$3 Dinners, Anyone? ‘Money Saving Meals’ Book Review

From the creator of $10 Meals Australia, Chelsea Goodwin returns with a new collection of easy, budget-friendly dinner recipes designed to save you time, money, and effort.

Key points:

Building on her bestselling first cookbook, Chelsea shares eight weeks of practical meal plans — all costing $3 per serve or less — covering everything from one-pan wonders and slow cooker favourites to air fryer meals, vegetarian options, and super low-cost dinners.

Each chapter includes a week’s worth of recipes, a shopping list, cost-saving tips, and a photographic menu to make planning simple.

With full-page photos, flexible ingredient swaps, and family-friendly flavours, this cookbook makes stress-free, affordable dinners possible every night of the week!

More about Chelsea

Chelsea is a recipe developer, home cook, single mother of three, and bestselling author of ‘$10 Meals with Chelsea’.

Motivated by the rising cost of living, she founded the popular $10 Meals Facebook communities to help Australians prepare delicious, budget-friendly meals.

Each chapter includes a week’s worth of recipes, a shopping list, cost-saving tips, and a photographic menu.

Chelsea is passionate about making home cooking accessible, sharing her recipes, and teaching basic cooking skills and meal-planning both online and within her local community.

Her mission is to inspire households of all incomes and abilities to cook from scratch, explore new cuisines, and create lasting food memories around the table.

Pat’s review

I was really excited to get my hands on Chelsea’s new book – I love trying new recipes and being thrifty in and out of the kitchen.

A quick flick through the pages gave me confidence that the recipes wouldn’t be beyond my cooking skills, they felt approachable and not overly fussy.

I cook for a household of three adults: one carnivore, one vegan, and I’m pescetarian.

As the main cook and meal planner, this cookbook has been a great fit for me.

“As the main cook and meal planner, this cookbook has been a great fit for me.”

Each recipe is clearly tagged (Vego, Dairy-Free, etc.) which makes it easy to plan meals that suit everyone.

The book includes eight weeks of meal plans for four people, plus weekly grocery lists, which made planning super easy — even on nights when I was tired or not feeling very motivated!

I tried a couple of recipes before doing a full weekly shop, and I found them easy to adapt.

I was able to swap out a few ingredients to make the meals vegan-friendly, so I could cook just one dish that all three of us could enjoy.

The recipes land pretty close to the promised $3 per meal — depending, of course, on where you shop and which brands you choose.

Like with most recipes, the only challenge I found was the suggested cooking time.

I usually take a bit longer, especially when factoring in the time it takes to gather ingredients from the pantry and fridge, measure everything out, and get set up.

I didn’t calculate the cost of each meal down to the cent, but based on the ingredients and portion sizes, I’d say the recipes land pretty close to the promised $3 per meal — depending, of course, on where you shop and which brands you choose.

Overall, I highly recommend this family-friendly cookbook — it’s practical, flexible, and would make a thoughtful gift for anyone looking to save money while still enjoying delicious, home-cooked meals.

Recipes – tested by Pat

Greek Lentil Soup – Page 168

I didn’t have canned lentils so added dry brown lentils instead.

Did a variation of the Creamy Lemon Chicken Spaghetti – omitted the chicken and added mushrooms, and broccoli Page 29. DELICIOUS

Listen to Yvette’s conversation with Chelsea in the player above.

Feature image: Book cover image used with permission. Food photos supplied by Pat and used with permission.

Article supplied with thanks to Pat Waddington.