View Full Version : How to eat cheap AND healthy?
I know how to eat cheap. My challenge now is eating cheap and healthy. I'm on an anti-inflammatory diet and that means lots of fresh fruits, vegetables, nuts, seeds, chicken or turkey, (organic if possible) and very limited grains. I also need to limit tomatoes and potatoes. I had to eliminate gluten, eggs and dairy.
I feel great on the diet but it's really hard on the budget. Anyone else on a diet like this? Any ideas for eating frugally? Our growing season is over so no more cheap fruits and veggies at the local farmers market.
Notice how eating healthy at fast food places is more costly? I can get a chicken sandwich or burger from the dollar menu but a southwest chicken salad is $7.00.
How do you eat healthy but frugally?
I'm not sure what you consider cheap........Cooking at home and you'll need lots of freshies.
Buy bulk at Costco/Sams? There are lots of organics these days and they are reasonable. DH and I in 2 weeks can eat: 5# carrots, 3# broccoli, 4# tomato, 1# spinach, 1# spring mix, 6 english cucumbers, a container or 2 of apples.
organic ground beef is $20 for 60 oz. Organic chicken breast is $20 for 3# .
That's where I shop when Farmer's Market and our CSA are over (Oct-May).
greenclaire
10-4-16, 6:14am
I tend to substitute pulses for meat a lot of the time as it's so much cheaper to do so and can give you as much protein. Or even if you do make something with ground beef, bulk it out with lentils to make the meat go further. Also, remember frozen veg has as many nutrients in as fresh and can be much cheaper. I've stopped buying fresh green beans, broccoli, carrots and cauliflower, or if I do it's when they have been reduced and I stock pile in the freezer. Salad leaves are pretty easy to grow and even here where it's cold they can be grown most of the year round, get the varieties that keep springing back up if you chop them back.
Chicken lady
10-4-16, 7:32am
Last week I spent $75 at the grocery store to feed myself and dh. This is vegetarian and doesn't count milk and eggs which come out of the feed bill.
i don't know if you think that is cheap or expensive.
drink water. Are you eating beans? Buy them dry and cook a whole bunch at the beginning of the week. I buy carrots in bulk for 49cents a pound and I love them, so I eat a lot of them. Eat frozen fruit or what is in season (apples and pears here now) same with vegetables - kale and Brussels sprouts are good here now.
pack if you can instead of eating out. I'm lazy, so my lunch is often an apple, a couple of carrots, and some nuts out of the bag I keep in my car.
The nearest Costco is about a 40 mile round trip, but it might be a good bet for frozen vegetables. Fresh produce doesn't keep too long. Now that soup weather is here I can usually make less expensive meals using beans and lentils. The only thing we can get to grow in our garden is kale, and I use it in soups and chili.
I will check out Costco for dried fruit, oatmeal, frozen goods, beans, etc.
Check out a thread I started a while back on indoor salad gardening: http://www.simplelivingforum.net/showthread.php?13137-Winter-indoor-salad-gardening-without-grow-lights&highlight=salad+gardening. There's also lots of threads, mostly started by Amaranth, on low cost meals.
Find a source for sprouting seeds for you salad supply. Keep life very simple and enjoy the good and real food. Make a plan for what is in season and then build with frozen. Skip all processed items as the return on nutrition is very poor.
Perhaps some of us sharing our menus might help so here is mine:
B- 1/3 C oatmeal and 12 grain mix with a Tbsp of raisins and 3/4 C yogurt or milk plus tea
S - an apple after walking the dog for an hour
L - 1-2 C of soup made from split peas or similar mix with tomato juice and lots of veggies added, i slice of home-made bread and tea
S - banana or other fruit
Supper - beans with diced fresh veggies like tomatoes, peppers, onions or a vegetarian lasagna with lots of veggies or a salad plus tea.
S- might be popcorn or a small chunk of cheese
I do switch lunch and supper dishes as I want depending on my time, commitments and appetite. I have milk with my tea so get my two cups of dairy for B12 and Vit D.
I will cook up some meats occasion like Thanksgiving etc., but am getting away from a heavy meat-based diet just because I prefer it.
Hope that helps a little.
Ultralight
10-4-16, 8:37am
I have mentioned this before, but for one week out of each of the last three years I have done a week long lifestyle experiment where I live on $1.50 a day of groceries. I buy all the groceries the day before I start.
Anyway, that comes out to about $.50 per meal.
If you wanted to do this for a longer period, say a month or several months, or even a year, I think it would be easier with bulk purchasing power, like buy a huge bag of rice and a huge bag of lentils on the first day of the month. My experience is that lentils and rice are the key!!!
I also ate carrots, bananas, cabbage, bread, and PB during those weeks. Sometimes you can really find some awesome deals, like on potatoes or a big loaf of day-old garlic bread from the grocer's deli.
Now, I know you want to stay healthy -- so maybe dodge the garlic bread. But the lentils, rice, carrots, cabbage, and bananas are all winners!
Ultralite - Do you have your meals for the seven days posted somewhere? I'm intrigued.
Molly- another good resource is the book "Wildly Affordable Organic: All on $5 a day or less". This book includes seasonal menu plans, as well as recipes.
Ultralight
10-4-16, 1:31pm
Ultralite - Do you have your meals for the seven days posted somewhere? I'm intrigued.
Breakfast: Peanut butter sandwich and a banana
Lunch: Rice with sauteed cabbage and carrots
Dinner: Rice and lentils.
Repeat the above menu for seven days!
Not quite as intriguing now?
Remember though, my experiment was just for one week.
If you did it for a month you could have more variety!
Molly- another good resource is the book "Wildly Affordable Organic: All on $5 a day or less". This book includes seasonal menu plans, as well as recipes.
Reserved at library today. Thanks!
The nearest Costco is about a 40 mile round trip, but it might be a good bet for frozen vegetables. Fresh produce doesn't keep too long. Now that soup weather is here I can usually make less expensive meals using beans and lentils. The only thing we can get to grow in our garden is kale, and I use it in soups and chili.
I will check out Costco for dried fruit, oatmeal, frozen goods, beans, etc.
You could hit Costco 1/month and I think you'd save $. The fresh veggies last 2 weeks for us with no waste. We eat the leafies first and the cruciferous and carrots all 2 weeks. Then you can consume the dry foods the remainder of the month in soups, stoups, stews. This would give you month round variety mixing with legumes/grains.
I'm anxious to see what/how you do. I'm always looking for a new way to eat.
That book sounds good but my library doesn't have it. I will have to check interlibrary loan but the feature is broken right now online. I wonder though if food prices have gone up a lot since it was written.
Miss Cellane
10-5-16, 7:27am
Here's another way to look at this. It sounds like you are on this diet for health reasons, and that the diet is working. That's great! By eating this way, you are feeling better, are healthier, are taking fewer medications! And, by eating healthy foods, you are most likely improving your overall health long-term.
I'm not saying you shouldn't try to eat frugally, but if you switch your mindset to including this diet as part of your medical treatment, as an medical expense designed to improve your health that might make the cost more bearable. Don't just look on it as food, but as a way of medicating yourself to improved health.
Here's another way to look at this. It sounds like you are on this diet for health reasons, and that the diet is working. That's great! By eating this way, you are feeling better, are healthier, are taking fewer medications! And, by eating healthy foods, you are most likely improving your overall health long-term.
I'm not saying you shouldn't try to eat frugally, but if you switch your mindset to including this diet as part of your medical treatment, as an medical expense designed to improve your health that might make the cost more bearable. Don't just look on it as food, but as a way of medicating yourself to improved health.
I love this way of looking at the "investment" in food. My permaculture teacher told us that food *should* be expensive, and in fact, food as a percentage of our income has dropped dramatically over the past decades. Coincidentally, that's when a lot of our collective health issues started--diabetes epidemic, obesity, etc.
But that doesn't mean it has to break the bank. I find soups and stews to be one of the best ways to get cheap nutrition. And they can be made very easily in a slow cooker if you're pressed for time.
I second the suggestion to buy at Costco--I buy their organic chicken and it's very reasonable per pound. Learning a couple of dishes in which lentils or beans are the main protein really helps to keep food costs down, and it's a good way to limit animal protein.
Here's a link that I used to like to peruse now and then--it's a blog called Cheap, Healthy, Good (http://cheaphealthygood.blogspot.com) and it breaks down the cost and the nutrition for the recipes they post. The blog is not that active now, but the content is still there. Many of the recipes will NOT be appropriate for an anti-inflammatory diet, but you may get some ideas.
Molly, that is a challenge. But it will really pay off in better health and reduced medical bills. Might be able to pick up some ideas from the 50 cent meal thread as I try and make those as well balanced as possible. Probably at least one thing in each menu is on your avoid list and would need to be substituted, so I would guess that would raise the meal cost by 10-20 cents. In the poverty meal thread most of the meals have a fair amount of gluten foods, so unlikely to be much help there. 25 cent and 33 cent meal threads might have ideas—likely they’d be more in the 50 cent range now though.
Organic seems to help too as you avoid inflammatory pesticides and herbicides and also get the correct omega 3/6 balance.
Ideally how much would you like to spend per day on food? With that in mind and the list of foods you are focusing on and avoiding would be happy to see what I can come up with.
In addition to what people have already suggested:
If you do a big Costco run once a month, you can make some soups from the fresh vegetables and freeze them for later in the month.
Would you tell us some more about your garden? If you can get kale to grow in the winter, you can probably also get collards to grow through the winter. There is a vegetable breeder in Maryland that has been working on a line of vegetables that survives down to 6 degrees F. Southern Exposure Seed Exchange in Virginia has 6-12 varieties of seeds from them.
Sweet potatoes are usually available for .25-.33 a pound from now through Thanksgiving.
Large winter squash can often be had for 20 – 40 cents a pound in October and November. Cook them, eat some and freeze the rest in meal size portions. If a large squash has a tough shell and you have difficulty cutting it with a knife, you can lay a clean trash bag down on your driveway and drop the squash on it. It will usually crack in half.
While cabbage is cheap, make your own freezer slaw, sauerkraut, and kim-chi.
Fuhrman has some good recipes for making salad dressings from ground nuts instead of oil which makes them more nutritious.
Not sure where you live, but sometimes ethnic supermarkets are a lot cheaper than regular chains. For instance, we have an Asian supermarket near us--I shop there for certain things. Last weekend they had vine-ripened tomatoes for .89/lb. The fresh herbs are FAR cheaper there than Stop and Shop. And they have a huge variety of greens and mushrooms and other produce.
Ultralight
10-5-16, 9:40am
Yup, you can get a monster sized bag of basmati rice at Indian grocers. You can also get similarly sized bags of lentils and beans there too! Do you have anything like that near you?
ToomuchStuff
10-5-16, 10:36am
This is one of the times I miss Lessisbest. I am wondering if she or someone else here, would also bring up canning, so some of the fresh stuff gets saved for later in the year.
I would also love to ask her more about those bleach tablets (since they say not a disinfectant) to find out how she uses them, and if she adds any chlorine to them to convert them to a disinfectant.
I think if you do a search you can still find Lessisbest's posts, toomuchstuff. about canning and using fresh produce wisely.
catherine
10-5-16, 10:55am
I think if you do a search you can still find Lessisbest's posts, toomuchstuff. about canning and using fresh produce wisely.
Yes, I miss Lessisbest's posts. She's the master class on eating cheaply.
Here's another way to look at this. It sounds like you are on this diet for health reasons, and that the diet is working. That's great! By eating this way, you are feeling better, are healthier, are taking fewer medications! And, by eating healthy foods, you are most likely improving your overall health long-term.
I'm not saying you shouldn't try to eat frugally, but if you switch your mindset to including this diet as part of your medical treatment, as an medical expense designed to improve your health that might make the cost more bearable. Don't just look on it as food, but as a way of medicating yourself to improved health.
That is absolutely a wonderful way of looking at it! My doctor says 'let food be your medicine'.
There are foods on my acceptable list that I just don't like. Sweet potatoes are one of them. They are inexpensive and healthy so I guess I'll just have to get used to them. I cut one up into slices, drizzled them with coconut oil and salt and oven baked them. Not too bad. I would have liked to add ketchup but that is taboo.
I appreciate all the tips here. Thanks!
Lessisbest also introduced me to bone broth. It's inexpensive and nutritious. I drink it everyday. The butcher at my grocery store told me to add chicken feet. It's amazing - the broth comes out thick and gelatinous because the feet have so much collagen. It's great for achy joints with the added benefit nicer looking skin.
I got the book, Wildly Affordable Organic, from the library. Lots of good ideas, but lots of food I can't eat. It relies heavily on wheat based foods, and I cannot eat gluten. I can eat other grains only sparingly, like about once a day. Grains turn to sugar in the body, and sugar causes inflammation. Dairy and eggs are out too.
I'm sure there are plenty of ways to cut my food costs, but as Miss Cellane pointed out, this diet is also part of my medical plan. My food budget my have increased, but my medical costs should decrease.
I also find I am eating less, so that keeps costs down. My weight has stayed in the 130-135 range. Blood pressure and cholesterol numbers are excellent. Now I'm hoping to reduce pain from arthritis/inflammation.
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