what to eat when you're really poor? lol

landmine8713

i need some help with what to buy in large amount for cheap, i dont really eat too much throughout the day i kinda have a snack in the morning with coffee, then wait til like 6 or 7 to eat dinner which is fast food. lol I have to buy stuff for myself my boyfriend is a picky eater and im not gunna deal with that. I, on the other hand will eat any and everything. ive tried to break meals up, you know, eat breakfast then snack, lunch then snack then dinner.. and then ive tried the breakfast lunch and dinner.. i might eat breakfast if i have time and skip lunch then eat dinner. really my schedule is hectic and i love to cook but nowadays with work school and picky eaters (boyfriend) and 4yr old son, ive been getting fast food like everyday and i feel like poop. my body is getting bloaty and im getting lazy. so i need to change that. i honestly need ideas for on the go snacks and super quick and cheap meals that will last for leftovers and that if i buy the ingredients its cheap and i have a lot left to make more....

kissedbythesunlight

Pinterest and Google are your friends

fitoverfortymom

dry beans and lentils. frozen and canned veggies. becoming a savvy shopper helps.

MelanieCN77

Try here for ideas: https://www.reddit.com/r/EatCheapAndHealthy/

Lesscookies

You can lose weight while eating fast food if you want it's all about the calories you're consuming and to lose weight you need a deficit, so start tracking the food you eat, and see if you notice any changes it could take a few weeeks. However, if you do want to change your eating plan eggs are normally kinda cheap (cheap is a relative word though), and my favorite place to shop is at Aldi if you have one nearby they have stuff at great prices, if not consider looking at other shops.

bebeisfit

Get a couple of recipes and make a big batch then freeze a few meals for later. Chili comes to mind - saute onion, garlic & jalapeno, add a few cans of beans (kidney, pinto, black & white). You don't have to add meat, but certainly can. Add a big can or two of tomatoes. If you don't have spices in your cabinet, you can get a packet. Make some cornbread and bam, you've got a meal. You can also serve it over a baked potato, you can add a cooked sweet potato. Without the meat, you're looking at $7-$10 for at least 5 or 6 meals.. maybe more.

I'm not a big fan of the dried beans - I have trouble making them, but buy canned beans when they are on sale, I add them to soups, curries.

ritzvin

fitoverfortymom wrote: »

dry beans and lentils. frozen and canned veggies. becoming a savvy shopper helps.

ditto on the dried beans, lentils, and frozen/canned vegetables. Also (at least if you are in the northeastern US) some apples for snack/dessert ('tis the season when they are dirt cheap). If you need to cook for minimal time and money, things like soup/stew/chili are your friend (basically throw a bunch of generally cheap stuff in slow cooker/instapot and leave for a bit - and you can live on the resulting 5kg of food substance for almost a week). Depending on your local stores, you may find lean ground poultry and/or lean ham quarters for the $2.50ish/lb range (which will work well in soups, chili to supply some protein). If needed, calories per serving can be upped by adding cheap starch courses (rice, rolls, potatoes). And hard-boiled eggs (you can add some honey dijon mustard or some other sauce to make them tastier) & cottage cheese & greek yogurt make for good snacks with a decent amount of protein (not dirt cheap, but not expensive and is cheaper than fast food). Eggs are pretty cheap, you can get more protein for your calories by tossing out the yolks in some of them (whole eggs have close to 50/50 protein-fat, so not particularly efficient if attempting to use as a cheap primary protein source, but cheap enough to not mind using a few extra and tossing the yolks out).

ritzvin

Also, rice & beans can be made in giant batches on the cheap. Bulk out with vegetables to lower the calorie content per serving size.

kommodevaran

I think it would help if you try to focus. You don't need any special meal schedule, but you need to feed yourself properly, and you have a child who also needs to be fed regularly and properly. Sitting down and eating together is good in a number of ways. Even picky boyfriends can do that.

Others have already told you what to do to lose weight, I'll just address the lack of good nutrition in your diet, and how to improve that for cheap. In fact, you'll get a lot more for your money if you but ingredients and cook, as long as you buy smart and eat it up. Most meals will keep for a couple of days in the fridge.

Look up recipes. Almost any ingredient can be replaced or omitted. Plan your meals before you shop, but also learn how to use whatever you can get hold of. Buy whatever from each category that looks good and is cheap. Build your meals with starches - rice, flour, potatoes, pasta; protein - meat, fish, eggs, beans; vegetables - carrots, onions, canned tomatoes, frozen vegs. Add fruit, nuts, dairy, fats. Aim for variety and balance - you'll be making meals that look and taste good.

fitoverfortymom

Eggs are super cheap. Generally bananas are, too. Also apples. Cottage cheese. Lunch meats/sliced cheese.

Slow cookers are your friend because you can batch cook and portion pretty easily, also.

Kullerva

Rice 'n' beans are the stereotypes for a reason, y'know That and ramen. And dumpster diving, though I wouldn't recommend that one unless you're truly starving.

TimothyFish

Back when I was pinching every penny I would buy dry beans, dry rice, and dry pasta in the largest bulk size I could get because they were really cheap. I would also buy ground beef in large quantities and freeze what I couldn't use in a short time. Beyond that I would buy cans of vegetables. I never went hungry.

angie55575

Eggs are always a good option! And yes, I second all the canned veggies, dry beans, dry rice & pasta comments.

jondspen

bebeisfit wrote: »

Get a couple of recipes and make a big batch then freeze a few meals for later.

I agree with this. There is no reason why you can't eat cheap and healthy. I was working full-time, raising two teen daughters on my own, and going to grad school, yet still found time have a sit down meal with them 4/5 nights out of the week. I would typically make up 2-3 dishes on the w/e, eat some and freeze the rest. That way I had variety, and was able to pop a small container out of the freezer and microwave for us during the week. Chili, stew, lasagana, are all good choices. You can also cook just the main entree (bbq chicken, pork chops, fish), freeze the rest, then as the week goes by, open up a small can/frozen bag of veggies with a nuked potato, instant potatoes, or single serve rice...and you have a well balanced meal with very little cook time in the evening. Even a large can of veggies is ~ 3.5 servings...which is supper one night, left overs for lunch and then supper again the next, with little prep or clean up, no wasted food, and you don't get burnt out on a big pot of 1 thing through the whole week.

kmshover

If you have a dollar tree near you,go in and check them out. Ours always has different things, I even found a big bag of flax seed in there once.

We have a Save-A-Lot which is kinda like Aldi? They sell older produce for ridiculously cheap, never had issues with it. Another one in the next town over sells meat packages for like $25. That lasts me and my husband 3 to 4 weeks and this includes breakfast and dinner stuff. Grocery stores will sometimes mark down soon to expire meats, buy it and freeze it. You can get some really cheap frozen veggies, canned veggies. I eat a lot of canned soup (not sodium friendly) and it is pretty cheap. Tuna is cheap and you can do a lot with that. Flavored pouches are my thing. I stock up on eggs too. Check clearance sections in the stores

Gracie12311

Do you cook? If so, you can always, always find meat on sale at your local grocery store. Just ask for the day they mark their meat down. I could never exist on beans, pasta and rice. Or ramen noodles. I don’t find them filling at all and I don’t especially like any of them! I can get a pound of chicken for $2 on sale at my local Food Lion. Ditto at my local Aldi. You can buy super cheap hamburger meat as well. Our Aldo buns are $1.00 and their packs of tortillas here are $0.64 each. So hamburgers and tacos. A pack of chicken wings or chicken thighs is never more than $3 at either grocery store.

Fast food is cheap as well - plain hamburgers, salads, and tacos (at Taco Bell).

Back to Food Lion and Aldi - produce is super cheap as well. $0.89 for a pack of mushrooms and $1.99 for a 3 lb. bag of russet potatoes. Frozen vegetables are very inexpensive as well. Your (cheaper) grocery stores might vary in price but they’ll be close.

Eating cheap (when needed) is easy. Once you buy inexpensive meat, produce, and fruit, you can build your meals.

hydechildcare

Gracie12311 wrote: »

Do you cook? If so, you can always, always find meat on sale at your local grocery store. Just ask for the day they mark their meat down. I could never exist on beans, pasta and rice. Or ramen noodles. I don’t find them filling at all and I don’t especially like any of them! I can get a pound of chicken for $2 on sale at my local Food Lion. Ditto at my local Aldi. You can buy super cheap hamburger meat as well. Our Aldo buns are $1.00 and their packs of tortillas here are $0.64 each. So hamburgers and tacos. A pack of chicken wings or chicken thighs is never more than $3 at either grocery store.

Fast food is cheap as well - plain hamburgers, salads, and tacos (at Taco Bell).

Back to Food Lion and Aldi - produce is super cheap as well. $0.89 for a pack of mushrooms and $1.99 for a 3 lb. bag of russet potatoes. Frozen vegetables are very inexpensive as well. Your (cheaper) grocery stores might vary in price but they’ll be close.

Eating cheap (when needed) is easy. Once you buy inexpensive meat, produce, and fruit, you can build your meals.

This right here. My family never had fresh vegetables growing up or real food. It was always prepackaged and not great. Moving in with my now husband he couldn't believe what I called a meal. Going grocery shopping with him I was able to buy healthier options for the same amount or less. Now that I have found Aldi's and learned the sales on different food rotation I am even better. Kroger in our neighborhood. Week 1 - dairy, Week 2 - Meats, Week 3 frozen, Week 4- canned.

cmanitowabi

Good for asking! Food can be expensive but if you get sales flyers in your mailbox, check them out and meal plan around what's on sale. Soups, stews and chili go a long way and there is so many different ways to make them. Peanut butter, eggs, apples, carrots, yogurt are easy, relatively inexpensive snack foods that you can keep on hand. Casseroles are also good for making a meal stretch ie. rice dishes with some chicken or lean ground beef or add in some beans.

JRSINAZ

Get a coleman soft side lunch box cooler and one of those refeezable blocks. Take your food with you. My 99 cent store sells bread for a dollar and cans of tuna 2 for a dollar. One can tuna will make 2 sandwiches. They also sell rubber made take alongs 2 for $1 perfect for home made meals and sandwiches. Ramen is not a good choice IMO.

jgnatca

https://www.budgetbytes.com

Potatoes.

If you do well with two meals a day, do so. With some planning you will have a slow cooker meal waiting for you in the evening.

ritzvin

From my email inbox this morning from MFP... http://blog.myfitnesspal.com/13-ways-lose-weight-dollar/
It's actually a pretty good list of a lot of the main cheap staple foods a lot of us buy to fill specific macros.

ritzvin

JRSINAZ wrote: »

Get a coleman soft side lunch box cooler and one of those refeezable blocks. Take your food with you. My 99 cent store sells bread for a dollar and cans of tuna 2 for a dollar. One can tuna will make 2 sandwiches. They also sell rubber made take alongs 2 for $1 perfect for home made meals and sandwiches. Ramen is not a good choice IMO.

Those are the ones sold at the cheap grocery store I go to as well. I have a lot of the square entree-sized and a bunch of the ~2 cup bowl ones for soup/stew/chili.

ritzvin

If you can afford it, one of the newfangled electric pressure cookers (they also substitute in for a slow cooker and a rice cooker) is a great investment for being able to cook with minimal time and money. You can even brown meat right in them before adding other ingredients for chili/stews/etc. And they make short easy work of rehydrating and cooking dried beans (no more having to pre-soak them in advance or pay more for the canned ones). And it can cook up a 40-48oz bag of frozen chicken in almost no time at all.

kitlynnJ

jgnatca wrote: »

https://www.budgetbytes.com

I second Budget Bytes. Several of my favourite meals come from that site.

fitoverfortymom

I second the lunch box (any one you can afford will probably do).

I also eat yogurt just about every day, and your basic Chobani or Dannon greek yogurts are typically around $1 per. It's a nice filling protein boost IMO.

davidylin

I find that chilis not only work well but reheat well. Beef chili, bean chili, chicken chili, etc. You can also serve them over various carbs such as rice, pasta, bread, mashed potatoes, etc.

timtam163

There should be a sticky on best tips for eating healthy on a tight budget. Multiple posters MFP have asked about this; financial barriers to getting healthy are real, and doctors rarely provide resources.

cwolfman13

When I was broke, my dietary staples were rice, beans, potatoes and other root vegetables, in season fruit when on sale, mostly canned or frozen veggies...though I always found cabbage to be rather cheap and it keeps well fresh...same with broccoli. My meat was usually whatever was on sale...I ate lots of whole chickens or cut up fryers and ground beef...also eggs, bread, and sandwich meat...I just built my meals around these things for the most part.

kenyonhaff

One big trick I learned on a particularly harsh boat of unemployment:

Ground beef, mixed 1/4-1/2 with ground black beans is a pretty good stand-in for plain ground beef, especially for tacos and cassaroles and meatballs. Adds fiber too.

Banitos is an inexpensive, tasty corn tortilla (2 for $3 at Walmart) that is a great lower carb choice, good for above-mentioned tacos, too.

Rickster1967

loads of really cheap grains out there if you're really skint

millet, spelt, barley all dirt cheap

oats for breakfast is as cheap as it comes

flatbreads made from flour and water are a staple in many poor countries from Mexico to Bangladesh

chickpeas are a really cheap pulse and super versatile

Flyingfingers51

I second the Aldi recommendation, if you have one in your area. If not, stay away from the big chains, unless you go armed with their weekly special flyer. Plan for leftovers; cook and make enough to get two meals from one dish. You can supplement the dish with salads and/or bread or soup. Good luck!!