Food for Thought: Money Saving Breakfast Ideas as Easy as 1,2,3

At a time where inflation is into double digits and is at the highest it’s been in many decades, shopping for food is becoming an increasing expensive affair.

Add to this record energy prices, spiralling fuel prices, political instability, the lingering effects of a global pandemic, overseas invasions, and who knows what else, and it’s easy to see why we find ourselves in the midst of a very real cost-of-living crisis.

As depressing as it is, we of course need to eat, and any tips aimed at keeping food shopping bills down are very welcome indeed. Breakfast for example, is the most important meal of the day yet it can be expensive if you’re not careful. Just because of rising food costs however, this is no reason not to eat breakfast in a morning to try to save money, we simply need to look for ways of keeping the costs low.

To help you keep your breakfast shopping bills low, here are some money saving breakfast ideas and tips for you to try.

Get creative with your leftovers

Wondering what to do with those few potatoes, veggies, and pieces of meat from yesterday’s roast dinner?

Rather than simply re-heating them in the microwave or, worse yet, throwing them in the bin, why not get creative with them and use them in your breakfast instead?

One of the simplest breakfast ideas you can make, is to make regular scrambled eggs with whatever leftovers you had in the fridge from the day before.

It doesn’t matter whether it’s roast potatoes and veg, marinated chicken, fish, or anything else, if you use your imagination, cook them through, season them, and make a scrambled egg dish out of them, you’re making your breakfast stretch further, and are getting more from your meals as well.

Alternatively, sticking with the egg theme, you could use them in an omelette, frittata, quiche, or a breakfast tart.

Focus more on vegetarian meals

As delicious as many people may find them, a lot of the meats that you find on breakfast dishes are not exactly cheap, and it seems as if they’re only going to get more expensive.

Sausage, bacon, and smoked salmon for example, are all often associated with breakfast, but picking up just 1 pack of each of those items alone will cost you upwards of £12, if not more.

For anybody feeling the pinch and looking for breakfast ideas to keep costs low, why not ditch the meats, or at least cut back, and focus on vegetarian breakfasts instead?

A spinach and cheddar omelette for example, made with 4 eggs, will comfortably feed 2 people and will cost considerably less than a cooked breakfast made with breakfast meats, or fish such as smoked salmon.

Using more vegetarian ingredients is not just a great way to keep costs low, it’s also much healthier as well.

Buy your eggs in bulk

As you can probably tell from the theme of this post today, eggs are proving to be very beneficial when it comes to breakfast.

When talking about breakfast ideas for cutting costs while shopping for breakfast foods, buying your eggs in bulk is one of the smartest financial decisions you can make.

Eggs are extremely versatile, they’re low in calories, they’re a great source of protein and amino acids, and they contain healthy fats. The main issue with buying eggs in packs of 6, is the fact that you use so many of them. A family of four for example, can easily get through around 18 eggs per week, if not more.

If you go to your local supermarket, look at the price of 3 packs of 6 eggs, and then look at the price of the same brand of 18 eggs in one pack. Unless there are any special offers running, the pack of 18 eggs should be cheaper to buy than the 3 individual packs of 6 eggs.

When buying your eggs, work out how many eggs you’ll need between food shops and then buy them in bulk. Overall, the cost will be less than buying them in smaller quantities.

Cook and freeze your own breakfast foods

Another useful tip for anybody looking to keep their breakfast costs low is to cook and freeze your own breakfast foods.

Rather than purchasing ready-made breakfast foods that you simply reheat, why not make your own and freeze them instead?

For anybody looking for cheap breakfast ideas, there are all manner of different meals you can prepare in advance, freeze, and then simply defrost or even cook from frozen as and when needed. Just a few of these ideas include:

• Freezer-friendly toasted breakfast sandwiches
• Freezer-friendly bagels
• Freezer-friendly breakfast burritos and wraps
• Pre-made frozen blueberry breakfast pancakes
• Pre-prepared breakfast waffles
• And many more…

These dishes can be made with a number of different fillings, so you can get as creative and as inventive as you’d like. Simply prepare them in advance, store them in a freezer bag, and then simply grab them out of the freezer and pop them into the toaster/air fryer/oven/grill and cook.

Never underestimate fruit and yoghurt

For a simple, filling, and delicious breakfast that is much cheaper than a sausage, egg, and bacon sandwich, why not just go for fruit and yoghurt?

A serving of natural yoghurt with mixed berries is filling, nutritious, easy to prepare, and tastes great in the process.

When buying your yoghurt and berries, go for frozen berries rather than fresh, and pick up a large tub of yoghurt rather than smaller individual pots. Simply add a few spoons of yoghurt into a bowl, top with mixed berries, and maybe a scattering of granola.

Speaking of granola…

Prepare your own granola

Another of the more popular breakfast ideas out there for people trying to save money is to prepare your own granola.

Granola is extremely expensive when you buy it readymade from supermarkets. When you buy the individual ingredients however, and make it yourself, it works out to be much, much cheaper per serving.

Simply pick up a large pack of oats, mixed seeds, dried berries, desiccated or flaked coconut, almond flakes, and honey and you have all the basics. To make the granola, mix everything together apart from the coconut and dried fruit and bake in the oven at 150C for 15 mins. After the 15 mins, add the dried berries and coconut and bake for a further 15 mins.

Remove the mixture, set aside to cool, decant it into a suitable airtight container and then use as and when needed.