5 Budget-friendly Meal Ideas That The Whole Family Will Love

I'm going to be sharing 5 delicious budget-friendly family meal ideas.

These are affordable meals your entire family will love. They all use easy-to-find ingredients, many of which you probably already have on hand.

1. White chicken enchiladas

Season two chicken breasts with salt, pepper, onion, garlic powder, and some chili powder. I baked that at 400 degrees for 30 minutes, and let it rest for a bit.

Place a good amount of that chicken mixture onto the middle of the tortilla, spread it out, and tightly roll it up.

Now, we'll start making the sauce that gets poured over it. I melted down three tablespoons of butter.

I'm going to pour that all over the top of the enchiladas.

Lastly, I'll take the remaining pepper jack cheese that I have and sprinkle that all over the top.

I'm going to pop that in the oven at 350 degrees. I baked it for 25 minutes, then flipped on the broiler to brown the top of the cheese.

I also made some homemade Mexican rice to go with it.

2. Chopped turkey sandwich

I have a big piece of parchment paper laid out, and I'm just laying down some shredded lettuce, enough to top two to three sandwiches.

I'll lay down a few slices of tomato, and I also added some dill pickles on top.

I'll lay down a few slices of provolone cheese. I picked up some good-quality turkey oven-roasted turkey at the deli. It's just a little bit under a pound.

I got some Duke's mayo, added a couple of good spoonfuls, and drizzled on some red wine vinegar.

At this point, I wanted to go in with my large knife and start getting this chopped and folded together because that vinegar was running all over the place, and I wanted to get it all mixed before I started adding in a few of the seasonings

Now, I'm going to add just a little bit of salt. I'll add a good amount of black pepper and some oregano.

I'll continue chopping it until it gets to the consistency I seek.

This is the bread that I chose, so I'm just taking a serrated knife, getting those cut open, and I will start stuffing it. I topped it with some extra black pepper and served it with steak fries.

I have a little side of ketchup to dip the fries in.

3. Sour cream noodle bake

I started by crumbling and browning one pound of ground beef. I seasoned mine with garlic salt, onion powder, and black pepper. If you do have a lot of excess grease, drain that off.

Add in one regular-size can of tomato sauce, about 15 ounces, and I'll season the sauce with some salt and pepper. Get that all stirred together.

I will let this simmer on the stove on medium heat while I prepare everything else.

In a medium mixing bowl, add a half cup of sour cream. You'll also need a cup and a quarter cup of cottage cheese.

Season that mixture with some black pepper and freeze-dried chives.

Stir it together, combining all the ingredients.

You'll need to cook eight ounces of egg noodles to al dente, drain them, and add the noodles to this creamy mixture.

Stir well. Spray a casserole dish with non-stick cooking spray, and layer this like you would with a lasagna.

I added half of the noodles and half the meat sauce to the bottom.

I shredded an 8-ounce block of some sharp cheddar cheese, so I'm just adding some of that over the meat sauce

Next, I'll cover that with the remainder of those noodles, then the rest of that meat sauce. Then, I'll do a final layer of the shredded cheese. I'm going to pop this in the oven at 350 degrees.

I baked mine for around 25 minutes.

You'll know it's done when the cheese is melted.

We served it with some steamed veggies and garlic Texas toast.

4. Cabbage sausage soup

I started by getting the ingredients that I would need for the soup. So my kielbasa, cabbage, carrots, and red potatoes. I heated up just a little olive oil in my large pot, then threw in my thinly sliced sausage.

Cook that for a few minutes to give it some color, and let the flavor sweat out before adding in my diced carrots and some chopped celery.

I seasoned all that with some onion powder and a big spoonful of minced garlic, some oregano and black pepper, and let that garlic cook for another minute before adding the chicken broth.

You will need six cups of chicken broth.

Next, I added my chopped cabbage and my red potatoes. I also decided to throw in some Cajun seasoning. I knew that flavor would work well in this dish.

Stir everything together.

I have this on medium-high heat and wait for it to boil. I'll get my lid on as soon as it does and turn it down to simmer.

I let mine cook for about 30 more minutes because we like our cabbage to be tender.

I served this with some homemade cornbread muffins with some butter, and it paired perfectly with this meal.

5. London broil

The recipe called for this Lawry's Beef Marinade seasoning mix.

I found it in Walmart, so I ordered it from there.

I followed the directions on the back of the package, mixed it with water, and poured it over my meat.

I'm just kind of flipping the meat around in that marinade, and I'll let it marinate in the refrigerator all day, so I will get this dish covered with some cling wrap.

I came in every couple of hours to flip the meat. It is time to cook this, so I'm just transferring it to my cookie sheet.

I put it under the broiler in the oven. I could tell that my meat was bigger and a bit thicker than the recipe, so I added a few more minutes.

So here we are after that, and I cut it against the grain.