Only Eating Dollar Tree Food for a Full Week

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Times are getting more expensive as the year progresses, and I thought it was time to see how to create an extreme budget meal by only buying food at Dollar Tree.

I will be using foods that I might normally find or buy at Walmart, so I can try and compare the quality of the food for potentially a cheaper price, as well as some foods that might be specifically found at Dollar Tree.

Depending on when the last time you have been in the Dollar Tree, you might not know, but they do have a pretty good variety of ingredients and food staples we use often in my house for quick dinner recipes.

So, now it is time to figure out if I can make delicious, nutrient-dense, quality meals from the Dollar Tree to keep to an extreme grocery budget meal plan.

How I Made 39 Meals with Just $21 at Walmart — Emergency Budget Skillet Recipes

Is Everything at Dollar Tree a Dollar?
What type of ingredients can I find at Dollar Tree?
What ingredients do I need to make Dollar Tree recipes?
Extreme budget meals made from Dollar Tree ingredients:
Are Dollar Tree and Dollar General the same?
The outcome of Dollar Tree ingredient recipes:
Leftover food from recipes:
More extreme budget meals:
Quick links for making dinner easy:

Is Everything at Dollar Tree a Dollar?

Unfortunately, no nothing there is actually a dollar anymore. Dollar Tree increased its prices from $1 to $1.25 in late 2021 to keep up with the rising prices for its products.

There are actually some stores that have things that are $3 or $5. So, sadly, the days of the true Dollar Tree are gone.

What type of ingredients can I find at Dollar Tree?

If you are trying to figure out how you are going to make Dollar Tree recipes, you might be surprised to know that they actually have quite a few things you would find at your local grocery store.

You can find spices, baking supplies like sugar and oil, pasta and grains, pasta sauce, lots of canned food, and baking mixes.

Dollar Tree also has a good amount of breakfast foods, prepackaged dinners, and even some International foods.

What ingredients do I need to make Dollar Tree recipes?

To be honest, I started out by looking for things I normally would grab at Walmart or Aldi, and went from there.

Here is a list of everything I got from Dollar Tree to create these extreme budget-friendly meals:

Dry hash browns
Gravy packet
Cheese
Frozen Waffles
Black beans dry
Tortillas
Garlic toast
Lentils
Ham
Frozen dinner
Cake mix

Pasta
Frozen mixed California veggies
Pinto beans can
Canned chicken
Mac and cheese
Salsa
Bacon
Pasta sauce
Bosco sticks
Frozen berries

Extreme budget meals made from Dollar Tree ingredients:

Here are the recipes I made using only the ingredients I bought from Dollar Tree:

Black bean burritos
Ham and lentil burritos
Hashbrown bacon casserole
Bacon lentil pasta
Minestrone soup
Texas toast pizzas
Taco Mac and cheese
Blueberry crumble cake

Are Dollar Tree and Dollar General the same?

While they both have the word Dollar in the name, they are actually pretty different.

Dollar Tree lends itself to providing products that are only $1.25 or close to it.

Dollar General does tend to have more budget-friendly items, but they are definitely not just a dollar. Often, the items in Dollar General are rounded to the nearest dollar.

But you can find items from $1 to $50 or more at your local Dollar General.

So, when making these recipes, keep in mind I am shopping at Dollar Tree when finding the products I am using in these extreme budget meals.

The outcome of Dollar Tree ingredient recipes:

These recipes actually came out super delicious, and I can say they were definitely budget-friendly.

My family and I really enjoyed the meals we were able to make with the ingredients I purchased from Dollar Tree and will definitely keep these recipes in our menu rotation.

They were tasty and super-easy dinner recipes!