Self-Catering Sunday: A Week of Kitchenette Meals for Under $100
A week of kitchenette meals in Dubbo for under $100 is not a challenge, not a compromise, and not the kind of budget-travel austerity that requires eating rice and tinned beans while pretending to enjoy it. It is a practical demonstration that self-catering in a city surrounded by some of Australia's best pastoral country produces better food at lower cost than the restaurant and takeaway alternatives that most regional travellers default to — and that the meals themselves, assembled from the Dubbo butcher's selections and the supermarket's produce, provide genuine eating pleasure rather than the nutritional survival that budget cooking usually implies.
The Shopping List
One scotch fillet and one pack of lamb cutlets from the butcher: $28-$35. A dozen eggs, a loaf of bread, butter, a litre of milk, a box of cereal: $18-$22. Two bags of pre-mixed salad and two bags of frozen vegetables: $10-$14. A packet of pasta, a kilogram of rice, and a jar of quality pasta sauce: $10-$14. Fruit — bananas, apples, and oranges for the week: $8-$12. Cheese, ham, and a packet of wraps for packed lunches: $10-$14. Coffee and tea: $6-$8. Total: approximately $90-$119. This supplies seven breakfasts, five packed lunches, and five dinners for one person, with enough variety to prevent the monotony that budget eating normally produces and enough quality — particularly in the meat, sourced from the butcher rather than the supermarket — to make the meals genuinely satisfying rather than merely adequate.
The Weekly Menu
Monday dinner: the scotch fillet with mixed salad and a baked potato if the kitchenette has an oven, or pan-fried with the salad alone if it does not. This is the reward meal — the dinner that establishes the self-catering standard and demonstrates that the kitchenette can produce restaurant-quality food when the ingredients are right. Tuesday: lamb cutlets with frozen vegetables and rice. The cutlets need nothing beyond salt, pepper, and high heat — three minutes per side for pink, four for medium. The frozen vegetables, steamed or microwaved, provide the nutritional ballast. Wednesday: pasta with sauce and salad. The simplest dinner of the week, deliberately scheduled for the mid-week energy dip when cooking ambition is lowest. Thursday: eggs on toast with a side salad. The simple meal that shift workers eat without apology and that provides the protein and satisfaction that its modest ingredient list does not suggest. Friday: the remaining lamb — roasted with whatever vegetables remain if there is oven access, or pan-fried with rice and the last of the salad greens.
Saturday and Sunday: eat out. The two restaurant meals per week provide the variety, the social atmosphere, and the someone-else-cooked pleasure that seven consecutive kitchenette dinners would deny. Budget: $35-$55 per restaurant meal. Total weekly food cost including two restaurant meals and all self-catered breakfasts, lunches, and dinners: approximately $160-$230. Total weekly food cost eating out for every meal at Dubbo's cafes, restaurants, and takeaway options: approximately $350-$500. The kitchenette saves $120-$270 per week — money that accumulates into significant savings across any stay longer than a few nights and that funds the Mudgee wine, the zoo entry, and the experiences that make the trip memorable rather than merely affordable.
The Practical Reality
The shopping trip takes 30 minutes on arrival day and requires one subsequent top-up mid-week for fresh milk, bread, and any ingredients that the first week's cooking revealed as necessary additions. The cooking takes 10-20 minutes per dinner — less time than driving to a restaurant, waiting for a table, ordering, eating, paying, and driving back. The washing up takes five minutes. The total daily time investment in self-catering — shopping amortised across the week, cooking, and cleaning — is approximately 25 minutes, compared to the 60-90 minutes that a restaurant dinner requires from departure to return. Self-catering is not only cheaper. It is faster. And in a motel kitchenette overlooking the pool, with a glass of wine and the quiet evening sounds of a regional city, it is more pleasant than the restaurant queue and the $55 bill that the alternative delivers.