How to meal plan on a budget (without eating the same thing every night)

Most meal-planning advice starts in the wrong place: with recipes. You scroll, you save a dozen, and only at the checkout do you find out what the week costs. Budgeting flips the order — you start with the number.

Set the number first

Pick a weekly grocery figure you can actually hold to. A common starting point in the UK is around £40 for a couple or £60–£75 for a family of four; in the US, roughly $75–$100 for four. It doesn't need to be precise — it needs to be a ceiling you plan underneath.

Build the week backwards from it

1. Anchor two or three "workhorse" dinners — cheap, filling, and forgiving (a lentil ragu, a bean chilli, a tray bake). These do most of the budget's work.
2. Plan for leftovers on purpose. Cook once, eat twice: tonight's dinner is tomorrow's lunch. It's the single biggest lever on both cost and effort.
3. Fill the gaps with variety, not expense. One slightly nicer meal is fine if the workhorses carried the week.

Shop the plan, not the aisles

Turn the plan into one consolidated list, ordered by supermarket section, and buy only what's on it. Check the plan against your cupboards first — the cheapest ingredient is the one you already own.

Track what you actually spent

Keep the receipt. Comparing planned vs. actual for a few weeks tells you where your estimates are off, and your next plan gets sharper.

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That's the whole method: set the number, build backwards, shop the list, check the receipt. Mealconomy runs each of those steps for you — you give it the budget and it returns the week and the shop, with the cost of every serving worked out.