Eating clean(ish) on a budget. HELP!

for some ideas i would say large bags of frozen veggies so you can take out what you need at meal time and steam it in the microwave. brown rice is cheap and you can make a lot with a little bag. you can make black beans in a crock pot or on the stove top and it makes a lot and freezes well. oatmeal or steel cut oats for breakfast can be sweetened with honey or agave nectar. oh, and eggs are cheap and full of protein. hope others have more ideas for you...

Shop the perimeter of the grocery store and buy non-processed foods that is ON SALE! If you can afford the organic, great. If you can't, just taking out the processed food is a great start. Local in-season produce is usually a good buy. This time of year apples, citrus, lettuce greens, beets, turnips, and swiss chard are plentiful. Eggs are usually an inexpensive source of protein - even the pricier cage-free organic are pretty reasonable on a per meal basis. Do the best you can and don't sweat the details.

Buy frozen. That usually saves alot.

A.C.E. Certified Personal Trainer
IDEA Fitness member
Kickboxing Certified Instructor
Been in fitness for 28+ years and have studied kinesiology and nutrition

Oh man, so many ideas...

I drink tea every day, for the antioxidants, and because it helps me feel full. On a budget, I'd probably get a big box of store-brand tea - they sell the black tea, like Liptons, in pretty big boxes - and drink it hot.

I bet there are good food hacking sites out there with other good ideas. Lifehacker? Hopefully a site more dedicated to this? There should be!

Great post we are also on a tight budget and trying to eat healthily the week before payday is impossible. I buy mince in bulk and freeze individual portions made up with carrots, onion and gravy. Last night my kids had that with pasta. AS someone else said, eggs are cheap and healthy as long as they are not fried. When my eldest was a baby I used to buy frozen chicken pieces and veg, steam in microwave for 3 mins and then add to an omlette.

I am going to bump this thread as I am looking for high cal, low budget healthy snacks? I am below my calorie count on a daily basis, feel full after each meal but between meals I get really hungry! Any ideas? I dont like almonds or avocados which I know are high cal but healthy.

Frozen fruites and veggies are just as nutritious. I also buy fruits/veggies that are on sale then plan the rest of what i buy around that. Also a farmers market usually has deals. I usually just grab the essentials; eggs, soy milk, chicken, ground turkey, ect. Then buy everything else based on whats on sale.

LENTILS (dried in the bag) Most other dried beans need to be soaked.

When I was in college I put up a pot of brown rice, add lentils, and veg. (fresh or frozen) Usually, carrots, onions and something green. Simmer that on the stove for about 20-25 minutes and everything is done.

I also used to get TOFU from the green grocer (till I found out I was allergic) and stir fry up some veg, then add the tofu and some sauce.

In college I lived on Hard boiled EGGS, CARROTS, PEANUTBUTTER, WHOLE WHEAT BREAD and unsweetened ICED TEA
(okay, there were some ramen noodles in there to, but I can hardly call them "clean" never use the packet that came and always added some veg.)

SWEET POTATOES are one of my new favorites.

I used to take a thinly sliced white potato (might work with sweet too?) drain a 10 oz pack of spinach and slice up some muenster cheese and layer it all and bake for about 30 minutes,. until potato was cooked thru and the cheese brown and bubbly.

Potato + Cheese = a complete protein and spinach is your veg

whole grain pasta has come down in price quite a bit
by fresh fruits and veggies when they go on sale
same with meats, lean meats like ground turkey, chicken, fish and pork
I limit myself to red meat and taters 2x a week
buy low sodium cans of soup when they go on sale
romaine lettuce is the bomb! its better then head lettuce head lettuce has hardly any nutritional value

drinks - water water water
or for some flavor great value brand (walmart) carries kinda like a crystal light some of the new flavors are done with stevia
I drink fat free skim milk myself

its just a matter of getting things on sale and freezing what you can

I learned a lot when I dropped 156lbs in 19 months (gained 195lbs when I quit smoking) my doctors and dietitians helped A LOT!

good luck to you

watch ur sodium some frozen stuff is laced with it BADLY! that can hurt if your not exercising regularly, I personally stick to 2500mg or less a day and treat myself once in awhile to processed/fast food/junk food but I stay away from it most of the time

When I was in my last few years of college (multiple post-grads, so a long college career!) I made a point of going through all the grocery stores nearby just before closing a couple of times a week. Often, things that are just about past their sell-by date will be massively reduced then, especially meat., fruits and vegetables. I then broke down the packs into individual plastic bags and froze them, so that I could use them as needed - the stockpile in my freezer got me through a fair few periods when I was very short of cash.

Almost everything is cheaper if you make it from scratch - rolled oats plus water or milk, a bit of spice and some chopped up dried fruit makes fabulous porridge, a few over-ripe/discounted bananas, some flour, baking powder and an egg or two makes a batch of 10-12 small muffins, which can also be individually wrapped and frozen for snacks, a tin of beans, an onion, a tin of tomatoes and a packet of mince will make 5-6 meals (freeze the spares!) and cost less per serving than five or six individual chilli con carne meals. Tinned chickpeas plus onion, tomatoes, a red pepper and spices, served with cous cous, is a high-protein, low-fat meal that comes in well under £3 for the whole recipe and will make around four servings. Homemade soups freeze well also. There are a lot of published cookbooks aimed at students with budget- as well as health-conscious recipes. Learning to cook will help a lot.

Most things are cheaper per unit if you buy the larger size, though this mainly works for non-perishables... If you can invest in a few large, airtight jars, you can bulk-buy staples like rice, oats etc and keep them for a long time. Also, slice/grate your own cheese - it costs far less than buying pre-sliced. Ditto bread (also freezes well). If there's a two-for-one on something you'll use, and can freeze until needed, buy it - Milk freezes very well, and I imagine yoghurt would too, though I've never actually tried it. The other thing I found is that sometimes, buying something that seems expensive - a roasting joint, for example - can work out very economically once you use the meat for a variety of hot meals, cold for sandwiches etc.

I suspect I'm preaching to the choir, and you probably already know lots of this, but maybe some of these will help. Good luck!