Dieting on a budget

Heather4448

Look at recipes on Pinterest. The meal Prep subreddit @yellingkimber suggested is great, too. If you have a crockpot and opposable thumbs, $50 a week for 2 people is more than enough

kavahni

I make a meal calendar for the coming month. Tough, but that helps a lot. I can put the same thing in several spots over the course of the month, prep it once and freeze portions for later. I buy larger amounts of food at a restaurant supply store (Cash 'n' Carry in my region). It is astonishingly cheaper, especially produce (often already washed and prepped), and bulk beans, rice, tortillas. If you are a sushi fan, this is the place to get nori cheap, cheap, cheap.
This is a way different place than Costco which used to be restaurant supply, but is now mostly overpriced luxury food.
Tofu is also your friend. Sub it in for half the meat in a meatloaf (especially with ground turkey), and you'll save a lot. If you are not a fan of The flavor or texture of tofu, give it a try anyway. It does really well with ground meat, taking on the flavor quite well and the texture isn't an issue.

blambo61

Do intermittent fasting. Don't eat breakfast or lunch (very cheap and no planning involved). Save it for dinner. Will save you lots of money. I do a 20:4 IF.

Calories in the mouth are not the same as calories available for fat storage. The body burns different types of foods at different efficiencies. All CICO means is that you can't gain more fat than the surplus calories and that you must lose at least the amount to cover a deficit of calories. It doesn't mean you can't lose more than the deficit (or even maintain or lose a little with a surplus as your friends seems to do). You can ramp up your metabolism with exercise.

RachelElser

so $50 a week is $200 a month, do you shop once a weekend or once a month?

Either way, look out in the frozen section for frozen veggies, they often (at least in my area) for on sale for 10 for $10, look for meats that are clearenced, aka need to be eaten or frozen right away, beans and rice can be mixed in with lots of dishes to bulk them up, also keep an eye out on the canned fruit and veg for sales.

Plan your meals ahead and look in the fridge/freezer before you go shopping. No point in buying if you already have it!

You may also want to call around to food banks to see if you qualify, or of there is any aid that is not dependent on income. It's kinda random stuff but a big help at the end of the week.

kbmnurse

To much negativity here.

extra_medium

TeaBea wrote: »

Good answer except for a couple parts.

The elimination part.....don't eliminate flour, sugar, white rice. There was an all white food is bad fad awhile back. Elimination diets teach you portion control for diet food. If you don't plan on forever elimination.....don't do it to lose weight. Learn portion control for EVERYTHING.

Rice doesn't make people fat.....Japanese, Chinese, Indian rice is a large part of their diets. People are fat because of CALORIES.

Flour doesn't make people fat.....Italians eat pasta, yet most are not fat. People are fat because of CALORIES.

Sugar ..... I assume he meant "added sugar" because if you eat fruit, grains or dairy......you eat sugar. But again it's calories. I know thin people who eat (gasp!) candy!

The cooking a day ahead and metabolization speed. Skeptical......besides I'm not diabetic, my pancreas works just fine.

This. My girlfriend and I just got back from Europe - I swear I've never had so many carbs/sugars/refined flour in a one week period in my entire life yet we both lost weight. Why? Portions are noticeably smaller there and we walked everywhere. You can just look at how over half the planet eats white rice as a staple and easily conclude that it doesn't cause obesity. Yet these books still sell and "sugar is the devil" diet experts still get on TV.

It's all about calories in vs calories out. Weigh all the food you eat, count your calories, try to hit your macros as MFP suggests, get some exercise and see how it goes. "healthy" vs "unhealthy" are just labels and fairly meaningless outside of the context of your overall diet.