• Cocodapuf@lemmy.world
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    49 minutes ago

    Sandwiches and soup. I always preferred tuna, but grilled cheese or ham and cheese are solid too.

  • Sterile_Technique@lemmy.world
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    8 hours ago

    When I was literal piss-broke, there was a college campus near me with an open food court. Couldn’t afford the actual shops selling food there, but in that food court was a condiments station that randomly had one of those electric hot water dispensers for making tea, and styrofoam cups. It also had ketchup packets, saltine crackers, and pepper.

    Turns out you can make a pretty passable tomato soup with ketchup and hot water. Bit of pepper and a handful of saltine cracker packets, and I had myself a hot meal for exactly $0.00

    With some money to spend, rice is where it’s at. Hitch a ride to Costco or Sam’s with someone who has a membership, and they have iirc 50 lb bags of that short grain fortified rice for like… $15? That’s well over 100 meals worth of rice.

    Cook that up with literally almost anything that has some flavor or nutrients - whatever’s cheap. Or just eat it straight… bland, but it’ll fill you up. Eggs go great with rice.

    Fair warning, you’ll get fat. Cheap food is NOT usually healthy.

    • zergtoshi@lemmy.world
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      6 hours ago

      Beans shouldn’t be much more pricey, give you less worry about arsenic and contain a fair amount more protein than rice.
      If affordable, I’d pick beans over rice any day.
      Big bags of dried beans it is!

    • Valmond@lemmy.world
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      5 hours ago

      I hope you’re better off now ❤️ !

      The rice comment is 100% spot on BTW, you know you’re in dire straits when you can’t afford rice…

  • Scavenger8294@feddit.org
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    5 hours ago

    oats with whey

    2 cans of beans with oil and spices (or chickpeas)

    pasta with oil and frozen veggies (pasta always whole grain ofc) pasta with canned fish

    these are my go to meals. However i cook them because im lazy and these are all very healthy, chep, and easy to make

  • someguy3@lemmy.world
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    9 hours ago

    Rice and beans. Together they make a complete protein so can make up a larger bulk of your diet.

    Pork loin, those gigantic big ones, are cheap per pound. Cut it into three for three roasts, freeze the other 2.

    Try to get Multivitamins and magnesium. Long term you want those vitamins and minerals. Fish oil too. It’s seems expensive but it’s cheaper than fish itself.

    • bluelander@lemmy.ml
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      8 hours ago

      Beans and rice is the real answer here, +1 to this

      Lots of meals are cheap but few will also fill you up.

      • Pilferjinx@lemmy.world
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        6 hours ago

        Yeah agreed. Beans/lentils, rice, potatoes and flour make up most of my meals. I rarely eat meat but I do consume dairy and eggs occasionally. If you mix in some cheap vegetables like carrots, celery, onion, ect you can get really far with tasty meals.

    • zergtoshi@lemmy.world
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      6 hours ago

      +1 for the beans (or lentils, or just any pulses fwiw), but why the rice?
      Pulses contain carbohydrates, but much more protein than rice and as rice is a hyperaccumulator of arsenic and pulses aren’t, wouldn’t that make a diet centred around pulses healthy while still affordable?
      Put some canned tomatoes, vegetables, onions, garlic, spices or whatever else is available and affordable to the beans and you have a nice enough and quite healthy meal.

  • Little8Lost@lemmy.world
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    7 hours ago

    You do not need to be broke for: noodles made in herb water
    Once you try it you may never go back to only salted water

  • Venus_Ziegenfalle@feddit.org
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    9 hours ago

    There’s a few things I usually have at home because they’re cheap, can be used for various dishes with or without additional ingredients and I will actually eat them before they spoil:

    Beans, lentils, tomato paste, eggs, peanuts, cottage cheese, smoked tofu (not neccessarily a cheap item but I only use half a block or less per dish), bread, rice, spring onions, bell pepper, frozen spinach, hummus, cucumber.

  • Horsey@lemmy.world
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    4 hours ago

    When I was poor I ate boiled chicken and rice for every dinner. Breakfast was either cereal+milk (you can try ringing up multiple boxes at the self checkout using a “small” box but bag the bigger boxes), or yogurt+granola (I’d steal granola by ringing up bulk granola as cheaper bulk items and ring up the single yogurt cup in a 6 pack and pay <1/6 the actual cost).

    • jcg@halubilo.social
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      7 hours ago

      Petty theft rings too true. Had a friend that worked at one of those bulk ingredient shops who’d regularly just take home like a kilo of rice or flour. They don’t check anyway and it hardly affects their bottom line.

  • BigTrout75@lemmy.world
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    8 hours ago

    Burritos. Beans, rice and whatever else you can get that’s on sale it cheap. Make a batch Sunday night. The poorer was the more I would cook.

    • belastend@lemmy.dbzer0.com
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      1 hour ago

      Yeah, this is it.

      Any grain, any bean, any vegetable u can find and then slap that bitch into a tortilla. Or don’t, If the tortillas aren’t in the budget that week. Yoghurt plus garlic makes a cheap sauce.

  • Nikls94@lemmy.world
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    7 hours ago

    Depends where you’re at. If you’re not too far from forests and meadows, mushrooms, grasshoppers and herbs.

    Other than that, rice, noodles. You can add the above things to your rice and noodles.

    You can cook your noodles in tomato sauce like spaghetti al‘assassina to get some variety.

    Remove wings and legs from grasshoppers before eating, they’re scratchy.

    Only eat mushrooms and herbs you’re certain they’re not poisonous.

    Beans/legumes can be cheap

  • TheReturnOfPEB@reddthat.com
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    14 hours ago

    i think that it helps to always have some rice cooked and waiting to bump up the calorie count to almost any meal.

      • blarghly@lemmy.world
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        14 hours ago

        A friend had a recipie for a dinner he ate almost every night in college. One can of beans. One can of diced tomatoes. Put in microwave. Spice to taste. He called it “beans and tomatos”.

      • memfree@piefed.social
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        13 hours ago

        Yup. Buy dry beans and dry rice – none of that precooked stuff. Buy fresh potatoes tho. If you can afford it, I’d also get a bag of onions, maybe carrots, and some spices that do NOT contain salt. You can also buy salt, but it is way cheaper per-gram to get salt and other spices on their own. Note that brown rice has more vitamin content than white rice (thiamine deficiency), but most white rice is enriched to compensate.

      • TheReturnOfPEB@reddthat.com
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        13 hours ago

        I have to admit that I do not do beans nearly as much as I should. I think it is because canned beans are not nearly the deal money-wise as dried beans are … and I am not good at letting beans soak without forgetting them and ruining them.

        • Maeve@kbin.earth
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          13 hours ago

          I’m not sure they’re quite ruined if over soaked. Cooking time will be greatly diminished. I’ve left beans soaking for 24 hours because I forgot, they turned out fine.

        • actionjbone@sh.itjust.works
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          12 hours ago

          You don’t actually need to soak them before you cook them.

          I’ve made plenty of bean dishes, starting with completely dry beans. It takes a little longer to cook because they are rehydrating while they cook, but they still come out great.

          • Eq0@literature.cafe
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            4 hours ago

            Part of the reason to soak is for them to release sone long proteins that are hard to digest. You can achieve the same result by carefully removing the foam they produce at the beginning of the cooking (or replace the water completely after 10-15 minutes of boiling)

          • heatermcteets@lemmy.world
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            10 hours ago

            Adding to this. A pressure cooker brings the cook time down dramatically and I think it produces a superior result.

        • solrize@lemmy.ml
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          8 hours ago

          Magic words: pressure cooker. Electric ones are simplest, press one button and wait for beepng.

        • Øπ3ŕ@lemmy.dbzer0.com
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          12 hours ago

          Fun fact FTW! Check out epazote for not only doing away with the pre-soak, but most of the renowned GI effects, too. 🖖🏼 A little goes a long way, (IIRC, ~ ½T for a 4-5gal pot) and it’s essentially dried grass. Get it from your local mercado/bodega for dirt cheap, change your life. 🥳

      • mateofeo85@piefed.social
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        13 hours ago

        I mix lentils and rice with sautéed onions and I have a meal for a couple days. Add a dollop of sour cream.

  • ALoafOfBread@lemmy.ml
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    9 hours ago

    Breakfast: oatmeal

    Snacks: popcorn (air popped, buy kernels. Need an air popper, but they’re like 20 bucks. Then you can eat cheap popcorn forever)

    Lunch/Dinner:

    • Fried rice (egg, whatever meat/veg, I like doing soy sauce glazed canned sardines with it for a cheap meal)

    • Red beans and rice

    • Enchiladas, rice, beans

    • Rotisserie chicken tacos

    • Collard greens and cornbread

    • Pasta bake (chicken, spinach, pesto, white sauce)

    • Korean rice bowls. Chicken, gochujang (a little expensive but lasts a long time in the fridge), red pepper flakes, ginger, garlic, vinegar, sesame oil. Marinate overnight. Cook on stove or in oven. Serve on rice with side dishes: carrot and cucumber banchan - just get some matchstick carrots, combine with vinegar, soy sauce, sesame oil, garlic, chili flakes. Cucumbers: slice thin, salt, drain. Combine with sesame oil, soy sauce, vinegar, garlic, red pepper flakes. Assemble.

    • Make like 200 pierogis for like 20 bucks (and several hours) and freeze them for later. Boil or pan fry and eat with a sausage and some saurkraut.