Eating on a tight budget

Oh, there's so much you can do!  Campbell soup has tons of recipies and they're even listed on their cans.  Chicken & Rice casserole, Stir fry w/ your beef cubes w/ veggies (you can even by the premade stuff and just ad meat), spaghetti is cheap!  Breakfast for dinner, like french toast and bacon/sausage, maybe some potatoes (that's my favorite), hamburger helper, chicken helper and tuna helper.  Seriously, though check out the back of the campbells soup cans for recipies.  They're usually really easy and shouldn't be that expensive.  Oh, meatloaf, mash potatoes, and veggie.  I usually make a roast in the crock post w/ carrots and potatoes, with some cream of mushroom soup and onion seasoning mix, and then you can have left overs.  If I think of anything else, I'll be sure to let you know.  My husbands the cook, so he may have more and/or better ideas!

I'm procrastinating horribly, so I did some research. Do you guys remember that "food stamp challenge" in May where several Congressmen attempted to live on the $3/day allocated to food stamp users? I was reading Congressman Tim Ryan's blog about it, and in the comments section some people really reamed him on not knowing how to eat on a budget. They had some interesting suggestions about cheap ways to feed yourself nutritiously. So here are some of them reposted! (from http://www.house.gov/apps/blog/oh17_ryan/index.shtml)

by Jessie S. Leary
May 16, 2007
It costs 1.00 for a 6 pack of ramen, and 1.99 for 12oz of tofu, super firm (holds up better in soup) (thats about 6 meals worth) and green onions are .79 a bundle (at least it is on Safeway.com). then you get some protein from the tofu and some greens from the onions. can also toss some spinach in, 1.29 for 10oz frozen leaf spinach. Even with spinach that is .84 cents a meal, and six meals. During college I had to get inventive with ramen... and somehow keep it semi-healthy. 

by gail
May 16, 2007
You can get nutritional value without having to go with prepared foods. Peanut butter, jelly and tomato sauce are not good values. I've lived on much less than $21 a week. Here's a sample grocery list (which I priced on Peapod, so it will probably be cheaper in the store).
1 4.5lb whole chicken at 1.49 per pound ($6.70)
1 can giant brand crm of mushroom soup (1.20)
3 lb bag of gala apples (3.99) on sale this week
32 oz bag of long grain rice (1.59)
1 head of celery (1.99)
1 bag of kale (1.99)
2 bags of carrots (.99 x 2)
4 yellow onions (.89 x4)
First night bake the chicken with 1 onion, 1 carrot and 1 stalk of celery.
Make a pot of rice with half the bag
cook the kale with onions chopped
2nd night make a casserole with leftover chicken, veggies and rice with crm of mushroom.
You've got enough carrots, celery and apples for lunch and breakfast each day and carry leftovers of chicken casserole
make soup with carcass adding veggies and rice, now you've got soup.
Save a little money and get the big box of oatmeal..which goes well with apples!

by Catherine
May 17, 2007
While this is a great idea, I have to agree with the above posters that your shopping skills are awful. If these are the typical purchases of a person receiving food stamps I'd say we also need to start making nutrition consultations available.

Had it been me, I would have been purchasing things like:
Dried beans: Usually around $0.8-0.9 per bag. A bag supposedly contains 12 servings, for one person for a week I would get 2 bags.
Vegetables: A 5 lb bag of carrots is generally $5 or less (even if you are going for organic). I would also pick up a package or two of frozen vegetables (usually under $2/bag for a store brand).

For breakfasts, I would advise plain oatmeal (filling and high in fiber). Even if you also get a half-gallon of milk so you don't have to make it with water, your cost for breakfast for the week will still likely be under $5.

Rice, pasta, or potatoes, depending on what was cheapest. You should be able to get a week's worth for one person for under $3.

Fruit: Bananas are always by far the cheapest option, you could get enough to have at least one piece of fresh fruit per day for a couple of dollars. Depending on the price of other items suggested above (since they can vary from week to week), you might even be able to splurge and get a more expensive fruit, like a 3-lb bag of apples.

And here's one that was linked from the website: a livejournal community for "Recipes Under $5"

http://community.livejournal.com/recipesunder5/

There, hope my time-wasting procrastination skills were helpful :)

I'm sorry I don't understand...$3/day on food stamps.  When I was first married had the two girls,  and the A-hole divorced me leaving me w/ nothing, I had to go on welfare, and they gave me so much in food stamps, I wish it was cash!!!!  I never ate so good!  I had Filet Mignon, shared w/ my mother, who gave me cash for my food stamps, so I could afford to by diapers, toilet paper, pads, papertowels, etc.  I've never heard of this!  The food stamps were the highest amount I ever received of any government support.  The cash sucked, heck, I had rent to pay and bills, and if it wasn't for the overpayment in food stamps, I would have never been able to pay my utilities.  It was like a mix up, in my opinion.  It was me and 2 toddlers, how much food did they expect us to eat!  If they would have switched the two around, I would have been fine, but no, I had to figure out how I could make it work for me....Thank goodness, I don't have to go thru that again!  I hated being on Welfare!  Oh, and then when I did get a job, they pestered me at work about my medical card!  When I told them I couldn't talk, they didn't seem to care, so then I said I didn't need it, since I had a job and it covered my medical for me and my family, they still called!  So finally I had to get rude, and tell them not to call, I don't need you!!!  Which really pissed me off, since while I was on Welfare and actually needed help, I didn't seem to have a Social Worker assigned to me!  Yeah, I guess....I won't go there!

I always do a jar of pasta sauce, ground beef and a box of noodles for pasta. Eggs, egg salad sandwiches, PB&J, Grilled cheese.

For the ramen noodle thing... I am not a fan of them either BUT, try them this way :) Make them like normal and drain ALL of the water out then add a little bit of butter and the seasoning packet and stir. They just taste like seasoned noodles and are A TON better. This was a trick some of the guys learned at college when they got sick of eating them like soup.  It's the only way I eat them now.

rice and pasta, you can make a myrid of dishes with those two and all you need are some basic seasonings/ingredients  

Luvmydane

I always do a jar of pasta sauce, ground beef and a box of noodles for pasta. Eggs, egg salad sandwiches, PB&J, Grilled cheese.

For the ramen noodle thing... I am not a fan of them either BUT, try them this way :) Make them like normal and drain ALL of the water out then add a little bit of butter and the seasoning packet and stir. They just taste like seasoned noodles and are A TON better. This was a trick some of the guys learned at college when they got sick of eating them like soup.  It's the only way I eat them now.

Thats how Tommy made Ramen for me once and I won't eat them any other way.  I really dont like them normally, but I dont mind them like that. 

When i was young, and we had little money or food, we had popcorn with milk (it seemed like cereal).  It sounds disgusting, but i liked it as a kid.

Sorry you are going through rough times. I've been there and I learned how to eat on next to nothing.

At rock bottom I was making a huge pot of vegetarian chili and eating it for lunch and dinner for 5 days.  I used dried beans (cheap!) cans of tomatoes I got on sale, onions and whatever else was cheap. I also made corn bread to go with it. I liked chili but I wouldn't recommended it!

There are some great frugal recipe sources on the web---many of them are part of "stay at home mom" sites. Look the sites over for other helpful tips and ideas.

Basic recipes:

http://www.miserlymoms.com/MOMfrecipes1.htm

http://www.frugalrecipes.com/

http://www.betterbudgeting.com/frugalrecipelist.htm

Some sites address making one recipe and then using it for lots of different dishes. If you have lots of ground beef, then you can do a ton with it:

http://www.christian-mommies.com/special-features/just-for-moms/one-recipe-many-meals-save-time-and-money/

There is also the "cook it all one day and freeze it" approach where you can make up a bunch of things from the beef and spread the meals out.

http://www.frugalmom.net/beef_recipes.htm

Try to plan your meals to use leftovers and ingredients you didn't completely use--for example if you have a recipe that needs 1/2 a container of sour cream make sure you have another recipe that week that will use the rest. Or double up what you cook and freeze half---or since you are just one person you may find yourself freezing several portions.  Buying a bigger container of sour cream or carrots or cheese or ???? can make more money sense then just buying enough for one recipe and you CAN do it without having the same meal every night.

For me I might start on a Sunday with a whole chicken, veggie crescent rolls on Monday, chicken pot pie on Tuesday, hamburger stroganoff on Wednesday, baked stuffed potatoes on Thursday, and homemade pizza on Friday. FYI Someone usually has leftovers for lunch the next day.

If you buy a whole chicken and bake it, you can use the leftovers (and any leftover veggies) to make chicken pot pie. Mix the chicken with some gravy, toss in the veggies (or buy a cheap bag of mixed veggies) heat it up and dump in a pie plate. Toss a crust on top and bake. I also boil the bones and some scraps in a bit of water to get broth for soup asnd freeze it.

A favorite hamburger recipe: if you have onions, chop them up and brown in a pan. cook beef in pan until browned. add some beef broth until you can see the broth in the pan but it isn't soupy, sprinkle in some worcestshire sauce. once it is heated through add some sour cream and stir. I use just under a cup for 1.5 pounds of hamburger. It will be creamy but not thick. heat through and let stand for a minute and it will thicken. Serve over egg noodles. Green beans, carrots or broccoli go nicely with this. DH calls it hamburger stroganoff and that may be its real name :)

Veggies + cheese on crescent rolls: Whether or not this is frugal will depend on sale prices, but it is something different for supper and is a great way to use up veggies and cheese. You'll need butter or oil, carrots (big ones) onions, beans and whatever else you like for veggies, a can of crescent rolls and some shredded cheddar and/or cheddar-mozzarella cheese, and basil or italian herb mix. 

Slice carrots so they are thin-- but not paper thin. Cut up the other veggies into bite size pieces. heat some butter or oil in a pan. cook the onions until they are translucent, then cook the veggies. add them to the pan in order of hardness. For example: carrots and broccoli cook for a few minutes before you add something like summer squash so the hard veggies get mostly cooked before the faster cooking veggies are added. You will need some hard veggies in there. All soft veggies like squash or tomatoes and the bottom "crust" will get soggy. 

Preheat the oven. as the veggies finish cooking add some basil or the herb mix. I honestly don't know the measurements because I wing everything so look at the container and see if there is a recommended amount to add to food. It is probably a teaspoon or two. Then unroll the crescent rolls and separate the dough into rectangles (not triangles) onto a baking sheet. Scoop the veggie mix onto the rectangles and sprinkle with cheese. Bake according to the crescent roll instructions, but keep an eye on it and remove from oven when rolls are baked and cheese has melted.

Baked stuffed potatoes: take the basic veggie mix above, bake some potatoes (use microwave to hurry it up if you want) scoop out the insides and mash them. Use a little butter and if you have sour cream left over from the hamburger recipe then use that to help mash the potatoes. Mix in the veggies and for four potatoes about half a cup of shredded cheese. Re stuff the potatoes and put on baking sheets. sprinkle some more cheese over the top and bake in a 350 over until the cheese melts. You can also grease a baking dish and put the mix in there and bake it.

Homemade pizza is really cheap. Here is a page with a bunch of recipes. http://www.easypizzacrusts.com/  Personally I use flour, oil, yeast, salt, sugar, cheese, and tomato sauce and pizza seasoning for the sauce. The flour cost next to nothing, ditto for the tiny amounts of salt and sugar, the tomato sauce you can buy in big cans and mix with pizza seasoning and then freeze what you don't use, the cheese you can buy in a big bag and use up during the week.

These are some of my old standbys and hopefully they'll work for you. If anything is unclear just email me. I usually make recipes up as I go along and I'm afraid it shows.

Lots of great ideas!

 I'm the queen of the Rubber Chicken.  Baked chicken one day (in the crock pot), then chicken enchiladas or chicken salad with the leftover meat. Then chicken soup with the bones. BBQ crock chicken is easy, too. Toss a whole chicken in the crock, top with sliced onion and BBQ sauce. Serve with more sauce on buns or with taters & veg.

Take those ramens & make stir fry! A big bag of stir fry veggies (and some thinly sliced chicken or beef if you have it) then toss in the drained cooked noodles and seasoning at the end. My kids love this.

Since you said you had ground beef, I'd recommend shepherd's pie. Another family favorite that makes great leftovers. Just brown the beef with a bit of beef base (like bouillon but much more flavor), mix in some flour (lazy roux) and then add water and cook to thicken the "gravy". Throw in a bag of frozen mixed veggies (usually under $1) and cook a few more minutes. Top with about 4 big taters, mashed. Bake til bubbly.

My favorite meal stretcher is frozen veggies. They're cheap, healthy, won't spoil like fresh and are tastier than canned. I do use pastas and rice to stretch meals, but try to stick with brown rice or whole grain pastas to keep it healthier.