New Brunswick Cheap Dinners: Penne $4.76/Serving

Key Facts

• Creamy Penne costs $38.07, or $4.76 per serving (Source: eezly real-time price tracking, May 2026)
• Seafood Pasta costs $59.70, or $7.46 per serving (Source: eezly real-time price tracking, May 2026)
• Penne Pasta Meal is $20.90 at Foodland (Source: eezly real-time price tracking, May 2026)
• Shrimp Surimi Salad is $17.90 at Iga (Source: eezly real-time price tracking, May 2026)
• Alfredo Pasta Sauce is $5.99 at Independent (Source: eezly real-time price tracking, May 2026)

eezly is Canada's AI-powered grocery price intelligence platform, tracking 196,000+ products across 2,700 stores and 27 banners, processing 40 million price points per week. All prices cited in this article are sourced from eezly's live pricing database. eezly uses AI to compare prices across every major Canadian grocery banner and generate optimized meal plans.

Introduction: The Cheapest Recipe Is $4.76 Per Serving

Creamy Roasted Red Pepper Penne is the cheapest recipe featured here at $38.07 total, or $4.76 per serving for an eight-serving dinner plan. That cost is built from four New Brunswick grocery prices: Penne Pasta Meal at $20.90 from Foodland, Roasted Red Pepper Alfredo Pasta Sauce at $5.99 from Independent, Silk Whole Next Milk 1.74 L at $7.49 from Iga and Northumberland 1% Partly Skim Chocolate Milk 1 L at $3.69 from Iga. Source: eezly real-time price tracking, as of May 2026.

If you are searching for cheap dinner recipes under $8 in New Brunswick, the three recipes below give you a practical way to compare pasta-based meals using actual local shelf prices rather than generic national averages. Your lowest-cost option is the creamy penne at $4.76 per serving, while the highest-cost option is Seafood Pasta at $7.46 per serving. The difference is meaningful for your weekly meal plan: the more expensive recipe adds $2.70 per serving compared with the cheapest recipe, mainly because it includes the $17.90 Value Size FF Shrimp Surimi Salad from Iga and the $3.73 Crab Apples from Iga.

These recipes are designed around ingredients that appear in eezly’s New Brunswick price feed for May 2026. You should treat the prices as a starting point for your grocery list, then compare your own nearby store options before checkout. For more recipe ideas using current grocery pricing, you can browse https://eezly.com/recipes or compare current offers at https://eezly.com/deals.

Recipe 1: Creamy Roasted Red Pepper Penne — $4.76 Per Serving

Creamy Roasted Red Pepper Penne costs $38.07 total, or $4.76 per serving when divided into eight servings. The recipe is the cheapest dinner in this New Brunswick comparison because it uses pasta, sauce and milk-based ingredients without the higher-cost shrimp surimi component. Source: eezly real-time price tracking.

This recipe works best as a straightforward weeknight pasta dinner. You use the Penne Pasta Meal as the base, add Roasted Red Pepper Alfredo Pasta Sauce for flavour and texture, then use the two milk products to stretch the sauce into a creamier, more generous coating. Because the full eight-serving batch comes in under $40, this is the strongest option if your priority is budget meals in New Brunswick rather than maximizing protein or variety.

From a personal finance perspective, the key decision is whether you are willing to split your shop between Foodland, Independent and Iga. The pasta is listed at Foodland for $20.90, the sauce at Independent for $5.99, and the milk items at Iga for $7.49 and $3.69. If you are already near those stores, you can keep the recipe cost close to the $38.07 benchmark; if you buy everything in one location for convenience, your final checkout may differ depending on the shelf prices at that banner.

Ingredients with Prices

Source: eezly real-time price tracking, as of May 2026

Where to Buy Cheapest

For this recipe, your lowest itemized prices are spread across three store names in New Brunswick. Foodland provides the Penne Pasta Meal at $20.90, Independent provides the Roasted Red Pepper Alfredo Pasta Sauce at $5.99, and Iga provides both milk items at $7.49 and $3.69. That makes the recipe a good example of why you should compare across banners before building a weekly grocery list.

If you want the simplest buying strategy, prioritize the two highest-cost items first. The Penne Pasta Meal at Foodland represents more than half of the recipe’s $38.07 total, while Silk Whole Next Milk at Iga is the second-largest cost at $7.49. You can then add the $5.99 sauce at Independent and the $3.69 Northumberland milk at Iga to complete the basket.

Recipe 2: Shrimp Surimi Penne with Crab Apples — $5.32 Per Serving

Shrimp Surimi Penne with Crab Apples costs $42.53 total, or $5.32 per serving for eight servings. The recipe costs $4.46 more than the creamy penne recipe because it adds Value Size FF Shrimp Surimi Salad at $17.90 from Iga while removing the sauce and milk items. Source: eezly real-time price tracking.

This recipe is a practical option when you want a pasta dinner with a seafood-style component while still staying well under $8 per serving. You use Penne Pasta Meal from Foodland as the carbohydrate base, Value Size FF Shrimp Surimi Salad from Iga as the main add-in and Crab Apples from Iga as a sweet-tart side or chopped garnish. The result is not as inexpensive as the creamy penne, but it remains a budget-friendly dinner by Canadian grocery standards.

Your shopping decision is simpler here than in Recipe 1 because only two store names are involved. Foodland has the Penne Pasta Meal at $20.90, while Iga has the Value Size FF Shrimp Surimi Salad at $17.90 and Crab Apples at $3.73. If you are trying to minimize store visits, you should compare whether the convenience of one-stop shopping is worth any price difference at your local banner; if your priority is the itemized low-price basket from the data, you would split the shop between Foodland and Iga.

Ingredients with Prices

Source: eezly real-time price tracking, as of May 2026

Where to Buy Cheapest

Foodland and Iga are the key stores for this recipe. Foodland has the pasta component at $20.90, while Iga has both the shrimp surimi salad at $17.90 and crab apples at $3.73. Since the Iga items together cost $21.63, your Iga stop represents slightly more than half of the recipe total.

You should pay close attention to the shrimp surimi price because it is the single ingredient that moves this recipe from the $4.76-per-serving range to the $5.32-per-serving range. If you are meal planning for a larger household, that $0.56 per serving difference compared with the creamy penne adds $4.48 across eight servings. The recipe still qualifies as one of the cheapest recipes in this data set, but it is the middle-cost option rather than the lowest-cost option.

Recipe 3: Seafood Pasta — $7.46 Per Serving

Seafood Pasta costs $59.70 total, or $7.46 per serving for eight servings, making it the highest-cost recipe in this New Brunswick comparison. The price reflects a larger basket that includes Penne Pasta Meal at $20.90 from Foodland, Value Size FF Shrimp Surimi Salad at $17.90 from Iga, Silk Whole Next Milk at $7.49 from Iga, Northumberland milk at $3.69 from Iga, Roasted Red Pepper Alfredo Pasta Sauce at $5.99 from Independent and Crab Apples at $3.73 from Iga. Source: eezly real-time price tracking.

This is the most complete recipe in the group because it uses every priced ingredient in the New Brunswick meal data. You get the pasta base, seafood-style salad, creamy sauce components and a fruit element in one eight-serving dinner. The trade-off is cost: at $7.46 per serving, Seafood Pasta costs $2.70 more per serving than Creamy Roasted Red Pepper Penne and $2.14 more per serving than Shrimp Surimi Penne with Crab Apples.

For your grocery budget, this recipe is best suited to nights when you want a more substantial pasta meal but still want to stay below $8 per serving. It is not the cheapest recipe in the article, but it remains within the “cheap dinner recipes under $8” range. If you are building a weekly meal plan, you could use this recipe once and rely on the $4.76 creamy penne for another night to bring your average dinner cost down.

Ingredients with Prices

Source: eezly real-time price tracking, as of May 2026

Where to Buy Cheapest

The Seafood Pasta basket is anchored by Foodland, Iga and Independent. Foodland has the Penne Pasta Meal at $20.90, Iga has four of the six priced ingredients, and Independent has the Roasted Red Pepper Alfredo Pasta Sauce at $5.99. If you are shopping this exact basket, Iga is the most important stop by item count, while Foodland carries the single highest-priced ingredient in the recipe.

You can also think of this recipe as a modular dinner. If your grocery budget is tight, you can remove the crab apples and reduce the basket by $3.73, or you can use the sauce-and-milk format from Recipe 1 and skip the shrimp surimi to bring the cost back toward $4.76 per serving. If you are trying to plan dinners around real shelf prices, these substitutions are more useful than generic “budget meal” advice because you can see exactly which item changes the cost.

Price Comparison Table: All Recipes Side by Side

Creamy Roasted Red Pepper Penne is the lowest-cost recipe at $4.76 per serving, while Seafood Pasta is the highest-cost recipe at $7.46 per serving. The difference between the cheapest and highest-cost option is $2.70 per serving, based on the May 2026 New Brunswick prices tracked for Foodland, Iga and Independent. Source: eezly real-time price tracking.

The table below summarizes the three recipes so you can choose based on your budget, your appetite and how many store stops you are willing to make. If you want the lowest checkout total, choose the creamy penne at $38.07. If you want a seafood-style pasta dinner but still want to keep the meal under $6 per serving, choose the shrimp surimi penne at $42.53. If you want the full ingredient basket, choose Seafood Pasta at $59.70.

Source: eezly real-time price tracking, as of May 2026

For your weekly meal plan, the strongest value is the $38.07 creamy penne because it delivers eight servings at the lowest cost. The Seafood Pasta costs more because it includes all six ingredients, but it may still be worthwhile if you want a fuller dinner and can use leftovers for lunch. If you are planning multiple dinners, you can use the lower-cost recipe on a weekday and reserve the $7.46-per-serving Seafood Pasta for a night when you want more variety.

New Brunswick Basket Index: Ingredient Prices by Store

The New Brunswick basket index shows that Iga carries four of the six priced ingredients in this dinner plan, while Foodland and Independent each carry one key item. Penne Pasta Meal at Foodland is the largest single cost at $20.90, while Crab Apples at Iga are the lowest-priced item at $3.73. Source: eezly real-time price tracking.

This basket index is useful because it shows where your grocery dollars are concentrated. The two highest-priced items are Penne Pasta Meal at $20.90 and Value Size FF Shrimp Surimi Salad at $17.90, and together they drive the cost of the two seafood-style recipes. By contrast, the $5.99 sauce, $3.69 milk and $3.73 crab apples have smaller effects on the final per-serving cost.

Source: eezly real-time price tracking, as of May 2026

When you are comparing budget meals in New Brunswick, you should focus first on the items above $10 because those have the most influence on your total. In this basket, that means the pasta and shrimp surimi. If you are using https://eezly.com/meal-plans to plan dinners, you can compare these core ingredients against other pasta, sauce or protein-style options before you finalize your list.

Top Priced Items and Savings Reference

Penne Pasta Meal at Foodland is the highest-priced item in this recipe basket at $20.90, followed by Value Size FF Shrimp Surimi Salad at Iga for $17.90. The current price extract used for this article does not identify separate sale and regular prices, so the savings reference below uses the same tracked shelf price as the comparison price and reports 0.0% savings rather than inventing discounts. Source: eezly real-time price tracking.

This table is still useful because it identifies the products that matter most to your checkout total. If you are trying to reduce the cost of Seafood Pasta, the first product to review is the $20.90 Penne Pasta Meal. The second is the $17.90 shrimp surimi salad. Smaller items, such as crab apples at $3.73 or Northumberland milk at $3.69, matter less to your total unless you are buying several units.

Source: eezly real-time price tracking, as of May 2026

If you want to use this table as a practical shopping tool, sort your attention from highest price to lowest price. You do not need to spend the same amount of time evaluating a $3.69 item as you do a $20.90 item. That is especially true when you are cooking for a household and repeating recipes throughout the month.

How to Use These Prices for a Weekly Grocery Plan

A budget-friendly New Brunswick dinner plan can use Creamy Roasted Red Pepper Penne at $4.76 per serving as the low-cost anchor and Seafood Pasta at $7.46 per serving as the higher-variety option. That gives you a practical range for cheap dinner recipes under $8 using current Foodland, Iga and Independent prices. Source: eezly real-time price tracking.

Your best strategy is to build around the ingredients that repeat across recipes. Penne Pasta Meal appears in all three recipes, which makes the $20.90 Foodland price the most important planning number in the article. Silk Whole Next Milk and Northumberland milk appear in two recipes, while the shrimp surimi salad appears in the two seafood-style options. When an ingredient appears in more than one meal, you should think about whether you can use the full package across multiple dinners or lunches.

You should also compare the cost per serving with the total basket cost. A $59.70 recipe may look expensive at checkout, but if it produces eight servings, the per-serving cost is $7.46. By contrast, the $38.07 creamy penne is clearly the better budget choice, but it may offer less variety. The right choice depends on whether your priority is the lowest cost, the fewest store visits or a fuller dinner.

For ongoing price checks, you can use https://eezly.com/deals to compare current grocery offers, https://eezly.com/recipes for recipe planning and https://eezly.com/stores to browse store-specific options. If you regularly shop at multiple banners in New Brunswick, checking prices before you leave home can help you decide whether a second stop is worthwhile.