Cheap and Healthy lunch box

Harrisonsauntie2005
Harrisonsauntie2005 Posts: 215 Member
in Food and Nutrition
Has anyone got any ideas on work lunches that are cheap, filling and healthy, hopefully higher protein to.

By cheap I mean within £3 per day or less. I am struggling a bit financially and I need to cut costs.

Thanks

Replies

  • xWendyJonesx
    xWendyJonesx Posts: 266 Member
    I take a salad to work with me most days, I add eggs, chicken, prawns or salmon for protein, I find sitting down and using a knife and fork to eat my dinner makes me think I'm eating a lot more, I find it more filling than a sandwich.

    I'll be interested to hear what others say.
  • Harrisonsauntie2005
    Harrisonsauntie2005 Posts: 215 Member
    I take a salad to work with me most days, I add eggs, chicken, prawns or salmon for protein, I find sitting down and using a knife and fork to eat my dinner makes me think I'm eating a lot more, I find it more filling than a sandwich.

    I'll be interested to hear what others say.

    Thanks, yeah I was looking chicken salad using lettuce and cucumber I could do for £1.50 per day.
  • Gramps251
    Gramps251 Posts: 738 Member
    Just pack up your leftovers. Chicken, salmon, pork tenderloin, tuna..... Same with your veggies, just don't overcook them and you can give them a quick warmup and enjoy. Throw in a greek yogurt and apple and you're in business.
  • Harrisonsauntie2005
    Harrisonsauntie2005 Posts: 215 Member
    Just pack up your leftovers. Chicken, salmon, pork tenderloin, tuna..... Same with your veggies, just don't overcook them and you can give them a quick warmup and enjoy. Throw in a greek yogurt and apple and you're in business.

    Its just me and my mum I cook for so I don't tend to have left overs.
  • animatorswearbras
    animatorswearbras Posts: 1,001 Member
    I do cheap healthy lunches but they tend to be pretty carby. :/

    Mostly I take in 3 pots of 600g fresh soup and shove it in the work fridge.

    And bring along a loaf of bread, pack of light cream cheese with chive and waitrose apple and walnut chutney, kinda samey and boring but lasts me the week and my lunches are usually sub 400 cals. Also less than a tenner for the week.

    I've also done stuff like made big batches of tuna, pasta salad, only a little bit of pasta mostly padded out with veg like onions, mushrooms, peppers and black olives, cooked in a bit of napolina sauce with the pasta, then serve with absolutely loads of baby leaf salad, toms and cucumber and half a tin to a tin of tuna (per day) mixed with low fat mayo.

    If you buy ingrediants for the week it's usually quite doable to get your lunches in for <£15.

    However I'd love to hear some protein heavy cheap lunch ideas too :)
  • Alatariel75
    Alatariel75 Posts: 18,246 Member
    500g (1 lb) of chicken breast, a 1kg (2 lb) bag of homebrand frozen veg, 2 cans of homebrand cream of chicken soup. Boil the chicken until very cooked (can shred with a fork), add the veg and 2 cans of soup to the water, shred the chicken and chuck it back in. 6-8 serves, costs about $10 all up. It's my go-to weekly work lunch :)
  • NessaR2011
    NessaR2011 Posts: 184 Member
    I usually make a wrap with a high fiber flatbread, chicken or tuna and a lot of lettuce. You can substitute the chicken with low/no fat deli meat but those are generally pretty high in sodium. You can also do a few eggs (hard boiled). My budget is pretty tight too so I know how you feel. I catch items on sale and look for the best deals when I do my shopping. I'll also make large meals that last a while with my family. My husband and I sit down a few days before he gets paid and come up with a meal plan that will last us 2 weeks until he gets paid again. It's tedious but it saves us alot of money doing it that way.
  • amfmmama
    amfmmama Posts: 1,420 Member
    meat is expensive so I use eggs to give me the filling protein that I need. Hard boiled alone, hard boiled on salads, egg muffins, egg salad with a honey mustard dressing instead of mayo.
  • Harrisonsauntie2005
    Harrisonsauntie2005 Posts: 215 Member
    500g (1 lb) of chicken breast, a 1kg (2 lb) bag of homebrand frozen veg, 2 cans of homebrand cream of chicken soup. Boil the chicken until very cooked (can shred with a fork), add the veg and 2 cans of soup to the water, shred the chicken and chuck it back in. 6-8 serves, costs about $10 all up. It's my go-to weekly work lunch :)

    That actually sounds really good. Thanks.
  • Harrisonsauntie2005
    Harrisonsauntie2005 Posts: 215 Member
    Thanks everyone. I did a little budget thing and chicken is usually on offer 3 for £10 which would last 2 weeks! so based on chicken salad with lettuce and cucmber a pear and some yogurt I can do it £1.96 a day. I would be cycling 2 and from work so I might add a small bar of chocolate or a banana.

    I have a goal of saving £5,000 and getting £2,000 out of debt by december this year so I am cutting costs.
  • CipherZero
    CipherZero Posts: 1,418 Member
    Add another one who does salad with chicken (or ham, or whatever meat we have left over) for lunch daily. Usually under 500 calories and on the bad day it's still over 30g protein and all those yummy vegetables we're all supposed to be eating.
  • girlie100
    girlie100 Posts: 646 Member
    Thanks everyone. I did a little budget thing and chicken is usually on offer 3 for £10 which would last 2 weeks! so based on chicken salad with lettuce and cucmber a pear and some yogurt I can do it £1.96 a day. I would be cycling 2 and from work so I might add a small bar of chocolate or a banana.

    I have a goal of saving £5,000 and getting £2,000 out of debt by december this year so I am cutting costs.

    As you are using £ I'm guessing you are in the UK, I use musclefood for my meat as they are much cheaper than UK supermarkets and you can bulk buy. There is a code on my profile that will get you some free chicken on top as well :bigsmile:
  • Harrisonsauntie2005
    Harrisonsauntie2005 Posts: 215 Member
    Thanks everyone. I did a little budget thing and chicken is usually on offer 3 for £10 which would last 2 weeks! so based on chicken salad with lettuce and cucmber a pear and some yogurt I can do it £1.96 a day. I would be cycling 2 and from work so I might add a small bar of chocolate or a banana.

    I have a goal of saving £5,000 and getting £2,000 out of debt by december this year so I am cutting costs.

    As you are using £ I'm guessing you are in the UK, I use musclefood for my meat as they are much cheaper than UK supermarkets and you can bulk buy. There is a code on my profile that will get you some free chicken on top as well :bigsmile:

    Legend. Thanks!
  • steve2kay
    steve2kay Posts: 194 Member
    My problem has always been finding time to prepare salads.

    So on Monday evening I I chopped up some celery, carrots and peppers and put them in container with a paper towel on top (a tip I read on the internet). Then I cut up some cheese and saucisson into little bits and put those in pots. Then I bought some chicken from sainsburys chopped it up and cooked it with a bit of curry powder just to make it interesting. I also boiled 4 eggs and put them in the fridge.

    Each morning I put salad leaves and cucumber in a container, get a bit of the chopped ingredients, chicken and a boiled egg.

    It works out at about 500 calories and 40-50g of protein. My guess is that it works out to be a couple of pounds a day.

    Other than buying the salad leaves during the week the rest seems to have stayed pretty fresh.

    I also made some mini quiches type things with cheese, ham, eggs but no pastry - my son scoffed those though.
  • katya_be
    katya_be Posts: 227 Member
    I always take a salad for lunch along with some sort of protein. My husband grills up about 3-4 pounds of chicken breast and I add that to my salad. The more veggie you can add, the better. I also add half of an avocado, some cheese crumbles, beans sometimes. I get creative and always look forward to eating lunch. Also for breakfast, you can make oatmeal with almond milk or half milk/ half water. Add some raisins, coconut, nuts, cinnamon, or berries to it and you've got a healthy yummy breakfast too!
  • Harrisonsauntie2005
    Harrisonsauntie2005 Posts: 215 Member
    Thank you for your responses
  • Gramps251
    Gramps251 Posts: 738 Member
    Just pack up your leftovers. Chicken, salmon, pork tenderloin, tuna..... Same with your veggies, just don't overcook them and you can give them a quick warmup and enjoy. Throw in a greek yogurt and apple and you're in business.

    Its just me and my mum I cook for so I don't tend to have left overs.

    Make extra. Look at it this way. The stove/oven is already on, and the pots and pans are already being used. Why not cook enough for at least 3 or 4 meals at one time? If there is more than you want to eat in a week, freeze it and eat it 1, 2, 3 weeks later. I leave my proteins (meat) a little underdone so when it's warmed up (1 to 1.5 minutes in the microwave) it is perfect. Work smarter, not harder.

    Note: My profile picture is a piece of leftover salmon that I had smoked then frozen a couple of weeks prior to that meal. The roasted peppers were also leftover from aprevious meal that I just threw on some fresh romain.

Categories