On a budget...

How about catching Chicken breast on sale, cooking it and portioning it out into individual servings (I LOVE it grilled with salt and pepper, or pan 'fried' with cooking spray and a package of taco seasoning mixed in). It would be a great go to.

Buy the fruits and veggies which are on sale, and buy canned items that are store brands, since these are often less costly. Shop around. I buy cans of Dole Pineaple Chunks at Save A Lot for 99c a can, while it can be onwards of $1.50 at other stores. Stock up. It'll cost more in the beginning to stock up, but make a list and stick to it. When frozen fruits go on sale, buy a few extra bags for the freezer. Just be sure to ALWAYS read your labels cause I've found frozen strawberries with added sugar.

Rice, beans, and in-season/on sale produce are your best friends. With the fruit and veg, definitely cut and freeze anything you can't use yourself, and definitely, definitely skip the pre-cut options unless they work out to be cheaper than the lowest price fresh alternative. My freezer right now is packed with strawberries and bananas from the last time I caught them on sale at the farmer's market, so my fiber and vitamin c counts are gonna be awesome for the foreseeable future!

Also, be sure to check the bulk section for oatmeal, nuts, etc. Most of the time, they're way better priced there than in the main aisles, and you can't beat oatmeal + mix-ins for a cheap, healthy breakfast!

It's really a matter of how far you will push yourself.

You could literally spend $20 and eat all week if you will go through and cook and chop and eat the exact same thing over and over most the time.

How much time are you willing to put in?

How low of budget?

I prefer what to me is middle-budget.

I couldn't eat rice, beans, lentils and eggs everyday.

But if I could, I could probably eat for $5-$10 a week.

Wal Mart has food scales for sale at about $18.

How do you portion meat out once it's cooked? See I've never learned how to count the calories in that type of things so it always seems so hard to me when it's really not!! Do I need a scale of some sort? Thankyou for the tips!!

Yes. A scale is a good idea. You can cut it up and put it into baggies to cook later.

I have some Rubbermaid food containers I use. They are in various sizes. I also use snack bags. I measure out my food, put it in a snack bag, then put the snack bags in a gallon freezer bag with a date and label so they don't get lost in the freezer.

I have everything pre cut up for my stir fry. Saves a lot of time since I only have to prepare it one day a week.

I have chicken breast which I buy about 1kg at a time which once a week I portion it out to correct weights and freeze it.

If you make 2 serves measure it out raw and once it cooked roughly divide it up. You'll end up eating the same about over the course of the day.

You can also use visual cues for portion control. Not as precise but you don't need to buy a scale.

Depending on how much you like to/have time to cook, you can save money by purchasing whole foods as using ever part as much as possible. A whole chicken can be broken down into its parts then the carcass can be used to make stock (which can be frozen). Onion peels, celery ends, carrot peels, etc can be thrown in the freezer then added to the stock pot when you have a good sized bag of them.

Buying dried beans and cooking them instead of canned is also a great money saver. You can cook in bulk and freeze the beans in one or two cup portions until you are ready to use them.

Dry rice ans beans in bulk. You can make some really delicious and filling meals for just pennies.

One of the best investments I think I ever made was a sleeve of 40 deli-style 1-cup food containers from Amazon for $15 tho' I'm sure you can get them elsewhere. They hold a cup of food. They go through the dishwasher, and they stack compactly both empty on the shelf and in the fridge. And the 40 of them are basically a lifetime supply. I also got the two-cup size.

So, if you were to look in my freezer right now, you'd find a bunch of these containers with stock, beans, pasta sauce, pre-cooked bacon, etc. -- neatly stacked instead of flying out of the freezer as I open the door and dig around.

http://www.amazon.com/gp/product/B007V2W3VO/ref=wms_ohs_product?ie=UTF8&psc=1

Also, you can buy bigger amounts of meat when it's on sale and freeze it in single servings. Just last night, we had beef fajitas using a chunk of bottom round I bought on sale a few weeks ago. When you get the meat home from the store, cut it into serving-sized chunks. Wrap each chunk in plastic wrap and then aluminum foil and shove them in a gallon zipper bag. Write which meat it is on the outside of the bag because when they are wrapped an 8-oz. portion of beef looks just like an 8-ounce portion of pork. (I tend to to 8-oz. because there are two of us.) The double-wrapping in plastic wrap and then foil prevents freezer burn like nothing else I've ever tried.

To divide the meat, you can figure out how many ounces meat is in the whole package and then divide by how many ounces you want to have in each serving. Then just cut it into that many pieces. It may not come out even but probably quite close enough for a large piece. For example, I think that most recent chunk of bottom round was 3 lb. 7 oz. or (3*16)+7 = 55 oz. Fifty-five divided by 8 is 6.85 -- so I had a choice of cutting 7 pieces that were 7.85 oz each or 6 pieces that were 9.16 oz each. Since it is easier to cut it into an even number of pieces, I did six.

Now, this is close enough for me to consider each piece two four-ounce servings.
7.85/2 = 3.925 ounces @ 36 cal./oz. for ground round = 141.3 calories
9.16/2 = 4.53 ounces @ 36 cal./oz. for ground round = 163 calories

20 calories is close enough for me. Besides, you are eyeballing your "equal pieces" anyway.