I have been struggling with money lately have have had to dramatically change how I eat because of it. Which is fine, I managed to eat a bit healthier since then. However I haven't been able to fine a job yet, and the budget is getting scary low and bills always come first to me. Ive been getting the basics; eggs, milk, oatmeal, turkey for lunch meat. I live with my dad but I pay for my own food and stuff. Dads not the type to fill a fridge anyways so its a pretty empty 90% of the time. We live with and take care for my grandpa and all HE eats are TV dinners, chicken noodle soups, canned spinach and asparagus, so the freezer and cabinets are filled with the stuff!
I have never had a problem with over eating, my issues are about not eating enough, even when I didn't have money issues. Now more than ever I have been having the hardest time keeping my calorie count up, I log my food at fitday.com. Even when I try to eat more, I get stomach pains like STOP I'M FULL feeling.
Anyways to get to my point. I have had my gallbladder removed and try to stay away from fatty foods because of the stomach sensitivity now. I've also been staying away from really salty foods which the doc recommended after I started having issues with Kidney stones.
My question is, were does chicken noodle soup and top ramen stand? I notice both have a lot of sodium, but they are super cheap...I'm really trying to stay on a semi-liquid diet (2-3 meals are shakes), stuff thats easy for my stomach to digest, so soups are looking really good to me. All seem to have a good amount of salt though and I don't know how much is too much.
Hi Jennie!
Sounds like you are doing a good job with pretty limited resources. Have you seen the Shoestring subforum: http://www.3fatchicks.com/forum/shoestring-meals-235/ ? There's lots of ideas about eating on a strict budget.
I feel for ya on this. I had a '0 salt' rule imposed on me when I was pregnant.
For cheap soup, I would say look for a fresh whole chicken. You can find them on sale for .79 or even .69 a pound sometimes. Get a thing of celery, and a cheap bag of carrots (run ya maybe 3 bucks tops on sale) and a cheap little onion. Season it with whatever you want for flavorings, a bit of pepper even if that is all you have. My family uses Cavanders greek seasoning, but it does have salt in it. Clean the chicken, put it in a pot and boil it til about done, chop and throw in your veggies and spices, and boil on low until the chicken falls apart when you try to pull it out. Then you can pick out the chicken, separate out the meat from skin, bones etc, and you have an awesome pot of soup that can be frozen in zipock bags for less then $10. You should be able to get at least 8 quarts of soup from 1 good sized chicken. And it will be a LOT healthier then the stuff from the can. If you need it to be more filling, you can boil some orzo pasta or rice to go in it.
As for the top ramen, I would say maybe throw out the seasoning packet since that is where most of the salt is, and maybe cook it in a low sodium chicken broth with some kind of veggies. You can get a cheap bagged of mixed frozen veggies for less then a buck sometimes, and it will go a long way with some ramen.
I know you didn't ask for recipes, but it's a start. There is also the option of maybe getting food stamps, but it all depends on you individual situation. You could look into that at your local state agency.
Hi Jennie!
Sounds like you are doing a good job with pretty limited resources. Have you seen the Shoestring subforum: http://www.3fatchicks.com/forum/shoestring-meals-235/ ? There's lots of ideas about eating on a strict budget.
Beware! The cheap ramen packets are a problem not just because of the salt but because the noodles are fried in oil during the processing. And you can't get rid of that by throwing away the seasoning packet. You may be better off getting regular spaghetti noodles (or angel hair pasta or macaroni); look for whatever shape is on sale that week.
How about canned beans? Look for white, black, red kidney beans, especially the type which is marked vegetarian or "no lard" in the case of black beans. Or even cheaper, if you have just a little time, cook your own beans from dry and then you can control the salt and fat. They have lots of fiber, if that is not a problem, and lots of good protein and iron (especially if you can eat them in a meal with a carb, or a glass of orange juice if I remember correctly).
To speed up cooking, you can pre-soak a 1lb package of beans in the pot overnight, with 4 qt water and 3 Tbsp salt. The next day, drain and rinse, then cook until they are as soft as you want (40min to 1 1/2 depending on the type of bean). Add whatever bits of veggies and meat you have, along with whatever spices you can tolerate. Traditional is oregano, garlic (fresh or powdered), thyme, pepper. If you salt during a presoak the beans will absorb a little salt and you do not have to put more in. (You can leave out the salt completely but they end up a little blah.)
They keep in the fridge well for 3-4 days; if you make a whole 1 lb bag and are just eating them yourself, you can freeze them with a little cooking liquid in portions in ziploc baggies or plastic containers. You can eat them as soup or drain for salads.
Also potato soup is cheap and very soothing. OMG I lived on that as a grad student, when I probably did qualify for foodstamps if it had actually occurred to me.
Saute some onions in a pan with a spoonful of oil; add cut-up peeled potatoes and a little salt /pepper and just enough water to cover; cook until potatoes are soft and then mush them up with a fork, or with whatever pureeing type machine you have. You can add a little skim milk at the end if you want them richer, or use chicken broth instead of water. Does not have many calories unless you add lots of whole milk or cream and butter.
Saute onions until soft, then add vegetables with water/broth to cover, and a little milk at the end (after you turn the burner off) is the basic recipe for pretty much any home made vegetable cream soup. Broccoli, asparagus, cauliflower, leek, carrot... You can add cut-up hot dogs, shredded cheese, bulk frozen meatballs to them for protein.
Tomato soup with rice! Barley vegetable soup! Pea soup! Good Lord it's all coming back to me now. I could totally write The Impoverished Grad Student Cookbook, only none of them would have money to buy it.
Don't forget Aldi if you have it in your area, and grocery/health food store bulk bins. Sometimes they are cheaper than buying pasta etc in the package.
I love a soup made with red lentils (not to hard to find and cheap about 1.99 a pound at whole foods) It takes 2 cups of lentils, 6 cups of water and a veggie bolluion cube or two and an onion (sautee it first)...you basically toss everything into the pot and 15 minutes later you blend it all up until smooth and salt and pepper it to your taste..its quick, healthy cheap and good.
Shop the sales. Compare the sales ads. When you find a really great price on an item you like, try to stock up as much as possible. Check different strores in your area. When I lived in the midwest, we had a lot of salvage stores that sold food cheap. You never knew what they were going to have but if you're flexible you could get quite a bit. They didn't advertise so you heard about them by word of mouth.
Kinda poor and not much to eat...
