Welcome back to our A-Z ingredients cooking with kids series. We are currently at H is for honey. As an added challenge this week, we were asked to produce a three course dinner for four on a budget of £20 by Ffrees. So I passed this over to Maxi who is ten and he certainly rose to the challenge in budgeting, buying and cooking us a fantastic Sunday dinner.
So to start with Maxi devised his menu. All I told him is that it had to be three courses, under £20 and have honey in it somewhere! So this was what he came up with.
- Grilled halloumi salad with honey mustard dressing
- Spaghetti bolognese
- Chocolate cheesecake with raspberries
We shop at Lidl and Aldi and this week Lidl have a greek week so halloumi with chilli was only £1.39 and baby plum tomatoes were part of the Aldi super six so only 59p. Baby spinach is a great salad leaf to try with kids. Spinach is simple to grow and has a mild, mellow taste.
Maxi set down with the Ipad to see what offers were on this week at Aldi and Lidl, which are where we shop. He also thought about the fact that preparing and cooking three course would be a big challenge, so decided (with a little help from me) that preparing the bolognese in the slow cooker and also buying a ready made dessert was the way forward! Using the MySupermarket app, Maxi worked out how much his shopping would be and also what we had in the house that could be used such as the worcester sauce and mixed italian herbs. He also used fresh basil out of the garden.
Our weekly food budget is £70 at the moment, so £20 for one meal is a LOT and maxi realised that. Although he spent all bar 49p of the £20, we actually have enough bolognese for another meal, the same with the pasta and also enough salad for 2 more meals.
Ingredient list
Spinach £1.19
Cucumber £0.44
Tomatoes £0.59
Halloumi £1.39
Lemon £0.75
Mince £3.69
Passata £0.35
Tomato puree £0.37
Spaghetti £0.45
Onions £0.59
Garlic £0.79
Peppers £0.95
Cheesecake £2.99
Mustard £0.59
Halloumi £1.39
Olive oil £2.99
£19.51
Once he had wrote out his shopping list, we went to the supermarket and shopping. Then once we got home it was cooking time!
Grilled Halloumi Salad with Honey mustard dressing
Ingredients
Halloumi with chilli
Baby plum tomatoes
Baby Spinach leaves
Cucumber
Honey
Dijon Mustard
Lemon
Olive oil
Salt
Method
Cut your haloumi into 1cm thick slices
Slice your cucumber into thin slice
Half you tomatoes
Place your spinach leaves and other salad ingredients in to a bowl
Grill your halloumi or fry with a little olive oil until golden on each side and place in the bowl
Take 1 teaspoon of mustard and one teaspoon of honey and place into a small jar.
Add the juice of one lemon, pinch of salt and a glug of olive oil and give a good shake.
Serve
More H is for Honey Recipes from the Cooking with Kids Team
Honey Granola – Rainy Day Mum
Grilled Halloumi Salad with Honey Mustard Dressing – The Mad House
Honey Crispy Treats – Sugar Aunts
Fried Ice Cream Sundaes – Still Playing School
Homemade Honey Caramel Sauce – Frogs Snails and Puppy Dog Tails
Slow cooker bolognese with Spaghetti
Ingredients
2 onions – finely diced
3 peppers – finely diced
2 cloves of garlic – crushed or chopped
pack of quorn mince or beef mince
jar or packet of passata
Tomato puree
teaspoon of sugar
Mixed herbs
Worcester Sauce
Method
We make bolognese in the slow cooker as it can be prepared in advance, cooks slowly throughout the day and it is delicious.
Dice your onions and peppers and add to a prewarmed slow cooker
Add your mince
The the garlic, herbs and worcester sauce
Then add the pasata or a tin of chopped tomatoes
Cook on high power for four hours or low power for eight hours
We ended our meal with a fab specially selected chocolate cheesecake from Aldi at £2.99 it was amazing!

Grilled Halloumi Salad with Honey Mustard dressing
Ingredients
- Halloumi with chilli
- Baby plum tomatoes
- leaves Baby Spinach
- Cucumber
- Honey
- Dijon Mustard
- Lemon
- Olive oil
- Salt
Instructions
-
Cut your haloumi into 1cm thick slices
-
Slice your cucumber into thin slice
-
Half you tomatoes
-
Place your spinach leaves and other salad ingredients in to a bowl
-
Grill your halloumi or fry with a little olive oil until golden on each side and place in the bowl
-
Take 1 teaspoon of mustard and one teaspoon of honey and place into a small jar.
-
Add the juice of one lemon, pinch of salt and a glug of olive oil and give a good shake.
-
Serve

Slow cooker bolognese with Spaghetti
Ingredients
- 2 onions - finely diced
- 3 peppers - finely diced
- 2 cloves of garlic - crushed or chopped
- pack of quorn mince or beef mince
- jar or packet of passata
- Tomato puree
- Teaspoon of sugar
- Mixed herbs
- Worcester Sauce
Instructions
-
We make bolognese in the slow cooker as it can be prepared in advance, cooks slowly throughout the day and it is delicious.
-
Dice your onions and peppers and add to a prewarmed slow cooker
-
Add your mince
-
The the garlic, herbs and worcester sauce
-
Then add the pasta or a tin of chopped tomatoes and a good squirt of tomato puree
-
Add a teaspoon of sugar and a pinch of salt and peper
-
Cook on high power for four hours or low power for eight hours
Disclosure – we were provided with £20 for our meal by Ffrees
Wow he has done well cooking this himself. I am teaching my son some dishes before he goes to Uni, the Spaghetti Bolognese is nice and simple to make
What a fantastic exercise for kids, I love this and the honey and mustard dressing sounds divine can’t wait to give it a go at our next BBQ
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What a great menu. I love halloumi but you can’t find it in France…it’s one of the things I often bring back with me after a visit to UK!
Yum! Salads are our go to side in the summer so this dressing will come in handy!
Well done Maxi – great menu choice and the food looks delicious.
I love cooking with the kids and they love being involved. They are 5 and 3 so there is only so much they can do but we are happy to let them watch, safely f course
This is a great way to teach budgeting – we do it once a fortnight and the kids plan and make the meal and then pretend that they’re restaurant staff and they take our orders and serve us the meal too x x
Wow, what a great post. I am a huge fan of Halloumi and can’t get enough of it. The Honey and Mustard dressing looks yummy too xxx
All that gorgeous food and a great learning activity, your son did really well. Halloumi cheese is my favourite, love the stuff and the dressing, I need to try that.
That’s very impressive of your son to plan the meal to budget like that. The recipes all look very tasty.
We do alot of this now going to Aldi as much more cost effective. Food looks amazing.
Oh what a clever boy, that meal sounds and looks delicious! I could eat that spag bol right now 😉 Didn’t know about the supermarket App – will check that out!
I love this concept, you are never too young to learn the basics of food cooking x
That is brilliant that he does all of this cooking and that Grilled halloumi salad with honey mustard dressing sounds delicious – I’d order that in a restaurant!
Oh bless him, Maxi did such an amazing job! What a fun challenge, and he can obviously find his way around a kitchen well. I really like the sound of that salad, I’m going to have to give that a go. xx
We shop at Lidl and Aldi too. Better get down to Lidl now, as I adore Greek food! I’d never considere making bolognaise in a slow cooker – that’s a great idea.
Oh yum this sounds delicious – what a tasty meal. x
Teaching Kian to cook at the moment – he is surprisingly good but so slow at chopping veg lol – these recipes look delicious and easy too
Well done Max I bet he goes onto be better than Jamie Oliver
Wow Jen i so should follow in your footsteps here, Bethany has never stepped foot in the kitchen (my fault) i need to take steps! .. well done boys and Maxi that starter is one of my all time faves!
Teaching kids how to cook is such an important skill; looks like you did a fab job and now can enjoy super tasty meals
I love doing activities like these with my class when they cost things out – I can’t wait to involve some maths in the cooking with my boys. You’re lucky you have such an amazing chef – halloumi! In my day, it was beans on toast for the Brownie hostess badge!