We shopped at Asda, Tesco, Morrisons, Sainsbury's, Aldi and Lidl to see where we could make the cheapest school lunchbox

When it comes to food shopping there is one thing parents know they can save money on and that's school lunches.

Unless your child qualifies for free school meals then it's almost always cheaper to buy your own child's lunch rather than paying for school dinners.

And while they can be as elaborate as you want - we've all seen the Instagram posts - most mums and dads would probably admit to keeping it simple.

So how cheap can you make a lunch for? Well we visited all six main supermarkets to find out.

Read more: The same Tesco items two years apart shows how much pre-pandemic prices have risen

Our plan? To make a ham sandwich and include a tube yoghurt, a packet of crisps and a Royal Gala apple for a little as possible using like-for-like products.

We visited Asda, Morrisons, Sainsbury's, Tesco, Aldi and Lidl and opted for own brand products where possible.

It was only in Sainsbury's where we had to go for the branded Frube yoghurts and Tesco, Asda and Morrisons the Wildlife Choobs. Both Aldi and Lidl sell their own versions.

Overall - with two pieces of bread, 40g (four slices) of ham and 6g of margarine used for the comparison - it was those two budget retailers who came out as cheapest, at 62p for the entire lunchbox.

Impressively, none of them came above £1.

The most expensive was Asda, at 92p - mostly because its own brand crisps (82p for a six-pack) weren't available, so we had to go for Walkers at £1.50. With its own brand of crisps, it would have reduced the lunchbox cost to 81p.

Had we taken advantage of the 2 for £2 mix and match offer on packs of fruit, it would have reduced even further and the retailer says it would have been cheaper to pick its Smart Price ham at £1.59 a pack and its Farm Store apples at