As a busy working mum I’m always looking for quick and easy dinner options, and if they’re purse friendly then that’s even better. Now, I’ve got to admit, I am a bit of a food snob, so the thought of using a packet sauce was a bit of a tricky one for me to get over. But I’ve come to the realisation I don’t have to serve up a Michelin Star meal every evening. I am allowed to give myself a break.
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Quick and Easy Dinner
I was sent the Schwartz Spaghetti Carbonara sauce to try out. I find a lot of ready made carbonara’s are far too thick and gloopy and nothing like the dish is meant to be. So I was interested to see how this would work out.
I’ve never really used packet sauces before, so I tried to stick to the instructions closely. For an off-the-cuff kinda cook, it took all my self discipline haha! The instructions were easy to understand, and the whole process was really simple.
Dinner on a budget
It was a very lean week for me so I knew I was going to have to pull this one in on a very tight budget. So I stuck to the supermarket basics range. I’ve done a break down below:
Schwartz Spaghetti Carbonara Sauce – 85p
Spaghetti 1/2 packet used – 10p
Mushrooms 1/2 packet used – 40p
Bacon (cooking bacon) 1/2 packet used – 40p
Milk 1/2 bottle used – 25p
Ingredient total = £2.00
The sauce/recipe itself serves 4 people (we ended up just splitting it three ways) but potentially that works out at 50p per person, which I think is pretty incredible.
The whole process really was the epitome of a quick and easy dinner. It was just a case of cooking the separate components and bringing it all together. If you stick to the instructions you’re going to have a dinner for the family in 10-15 mins maximum!
The verdict
The sauce was light and full of flavour, it wasn’t gloopy at all and just covered the pasta perfectly. I didn’t have any parmesan but think the addition of that would be perfect. We got a little garlic tear and share bread to go with ours which was lovely.
Even Pops enjoyed it and she can be pretty hard to please. If you have vegetarians in the family you could leave the bacon out and double the mushrooms and it would be equally as delicious. It does contain milk powder though so it wouldn’t be suitable for vegans.
If you liked this, check out my other food blog posts!