Budget food/living

https://www.lfgss.com/thread43474.html

What a great thread!
I've been on a tight budget for a while.
I've found Tescos the most expensive of the supermarkets, even though they seem to portray themselves as the cheapest.
I've started shopping at Sainsburys, Aldi and getting veg from the market.

My friends introduced me to Aldi's fake Pringles - snack something or other. They actually taste better than Pringles and are cheaper.

I'm going more and more towards veggie options as fish (my main love) and meat gets so expensive.

Couscous, rice and pasta are most of my cheap filling basics.

Work canteen will sell me as much chips and beans as I can fit on a plate for £1.17.

My poor arteries.

Need to learn to make my own pasta sauce, cheapest OK stuff in a jar I've found is 770g@£1.28 for Asda's Bolognese sauce, that's about 3 servings usually.

Freegan Thread is

Nour Cash & Carry, Brixton Market... £15 will get you a whole week's worth of groceries... Ride out here, I'll show you... I'm free on Monday... x

Ham Hock and Split Pea soup!
or Gypsy Soup.
or Chili con carne.
Made in a massive batch at the beginning of the week and eaten throughout.
~a 5er a week.
then fruit and veg to add goodness and scurvy protection.

chili is my go to budget meal, good with chips, rice pasta. Also freezes well.

Or make a load of pasta bakes, cook and freeze/chill. lasts ages.

Parsnip and chickpea soup for lunches this time of year. Cheap and easy with bulk stock cubes.

Not sure if I've mentioned it elsewhere on here... But mushy pea soup is cheap to make... Just a tin of mushy peas, a stock cube and water. Cook for 20 mins and blend.

Or cauliflower soup (when cauliflowers are in season, like now). One cauliflower, stock cube, enough water to cover all the florets, cook for 45 minutes, blend. This freezes really well too, so it is great for batch cooking.

And a +1 to chilli too, just make sure you don't get really fatty mince.

I bypass meat most of the time (outside of Bacon) too pricey for a student budget. lentils and chickpeas bulk up most meals.

braising steak/stewing steak.
i like proper sirloin now and again but the cheaper cuts of beef cooked in a tagine or casserole for a couple of hours are real tasty, never really bothered with it before but i prefer it to lamb which is stupidly expensive at the mo.
i usually buy 3 packs for a tenner in sainsburys.

This

Since I'm broke I cook beef casserolles for the whole family. In fact I had one today.
Two packets of fine sliced stir fry steak will cost £6 (stweing meat is even cheaper). Add a packet of mushroom and some baby carrots, onion, maybe leek, a pot of beef gravy, a packet of ready made mix and you have a full dish which will last a week. And it takes 1.5 hrs to make. With a normal cheaper stweing beef around 2.5 hrs.

jobless

Shit, didn't know about this.

You need to be getting in touch with your Uncle Monty, mate!

Liver and onions with mash is always a budget winner .

Get a stack of tin foil containers and have a shepherd's pie session, make about ten and freeze them. You might not want them straight away, but you'll weep with glee when you find one of those bad boys in the bottom of the freezer in the leaner times.

roast med veg is good to.

Slice lots of onion, pepper, courgette, garlic, new potatoes, sweet potato, etc, splash with oil and roast. Eat half of the end result, the rest blends into a brilliant soup.

Main thing is, ride your bike a lot. Loads of people up North became pro riders during the Eighties simply because there were no jobs and nothing better to do than ride, ride, ride. They got good enough to go pro!

James' next job?

Hope employment comes your way soon, buddy.

Ray Mears it up and start drinking your own piss.. Saves a fortune

Time to visit Yorkshire.

Bear grylls is the more likely candidate for piss drinking. Ray's far too civilised

Couscous with a handful of chopped olives, little bit of chopped onion and a splash of balsamic vinegar. Dead cheap, min prep and still middle-class. Unless you use sarsons instead.

Olives???

They don't keep and are fairly pricey. You don't get enough to justify adding to a meal.

For similar hit I'd recommend capers. Last for yonks in the fridge without going manky and you only need a few for an umami hit.

Couscous is a great option though, as are lentils. bland things with good cals that can be boosted with cunning flavours.

Another great option is the humble chicken. As a single chap you've got about five meals right there! (Two breasts=two meals, legs and wings with chips = 1 meal, carcass into soup at least two meals). Get a big bag of that stew mix of pearl barley and stuff to bulk out humble meals too.

This is fast becoming my favourite thread. I've been stuck for a bit on lasting meals that aren't pasta based or chili.
Alas the weeks shopping was done yesterday.

I think I might try to make a big pot of soup tomorrow, need to do a cupboard shop.

Easy veggie soup ingredients
Potato
carrots
chickpeas
veg stock
...
suggestions?

Roast stuff as said above somewhere ^^^^^^
Roasting makes everything better. Especially parsnips but I could eat roast parsnips everyday without feeling bored.

someone mentioned pearl barley

now thinking of irish stew

Mmm stout...

i just remember the scraggy bits of lamb, celery, carrots and spuds with bits of pearl barley in a warming clear broth - i miss my mothers winter stews

Eating on the cheap is so fucking easy, it's how we live... And we eat like kings/queens*...
*co-ed household

i think i am going to appreciate the additional time from being unemployed - slow cooking food while i go for bike rides or to the gym etc

I think beans on toast will also be a regular snack meal.

Need not be humble, though!

Borlotti beans are as cheap as baked beans. Making your own bread is a nice cheap option, don't do anything fancy, just little one man baguettes made with a little oil in the mixture to add squidge.
Crisp a few bacon lardons (or cheap packet ham sliced and fried to get rid of water and gain flavour!) in a frying pan, add the beans and a few chilli flakes, then crush the beans lightly to make them into a bit of a paste. Toast one of those lovely little baguettes, pile on your bean and bacon mixture thick, you've got luxury beans on toast.