What is the best way to eat as a poor person? I'm between jobs. pic related are 35 cents where i live
>>7056851
Beans so you can get that protein and that fiber.
>>7056851
I haven't seen that brand in years
>>7056868
me neither. the pizza burritos were the fucking best.
anyone ever try the 7-11 burritos?
rice and beans and bulk frozen veggies
Rice and beans will be a popular answer but I'll make a suggestion.
Get some discount bread from the deli. Walmart calls it "oops we baked too much". Then buy the cheapest deli ham and cheese. Melt and toast that shit under the broiler.
It'll keep you fat and satisfied.
>>7056868
Yeah. I ate those in college.
>>7056851
OP:
**Beans and Rice**: beans, as have been mentioned, have a good amount of protein and you can get a good ~500 calories out of a ~70-90 cent can. Buy a large bag of rice to stretch it while adding extremely cheap calories that happen to taste great with beans. Boil-n-bag rice, while cheaper than many food stuffs, is still quite a bit more expensive than just a simple large bag of rice. For variety, get red beans, black beans, chili hot beans, etc.
**Potatoes**: A 5lb bag of potatoes is $2.49/lb and a 10lb bag is $2.99 per pound where I live. Salt, pepper, and a 4-stick thing of store brand butter are all pretty cheap. If you really want to pinch every penny, a tub of margerine is even cheaper and not bad in times of scarce money.
The plus is there are tons of ways to prepare them, assuming you have a stove, oven, or microwave. You can interchange them with rice as your cheap carb.
**Cheap sandwiches**: Krogers has many kinds of $1-~1.40 / loaf bread.
Peanut butter is cheap, especially in big jars. Can be livened up with some cheap honey (read: most likely honey flavored corn syrup), jelly, or banana slices.
Bologna. Can be okay with condiments. Or, if you really don't like it, get the thin cut, fry up a couple slices until crisp and its much better. Fried bologna with some cheap, processed cheese slices or an over easy egg is a cheap breakfast.
**Big chunks of meat**- Save money by not trying to make a meal out of them, as many do when they have the money. Eat a serving about the size of your palm, and remember no one really needs to eat meat at every single meal.
Pork Chops can often be found for ~2.50-~2.99 a pound.
Chicken thighs are usually cheap relative to other parts of the bird. But, I think they're the most flavorful part. If you are willing to put in a little extra effort, buy the WHOLE bird, quarter it and save any leftover bones to make stock.
>>7056954
Enjoy mad constipation from all that protein and starches.
>>7056954
what are the cheapest fruits?
>>7056981
bananas and frozen fruit
>>7056954
cont.d
**Pasta**
Spaghetti is cheap. So is spaghetti sauce. You can usually find a jar of sauce for $1-1.20. If you want it to feel more substantial, buy a pound of ground beef in those tubes like you buy breakfast sausage in. Go ahead and pay the extra for 80/20, as 73/27 cooks into a lot more odd-smelling fat. Besides adding to the sauce, you can freeze half the tube for using with tortillas with some sour cream, lettuce, and hot sauce.
**Cheap, flavorful additions**
-Onions. Add tons of flavor to eggs, beef, or anything, really. Cheaper in bulk
-Green bell pepper. Do cost a dollar each, but even just using a little at a time adds some color and flavor to most things you'd add onion too. Not a necessity, but, eating overly plain food can get tiresome.
-Frank's red hot / Tabasco / store-brand vinegar-based hot sauce. Goes on anything.
**Fruit/veg**
-Bag of apples. Don't usually taste anywhere near as good as the loose, larger apples. But, a bag of red delicious will get you some vitamins and the soluble fiber helps fill you up.
-Bag of carrots. Carrots and broccoli are both very nutrient rich vitamins, but a bag of carrots is usually going to last you longer than the broccoli. Buy both if you can.
**Huge Boxes/BAGS of Generic Cereal**
Almost no generic cereal for something basic like Cheerios, corn/frosted flakes, Chex, or Raisin Bran is noticeable worse. Can eat dry or buy a gallon of store milk which groceries price below cost to bring people in the door.
Good luck!
>>7056981
As I mention in my continuation, bags of red delicious apples were the cheapest fruits that had some okay amount of vitamins and, importantly, kept me full for awhile. The ones I bought taste like school lunch apples, but that may have just been that season or brand (don't remember brand).
Bananas are almost always cheap and are great to add to cereal and PB sandwiches.
Otherwise, a lot of the cheapness will be what's on sale at the moment. Kroger always has flyers by the door. Also, Wal-Mart honors competitors' coupons. And, if there's an ALDI in your area, don't knock them until you try them. They have lots of brand names and their fruits and veg.s are usually decent.
>>7056974
Forgot to mention that, yeah, fiber is important. Bran cereals, oats (also EXTREMELY cheap if you buy the canisters and just flavor them yourself with cinnamon, apples, honey, or whatever), Kroger brand High Fiber bread (literally says High Fiber on the package) has a ton, plus a good amount of protein.
If food banks are a thing where you live, hit them up. I heavily relied on a food bank for a couple of years when I was at one point too ill to work, and then had to scrape together every cent I made to afford a 10k surgery so I wouldn't be in constant pain. A lot of the stuff was nothing I would ever buy myself, crackers I'd never heard of, off brand canned and dry goods, kid's cereal, yogurt past its sell by date, but there was also a surprising amount of fresh produce and high end goods that many food bank recipients turn down because they refuse to eat them. I once got a tiny jar of sea salt that retailed for $20, not to mention countless cans of tuna. If it hadn't been for that place, I probably would have developed some kind of malnutrition from eating nothing but marked down bread and stolen salsa for a year.
Aside from that, buying in bulk is generally the cheapest means of acquiring staples, bananas and apples are cheap and filling, a few spices will go a long way, cabbage, carrots, etc. Chili is definitely a solid poor man's feast that can be improvised with whatever you have on hand. Asian groceries often have goods cheaper than regular grocery stores.
Frozen burritos are what people with a little money eat when they're being lazy.
This thread makes me miss living alone, just a little. Though I still eat about the same living with parents.
Typically one meal a day is fried rice (big cast iron pan) with lots of vegetable and onion and anything else which can go in. they're giving away eggs which is saddening but I eat a few a week regardless. With addition of tortillas and canned beans I have burrito or taco.
First meal of day is oatmeal and tea. Oats usually have raisins but that gets old so I put anything sweet in there.
Dinner in winter is steady instant "pho ga" or "chand noodles" or similar, with more vegetables (cabbage or broccoli) half-cooked. Fully cooked and an egg too if feeling energetic. Can even add vermicelli to stretch it out. That's easily less than $1. Instant noodles come from asian market which we are fortunate to have.
Lots of apple with peanut butter. Can't get enough of it.
tl;dr I'm a tasteless peasant and don't belong here.
>>7057004
i hate red delicious apples though...im poor but surely i can do better than that? i like pears.
>>7056851
https://thinkingoutsidethehorsebox.wordpress.com/survival-cooking/
>>7057506
>>7057506
Gala apples are good. Not as expensive as Fuji apples (my choice when buying for flavor), but a bit similar in taste. Pears aren't going to be bad, especially compared to a lot of the white trash or ghetto foods I've seen (value menus, juice, or junk snacks), it has a decent amount of fiber and is affordable. If you're eating an actual fruit or vegetable, whether fresh, canned, or frozen, you're ahead of the game vs. most low/no-income diets. I mentioned apples because they keep me full, whereas many cheap carbs leave you hungry an hour later.
A good thing to keep in mind is if you're not at a job, you can have time job searching and time food prepping. Never buy pre-cut fruit or vegetables. Practicing food preparation can help keep you busy as a cheap hobby that feeds you. Maybe you'd find fun in making a salad/omelet/casserole that suits your tastes and your budget. I always thought mixing nutrition, complimentary flavors, and economics to be an enjoyable project.
Some anons mentioned deli meat.
Most delis will sell you the assorted "meat ends" at a fraction of the normal price. These are the sample bits, the unsliceable end chunks, the otherwise ugly and unsellable parts.
If you don't mind the randomness of it it is worth a shot.
>>7056851
>not eating Asian frozen burritos
>being this much of a generic pleb neckbeard
Get on my basement dwelling level faggot.
>>7058724
Game changer. Where to buy tho?
>>7058724
I would be willing to try these.
But I don't expect much, Taipei's frozen shit is pretty bad.
>>7058724
ANSWER THE FUCKING QUESTION WHERE TO BUY?????
>>7058735
I hate that shit. Wife picked them up at Walmart one day. I thought they would be gross so I avoided them until one drunken evening when I ate 7 in one sitting.
Drunkies like a motherfucker, so good, no idea how or why.
>>7058740
>Walmart
Gotta go there anyway for some shit and to pay a bill, thanks anon.
>>7056884
Yes. They are... edible. But there's no convenient way to get some salsa from the condiment station and take it with you without looking a stoned psycho. Anyway, all the fucking chemicals and preservatives always make me shit my guts out about 8 hours later.
>>7056853
what kind of beans to get and what to eat them with?
>>7056954
why are you suggesting canned beans. canned beans don't have great value. dried beans are were the cheap eats are.
>>7056851
I was trying to include some links to the cheapest recipes I know but apparently they're spam so I suggest looking up:
pasta con ceci (check Dinner A Love Story, they just posted a version that's pretty much pasta, tomato paste, garlic, and chickpeas, and it's delicious)
Marcella Hazan's cabbage soup (use regular rice, not arborio, because arborio's expensive)
Marcella Hazan's tomato sauce (tomatoes + butter + onion, delicious and cheap)
Also you can easily make lentil soup with just an onion, lentils, and cloves...just halve the onion, stick a few cloves in each side, brown in oil, then throw in your lentils and more than enough water to cook the lentils. Bam, you got a serviceable lentil soup.
All of the above make a shit ton of food, keep a long time, and can be had for much less than a dollar per serving.
If you don't have the equipment or the time to make this shit I personally have survived for far too long on tortillas, black beans, and salsa (I like the $1.99 salsa at Trader Joe's), sometimes with cabbage or pickled shredded carrots/slices of radish (vinegar, salt, sugar) if feeling fancy.
My advice is to avoid stuff that will make you crave more: cheese (addictive), excessive sugar, really shit-quality bread (and desu those Tina's burritos made me crash hard and get super hungry so I stopped eating them). You need complex stuff that your stomach will take a long time to process. Also, never hurts to add a can of Bustelo to the mix because it's usually cheap ($2.99/can where I am) and curbs appetite. Buy a can of sweetened condensed milk if you need a little dairy/sugar, since it keeps for a long time and you'll only need a tiny bit.
>>7059260
Oh also I forgot mujadara, it's just a shit ton of fried onions with lentils and rice, but somehow it's delicious, so cheap, and so filling.
>>7056890
This. I also love it when they do the clearance rotisserie chickens. $2.50 for a whole chicken ain't bad.
this shit right here f4m
My friend lived on pasta and passata for a month. He also used to buy jars of jalapeños for variety. Cost him about $1-1.50 a day but he said he did get really sick by the end of it.
douse it with tapatio
>>7059283
the el monterey breakfast burritos are good as fuck too
gotta get the one with the peppers though
>>7056851
>used to eat Tina's Red Hot Bean Burrito
>they don't make them anymore
>no one else remembers them
>>7056851
Go to a food bank or dumpster dive at fast food places. Both free food
>>7056851
>be mexican poorfag
>buy slowcooker dump some shitty $1 meat and a couple of cans of chili verde sauce, mixed with pepper
>make 3 cups of rice in rice cooker
>Get ~10-12 servings of good chili verde for $10
you can throw in shit like carrots and peas if you feel rich too
>>7059367
They never made Red Hot Bean. It was always Red Hot Beef. You're hallucinating
>>7056851
If you're legit poor, seek help from churches and food banks. There is no shame in asking for help when you need it, but don't abuse the system; your poverty may be temporary, but people with kids often really need that help.
Lentils, beans, rice, and canned veggies are your best friends. Spices are a relatively cheap upfront investment that you might have to make, but you honestly can transform food with a bit of cumin, nutmeg, salt, pepper and spice. Whole chickens are cheap and you can make them last, but there is a slight learning curve to butcher them decently. For veggies, always go for what is in season.
>>7059624
I found proof once, but I didn't save it and now I can't find it on Google images anymore. The package color was maroon. I ate them all the time about 15 years ago.
>>7059712
> ITT
>lies and mental illness
>>7056851
Look for factory surplus bread stores. I recently found one in my area that sells cheap white bread for like $0.40 a loaf and decent stuff like rye and sourdough for $1.00 a loaf. Bagels are even cheaper. Some places will even give you garbage bags for $1.00 if you say you're using it for your chickens
>>7059728
I'm going to write an email to Tina's and beg for some proof. Or at least I need to find someone else who remembers.
>>7058724
Those look dope af t-b-h, f-a-m
