This month I had more giant chunks of my income disappear than usual (Home Office fees for a nice new visa, moving deposit for new flat), which means I’ve currently got about £20 to last me until payday on Nov 29. I’m trying to figure out how I’m going to eat!
Facilities at home:
two stove tops
a tiny oven
fridge (no freezer)
Kitchen essentials:
canola oil
olive oil
salt
butter
garlic
(I mentioned that it was new flat, right?)
I get free Guinness for playing in pubs three nights a week, so that helps round out my calorie intake, but despite the legend I don’t think you actually can live off the black stuff. I also need something I can take to work for lunch.
Any suggestions? I was thinking things like rice and chickpeas, and potatoes, but I’m not sure what essential food groups/nutrients those are leaving out. Any advice/tips on cheap eating?
Sounds like a plan. Even if you are missing some essentials, I doubt it will do you much harm in a ten-day span unless you have preexisting deficiencies. Hit up your nearest supermarkets as often as possible and check out what they have on special because of expiry dates/promotions, and their basic/supersaver ranges. See if you can score some spices etc - chilli/curry can cover a multitude of sins.
If you’re prepared to have toast+margerine or porridge for breakfast, bread+cheddar for lunch and chickpea curry with rice for supper then you can probably manage on less than £2.50, especially if you have an Aldi or Lidl nearby.
Where do you work? If you’re fortunate enough to work in an office that provides milk for coffe then all you need to provide is some cereal and your breakfast is done. Get serious about cashing in on vouchers and the like, but don’t ever be tempted by a great deal unless it’s something you need to eat. Half-price steak is still more expensive than no steak at all.
In America at least, a ten buck bulk bag of rice and a ten buck bulk bag of beans will yield around 1,000 servings- enough to eat for the better part of a year. With some tomato sauce (and maybe chilies, onions and garlic) it is actually pretty nutritionally balanced. In my poorer days, I would make a huge pot of beans twice a week and eat from each pot for two or three days. With enough hot sauce I didn’t even mind how repetitive it got. Each meal worked out to pennies. Take it to work in some plastic containers. I’d mix it up with lentils and rice now and then.
If you are in really dire straights, check out the backs of grocery stores and bakeries at night. They usually toss out a huge selection of perfectly good (though slightly expired) food, but finding good places can be pretty hit or miss. It’s really a lot less gross than it sounds. I used to live near a French bakery that provided me with cakes and croissants and fancy pastries daily. Most of these places know what goes on, and take some effort to keep things clean and separate any real garbage. If you don’t want to do that, you may also have some luck just walking into bakeries at closing time and seeing if they will give you some leftovers. Try asking if they will sell you stuff as day old- they will probably just give it to you.
Powdered milk is a dirt cheap way to add nutrition to everything. When I lived in Africa, I got in the habit of throwing a few spoonfuls into just about everything I cooked- it’s good in pasta sauces, enriches bread dough, works in hot drinks, can be easily made into yogurt. Really, anything but straight up drinking.
Ethnic supermarkets often have the cheapest and freshest fresh vegetables.
Would it be out of order to suggest asking your bank for a temporary overdraft? I can extend my overdraft online without even have to crawl to a human being!
Otherwise, beans and rice sounds like a plan. It’s all they seem to eat on "I’m a celebrity’
First off, provided you’re not a vegetarian, buy a chicken. I see you said you have a tiny oven but I’m presuming it’s big enough to roast a chicken in.
Roast your chicken and have chicken and vegetables and spuds one day, then take the meat off the chicken and make a curry with it, use your chick peas or lentils and vegetables in there to stretch it. Or a pasta sauce. Either of those would last you a few days, provided you bulk them out
Boil the carcass of the chicken and make a stock. Use that to make a risotto or a big pan of chicken soup.
Do the same thing all over again when that’s finished.
That should take you to the 29th of November with no trouble at all. You’ve got 8 days and 8 x £2.50 = £20.
Easy.
Tinned sardines can be had for very little out of supermarkets (even cheaper if you’ve got a Lidl or Aldi nearby - about 40p a tin). Using your oil, garlic and some pasta or even some toast makes an excellent cheap meal. I’m no nutritionist but I’ll guess sardines will hit some food groups that rice, chickpeas and potatoes won’t.
It’s worth scouting out your local big supermarkets to find the chiller cabinet they use for stuff that is priced to get rid off because it’s reached the sell-by date. Tends to be a bit random, but silly bargains can be found. Sell-by is only a guideline and you have a fridge so you are good for a couple of days.
1-pound packages of Lentils, split peas, black beans and barley (all 79-99 cents)
chicken parts on sale (mostly legs, 99 cents a pound)
frozen peas
frozen carrots
Boil chicken parts in 6-8 cups of water until meat falls off the bone, remove the bones and leave the meat in about 7 cups of water (add more as needed). Add dry item of choice (if beans, of course soak overnight first) My latest was 1 cup split peas with 1/3 cup barley and 1 cup lentils. Salt and pepper to taste. Let the whole business cook for about an hour, until the peas become mush. Add 1/2 package frozen peas and 1/2 package frozen carrots, bring back to a boil and you’re done. I switch it up by changing around which starches I use, but always add some barley in there for the fiber.
It congeals in the pot while it’s cooling and is easy to stick in a container (won’t leak) and when I’m ready to eat it at work I just add water and make it soup again.
As another switch-up and for breakfast - peanut butter and jelly sandwiches.
I’ve been eating for about $30 a week this way, but I do take multivitamins and other supplements.
Poverty or not, I can live on pasta with olive oil and pepper alone for any length of time. Pasta is not as cheap as rice or beans, but it should be really cheap.
And £20 of Ramen noodles should be enough to see you until the end of the year, never mind the month.
ETA: And if this is just a temporary fix, screw nutrition. It is only a couple weeks, you will be fine. If you were in Montreal, I would tell you to survive on cheap pizza pointes.
Porridge oats for breakfast. If you squeeze a tad of citrus in it’ll help to release the iron.
Huge pot of green lentils with whatever vegetables are cheap thrown in. If you can catch the market when they’re closing up you’ll get deals on fruit.
Dublin 11 - that would be my other suggestion - the eternal chicken week!
My ex is English I think I can help you out in your dialect even.
You want pot noodles, and a bag of potatoes to make chips (your chips not ours), then maybe you can save some out for kabobs at the chippie shoppe as a treat.
Potatoes are definitely the way to go, provided you’ve got some basic spicing and fat. Rendered chicken fat is perfect.
Alex Coxon’s potato recipes is bookmarked in my “tight times” folder. Buying a 20lb sack of potatoes will definitely last you through ten days - if not a month - provided they’re good quality. Try getting from some local farmers, if you can.
Vegetable soups are also brilliant and I can live off them for months if I had to. Hell, 10 days for £25 wouldn’t be a problem even in Norway.
Buy a 10kg (20lbs) bag of potatoes. (2.95x10~30,- NOK, or £3.)
Buy two large-size packs of sausages. (2x36,- NOK, or 2x£3,5)
Buy a small variation of celery, carrots and other vegetables you’re partial to for £6.
Buy soup bullions if you prefer the additional flavour. £4.
Buy some good bread or other snacks for the last £5.
Boil the water, add potatoes, turn down the heat, add the other vegetables and the meat/sausages and let stir for 8-10 minutes. The soup re-heats very well, even the day after and actually tastes better re-heated in a lot of cases. Leftover soup can easily be made into stew or - in some cases - be dried, pan-fried and made into filler for a jacket potato.
It’s very filling, tastes good and can easily be brought for lunch if you have access to a microwave. (And if you wouldn’t feel odd about bringing soup for lunch, which at the time half the students here were doing anyway.) Add beans and tomato purée if you want. Best served with freshly baked potato bread, this being my favourite recipe.
Soft shelled “tacos”. Make your own flat bread and use rice/beans as filler which can be flavored with bullion.
Buy baloney by the slice from a deli and fry that up as added flavor to any dish you may want. In this case I’m thinking of a single slice of fried baloney using beer to flavor it. Add this to the red beans/rice soft taco. Dessert can be rice pudding made from rice, powdered milk, cinnamon and sugar. Toast your homemade bread into crackers and sprinkle it with olive oil, rosemary, basil and oregano (if you have the spices) or olive oil and salt if you don’t. That will go good with beer.
Your goal is to use low cost base materials such as flour/rice/beans/macaroni for bulk and beer/bullion/spices for flavor. What remains from your budget can go towards cheese/meat/vegies.
Thanks to everyone for the advice! Apologies for not responding earlier, but I haven’t got internet at my flat yet and I can only access the Dope from work.
I ended up stocking up on rice (80p/kg), potatoes (£1/bag), beans and lentils (…Very Cheap). My local street stalls and ethnic supermarkets do a “giant bowl of vegetables for £1” that I intend to use to fill out the rest. Yesterday I made a giant pot o’ beans with a little pepper and garlic that I took (with some rice) to work today. I’ll check back in once I’m on Day Six, but it was very filling and tasted quite nice.
I forgot how many lovely and generous people hang around this place! I especially appreciate the people who offered to PayPal a little emergency relief – unfortunately I don’t have a PayPal account and I think by the time it’s set up/confirmed it will be payday already! I really can’t express how much the offer meant to me, though.
I’ll check back in once I’m on Day Six, but it was very filling and tasted quite nice.
