7 Easy Budget Family Meals to Feed Your Family For the Week

1. Pocket Joes

On Sunday night, we had pocket joes with fries. This is something that my husband came up with.

We made some regular sloppy joe filling and put it inside a crescent roll. 

We tried several ways of wrapping these, but these were our favorite ones. It was the messiest one of all of them that I had done. We just baked them in the oven for the recommended temperature and time of the crescent rolls and had some fries on the side, and they were excellent. 

My family said that we should have these more often. 

2. Homemade pizza

Monday night's meal was easy homemade pizza. We used anything that sounded good from the fridge. 

We had salami, bacon, bell peppers, onions, and tomatoes on our pizza. 

It was delicious. You can't go wrong with pizza. 

3. Tacos and potatoes

On Tuesday night, of course, we had to do Taco Tuesday. 

We had some ground beef tacos, and I made some fried potatoes to go on them because I have a ton of potatoes, lettuce, tomatoes, bell peppers, onions, and cheese. My family loved them.

4. Zucchini corn chowder and biscuits 

On Wednesday night, I made zucchini and corn chowder. I like to cook my bacon in the oven, so I used some of the bacon grease in the pan to cook the onion. 

I added chopped-up onion and black pepper bacon in a skillet on medium-low heat. 

I put some of the thicker bacon pieces in the pan with the onions, and I let those saute for a little bit on a lower heat. 

Next, I put in my zucchini. I only used one very large zucchini because I felt like that was a ton of zucchini. 

Once I let that saute for a bit, I added one carrot I shredded with my box grater. 

This was not in the recipe, but we have carrots, and I figured let's add as much nutrition as we can. Once I stirred the carrots and let them sauté for a minute, I peeled and chopped five potatoes.

Normally, I do not peel my potatoes, even if they are russet potatoes, because we like potato peels, but for this soup, I thought it would be better if they were peeled. So I just saved my peelings for vegetable stock later on. 

After I got my potatoes stirred in, I added a few cloves of minced garlic. 

Next, I added a few teaspoons of chicken bouillon powder, onion powder, garlic powder, garlic salt, and some cajun two-step fire. That's completely optional. I had it on hand, and I thought it would be perfect in this chowder or soup, and it was terrific. 

Once I got all my seasonings in, I added two cans of corn and four cans of water. After everything was in, I gave it a good stir and let it simmer until the potatoes were nearly cooked. 

I added some whole milk yogurt and a couple of cups of cheddar cheese. 

I chose yogurt because we had run out of milk on this day, but we had some plain yogurt, and I thought it would be a good substitute. It worked out fine. The only thing I should have done differently was completely turn the heat off before adding the yogurt and cheese because they curdled just a little bit. 

If I had turned the heat off and let it sit for a few minutes, then I don't think I would have had that issue at all. I got all of this mixed in and let it sit on a very low heat for about 30 minutes. It was just until we were ready to eat because everything was fully cooked, so we had to let it sit. 

The recipe says to blend part of your soup or chowder, but we like our soups, stews, or chowders to be chunky. Also, I don't have an immersion blender or a regular blender. I have a food processor, so I just used a cornstarch slurry, and it turned out really well. 

I'm not sure if it is still classified as chowder, but it was delicious regardless. 

I made some garlic cheddar biscuits to go along with these, and those were really good as well.

5. Fried chicken and fried rice

On Thursday night, we had fried chicken and fried rice for dinner. 

I just make regular fried rice and some fried chicken to go along on top of it. 

I usually put vegetables in the fried rice, but we had so many zucchinis that I just sauteed some on the side. This dinner is one of our family's favorites. We haven't had it in quite a while. 

6. Vegetable lo mein

On Friday night, I made a one-pot vegetable lo mein, which was part of my $ 5.01-day challenge. It was super easy and really delicious. 

7. Beef rice bowls

On Saturday night, I made beef and rice bowls with fried potatoes and steamed carrots. This was super good. It is always a crowd-pleaser every time we have it. 

Budget family meals

We enjoyed every one of the meals we had this week and hope you do too. What budget family meals did you have this week? Share your recipes in the comments below.