so like we don't want to go without, We've just got to make substitutions. So instead of like getting a porthouse steak or I feel it you're going to go for the chuck or the blade roast or the brisket, all
of which you can buy. I'm pretty sure. Even still at the moment, most of them are fifteen dollars a kilo and under, so you're going to just make those last and get those bigger cuts. But I think a lot of that is also about education and just like people understanding that it's not overwhelming and knowing how to prepare them because it can feel a lot. I used to be so scared of, like broasting, even broasting a chicken used to scare me. So I get it.
But it's relatable, right, Like I know that so many people listening to this are going to go, yeah, I wouldn't have a clue. Like, so I've got my truck roast, no worries. I went down to Coles, I picked one up. Thank you so much, Chelsea. What do I do? Slam it on the bench and know where to cut?
Literally as easy as just throwing it in the slow cooker, throwing it in a pot in the oven with some spices. I can have that on in five minutes.
See, this is not how in my brain. It went in my brain. I was like sy it, and I would say, I'm a relatively okay cook. I'm just not someone who has been as good as they could be with being good at those bigger cuts of meat and you know, reusing them for stuff, because honestly, I'm a creature of convenience. And I feel like that's really relatable because we're like, well, if having chicken, I'm going to get, you know, either chicken breast or I'm going to get
some chicken thighs. In my head, that's the only options that exist. When that's not the reality of the situation, and I'm actually wasting hard earned dollars on things that I don't need to waste money on.
It's true, but I was in the same boat as you, so I understand that I actually do learn to cook. I should say that until I was thirty, So I went a long time. Like my kids suffered for a really long time with my terrible cooking.
They're fine, They're now going to remember mum slow cooked meals and be like, oh my mom sit at the bar.
Yeah. I still haven't erased some of the trauma of my early cooking, but I'm trying to make up for it every night.
I like it.
I do.
Hear a lot of people saying the same thing as you, where they're like, no, but we just eat chicken breast and I've never eaten chicken with bone in it and things like that. But they're just as easy to cook with. You just have to know what to do.
They're better, Like even the difference between breast and thigh tastes better than breast. You can't convince me otherwise every day of the week.
I agree, Yeah, But I think that's another thing where people don't understand where they can substitute things. So they see something in a recipe and they think, oh, I have to use breast because it says breast, or I have to use fire because it says fire, or I have to use this vegetable when there might be a cheaper alternitive that is almost as good or just as good.
It's because we're not as confident, and I'm so worried that if I pick a different ingredient that's outside of the norm, I'm gonna, you know, mess up the recipe and then waste dinner. And I don't want to do that.
But I think that one of My favorite things about what you do is like that education piece as well, because you start to learn what you can substitute and how things work, and not just talk about like oh you need X for Y. You're kind of teaching people how to substitute them, which I think teaches you just subliminally as well, like oh, if I'm making this other meal, I could actually use this instead, or you know, you've got your family favorite boldin aise, you can probably do
something really similar again, but make some small substitutions that put you in the right direction when it comes to saving more money. And I mentioned pantry staples before, and how I don't think that people have as well stocked pantries as you know our parents or our grandparents did. Do you think people tend to overcomplicate pantries and how can we be smarter with what we're choosing to keep on hand?
Yeah? I think a lot of people, like they'll see a recipe on TikTok or on Instagram or in a cookbook and they'll think, oh, I want to make that, and they'll go out and buy everything for it. But then they might be ingredients that they'll never use again. So then we end up with food waste and a whole lot of sources and spices and that sort of thing that you don't use, and then it becomes overwhelming and then they think, oh, well, I'll just take shortcuts
next time. I'm not going to cook from scratch, and I think I try to simplify it by keeping my spices and my sources to a minimum, like the minimum amount possible to get as many flavor combinations as I can with those.
That's actually smarter than I've ever been, because I'm not gonna lie. This morning, when I was opening the fridge to get some milk out, I saw that there were an in preparation for this episode. I was just like looking at my fridge a little bit different than I usually would, and I was like, wow, Victoria to Vine, that is three half eaten jars of capers. I can't be trusted. I really like capers, but I can't even keep track of what's in my fridge.
I mean, as long as you eat them, it's okay.
I will at some point maybe or maybe I'll buy a new jar. You never know.
Yeah, just don't buy any next time you go shopping. Okay.
Honestly, it's one of those things. I feel like we've all got that one thing though, that we convince ourselves we don't have in stock. Like my partner it's toilet paper. He's always like, every time I goes through my goot, need to buy toilet paber? What if we run out? Like me capers?
I think with me, it honestly used to be so many things that my fridge used to be a nightmare. My everything. It used to actually dress me out so much. Just the amount of food waste, the ship volume of like spices that I had that I didn't even really know what to do with for a long time as well.
Yeah, I'm not gonna lie. I don't know one recipe that Cardaman goes in. Not one. Do I own Cardoman though, yes of course I do. Oh it's not good, is it? And I feel like that's the sneaky budget killer right like food waste is the budget killer that none of us signed up for. Like I don't think any of us go to the supermarket by a loaf of bread or buy a packet of pasta and go can't wait to throw half of this away? Like none of us
do that. We're all guilty one hundred percent, and we all justify it as well, right, like we all go, oh, that packet, it's a little bit more expensive because it's bigger, but I'll like reuse it and like we never do. And according to research, it's apparently costing Ozzie households up to twenty five hundred dollars a year, which you probably already knew. That is literally money in the bin. We're
clearly getting it wrong. So talk to me, how can we cut down on waste and also save money at the same time, Like, what do we need to be doing?
Meal planning helps so much with that. I think it's knowing exactly what you need for the meals that you're going to cook, and if you're meal planning with a view to minimize waste, so like I do with sharing ingredients and making sure that there's nothing left over, the thing is there is always often going to be something leftover, so I think it's then having a plan for what
you're going to do with that. So if you know there's going to be you've got half a bunch of chibes or something at the end of the week, instead of them, you know, turning into mush and a brown mess at the bottom of your crisper, you're going to go, Okay, you know what, I'm going to make scrambled eggs twice this week. I will use the chibes on top of those.
It's just planning ahead for those leftovers. But also I always tell people that don't just plan for your leftover ingredients, but plan for your leftover servings as well, because if you're cooking meal and you have extra and you know, you put that bolonaise in the container at the back of your fridge and you forget about it, and that's heartbreaking.
So I think you've got to know either put it in the freezer, take it to work the next day, eat it for dinner the next night, like know what you're going to do with that as well.
Yeah, and I think that that is really smart. But one thing that is coming to mind, and I feel like you'll know a lot about this because you're a mum of three and a single mum of three at that, and that is mental load. And I feel like there is probably for you a lot of mental load going on. But a lot of us are turned off this idea
of meal prepping because meal prepping, grocery shopping. It just adds to the load and sometimes figuring out what to cook in itself is harder than what we actually cook and how long it takes. But do you think that mental fatigue is also leading towards us just overspending to combat the fact that maybe instead of thinking about it, this is just the easy way out.
One hundred percent. I can still remember, you know, being a corporate job, and you know, to come to about an hour before I had to go home, and I'd start thinking about the fact that I hadn't organized anything
for dinner, and the stress would kick in then. And then you're driving home and you're thinking about ideas, and you're in Woolworths and I'd like walk laps around the supermarket googling recipe ideas, you know, recipes in under thirty minutes using chicken, you know, and had no idea what I was doing. And then before I know it, I've got to go pick the kids up and get home.
And it was just it was like this repetitive sort of cycle that would happen, you know, multiple times a week because I hadn't planned my meals, and I know so many people do that and it's just so stressful. I think that's why we resort them to much more expensive convenience options.
Yeah, one hundred percent. And I'm guilty of it as well. And I mean one of the best changes I've made. And I'm very lucky that this fits into my budget and I talk publicly about it all the time because I'm obsessed with it. But we have Marley Spoon and some people like Victoria you could cook that for so much cheaper, and I'm like, yes, Chelsea would tell you that you absolutely can, Like she could literally recreate all of these for ten bucks, and you know what, She's
a genius for that. But I don't have the capacity to do that supermarket walk around all the time. In fact, I will spend more because I don't have that capacity. So for three nights every week we do Marley Spoon and then you and Nagi from Recipe t Eats you carry the rest of my week. And between the two of you with your superpowers combined, like I feel like you are carrying most of the budget conscious mums in Australia.
Yeah. I actually do encourage people to look for that in between option, like you know that option that's not takeaway, but it's offering you convenience. If you need that, and like you said, it's not a seven night a week thing, it's something that you do night's a week. But it's always going to be cheaper than getting takeaway. It's probably going to be a lot healthier as well. But you're also learning something while you're making these recipes and you
have the satisfaction of actually creating it yourself. But something I like to do as well, which is my sort of in between option, is I've got a list in the notes up on my phone. I've got a pinned note with a list of what I call convenience meals.
Okay, I didn't even know you could pin notes. That is game changing, adore lo pin notes.
I've got one of convenience meals where I can go into the supermarket and their meals that will take me about fifteen minutes to put together. Where I'm not really cooking much from scratch, so sometimes it's getting those pre made cofters, those mincekebats that you can get at cales or Woolies. I will get those. I'll get some curss couss if I don't have it at home, because you
don't have to cook cosscuss on the stove. You just pour boiling water over it and I'll either get you get a pre made salad or you could just grab I'll grab a cucumber and some tomato. I'll dice that while the cofters are in the pan.
It's so quick, Okay. I have to ask, do you have that note screenshot on your Instagram so that we can go screenshot it and add it to.
Our sur I should do it. You know what, that's a great idea.
Are you telling me that you have a resource that could literally help mums who are turning up to the supermarket.
I hadn't said. I actually did a series of them once in my Facebook group a while back, where I just did a week of these sort of meals, just showing people picon and I think it's like, it's not rocket science.
Okay, but it feels like rocket science when I'm standing blankly at the chicken section.
Yeah, and that's the thing, And I'm like a lot of the stuff I share are the things that I wish I had ten years ago.
So you know, yeah, well, we want the screenshot and then we will screenshot it and then copy and paste it into our notes. And then every single time that we're feeling overwhelmed and actually haven't done our meal plan prep. We're going to be like Chelsea still got us. I adore this And before you mentioned uber eats, and I feel like we all know that feeling after a long day, like you really don't want to do the supermarket dance.
You just want to get home and then you open the fridge and it's uninspiring and it's honestly overwhelming, and Uber eats is honestly I feel like they call my name, like I can just hear the app on my phone singing, Victoria, it's me, And then I pick up my phone and I've ordered fifty dollars of takeaway, but takeaway is so expensive? So what are your tips on me? This has now become personal and the rest of my community being able to avoid that.
Okay, So one of them would be having some convenience meals that you can grab and it may not even be something at the supermarket. For instance, I have a bakery near me that does a tendle of family pie.
Oh that's a good deal, I know it does.
So I could get that. I could get a bag of chips from the supermarket and maybe some broccoli or something. If I felt like being healthy.
Yeah, but not broccolni broccolinis out of the tax bracket for everybody nowadays.
Unless it's that like two months that it's in season. No, So just having those options for not uber eats, not drive through, but it's just very quick requires or no cooking. Another thing I always try to do is to have meals in the freezer, so just cook a little bit extra in the meal plans in my cookbook and the
ones that I share in my group. I'll often have one night while you'll make a double batch of something, so that gives you the opportunity to either put those meals in the freezer or you get a night off cooking one week where you might be tempted to get takeaway, But.
I think that's me, that's literally me, and you will be happy to know that I have got a convenience meal now in the fridge and we are now freezing our leftovers because my husband and I had to come to the realization that even all of our best intentions mean that our leftovers get left in the fridge because we forget to take them in the morning, so now they're being frozen. And I just feel like even if
you're not struggling financially with your budget. I just feel like it is such a smart idea to start caring about the little things, because the little things become the
big things, and then the big things become issues. And this is honestly, even beyond the fact that they are very budget friendly, they are yummy, They work, and they take away that mental load, and I think that that is so important and the fact that I can if I'm not Unlike, let's be honest, everyone who knows me knows that my husband does most of the cooking in this house. But the reason he does is because there's a plan. If there is no plan, it is my responsibility.
This plan my husband's across. And that to me is amazing. I can be like, Okay, here's the meal plan or here's you know, the recipe, and whoever gets home first starts and I think that that is really helpful in a relationship as well.
I agree, yeah, And I think also like sharing the load with your family is really important. I get a lot of feedback from people that cook my recipes because I separate my recipes into prep steps and cook steps so they'll get their partner to do like the prep, or they'll get their teenage children to do the prep before they get home from school and then they'll walk through the door. Everything's done and they just need to do like all the Stoke top cooking.
Literally, Chelsea said, sit down, guys, we have Marley Spoon at home.
I honestly like, I have described my book as a meal kit alternative because you get the grocery list and people have shown me screenshots of their Woolworth or their Coals shopping lists and they have Chelsea Week one, Chelsea Week two of all the grocery lists for my meal plans, and now they just have to like they could just order the whole list and it's like a meal kit.
They are so smart. You could definitely put that into Woolies online.
I know. I was like, you guys are way ahead of me. That's awesome.
I mean, that's why it's a community. It's a give and take. Like you thought it was just you giving, You are wrong, my friend. I learned so much from my community literally every day having poured over your book.
One of my favorite features It's not going to come as a surprise, was the swap and save sections, and I thought that was just really smart, because that's what I was alluding to earlier when I said that, like you give really great alternatives, like you can, you know, even do swaps and saves of things that you know are more traditional recipes in your Like I don't know vocabulary, but I want to know, what do you think are three of your favorite like swaps that you can make
that help you save money.
I think again, like we were talking about before, a lot of them are making swaps for seasonal veggies. And I'll usually give people options, so I write them in the recipe notes of my recipes, but I also put that in the swap and save section of each meal plan, where I'll say, okay, if capsicum is really expensive, instead you can buy this, this or this, or if for instance, sometimes it's actually cheaper to buy a bag of coleslaw than to buy cabbage. Things like that that people don't
think of. They think, oh, God, surely cabbage would always be cheaper and then you can shred it yourself. But no, sometimes the cabbage that's already pre streted in a bag is going to be cheaper if it's not in seasons. So it's just giving people those options and just making them aware of the fact that these items might be cheaper at different times of the year. Also a lot of the time just reminding people that home brand is usually just as good.
It's usually the same thing repackaged.
Yeah, I'll say to them. I will say, though, the only item I do encourage people not to buy, the cheapest home brand item is with pasta. I agree, yeah, just because I've found, especially over the last few years, that the quality of that one dollar pasta.
Is just it's going down.
Yeah, it's not it. So I think if you're going to splurge a little bit, that's a swap and safe where you maybe spend a dollar extra.
No, And I like that for keeping it real because it means that we're just not having bad tasting meals. And I mean, if you still love the dollar past it, go for it. You're saving even more money, Queen. But I do think it's quite funny because we have a series on Cheese on the Money called name Brand Versus Generic, where our team puts on a blindfold and then tries the name brand versus generic. I didn't appreciate the time they made me try flour raw and try and tell
the difference. But I'm telling you right now, even raw can't tell the difference. But do you know what, we could tell the difference between dry pasta. We absolutely could, even when it wasn't cooked dry pasta, the dollar stuff was not as good.
It's a texture. It just falls apart a lot easier. And then I think people get disappointed when they cook something and they're like, oh, my rigatoni is in tiny pieces and.
It's become spaghetti.
Yeah, exactly. That is one of the only items, yeah, that I would say, spend that little bit more, But no, I think meat is one of the big ones as far as swaps, just knowing which cuts you can swap, even with mints, Like a lot of people don't realize if it's a say a pork mintce recipe, you can probably use chicken mints, you can probably use turkey mints and it's not going to make a difference, or that lamb and beef mints can often be interchangeable, or even
beef and pork. So I think just pointing those things out to people so they know they have options.
And I love that, but I need to know. I know that you said you'd spend it dollar more on pasta, but when it comes to convenience, like pre made foods. Are there anything that you've absolutely canceled that you absolutely refuse to buy anymore because it's i don't know, so much cheaper and all better to just make it yourself. Yeah.
Well, I should start by saying, like, no judgment to anybody that does purchase these items, because I know a lot of people do for convenience, But for me, I would say recipe bases, so you know, there's sachets that you can get, there's a huge section in the supermarket. Simmer sauces are a no go for me.
Are we allowed to keep them while we gain some confidence while reading your cookbook and then get rid of them later once we have a stocked pantry. Absolutely, Okay, well let them have them for the interim, but once you've read Chelsea's book, like you'll be on her team.
Well, ween, people loft them slowly, but that's funnily enough. That's something I hear people say, like I haven't bought a simmer sauce in six months.
I'm like, I feel like, honestly, it's a gateway. It's a gateway drug.
Yeah, And I guess because I used to buy them as well, but I think it's once you start sort of seasoning your food from scratch, you realize how much cheaper it is and you realize how much better it tastes. So it's very difficult to come back after that.
I agree, Chelsea. I mentioned before that people's lives are going to change when they read your book, and they're going to no longer buy Semma sauces, which honestly is really big. Like you too, we can go to the meeting, we can all sit around in a circle and say that I haven't bought a Sima sauce in six months, but you actually have a brand new book coming out. I want to know. Tell us that is so exciting. That means that the first book did really well, Chelsea.
But what's the difference about this one and how's it going to help us level up our budget and our meal game even more?
Okay, so my second book is called Money Saving Meal Plans at Chelsea, and it.
Does what it says it's going to do on the box.
Yeah, exactly. So I think I would have been crucified if I'd changed the format from my first book, because people really loved the grocery list, the meal plans the budget recipes, so I wasn't going to change anything in that way. But great thing about having a community you get so much feedback. So I was having people saying, oh, I'd love it if you do a vegetarian book, where I'd love it if you do a slow cooker book, and I thought, you know what, I'm getting all these requests.
I'm going to be eighty before I can write all these books feels.
But also you can be like me and you can pump out like I don't know, five in three years. It's like I believe in you. It's a lot the mental load we were talking about before books are on another level.
I have full respect to anybody that has written a book, honestly, but yeah, I thought I can try and incorporate all these things that people have requested into one book. So what I've done in this book that's different is that each meal plan is categorized. So I have a thirty minute plan, I have a meat free plan to cater for the vegetarians. I have a slow cooker plan, an air fryer plan, but also have provided instructions for stovetop and oven cooking for people that don't have appliances.
Oh, you're a nicon. I was like, I don't actually own an air fryer, and I feel like I'm one of the only people in the entire country that doesn't own any a fry nor do I feel the need to own one, which I think is the most concerning part.
Honestly, I don't use mine very often, but I know that people love them, and I know that people are looking for recipes to cook in their air fryers. So given the people what they want, and yeah, so it's just eight meal plans and then a chapter of budget sides, and a lot of the meals work in together, so you can swap different things around. A lot of the meals also complement the meals in the first book really well, because I know sometimes people say to me, oh, I've
got guests coming over, what can I make? So I can say, Okay, why don't you make this in the first book, and then use these sides from the second book.
And oh, that's genius, because I never know what to do when people are coming over, and that I would say it's one of the say the biggest money sucks because I definitely don't entertain enough, but it's a really big money because then I'm like, okay, you know what I'm going to do. I'm just going to do a roast because crowd pleaser. Yes it's more expensive, but I know how to do that, and I know how to do that well. But like that ends up becoming a very expensive dinner for four people.
It can, it can. So I think having also those like options for entertaining is really important for people because most people at some point will have guests over for dinner or even things that they can cook for Easter or for Christmas or when they have to bring a plate.
Just thought of everything exactly.
So try to cover all my bases so that there's something for everybody, but also really just working within that. Still a budget for this second book, it's three dollars per serve is the figure I gave myself.
I feel like that is still very impressive. Three dollars a serve is more than reasonable, I think.
So it's still like very budget friendly.
And in twenty twenty five, that's I would say, still unheard of. Like that is incredible, still difficult.
Put it that way. It's not an easy us.
No, but you've done the work for us, so for me, it is very easy and I hope I share that. Now, Chelsea, you have been insanely kind and you've actually put together a three recipe meal plan just for people in the She's on the Money community, Like that was so nice of you. Can you actually give me a little bit of insight And guys, don't worry, I'm going to put the link to that in the show notes so that you can get that in your inbox asap and give
it a crack. But Chelsea, why did you pick those three recipes and how I guess they fit into a budget friendly meal plan?
Okay, Well, I've been in your community in your Facebook group for a long time now, so I get a feel for like who they are and what their sort of lifestyle is and that sort of thing. So I know you've got a mix of like people who have
families and people who are single, people in couples. So what I've chosen is it's from my week two meal plan from my first book, Tend Doll Meals to Chelsea, and it's a trio of recipes where and this is the case with a lot of mind your plans, where you batch cook something and then you use that same base for multiple recipes during the week so that you're saving time and money. So this one is a Vietnamese
meat ball sort of trio of meals. Actually made these a few weeks ago and they are a huge hit with my kids.
They're still good. Yeah.
You start the week by making a rice bowl with an Asian swore with just cooking the Vietnamese meatbals in the pan, or you can do them in the air fryer, and then you use the same meat balls for barn meat, which you could take to work for lunch, or you could just have that as a light meal. And then you're using the rest of that meatball mixture in a stir fry, so that becomes the base of a noodle
stir fry with veggies. You've got a lot of shared ingredients within those meals, but also like a lot of variety, so you're not getting sick of like those same flavors all the time.
Yeah, you're not just having a rice bowl every day.
Yeah. And I actually had leftover meatball mixture the last time I made it, because I'm cooking for three now because my adult sons moved out.
Oh that's so you do not look old enough to have an adult son Chelsea, what is that I do?
So we had leftover meat or mixture and I used it as spring roll filling and it was so yummy, so so many different uses. You could use it in dumplings as well, so depending on what you wanted. But yeah, your listeners will have those recipes, they can give it a try and just try out that sort of cook once eat three times format as well, that.
They're gonna love it. I'm obsessed. I just know that that's going to hit really well. And I mean you're telling me three meals ten dollar meals, like it can't get better than that. Chelsea, this has been so fun, like you are very fun to talk to, but it's
also been very insightful. I'm so grateful that you wanted to share your genius budget friendly tips and tricks with us, because I just I have seen you pop up time and time again in my Shoes on the Money community, Like not only are you know my community recommending you, but you are supporting them in the comments, like you are getting in and being like well what about this? And like I swear there are often whole threads about it. I'm just always like this woman comes in clutch.
I link on Facebook, Victoria, I'm in my Facebook group like twenty four seven.
Yeah. Like what people don't realize about Facebook group management. We live there. I live there, am in there all the time. I'm deleting comments, I'm liking comments. People often like, oh my god, I saw your name pop up in that group. I'm like, yeah, babe, that's because I live there. I live there. Thank you so much for putting together that meal planned for our community. It's going to be in the show notes, guys, because obviously, not only do
my community want budget meals, we love a freebie. And if you want more of Chelsea's energy, which is unmatched, but also her incredible meal ideas, please check out ten Dollar Meals on Facebook and Instagram and grab a copy of her new book. Chelsea, thank you so much for joining me. It has been a delight, and I just know this isn't the last episode that we have you on, Like, I'm going to be planning to get you back as soon as poss.
Oh my gosh, I hope we get to do this again, Victoria. This has like honestly been so much fun for me as well.
I love it. I feel like we're on the same wavelength. When it comes to energy, which works really well. And I mean, you've just moved to Tasmania and I grew up there. I didn't know that, but I did, which is why I was like, oh, Tasmania. Really, my nana actually makes me bring back this salmon thing from Audi and also the Audi chocolates when I come home because you can't get them in Tasmania. So I knew you
didn't have Audi. I knew what I was doing there. Anyway, Thank you so much, Chelsea and guys, I hope you have enjoyed this and we will see your next episode. Bye. Did buy shared on She's on the Money is general in nature and does not consider your individual circumstances. She's on the Money exists purely for educational purposes and should not be relied upon to make an investment or financial decision.
If you do choose to buy a financial product, read the PDS TMD and obtain appropriate financial advice tailored towards your needs. Victoria Divine and Sheese on the Money are authorized representatives of Money sheerper p t y lt D A B N three two one six four nine two seven seven zero eight AFS L four five one two eight nine,