Plant-based store cupboard recipes to see you through.

Pancakes You may be used to flipping some pancakes once a year on Shrove Tuesday, but they make a great meal at any time of the year. They are flexible enough to be used for sweet or savoury fillings and only use four ingredients. Check out our pancake blog for the recipe.

You can also change it up and add more protein to your meal by swapping regular pancakes to chickpea pancakes. They use chickpea flour, and go great with fresh ingredients like salad.

Scones Even if you don’t have cream in the fridge, scones are great with just jam or butter. You can also add dried fruit to the mix below if you have it.

Mix 350g self-raising flour, ¼ tsp salt, 1 tsp baking powder and 3 tbsp caster sugar together in a large bowl then rub in 95g vegan butter or spread. The mix should look like breadcrumbs. Slowly add 150ml soya milk whilst stirring to form a ball of dough. Chill in the fridge for around 30 minutes.

Once chilled, cut out with a cookie cutter and place on baking parchment on a baking tray. Brush them with a little soya milk and pop them in the freezer for 15 minutes. In the meantime, pop the oven on to 200C fan or gas 7.

Bake the scones for 15 minutes until golden brown and then leave to cool (if you can resist!).

Curry Curry is super simple and can be used to use up veggies on their way out, or pop in whatever’s in the cupboard. For the base, simply use a couple of tablespoons of your preferred curry paste and a tin of coconut milk or creamed coconut dissolved in hot water. You can also use soy yogurt or soy milk if you can’t get hold of coconut.

As it thickens you can add vegetables, chickpeas, lentils or your favourite fake meat. If you have spinach, add it last for a good boost of iron.

Hummus If you can’t get hold of hummus it is really easy to make. All you need is a tin of chickpeas, a lemon, a jar of tahini and some oil. Pop the chickpeas, 80ml oil, 2 cloves garlic, the juice from the lemon and 3tbsp tahini in a blender and whizz it until smooth.

You can add the zest from the lemon to give it a kick, as well as a whole host of other options like coriander, roasted red peppers, caramelised onion or beetroot. The options are endless!

Flatbreads Flatbreads go with most things, especially the hummus and curry ideas above, and they are so simple to make. They are great to make with kids!

All you need is 350g wholemeal flour and 4 tsp cold-pressed rapeseed oil, as well as 225ml warm water.

Mix the oil into the flour with your fingers then slowly add the warm water. Knead the mix into a dough and divide into 8 balls. Roll the balls out (you’ll need some extra flour on your surface to stop it sticking) to around 22cm. At this stage you can freeze them to use at a later date.

Once rolled out, simply cook them in a dry, non-stick frying pan for 30 seconds each side...easy!

Orzo salad Orzo is pasta, but shaped like a grain of rice and it works really well for salads. You can really add what you like but I like giving it a mediterranean feel with chopped tomatoes, peppers, marinated tofu and artichokes.

If you can’t find orzo or haven’t got it in the cupboard, any pasta would do. You can also mix in a little pesto (just make sure you get a plant-based version without parmesan).

Stuffed tortillas If you have a muffin tin, you can use them to bake tortillas in - simply gather up the tortillas to form a rough cone shape and pop them into the muffin tins. Push them down with a balled up bit of foil and bake for around 5 minutes on 180C (Fan).

You can fill them with mixed roasted veg, chilli or salad and fake meat. They are fun for kids to eat too!

Soup Quite frankly, if you have stock cubes in the cupboard, you can make soup with anything! My favourite is pea and red lentil, but you can pretty much cook up any veggies and pulses in stock and then whizz them into a soup.

Jackfruit pasta bake

You can either use a simple jar of pasta bake sauce (watch out for milk in the ingredients) or make it yourself. It’s a flexible one but you can fry off some onion and garlic, add a tin of chopped tomatoes and some herbs like oregano and some water.

Simmer for around 15 minutes to let us reduce and then add the jackfruit and pasta. Often, penne is used for pasta bake but fusilli will work well too. Transfer to an ovenproof dish and pop it in the oven for around 20 minutes.

If you have some, grate some vegan cheese on top just before you take it out or sprinkle with some nutritional yeast.

Risotto Again, vegetable stock is your saviour here. If you have some stock and risotto (or arborio) rice then you can chuck anything in to make a yummy risotto. It does take time as it needs to be stirred almost continuously whilst cooking but risotto is a yummy, filling and cheap option.

You can follow the instructions on the pack but you’ll need to fry off some onions and garlic, add the risotto rice and then very slowly add the stock just a ladleful at a time. If you have some dried mushrooms these are great for a risotto.

These are just a few ideas to show you that it’s not hard to cook up some great vegan meals, from just a few ingredients. But get creative!

By using store cupboard ingredients you’ll not only lower your bills and your food waste, you may just enjoy yourself.