Cook Like it’s 1983: 40 Retro Aussie Recipes that Will Warm Your Heart and Save You Money

Made famous by the movie The Castle, beef rissoles are cheap, easy to make, and full of flavour.

Definitely one of my favourites, this is a full-flavour, cheap cut of meat. Easy to make, simmer low and slow.

Made with pantry ingredients, tuna mornay is packed with veg (frozen for convenience) and either pasta or rice to make this a one-dish meal.

Always a favourite, this version is a bit of a cheat's version, using tinned apricot juice and onion soup mix - a great pantry classic.

Stretch one chicken breast to feed a family with this chicken and veg pot pie made from pantry and freezer staples.

Flavoured with Keen's curry powder, savoury mince is a great way to use up what you have on hand. This is a dish we had a lot as a kid.

Top this dish with some tomato passata, ham and cheese for a classic chicken parmi (oh ok, or parma) at home.

Not going to lie, when we at this dish at home (every Wednesday night - when I was a teen, this became my night to cook), it was straight out of the jar. It was also the only dish we ate that wasn't meat and three veg.

When I was growing up, the fanciest restaurant in town was a crepe house. This retro classic is super cheap to make with pantry staples and whatever filling you like.

Not everyone's favourite dish, it uses lamb's liver (I was told lamb's fry refers to other parts of the lamb outside Australia), and bacon, with a lovely onion gravy.

Do you remember the ad from the 90s? Oh, I can't, mum's cooking a lamb roast! A iconic Aussie dish and while it's not as cheap as it used to be, with a little creativity, you can stretch it into several meals.

Can't have a lamb roast without a traditional gravy passed down through the generations.

A comedian once said that Aussies will put anything on toast. Well, toast is a common side dish in our house. Here's a stew made from leftover roast lamb...served with toast.

Ok, hill I'll die on - shepherd's pie must be made with lamb. This one is made from all leftovers - from the roast lamb, the veg, and the gravy. We'll pretend I was going for dark and moody lighting.

Made with mince, this cottage pie is topped with sliced potato because I only had one left. But you can definitely top it with the more traditional mashed potato.

Pies. Can't get much more Aussie than that, right? This is a family-sized pie made from beef with red wine. You can totally slow-cook the beef and eat it as a stew.

A vegetarian classic inspired by an old Women's Weekly recipe from the 70s.

Bangers and mash are another pub classic that we adopted from England. This easy onion jam gives them a delicious, modern twist.

Turn a bunch of celery into a creamy, warming soup.

Basically Scotch broth, we lived on this soup when we were kids because it's made from the bone of a leg of roast lamb, stretching a roast as far as it can possibly go.

Another classic soup that gets its flavour from the bone. We always freeze the leftover ham bone from Christmas, and pull it out six months later to make this delicious and filling soup for only a few dollars.

Spuds - a frugal staple. Turn them into soup with leeks (or onions for a cheaper version) for a filling meal.

What BBQ is complete without a classic potato salad? I sometimes make a big batch of this in summer and serve easy meats (like rissoles or skewers) with this and a green salad - 3 days or so of easy meals.

Have leftover mash? Turn it into bubble and squeak. Great for breakfast!

Mashed potato, but with garlic. Great with rissoles and gravy or sausages and gravy.

Irish Colcannon, basically. But we love this dish too.

I don't remember a single event or BBQ as a kid that did not have corn relish dip and West Coast coolers.

Damper is a classic Australian bread similar to Irish soda bread. Here, I've glammed it up with some rosemary and olives.

One of the most popular recipes on the blog. Made with the iconic Aussie breakfast cereal.

We grew up on pikelets. My mum would make them for afternoon tea because flour, sugar, and milk were cheap - a lot cheaper than chips or muesli bars. These pikelets include Weekbix and apple. You can totally just make them with the apple as well.

A winning recipe, I have strong memories of my mum getting boxes of free plums one year and making dozens and dozens of jars of jam. I still don't think she'll eat it anymore, lol.

The perfect afternoon snack when you have extra apples. I always keep puff pastry in the freezer as a staple ready to go.

Have an abundance of apples. These little pots of yum are the perfect easy dessert. Make one, make a hundred - they are easy to customise.

I know it says English trifle (sorry, we stole it), but this is a popular summer Christmas dessert in OZ with hundreds of variations. I couldn't leave it off the list.

Made with just four ingredients, including condensed milk, these little squares of sunshine always hit the spot.

My mum was asked to bring these classic caramel cups to every BBQ and school event. Made with Arnotts biscuits, they're easy, delicious, and always popular.

Slightly sweet, not as light and fluffy as modern scones, but delicious with a slather of butter.

While these look a bit rocky, they're not super hard. They are a classic. Peel in or out? Which do you prefer?

Nothing is more classic than an ANZAC bickie.

I grew up eating this, *and* we made it at school, so I'm placing it in the classic category, despite it being very close to an Elvis version. I grew up not far from Parkes - he's practically an adopted Australian, right?