Are you poor? Here's a quick, cheap nourishing meal!

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Rocky
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24 Nov 2009, 3:09 am

ooOoOoOAnaOoOoOoo wrote:

Rocky wrote:

The easiest, quickest, cheap alternative to the microwavable rice is the puffed brown rice that is sold as cereal in plastic bags. No cooking at all! It can be found in the cereal aisle at Walmart for less than $1. It is more nutritious, too. There are no added ingredients. Not as appealing, maybe, but I have found them a nice addition to some soups, and microwavable Indian entrees.

I've never thought that puffed brown rice could be anything but cereal. Do you substitute it for rice? It can get really soggy if it's exposed to anything remotely liquidy so watch out. I don't like it when it gets soggy. I wonder what can be done with it? I never thought of it as anything but cereal and it's really terrible in milk.

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My own nominee for the cheapest, easiest, most nutritious meal is oatmeal, sold in bulk often for less than $1 a pound. Uninspiring, I grant you, but easily modified with raisins, nuts, cinnamon, apple sauce, yogurt, etc. Regular oatmeal cooks fine in the microwave. You don't have to buy the packets which are marketed as "Microwavable." I add the extra ingredients after cooking, to help cool it off, so I can enjoy it sooner.

The best thing about oatmeal is it's so filling. It's great with raisins. A package of Sunmaid boxes isn't too expensive. You can put one in the microwave for ten seconds, then, put it in your bowl of oatmeal and it's so good warmed up like that. Another thing that's great in oatmeal is half and half or cream, but it's way to fattening to add too often.
A really good cheap meal: roasted potatoes. I quarter red potatoes, toss them in a bowl with olive oil, kosher salt and pepper, then, put them on a cookie sheet and into a preheated 425 degree oven. I bake them for thirty minutes, take them out and let them cool for about fifteen minutes. It's cheap and filling. I can find a bag of them from Campbell Farms at SWMC for $2.50, but it might be a "Thanksgiving only" special.

Re Puffed Brown Rice (PBR)- It does get soggy easily. The good news is that it is easy to dump a spoonful into your soup (or whatever) and eat that bite, and repeat. I don't mind it soggy in my soup. As a cereal, I never eat it plain, but mix it with cereals which would be too sweet otherwise. I seldom use PBR as a cereal, however. I use Cheerios instead (mixed as just described.)

Re oatmeal- I like it because it keeps you from getting hungry before lunch, because of the high level of complex carbohydrate. It also goes well with maple syrup and milk.

Re potatoes- Your recipe sounds great, but I am too usually too lazy. I just take a potato, stick it with a fork, and microwave it until soft. Then I combine pepper, butter, sour cream, cheese, or whatever strikes me at the moment.

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ooOoOoOAnaOoOoOoo
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24 Nov 2009, 6:24 pm

I got some great meal ideas for people on tight budgets:

When shopping, make sure to get some basic staples:

1. Buy a box of rice. Be sure to buy brown instead of white, it's more nutritional.
2. Buy a bag of Navy beans. Their smaller size means you don't have to cook them so long. They taste great with brown rice and make a complete meal. A small bag costs around a dollar, or less, and goes a long way with just one or two people.
3. Buy a box of whole grain oatmeal. Very good investment.
4. Raisins go great with the oatmeal so buy some of those.
5. Bags of potatoes. Just a small amount of them fills me up, and they are fairly inexpensive.
6. Celery. It's so inexpensive.
7. If you don't want to buy an onion, buy garlic instead. You get a lot of flavor, and it's cheaper. Garlic is a great alternative to salt.

BoringAaron
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26 Nov 2009, 1:45 am

Beans and rice each have all the nutrients that the other one doesn't. Together, they are a complete meal.

ToughDiamond
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26 Nov 2009, 6:23 am

ToughDiamond's cheap nutritious lunch recipe

Ingredients:
2 slices of wholemeal bread.
1 splat of sunflower margarine.
1 medium-sized tomato.
1 small-ish carrot.
1 small handful of fresh spinach leaves.
1 dollop of hummus (made of chick peas, olive oil, garlic & lemon juice).
1 slice of processed cheese.

Method:
Make a sandwich out of the ingredients (you will have to slice the tomato and carrot or they won't fit).

Wash down with 1 small glass of real orange juice.

I've been living on that for many years and I'm still walking about. Can anybody spot any vital nutrient that's missing from the formula?

Advantages: no cooking required, which reduces the labour time, the energy bills and the CO2 emissions. Very quick to put together.

ouinon
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26 Nov 2009, 8:06 am

ToughDiamond wrote:

That sounds absolutely delicious, ( if you aren't gluten-intolerant that is, as I am ), and very nutritious.

The only thing that seems to be missing is iodine, from fish, seafood or seaweed, and you might get a bit short on Vit B12 and Zinc, but if you eat fish at other times you could cover all those three!

PS. I'd hold the margarine, and use butter instead, but that's just a detail!

My favourite cheap and simple hot meal is spicy lentil soup with bits of leftover/cheap lamb, pork or other meat in, and my favourite cheap and simple cold dish is lots of green salad and cucumber with tinned fish particularly tuna. I used to eat lots of rice, with beans or lentils, but too much starchy carbohydrate doesn't agree with me.

.

sartresue
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26 Nov 2009, 9:18 am

How to eat cheap but good topic

I remember also using Gene Kowalski's How to eat Cheap but Good in the 70s and 80s. The hillbilly house diet is sufficient. I would just try to cut back on the sodium chloride.

Great thread!!

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