Your choices of food when on a ultra tight budget

[DinohScene]

Potato cubes, jar of carrots.

 

[TVL]

Buy eggs and do whatever you like with them. Omelette, scrambled, hard boiled... Omelette you can also vary a lot with what you put in it. Eggs are awesome in that they are cheap and it will be a while before you get hungry. Eating bread, noodles or cereal you will be hungry sooner. If you eat the same amount of calories it will be a huge difference in when you need your next meal.

There's also oatmeal porridge, I feel sorry for you if you have to eat it, but it is very cheap and decent food.

 

[Noctosphere]

just reminded something my grandfather(that i never met )did back then
he was dealing with a farm to get what we call here in quebec, ugly vegetables (maybe you heard them by another name in english, but thats the literal translation from french)
they are vegetables that are weirdly shaped, not beautiful enough for market
He was getting them for like 0.25$/lbs, if it isnt less than that.
Of course, he had a family of 5 children to make live
I dont know if they deal with student or whatever is your situation.
but as i said, they are very good deal
In Quebec, some groceries store begins to think about selling ugly vegetables in their stores

 

[gnmmarechal]

If you're on an ultra tight budget it is important to still get some protein or else you're going to be severely tired all the time. But, meat is expensive. What to do?

Eat liver. It costs less than a quarter of regular meat and has more protein so you don't have to eat as much.

Also, if you have a back yard consider growing spinach, tomatoes, potatoes and other easy things. Once a big tomato patch gets going it is very hard to kill and you'll be able to harvest for years and years, all for free (except for occasional manure and watering).

ewww liver


That's something I absolutely can't eat no matter how hard I try.

 

[orangy57]

crock pot

 

[Tom Bombadildo]

Ramen, eggs, and a bunch of frozen veggies and you have a delicious meal that only costs you ~$10 a week, depending on what veggies you get. If you bulk buy ramen, you could get a years worth (as in 3 meals a day, 365 days a year) for something like $100, $125 or so, and then just buy veggies and eggs as you go to spend as little money as possible on food while still getting a "fairly" healthy meal.

Though my go-to "on the cheap" meal is a rice casserole, make up some rice, a can of cream of chicken soup, pound of ground beef, mix it all up, throw in some cheese, pop it in the oven for 10-15 minutes and you got a fairly filling, delicious meal that'll last 2 or 3 days (assuming you're just one person). I like to take the leftovers and just put em in a soft shell flour tortilla, sounds a little odd but it makes a pretty delicious "burrito" type thing.

 

[Quantumcat]

ewww liver


That's something I absolutely can't eat no matter how hard I try.

Oops I just realised when I said protein I meant iron. It isn't fun to be iron deficient. You can get used to anything if you just try, so I think it would be better to endure a few weeks of getting used to liver.

 

[gnmmarechal]

Oops I just realised when I said protein I meant iron. It isn't fun to be iron deficient. You can get used to anything if you just try, so I think it would be better to endure a few weeks of getting used to liver.

I've been made to eat it for years. It comes back up every time I down a piece.

 

[Quantumcat]

I've been made to eat it for years. It comes back up every time I down a piece.

Use a food processor to grind it up, mix with cooked tomatoes, beef stock, garlic and cheese, mix with uncooked pasta in a baking tray and bake until cooked. The garlic and tomatoes will hide the flavour and being minced up you won't notice the texture as much. I can sympathise with hating something you were forced to eat as a kid though.

 

[Futurdreamz]

If you're on an ultra tight budget it is important to still get some proteiniron or else you're going to be severely tired all the time. But, meat is expensive. What to do?

Eat liver. It costs less than a quarter of regular meat and has more proteiniron so you don't have to eat as much.

Also, if you have a back yard consider growing spinach, tomatoes, potatoes and other easy things. Once a big tomato patch gets going it is very hard to kill and you'll be able to harvest for years and years, all for free (except for occasional manure and watering).

If all you need is iron there's pills for that

 

[jt_1258]

wo wo wo, it's just hypothetical, I still live with my pearents since I'm still in highschool so moneys for food is not an issue, nice to be able to have some nice steak from time to time

 

[Noctosphere]

wo wo wo, it's just hypothetical, I still live with my pearents since I'm still in highschool so moneys for food is not an issue, nice to be able to have some nice steak from time to time

Dont forget...
Ugly veggies are very cheap

 

[weatMod]

I dunno about nutritious. Pretty much all starch. And I say that as a person of Irish descent who loves potatoes be it mashed, baked, twice-baked, steamed, fried, whatever.

potato is still light years more healthy than most of the suggestions in this thread, especially ramen and rice with soy
most likely non GMO unlike ramen and rice and soy
has fiber and much more nutrition than other starches like grains

 

[FAST6191]

I have never been poor enough that I neglect feeding myself, and if you will pardon the pun I am not exactly rolling in the dough. It seems like a really poor place to economise -- my priority is surely me and what I fuel myself with has a direct effect on what I can do. Sure I have been poor enough that I can not afford to have caviar and filet mignon on frozen pizza, never gone hungry or under nourished because of it. I guess I have supplemented with wild foods (some nice pigeons, rabbits, berries, wild garlic, other fruits, nuts, mushrooms and such have gone in the pot over the years, and I see there are plenty of pheasant where I am at now...), however that is more because it is tasty and while I could probably have afforded to go buy the apples and blackberries that went into the pie it was no big effort to go pick them instead, and fulfilled some kind of woodsman/hunter gatherer instinct. Likewise I will happily raid the reduced row in the supermarket and freeze or cook that night, and in such cases might end up eating a fish and a garlic flat bread where lamb and potatoes had more appeal.

On the radio yesterday they had a segment where they discussed the idea of some poor people with kids going hungry so their kids can eat. Certainly not all but many times I see that I see a cupboard filled with processed crap, often name brand processed crap, and the people eating it unable to cook. Now in the UK in my lifetime it has always been cheaper to cook stuff, and going by the cooking books my mum has (they go back to the 1800s) it has been for a long time. My times in the US though I struggled to do that and can see why people turn to over salted and fad laden cheap crap -- at various times I priced up a basic stir fry and despite most of the food travelling less distance it cost considerably more both relatively speaking and compared to something from a foil sealed pack.

potato is still light years more healthy than most of the suggestions in this thread, especially ramen and rice with soy
most likely non GMO unlike ramen and rice and soy
has fiber and much more nutrition than other starches like grains

What difference does being genetically modified make?

 

[330]

Canned food.


Beans, peas, anything.

 

[sarkwalvein]

Noodles with butter and perhaps some cheese.
Rice with whatever-I-can-find-around seasoning.
Steamed potato cubes with salt, peper, and oil.
If there are leftovers from some of the previous, then all of that together mixed up with some egg and made into an omelette.

Broken-guy-food is saddening, specially when his cooking skills are luckluster.

 

[Issac]

Instant ramen, because it's hella tasty. I know it's not healthy.
Baguette with cream cheese is also nice and not overly expensive... not healthy, though.

SOUP!
French onion soup is hella cheap to make.
And my favorite "potato and leek" soup is kinda cheap and easy to make.
Some potatoes, some leeks, an onion, water and bouillon cubes... and some butter and cream. YUM

 

[Greymane]

Would depend on what ultra tight means in this situation.

Big sacks of cheap potato's, can do about 1 and 1/2 weeks with 5kg, be about 4 to 6 taters for diner.
Rice, can steam it, make fried rice, rice snacks, congee
Cheap meat(chicken hearts and the like).
Vegie's be onions/belgian endive

 

[sarkwalvein]

Cheap meat(chicken hearts and the like).

Ew, not tasty at all.
I would go with the meatless option in that case.

 

[Greymane]

Ew, not tasty at all.
I would go with the meatless option in that case.

Their is also another part of the chicken, for the same price that might be more to your taste(i tend to forget the name).
It is however mostly bone but can be used for soups.