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An AskMetafilter user wonders:
What’s your favorite healthy food that can be bought on a college student budget? I’ve decided that I’m really going to crack down on my poor eating habits. As a college student, I’ve always bought the food that was the most affordable. Unfortunately, this is usually generic-brand pizza, toaster streudels, and whichever soda is on sale. In order to combat this, I’m looking for suggestions for healthy, easy-to-prepare foods that won’t break the bank.
There are some great answers here, such as:
- A cup of rice and a vegetarian stir-fry
- Replace soda with water
- Pasta primavera
- Fruitshakes/smoothies
- Cheese and crackers
- Nuts
- Beans (flavored with a little meat)
- Fruits and vegetables
Learning to eat (and prepare) more meals at home is an excellent way to reduce your food budget and eat healthfully. Find a source of recipes that you trust and learn to prepare them. (Here’s a good online recipe page that features many cheap and healthy meals.)
If you’re looking for healthy food on a small budget, then fruits and vegetables and other whole foods are the way to go. They’re the basic building blocks of a nutritious diet, and they’re much cheaper than processed foods.
Similar questions have been asked several times before at AskMetafilter:
- I want to eat more healthy foods. I have a very small food budget. Any ideas?
- What do you think is the cheapest, healthiest, tastiest, easiest meal to prepare?
- I need suggestions on high energy food that’s cheap, doesn’t need to be refrigerated, and tastes good (if such a thing exists).
- What’s the simplest, cheapest yet most complete diet available?
- I want to bring lunch to work because I am 1) trying to lose weight and 2) save money. Any ideas for what’s both healthy and easy?
- I am looking for unique ideas for making quick, easy, heathy, inexpensive dinners (in my case, for two) every night… or at least most nights. “Dinner Hacks” you might say.
This article is about Food, Frugality, The Best of Get Rich Slowly Thursday, 1st June 2006 (by J.D. Roth)
Great Post! This is definitely a subject I was wondering about myself.
As well as finding individual meals that are cost effective try to find things you can spin out over a number of days. For example as a student I would buy a chicken and then;
Sunday: Roast the chicken with potatoes and red lentils and use lots of olive oil (this meal on it’s own is probably quite expensive).
Monday: Use the left overs to make either chicken sandwiches or chicken curry or similar.
Tuesday: Use the carcass of the chicken and any other left overs with a can of tomatoes water a few other vegetables to make a soup.
Wednesday: Use the leftover soup as the base for a pasta or chilli sauce.
When you work out the costs (plus time / effort for mon/tue/wed) it works out really cheap. With a bit of immagination and experimentation you could probably think other similar comibinations.
Why not just buy stuff thats on sale and the cheapest frozen package of vegetables that go with the aforementioned product.
[...] Change the way you eat. If youâ??re looking for healthy food on a small budget, then fruits and vegetables and other whole foods are the way to go. Theyâ??re the basic building blocks of a nutritious diet, and theyâ??re much cheaper than processed foods.read more | digg story [...]
Eating well on a budget requires some thought…. But planning out a whole month of meals, and shopping for that month (you only get two paychecks a month) is the real challenge.
Is there a web site with a month long meal plan of healthy meals, in a speadsheet shopping list, that can be used at most grocery stores? NO… at least I can not find any, yet.
i think the easiest way to eat healthy and cheap is to buy in bulk and buy things you will eat and easy to freeze. you can make a weeks worth of meals in one day and heat to eat for later.
I for one make a cajun style chicken fettachini alfrado. yes its high in carbs but this is why you work a little more like walking. the meal is easy to make and lasts a single person several days. use one pound of chicken tenders and a package of pasta. and a jar of alfrado sauce with one can of doles or the like brand of tomattos. and some broccle when i cook the pasta i also cook the broccle. i grill the chicken using a blacken spice.
one other thing is to grill chicken. whole chicken is best to buy since its the cheapest. for the side i make a mixed vegis in a bag. should be good for 3 or 4 meals.
beans and rice are also cheap and easy to make as a base for a meal.
[...] Healthy Food on an Unhealthy Budget [...]
I have been very interested in this stuff, a while back there was this great site called HillBilly Housewife that has a whole list of the recipes. I’ll admit the prices may differ, but the site says you can feed 4 to 6 people for $45 dollars a week. All the meals and recipes are included. Check it out:
http://www.hillbillyhousewife.com/40dollarmenu.htm
Or you could play lots of soccer.
[...] In response to recent posts on eating cheaply (Healthy Food on an Unhealthy Budget and Learning to Eat More Meals at Home), several readers have pointed to a site called Hillbilly Housewife. The focus here is on low-cost, home-cooking from scratch. The recipes are all tested in a real kitchen with hungry children, stalking cats, begging puppies and a playful husband underfoot. The ingredients are affordable and readily available in most areas. [...]
burn the ramen!!!!
How to eat healthy on a low budget…
Change the way you eat.
If you are looking for healthy food on a small budget, then fruits and vegetables ……
Ask the Readers: Eating healthy on a small budget…
The Get Rich Slowly blog highlights a few tips for eating healthy on a tight budget in response to a question over at Ask MetaFilter. The post offers several both tried-and-true and good-for-you snacks and meals and also suggests……
There are a number of ways to do this. I’ve been successfully living a healty and inexpensive college diet for some time now and the key is indeed buying fresh foods, but not at the grocery store. Food Co-ops, farmers markets, and the like offer extremely low priced and fresh foods that are usually grown locally.
Also I’ve noticed many ethnic food stores have similar pricing structures. It sometimes takes a few visits before they recognize you, but these places are usually very thankful for your consistent business and offer price reductions at the register with a minimal amount of “Social Engineering”.
More on the health side of things, it also helps to regulate the amount of spices and cooking ingredients used in the foods you make. I’ve found that rather than using even light ranch or other creamy dressing on a salad, a little bit of salt, vinegar and and water thrown together (often known as brazilian dressing) really brings out the flavors of fresh vegetables without all the unnecessary calories you get by smothering it in processed chemicals and cheese.
Drinking 4-less “natty’s” a night will also do wonders.
You could always eat less… actually, for the next 21 days I’m running a personal “experiment” where I only eat the recommended serving size of each item for each meal. This morning I had exactly 1 1/4 cups of cereal, and for lunch I had a breakfast burrito with one flour tortilla, 1 egg, 1/4 c cheese, 1 meatless sausage pattie, and 2 tbsp salsa, along with 5 dried apricot halves. I bet people generally eat portions that are too large… one could save money and be more healthy by eating “normal” portions (and getting 2+ meals out of 1).
for a cheap/fast/easy lunch i hit a local grocery store that has a salad bar that cost $3.99/lb. They have a wide assortment of fresh veggies to choose from and I have never spent more than $3.00 on a salad that i have made. i am always left perfectly full. just remember that the fatty stuff weighs more…so leave it off…saves money and calories.
Three key things to eat healthy:
(1) Soups: Soup isfilling and you can freeze it. Make brocolli soup using frozen broccoli that includes the stems (it’s cheaper than just flowerets!). Use lots of celery for the broth, it adds volume, its low in calories and cheap. Cooking greens such as chard, bok choy, kale, etc are usually very cheap, very filling, and very nutritious.
(2) Legumes (Beans): Whatever color, whatever kind. Use chickpeas to make your own hummus. Cook black beans with spices and tofu. You can also use dry soy beans to make your own soy nuts which are a delicious and healthy snack.
(3) Frozen fruit: I always have a good amount of frozen fruit in the fridge and eat it with nonfat yogurt. Fresh fruit like cherries can get expensive, so if you buy it frozen, you can eat it whenever and not worry about it going bad AND it’s cheaper!
“Once a month cooking” is something I’ve been looking to try for a while… I have no “monthly” experience to share, but the idea seems great to me (but I would have to adapt it, I just LOVE to grab fresh vegetables and fruits a few times per week, especially in season / right now, I’m more at the weekly cooking level).
There are a few web sites and a book on it (good start is: http://www.realfood4realpeople.com/oamc.html)
I’m not in university yet, but my cousins have all been telling me how much of a god-send that http://www.cookingbynumbers.com is. Although the recipes are basic, it definately helps when cooking on a budget using just the basic things that you have left over at home!
Healthy, not necessarily meatless, has almost as much to do with preparation as it does with content. Pasta is dirt cheap, especially in bulk and with a little olive oil and a lot of herbs (or just margarine or butter).
Shopping for a family on a budget I always scour the weekly circulars and check ’smartcoupons.com’ for manufacturers coupons on line. Walmart has its own brand of meatballs, cheese ravioli and cheese shells that are very tasty and far cheaper than you can make them. Michelini brand frozen dinners are often on special for less that a dollar each. On Saturday morning Winn-Dixie was over stocked on fresh shrimp so they marked it down to $1.99 a pound (normally $7-8 pound).
I will argue that you can do as well, and probably better from a budget perspective, by picking selected frozen foods, especially vegetables and especially in the larger bags, than you can with fresh vegetables or health food.
Do you have access to an oven? It’s great to just put something in an oven and then not have to worry about tending it til it’s time to eat. Like other commenters here, I tend to avoid processed foods as much as possible, and find it’s cheaper to buy raw produce. (Starting a small herb garden can also save you shelling out $2 or $3 for a bunch of herbs every time you need them). I don’t use that much meat in my cooking - I find only a little bit of meat goes a long way in a dish, and I bulk it up with pasta and veges instead. One of the staples in my cupboard is bacon bits (small diced bits of bacon). They freeze well and you can use them straight from the freezer to add just a tiny bit of meat to whatever you are cooking. Some cheap, easy and tasty meals:
- Roast some sliced up vegetables like pumpkin, capsicum and eggplant and toss with pasta and olive oil.
- Brown some pork chops and throw it in a casserole dish with (raw and chopped) onions, potatoes, broccoli or your choice of vegetables. Mix in a tin of your favorite soup and bake for an hour in a medium oven.
- Throw some chicken wings (one of the cheapest cuts of meat there is) into a baking dish with some cloves of garlic, herbs and soy sauce to season. Top with onion slices and wedges of very ripe tomatoes and olive oil. Bake for 30 mins in medium oven then shuffle wings to top, and turn up the heat to let the wings crisp up. Mix in some baby spinach leaves after cooking to wilt. Mix with pasta or serve with crusty bread to mop up the juices.
i really digg the chicken carcass soup idea
[...] Just on a lark, I decided not to buy any dark chocolate for myself this week. Readers may remember that I regularly take a few ounces of dark chocolate early in the morning as a pick-me-up (along with Diet Coke, a kiwi and shredded wheat cereal). I told myself that I’d do it for a week to see if I NEED it. Mid-evening, I’m thinking about the prospect of waking up to no chocolates, no sweets, no anything. I’ve cut down significantly on sweets (no ice cream or donuts, and a cookie only at parties and during my once-a-week shopping), so a little splurge on chocolate won’t kill me. The problem is that it’s difficult to control the amount of chocolate I eat. Often I eat more than a reasonable portion of chocolate. Will Robert be able to survive with no chocolate? Stay tuned for our next episode! Speaking of diet, here’s Michael Blowhard on diet books and a meta post on healthy eating at the personal improvement blog, Get Rich Slowly. [...]
@ Derek
My wife and I buy a $5 or $6 (depending on sales) rotisserie chicken from the supermarket once or twice a month. This provides an immediate meal of hot, juicy chicken. We pick the rest of the meat for a second cheap meal of chicken quesadillas. And we get a third meal out of it by steeping using the carcass to create chicken stock. This is very much like pgc in the second comment, except we’re paying the store to roast the chicken for us. It’s good stuff!
There is a website called savingdinner.com. They have 8 menus to choice from. One being frugal and another is vegetarian if that is your choice. They have sample menus for you to try so you dont feel that you need to buy till your sure it works. Each menu has a shopping list to go with it so you just go with the flow. All but one of the menus are dinner only. The other menu with breakfast, lunch and snacks on top of dinner is called Body Clutter. I picked the Body Clutter menu beacuse I have trouble remembering or even being good at thinking up good breakfasts.
The owner of the site has an article in the Desert newspaper about a pantry that keeps you eating the right stuff. There are also articles in the archives on the website.
[...] Get Rich Slowly » Healthy Food on an Unhealthy Budget They say that poor people are obese because they can’t afford heathy food. But that’s not true–take a look at this collection of healthy, cheap food. (tags: food health money cooking home recipes reference) [...]
@Phillip - I’m sorry I don’t have much that is more helpful to add at this time, but Phillip’s suggestion about chicken alfredo just isn’t appropriate for “healthy” food.
Alfredo is always one of the unhealthiest (and, um, most delicious!) meals you can eat. It’s not the carbs, it’s the fattiness of the cheese… really really high cholesterol. Just going for a longer walk won’t help. It would be better to grill or poach the seasoned chicken and eat it on top of a bed of greens.
Likewise, Steve’s suggestion of dirt-cheap Michelini frozen dinners isn’t a good one. Processed foods like that should be avoided as much as possible from both health and budget standpoints.
If I have something to add I’ll definitely be back. At the moment, the only thing I can think to add, which someone else might already have said, is that it’s always cheaper to buy your own lettuce and wash/cut it than it is to buy lettuce in a bag. Stick to green lettuces like romaine, skip iceburg (it has almost no nutritional value and is mostly cellulose and water).
To the original Ask Mefi poster I would have said to buy or ask someone for a Brita pitcher (around $20 + $6/ish filters every few months) and start drinking tap water instead of soda.
I think Real Simple has, in the past, had “what to do with a rotisserie chicken for several days” articles, which might be available on their website.
Learning how to eat seasonally helps my budget a lot. Rather than planning meals just around what sounds good (think red pepper and zucchini ratatouille in december. I try to think about what is in season, in my region at the time.
Sure, it can seem limiting at first, but it is also an opportunity to try new and interesting (and nutritious) vegetables. Roots and hardy greens were my best friends this past winter.
Things are WAY cheaper when they are in season (sometimes 1/4 of the off season price). You can even substitute seasonal veggies for your favorite dishes.
Your local farmer’s market is a great resource cuz if it’s not in season it’s simply not there. Natural foods stores often have plenty of info on seasonality of veggies and there are lots of great resources out there that tell you how to cook a rutabaga. Not to mention your frienly local farmer or produce worker…man do they know how to cook!
[...] Get Rich Slowly » Healthy Food on an Unhealthy Budget Bonne nourriture pour les pauvres (tags: nourriture cheap food health budget) [...]
Your website is to long but it’s o.k. to read if you have the time to do so.
love ya Jade Kitely
I would find it easy if your home page wasn’t so long, and by the way it looks like it would take me for eva to read if i needed information about healthy Eating could you make the writing more clear to read, i struggled to read most of the writing.
Love Ya Jade Kitely
Not sure if it is just a local thing, but we have Sav-A-Lots around where I live and they are awesome. Most of the stuff I have never heard of, but it all tastes pretty much like it’s name brand equivalent. My girlfriend and I especially like Dr. Pop, which is a rip off of Dr. Pepper if you couldn’t guess.
You need to eat a good, full meal on test day morning. I’d always go to Dennys and study on a table. Probably not the time to count calories or concentrate on health merits.
For general meals, I practically lived out of my crockpot in college. You can throw anything in there, left overs, side of meat, bag of green peas and a little ham. Just add a little water and learn how to make a stock.
Don’t like what you made? Throw some more stuff in their, you can usually fix it by adding something else.
Even cheap grade meats can taste good, cooked in a crock pot.
A pot roast seems expensvive, but remember, you can practically live of of that ten dollar cut for a whole week.
The only catch is it can smell up your room or house. I left my on the balcony, but you could put it in under your stove and leave the fan running.
Healthy food is a matter of diversity and quantity. Soups a good, a slow meal to relax and enjoy. Requires little time and you can season anything on the planet and make soup out of it.
Get some barley or throw some left over cooked rice in.
Make sure you get some canned tomatoes to zest up your meats.
You can’t ruin a meal with the crockpot, unless you leave unattened w/o water. Still won’t burn down the house though.
Get a big one, the little ones are a joke.
[...] I’ve also been reading a bunch of websites for tips on losing weight. [...]
there are ways of making the alfrado not so rich and fat and taste just as good. just have to do a simple google for low fat alfredo sauce. if you eat the meal in proper proportions you would also not have to worry about it being as unhealthy. eating a nice portion of steamed vegis and a salad balances it all out.
I’m on a budget but would like to go on a low cholesterol diet. And I would like to eat as many of the food groups a day as possible to stay healthily.
soak green lentils for about an hour, with salt, pepper, and curry powder.
boil until soft, which will take 20 minutes full blast, then up to 1 hour on a lower temperature. Add water when needed, but no water should remain (this isn’t a soup).
dice in half an onion.
crush or finely dice in some garlic.
cut up two or three frankfurt sausages.
add two or three boiled and diced patatoes.
You’ve got the healthiest and most inexpensive food, which could keep you going for days for under £5.
Mahatma Gandhi said you can survive on lentils alone, which he did. It is historically known to be the healthiest and cheapest and most ancient food known to man.
The first couple of days it might alter your digestion and make you expel all the usual gunk we eat and retain.. but once your system is flushed you’re in for a treat if you’ve been wanting to get rid of that gutt or love handles.
have a look around for variations and more info, just to get you started:
http://www.recipes4us.co.uk/Specials%20and%20Holidays/Lentils%20Origin%20Uses%20Recipes.htm
http://www.whfoods.com/genpage.php?tname=foodspice&dbid=52
Enjoy.
[...] Get Rich Slowly » Healthy Food on an Unhealthy Budget Interesting blog with some good advice. (tags: food health) [...]
[...] My wife and I love to eat. We also love to save money. Sometimes it’s difficult to reconcile these competing desires. I’ve written before about learning to eat more meals at home and how to find healthy food on an unhealthy budget. Recently, Bankrate posted an article called 10 Frugal Cooking Tips that Sizzle. Cooking can get expensive if you buy too many kitchen gadgets, make poor grocery choices or panic shop for each night’s supper. We spoke with chefs, caterers and cookbook authors for their insights on eating well without spending a lot. We share their onion pearls of wisdom with you. [...]
The roast chicken is a favorite in my house, too. We started buying $7 rotisserie chickens and moved on to roasting our own. (Not actually cheaper, but we can mix up the spices.) The leftover chicken goes into sandwiches, tacos or enchiladas. In the winter we make soup with the carcass.
Ethnic grocery stores are great - I can buy 100 tortillas for $1.50 at the mexican market near my house, cheap avocados (2/$1 when everyone else is charging $1.50) and other produce, canned refried beans, etc.
[...] Popular Three Reasons Most Budgets Don’t Work (and How To Fix Them)Healthy Food on an Unhealthy BudgetA List of Excellent Personal-Development SitesMy eBay Method: 13 Steps to Profitable AuctionsHow I Finally Defeated DandruffCarnival of Personal Finance #60Handy Personal Finance Spreadsheets [...]
[...] Change the way you eat. If you â??re looking for healthy food on a small budget, then fruits and vegetables and other whole foods are the way to go. Theyâ??re the basic building blocks of a nutritious diet, and theyâ??re much cheaper than processed foods.read more | digg story [...]
[...] Get Rich Slowly » Healthy Food on an Unhealthy Budget [...]
You don’t have to be rich to eat healthy, but it is more expensive and takes more commitment. It is also a lot better if you plan on living longer!
This post brings to mind my college days when our budgets allowed for spags(spaghetti) and pb&j.
I am also reminded of the tv show that ended in the 90’s, The Frugal Gormet. He always had some great recipes for little dinero. Especially loved an episode he did on Chili. I better stop, I am making myself hungry.
Curry….
It’s easy to make, it tastes great, very flexible to the ingrediants on hand, and if you buy the spice itself in bulk, cheap.
http://pussfeller.googlepages.com/quickcurrydishes
[...] Cook your own meals. This is a valuable skill, especially for young adults. If you can learn to eat well on a budget, you’ll be ahead of your peers. [...]
[...] (For more on this topic read: Healthy food on an unhealthy budget and Learning to eat more meals at home.) [...]
[...] Get Rich Slowly » Healthy Food on an Unhealthy Budget Tips for eating healthily on a tight budget. I must read this. (tagged: article blogs cooking food health howto interesting lifehack lifehacks money personal read productivity readme recipe reference tips tutorial nutrition @yettoread) [...]
[...] Popular Entries What is a Reasonable Offer for a New Car?How to Sell on eBayHealthy Food on an Unhealthy BudgetA List of Excellent Personal-Development Sites27 Money Tips for College StudentsMonthly Status Report (June 2006)Survey: What Does Money Mean to You?My eBay Method: 13 Steps to Profitable AuctionsLearning to Eat More Meals at HomeAn Introduction to Homesteading [...]
Quinoa, Lentils, and Frozen Spinach.
This is about as cheap as it gets, and it’s also about as healthy as it gets. I’m not sure it would be as appetizing for most people as it is for me (I eat it almost every day), but I would defintely consider it a power-house combo. For anyone not familiar with Quinoa, it’s pretty much like rice on steroids, nutritionally, and just as easy (actually, easier!) to prepare. The Quinoa can be prepared ahead of time, and then stored in the refrigerator. (You could even mix it up with some different grains, like bulgar, kasha, wild rice, brown rice, or wheat berries, to add a more varied texture.) Then, when you’re ready for a meal, mix up in equal portions the quinoa, lentils (I use canned lentils, out of laziness, but dried lentils would be healthier, as they aren’t loaded with all the sodium), and frozen spinach.
(I currently live in France, where I can buy a package of frozen spinach in which the spinach has been portioned into separate “balls,” either minced up or not — *very* convenient. I’m not sure why none of the American companies are doing this. It’s a real shame.)
Add a little garlic, cheese (soy, if you prefer), and your seasoning of choice, zap it in the microwave, and Voila! — in about 5 minutes or so you’ve got a fast, cheap, *supermeal*.
Okay, I think whoever made the list at the top of this page doesn’t live where I live, in the South in America. Cheese costs a fortune, even cheap cheese. Nuts are outrageously expensive! Quinoa can only be bought at a specialist store for lots of money. Fresh veggies add up quickly - 2 dollars for a small avocado, 5 dollars worth of eggplant, one good quality apple costs more than a dollar. Farmer’s Market prices are higher, not lower. Where are you people from that 7 dollars for a small block of cheese is a cost-effective way to eat?
Chicken is cheap. So is frozen turkey, which can substitute for ground beef. Red beans and rice are always good. A sweet potato in the microwave with a bit of salt and a little butter is a satisfying healthy snack.
One of my favorite college recipes was barley, sliced onions, sliced apples, a little bit of apple vinegar, garlic salt, and a bit of kosher sausage all in the same pot.
Just wanted to share my blog, where most recipes cost less than a buck per serving. What is frugal to cook definitely is based on your location and time of year.
[...] I’ve been meaning to write about eating on a budget for some time, but one of my favorite blogs, LifeHacker has an article that repurposes an article at Get Rich Slowly. Even that repurposes yet another article. So of course, I’m going to break the rule of blogging and repurpose it yet again. Hey, at least I’m going to add my thoughts in so it’s not all repurposing. [...]
[...] Healthy Food on an Unhealthy Budget lists inexpensive healthy foods at Get Rich Slowly. [...]
If you must buy your food in a food store, shop the outside aisles. There you’ll find the fresh produce, vegetables, dairy, poultry and breads. Invest in beans and rice in their un-seasoned forms. Reason: when you buy Uncle Freds Authentic Pagan Style Wild Rice you pay steak prices for spices. Skip the meat and learn to use spices for seasoning. Feel you need SOME meat? Boil an egg.
Buy a produce dryer. Thrift stores are good sources. Dry tomatoes when you get too many in order to take advantage of a quantity price. Dry carrots when you have to buy a 3# bag to get one stinking carrot. Celery going lame gets cut up & dried, too. Peel & dry apples when they go on sale (dip in lemon juice to retard browning and dust with cinnamon to add flavor). The veggies store in a plastic bag and get used in soups. The tomatoes can be added to yeast bread or salads. The apples go in your back pack for a snack on down the road.
Find a CHEAP source for fresh fruits & veggies. ASK people you know where the inexpensive places to buy this stuff are.
If you’ll focus on fresh foods properly prepared you’ll find that you are ill less often, too. That can be a huge savings.
Huge ditto on what “Allie” says: “Okay, I think whoever made the list at the top of this page doesn’t live where I live, in the South in America. Cheese costs a fortune, even cheap cheese. Nuts are outrageously expensive!….” (Except that I live on the Central Coast of California.) And sweet potatos are an excellent food!!!
Peanut butter (the real, healthy kind w/out sugars added) is good stuff too, and inexpensive if bought in bulk.
I’m six months pregnant, (due in June…yay!) and my husband and I are barely holding up financially until then, when he is finished with school (college) and starts work full-time. I’m trying to eat as healthy as possible on a budget and finding it pretty difficult. (Especially sharing the kitchen with a husband who likes healthy food, but is accustomed to buying or preparing greasy quick food and mac ‘n cheese or frozen chicken strips for dinner…lol)
We are finding if we shop right, take advantage of Costco and Food for Less (and other low-cost and wholesale stores) and get creative with a limited pantry, we can make it, and eat more healthy than we every have.
Learning new ways to prepare potatoes, rice, and pasta is getting difficult, but they’re the cheapest ways to a regular full stomach, and we tend to use one of the three every night….:)
Keeping to only the least expensive varieties, you can find okay deals on fruits and veggies, and buying certain frozen items in bulk helps. (Yay for rice and stir-fry veggies!)
However, cheese and nuts and most cuts of red meat ARE very expensive and there is no way around it. If you can afford them, great, but if not then skip the nuts and (oh so tender wonderful) meat. Depend on peanut butter and lean hamburger bought in bulk. Just prepare it in as many different ways possible. Cheese……well, cheese we’d like not to do w/out, so we give up a few other novelties.
And DRINK MILK (lowfat or no fat). Or Soy milk. Or whatever your thing is. I’m finding it is filling in the blanks for a lot of things our bodies are needing.
Our biggest obstacle? Finding things that don’t take too much time to prepare for lunches and those quick dinners, without buying them pre-made and finding new recipes that don’t call for a list of things we have to go out and buy. More recipes that keep it simple and limited to things that the pantry is normally stocked with would be nice.
http://www.cookingbynumbers.com/
not bad.
Your article had great advice. It made me think that perhaps, it is all in the planning. You have to plan ahead if you want to eat healthy and save some cash. You can’t just show up at the store and expect to make good choices. You need to make a list ahead of time and only shop from the list. Your list should include fresh and frozen fruits and vegatables with no added ingredients and whole grain everything- bread, cereal, rice and pasta. Stock up on nuts. The less indulgent food you buy the less you put in to your body and taking money from your pay check and waisting it on junk is crazy.
Check out this resource
http://foodstamp.nal.usda.gov/nal_display/index.php?info_center=15&tax_level=1&tax_subject=267
Hi,
I stumbled upon this thread and since I wrote the book on the subjuect (Healthy, Fast and Cheap: The Ultimate College Cookbook) I thought I would throw this in:
One of my favorite strategies for eating well in college ona budget was to roast a chicken. It is easy, you can eat for a few days with chicken and rice, chicken salads, chicken sandwiches and then use the leftovers to make a healthy, nourishing soup stock, whcih doubles as a catch all for leftovers! (ever culture has a variation on this; minestrone, jambalaya, etc.)
I have a useful series on the 5 prinicples of the Healthy, Fast and Cheap lifestyle at http://www.healthyfastandcheap.com
Seth
[...] Last June I asked GRS readers, “How much do you spend on food?” I noted that Kris and I were spending $400/month on groceries and about $200/month dining out. Those numbers remain unchanged. We’ve also discussed healthy food on an unhealthy budget. [...]
I don’t think that anybody yet mentioned Oatmeal?! I’m currently shelling about 70% of my pay on rent and tuition alone so I’m all about eating cheap, and trying to be healthy. Oatmeal is a life saver, it keeps you full, its cheap, and you can change the flavor to your tastes. I get the kind in individual packets (which I know isn’t as cheap as bulk) but they have organic packets at Safeway, I throw in some cinnamon and half a banana. Thats like $.50/serving for a healthy filling meal. Save the other half of the banana for a mid morning snack!!
Fresh produce???
I WISH I could afford fresh produce. That may be the most healthy thing to eat, but it is also the MOST expensive!
Most everything suggested on this page costs way too much or would be a lot of trouble to prepare.
Healthy food on a budget….think protein, carbs and fat…
Cheap/good protein: cottage cheese…yes cottage cheese! It’s been given a bad rap….reduced fat cheese singles…canned Wild Alaska salmon…eggs…yes, eggs…bad rap too….peanut butter (the fat is a good fat)…frozen cooked shrimp–find it in the freezer case at Wal-Mart…you can get a big bag that will last a long time for about $4….dairy like milk, and yogurt are good protein sources too…
Carbs: think whole grain–oatmeal, brown rice, apples or most fresh fruits on sale,not by the bag, but by the piece… whole wheat pasta, potatoes…even white potatoes..I know they’ve been given a bad rap but they are a good source of many nutrients,are cheap and filling…fresh regular carrots, cabbage, zucchini, plain, frozen vegetables…beans, canned and dried, lentils.
Fats: think monosaturated fats like canola oil, olive oil, cold pressed is best….real butter used sparingly…or an organic spread made from mono/cold pressed oils…walnuts,almonds…
Three easy cheap “recipes”:
#1
One baked potato, butter, S&P
Diced onion, 1-2 American cheese singles
Top with hot pork ‘n beans. Yum.
#2
1 pkg. of ramen noodles, (rice or wheat) prepared as pkg. directs….add a couple slices of cucumber, mushrooms thinly sliced(by the pound you can buy 1 or 2 mushrooms, you don’t have to buy a whole pound)…a few frozen peas…for protein add a diced hard boiled egg or add a raw egg and cook like egg drop soup…add a few frozen cooked shrimp…add a squeeze of lime or lemon juice and a tsp. of dark roasted sesame oil (it cost a couple dollars per bottle but goes a long way, and can be omitted)
#3
Combine a half cup cottage cheese,half a medium apple diced, a few raisins if you have them, a few walnuts, a generous sprinkle of cinnamon…
I use salmon in sushi and onigiri…enjoy it with salad greens, avocado, and a dressing made of wasabi and rice wine vinegar. Also, salmon patties made with some finely minced onion and an egg as a binder, pan fried in a little butter are a good cheap source of protein…serve with your favorite vegetables….
I do a lot of Indian cooking…with a potato, a tomato and one other veg. like cauliflower, and a few spices you can make a feast…serve with some plain yogurt, rice or chapati, and Indian pickle..there are many websites where you can find easy Indian recipes.
Healthy eating on a budget…
Eating well when you are on a budget can seem difficult if you are not sure what to eat. Usually the cheap can substitute seems better like a better option for your wallet but what is it doing to……
[...] pay for hydration! You’ll be fine without milk, really. Your kids don’t need juice. No one needs soda. Energy drinks, fizzy fillers, juice blends - all terrific ways to drain your bank account. These [...]
[...] Healthy food on an unhealthy budget [...]
my cheapie meal is fritata which if I make enough I can have cold for lunch the next day. Its filling and means I don’t buy lunch which gets expensive. I buy cheap veg at the supermarket to go in it. And its quick to make.
“My wife and I buy a $5 or $6 (depending on sales) rotisserie chicken from the supermarket once or twice a month. This provides an immediate meal of hot, juicy chicken. We pick the rest of the meat for a second cheap meal of chicken quesadillas. And we get a third meal out of it by steeping using the carcass to create chicken stock. This is very much like pgc in the second comment, except we’re paying the store to roast the chicken for us. It’s good stuff!”
If you go to the grocery after say nine, most of those chickens are half price.
[...] Healthy Food on an Unhealthy Budget [...]
hi i like to now how you can eat healthy on a 100.00 or 160.00$ a week for a family of 4.
Yummy meals:
–can of black bean soup over rice or a baked sweet potato
(for that matter, a small chili over a Wendy’s baked potato is only $2.40 including taxes).
–salad (even a bag of lettuce) with some rotisserie chicken on it. You can add other things that add to the deliciousness if you have them lying around: raisins, onions, a little bit of leftover cheese, fruit like apples or pears, frozen vegetables that are run under hot water until they are lukewarmish such as peas or broccoli, can of corn, raw vegetables, leftover grilled vegetables like zucchini, can of chickpeas, etc. You could even put a few crunchy mashed up potato chips on top if you want–not healthy but fun.
–You can get a crockpot for about $30ish, or less at a yard sale.
That’s great for a Sunday of studying, or, just start it in the morning and leave. Super easy dishes:
Throw in 2-4 pounds of chicken pieces. Cover with barbecue sauce. Cook all day slowly on low. Nice!
–get a cheap beef roast. Throw in crockpot. Add water. Cook all day. (However, this would taste even better: add red cooking wine, or even red grape juice instead. Throw in bag of small carrots, onions, cut up potatoes, a few spices. Could throw in a packet of dried beef gravy or something like that if you want–doctor it up if you want, or don’t.). Cook all day on low.
–buy a turkey breast if it’s on sale. Throw it in crockpot with a packet of dried turkey gravy (obviously, just the powder, not the packet) and a can of cranberry sauce. Cook all day on low.
[...] How to eat healthy on a low budget [...]
[...] Healthy food on an unhealthy budget [...]
I’m not sure about other grocery stores, but at one of the grocery stores I frequent, simply going to a different aisle in the store means that I’m going to save. For example, the price of a can of black beans in the bean aisle is one price. But, if I go the next aisle over, like to the ethnic foods, I can find the “ethinic brand” of black beans at either a cheaper price or the same price but twice the amount. I know it sounds odd, but I’ve noticed this marketing scheme with several grocery items.
The problem with this advice is that basically wrong. Fruits and vegetables are not really cheap in the volumes that one has to eat them to get 2,000 calories. They’re not as expensive as, say, meat, and they’re certainly more nutritionally efficient than processed foods. But the simple fact is that healthy eating and living frugally don’t mesh unless you eat mostly beans and rice. Although you can’t live on them exclusively, beans and rice give a much better bang for buck than fruits and vegetables.
Another healthy bargain: oatmeal. Not the instant stuff but the regular slow-cook stuff. The caveat here is that you may find yourself spending money on things to add to the oatmeal to make it taste less bland.
[...] on budget building, stories about spending thriftily, and links to other helpful sites like this one that gives you some tips on how to eat healthy on a college student’s [...]
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Eating healthy is more expensive, at least now. If you look at the long picture, it’s cheaper than medical bills when you get cancer or other diseases caused from poor food choices. We need to do what we can, buy fresh fruits and veggies, stay away from snack food etc.
I am neverceasingly amazed that people think soda is cheap. It isn’t, even when it is on sale! Tapwater is cheap. Tea is cheap. Homebrewed coffee is cheap.
I’m growing a garden. Fresh veggies. No tainted tomatoes. Fun and cheap.
How to eat on a budget of a 100 bucks a week for a family of 4? Try the grocery game.
http://www.thegrocerygame.com
The first store is 10 bucks and each additional store is 5 bucks, billed by-monthly. So for one month you, at least I do, pay 12 bucks. The first trial month is only 1 dollar. The game tells you when, where, how to use a certain coupon at rock bottom price. Often paired up with store sales and store coupons!! So for an example a bottle of shampoo that cost at least a dollar, I can generally get for .30 cents.
What you want to do is stock up on when there are sales. I also shop at stores that have the reward program. Wal-greens, CVS that type of thing. Oh and if you do it right, cereal is only a buck a box.
Just make sure you clip your coupons.
Great ideas, especially reminding people about nuts! Its a great for you and easy to take with you. I keep a container in my car so when Im leaving work and starving I have something to munch on and not tempted to stop somewhere.
Pic Current wrote a similar article about eating healthy cheap that was pretty interesting. I hope it can be as helpful.
http://current.pic.tv/2008/10/06/simple-ways-to-eat-for-less/
Trying to cut back on the cost of food is a great first step. But remember, often times people can be to ‘up-front’ cost sensitive.
For example, junk foods are generally cheaper, as are processed foods. But, they cost you a lot more in the long run in heart bypass surgeries, diabetes, etc.
Here’s an article that explains this a little more thoroughly: http://www.curtmalexander.com/cooking-on-a-budget.html
Try the real Italian cuisine. We don’t have “Alfredo” or such fancy Italo-American pastas - we have spaghetti with tomato and basil, penne with chopped vegetables, caprese salad (tomato and good mozzarella, sliced, with extra-virgin oil)… lots of simple stuff, light and healthy.
I’ve found smoothies and shakes to be great for me as I’m always on the go. Maybe a quick breakfast of fresh fruit, smoothie for lunch and a healthy dinner. I guess my question would be how do you cook? Alot of dorms don’t have kitchens…
I really feel that as times are changing and more and more people are becoming aware of the food choices that are out there as well as the resources that supply these foods, prices are going to start falling because of demand. I know that when we shop at Whole Foods we are able to buy everything we need and spend roughly the same as we would at a conventional store with non-organic and natural products. A little investigation and education in what products are offered and search for some coupons on line too - they are out there and that can help that budget as well!
People need to realize that farmers markets are cheaper, that buying from local and SEASONAL are very important. Don’t go looking for apples in the spring time. This is an example of ONE sort of growing season for the general population of apples… Learn this shit and shop when things are in season, or else it’s going to be expensive no matter where you go.
http://www.ces.ncsu.edu/depts/hort/hil/hil-8301.html
Tip: Go vegetarian! When I switched from eating meat to a near-vegan diet, I cut my grocery bill in HALF!
I also lowered my chances of getting heart disease, cancer, high blood pressure (mine is 106/66), and osteoporosis. So it’s a good thing I’m saving all that money, because I’m going to live a lot longer!
The best thing about cheap, healthy foods, is that they ca often be combined together to make great meals. A little rice, some seasonings, vegetables and a whole chicken can be combined to become so much more.
http://www.justpeace.org has a low cost cookbook and tips for living on less. http://www.stretcher.com also has a ton of low cost recipes and money saving ideas.
A way to stretch our budget is to also use one main ingredient to make a few different meals.
For example, we make a roast in the crockpot with veggies, the next night we make chicken enciladas with leftover beef. You could also make a potpie, of fajitas. Not a lot of ingredients and minimal time spent!
Keep it simple and buy basic ingredients for example, rice, potatoes, vegetables. Avoid highly processed packaged foods. Following these simple rules will help you save money.
I think people eat too many big meals. Eat something like toast, banana, and peanut butter in the morning and you’re set for all day.
Eat simple meals have an egg sandwich, veggie burger, or tuna fish sandwich for dinner . Then have a solid meal on say wednesday with leftovers on thursday. Then on Sunday have a large roast or something similar. Those leftovers can last a couple of days. You freeze whatever is left to pull out on days when you dont cook.
If you dont have big elaborate meals everyday you find you appreciate those nice meals much more.
Lentils, pasta, eggs, all dirt cheap.
You can spend 1/3rd of what most people spend and your meals be virtually indistinguishable from theirs if you shop smart.
Best book ever: Help! My apartment has a kitchen! By Kevin and Nancy Mills.
Trader Joe’s, if you have one around you, is what I would consider the “poor person’s Whole Foods”. They have some fairly inexpensive entree dinners (~$3-4 feeds my wife and I), along w/ a great selection of frozen veggies (although I recommend a bulk farmer’s market first if you have access to one).
We are a family of four, consisting of a pre-schooler who is a very picky eater, and a toddler, who will eat everything he can reach. Every month, we only have about $100 to buy groceries. This makes it very difficult to make meals of, to say the least. I have come up with must-have items that are cheap and can be made into several types of meals (so we’re not eating the same thing every day).
1. Milk - for drinking and cooking. Also check out evaporated milk which lasts a long time and is great for stockin up on in case you run out of regular milk and can’t afford to buy more just yet.
2. Veggies/Fruit - Frozen veggies are great because you can find them on sale for $1 usually, and they last a long time. Canned veggies have water in them, which adds to the weight listed on the can, and so it actually has less in it compared to a package of frozen veggies. You can add these into meals or eat as a side to an entree. The fresh veggies we buy are: onions, tomatoes, apples, bananas, tangerines (on sale), lettuce (for salads because it goes a long way and is a great filler), mushrooms (individually not pre-packaged, because it is cheaper), and a green pepper here and there.
3. Ground Turkey - This is used to replace ground beef, as ground turkey is cheaper AND healthier! It smells better cooking, and it’s hardly noticeable that it’s not ground beef.
4. Tortillas/Bread - You need these to slap together PB&J sandwiches and quesadillas for lunch.
5. Cheese - I splurge and buy Fiesta Blend shredded cheese (Walmart brand). We go through a lot of cheese, and for some reason, it always needs to be shredded for whatever we are making.
6. Eggs - Breakfast, egg salad sandwiches, dinner omlets, there are many ways to use eggs, and they are cheap.
7. Cereal - With kids, cereal seems to be a must-have. Walmart’s Great Value brand is the cheapest I have found.
8. Peanut Butter - Again, for the sandwiches.
9. Jelly/Jam - For PB&J, and also for toast in the morning.
Items that I like to have in the house (but can’t always, due to finances), are healthy items to snack on. I buy the big containers of Gold Fish, ice cream ONLY when it is on sale, mini bagels (again, ONLY on sale), granola bars or knock-off Nutrigrain bars, instant oatmeal, and some baking items. Having flour and sugar around is great when you want to have a cookie or cake or something else, and no money to buy them. Making the food yourself is usually cheaper and healthier.
Make sure to check the sales ads and buy only what is on sale if you don’t NEED it, and stock up! I buy a bunch of tortillas when they are on sale for .99 cents, and I freeze the extra ones. Also bread can be frozen, and so I buy 3 - 4 loaves at once when it is on sale. Sometimes checking the sales ads means bouncing from one grocery store to another. If they are near one another, it is worth it, but watch out if you are ending up spending money on gas to go a distance to get to another store that has an item just several cents cheaper.
Hope this helps someone!!
Wow. Hot topic. My wife and I do our best to eat cheap and healthy and it’s not always easy. First, good produce in the US is expensive. But, if you do things from scratch it can lead to saving a bundle on food costs. And, eating healthily is your own insurance for staying out of the doctor’s office. If you’re creative you’re can eat well and on a shoestring.
I have found it very difficult to eat healthy with no money. The biggest problem seems to be, and this is where I will disagree with you, is that processed foods are by far cheaper than fresh fruits and vegetables as well as anything else that is healthier. This is the perfect example of why so many families in poverty eat so unhealthy, it’s cheaper.