A new edition of a cookbook from Love Food Hate Waste will help Kiwis who are facing high bills this winter feed their families and put healthy food on the table.
The winter edition of 'Easy Choice – Family Kai', a meal planner and recipe book which shows families how to make five nutritious dinners a week for just $60, is now available to download for free.
Every winter, thousands of Kiwi families struggle with energy poverty and, in some cases, will go without food in order to be able to afford to heat their homes.
“When it comes to paying high bills or unexpected expenses it is usually the food budget that takes the first hit,” says Love Food Hate Waste spokesperson Jenny Marshall.
"We know that winter is a hard time for so many families, so we are hoping that Easy Choice can help ease the financial burden for some by providing low-cost meals."
How does Easy Choice – Family Kai work?
Easy Choice consists of four weeks of five dinner meal plans that will feed a family of six for approximately $60 a week.
“Easy Choice employs many different strategies to help keep the cost of food low while ensuring that each meal is healthy and balanced,” says Jenny.
“From making sure that no food goes to waste to utilising frozen vegetables and using the leftovers from one meal to make another, we have included all sorts of tricks to make food go further.”
Rotorua resident Sierra de la Croix started using the Autumn edition of Easy Choice – Family Kai and found it made a real difference, both in her pocket and on her plate.
"Easy Choice has really changed the way I go about planning, buying and cooking my food. I’m saving a lot of money and enjoying new recipes."
Download the Winter Easy Choice – Family Kai meal planner and recipe book
How it all began
Easy Choice – Family Kai developed out of an initiative started by Healthy Families Waitakere and the Fresh Choice supermarkets in Ranui and Glen Eden that offered the ingredients for the five dinners in the meal planner for a family of six at a guaranteed price of $60.
Love Food Hate Waste saw the opportunity to extend the concept nationwide to allow more families to access cheap and healthy meals no matter where they lived.
The winter edition of Easy Choice is the second of four seasonal meal planners to be released, following the launch of the autumn edition in April. The spring booklet will follow in October with the summer plan being released in January.
