Ask Lemmy

Breakfast: oatmeal

Snacks: popcorn (air popped, buy kernels. ~~Need~~ I recommend an air popper, but they're like 20 bucks. Then you can eat cheap popcorn forever). Bonus tip: if you can get your hands on a cheap electric coffee/spice grinder or want to grind seasonings by hand into an extremely fine powder, you can make popcorn salt that coats the popcorn really nicely. E.g. curry popcorn (salt + curry powder), lemon pepper, ranch (get ranch dressing powder)

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

• Chicken & sausage gumbo over rice

• Enchiladas, rice, beans

• Rotisserie chicken tacos

• Collard greens and cornbread, you can add bacon or other cheap cuts of pork to add protein.

• Pasta bake (chicken, spinach, pesto, white sauce, little cheese, optionally dried tomatoes - dry them in your oven to save money or buy canned for a little more)

• Korean rice bowls. Chicken, gochujang (like $5-8 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.

• Filipino style Chicken Adobo (potatoes, carrots, chicken, onion, garlic, ginger cooked in a vinegar soy sauce based sauce)

• 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. For fillings, I like a little ground meat with onion and mushroom and saurkraut - 1 part meat, 1 part mushroom, 1 part onion. Even cheaper is potato and cheese - typically this means mashed potato mixed with sour cream and cheese.

• Cabbage rolls. Head of cabbage, rice, ground pork, onion, garlic, a couple cans of tomato soup. Cook rice, mix with ground pork, diced onion, and garlic. Dunk cabbage head in boiling water for a minute or two, peel a leaf off, stuff with pork mixture and roll. Put all rolls in a baking pan on a layer of the tomato soup, top with tomato soup. Bake covered mins or until cooked (165f internal temperature)

• West African Peanut Stew. Lots of recipes online. Contains a mix of peanuts, peanut butter, sweet potatoes, collard greens, chicken/veggie stock, and optionally chicken. Very filling, calorie dense, and cheap. I make like 2kg of soup for <$20.

In general, if you want cheap food then look for cultures with rich food traditions born from poverty. Also look for more plant-based recipes or find ways to stretch your meat using fillers like cabbage and onion.

Examples: Louisiana Cajun, American South, India (at least the more modest dishes without lots of meat and cream/butter), Eastern Europe, Central and South America, even provincial French food & British "food" (I jest, but bubble & squeak or bangers & mash have fed many a hungry family)

Staple foods should include:

• Staple Starches: potatoes (sweet potatoes and normal potatoes), rice, corn, beans, lentils

• Chicken (whole raw or rotisserie) - benefit of a whole raw chicken is you can use the whole carcass to make stock and get enough meat for 2 people for a whole week. Rotisserie is the same deal, but precooked and not best suited for all applications.

• Filler vegetables: basically all of your cruciferous vegetables, onions, root vegetables