Healthy Eating on a very tight budget

midnight_express

bananas are high carb

adelight

It does not have to be expensive! I have always eaten a very healthy diet on a low budget.
I've found that the budget supermarkets like aldi & lidl and markets do the cheapest healthy foods. You can get delicious smoked mackerel fillets from the chiller at lidl/aldi for cheaper than the grotty basic stuff in Mr S!

The "brown" pasta at tesco is soft wheat pasta and it's 1) not whole wheat 2) revolting and pulpy, well imo it is. Whole wheat pasta is 70-90p/500g from lidl, aldi & asda. Brown rice, particularly brown basmati which has the most fibre, is ~£3 for a 2kg bag by ethnic brands in tesco/asda, but much cheaper from asian food shops at ~£1/kg.
Whole wheat bread is cheap, so are whole wheat pitas again from my old favourite Lidl!!

Sweet potatoes/squash/plantains, hearty, delicious, reasonably cheap.

Pulses are insanely cheap dried, versatile and an incredible food full of protein and fibre. Waitrose do the best selection at around £1/500g but a serving is 40g dried. Make curry, stew, burgers, salads, soups, bolognaise style sauce, pates, dips.

Oats are the best, cheapest healthy "cereal" at ~40p/500g. You can make a DIY museli from oats, chopped nuts & dried fruit that goes well with yogurt and fresh fruit.

Buy seasonal veg from markets (look out for what's on a good deal, it's probably in season) or whatever veg is on offer at Lidl or in Aldi's super six. In my eyes veg can be divided into two groups: stuff that goes well in sauce/pasta/mediterranian and stuff that goes well in more "meat and two veg" type meals so plan to eat a pasta dish or a pork chop with veg and be flexible with the details.

Do you like seafood? Frozen cooked mussels are one of the cheapest sources of animal(okay it's a fish same thing!) protein around at ~£5/kg most places and fresh quid is £7/kg from Waitrose.
I have no idea where you're buying your salmon but it can be bought much cheaper than that. Large salmon fillets are often on offer for £8/kg so buy a large one and cut your own portions for the freezer. Lidl currently do 4 salmon steaks for £3.99- not bad! Frozen fish fillets are often cheaper than fresh and easy to use.

Oily fish is very cheap in tins, sardines are often 40p, mackerel fillets if you don't like skin/bones are 70p. Kippers from the chiller are 2 for £1.50 on 2 serving packs at many supermarkets.

Lidl's tuna is 64p a can and has the "SAFE" logo so it's not irresponsibly sourced cack like basic tuna flakes or 99p store stuff.

Pork is very cheap and the right cuts are very lean and you can cut excess fat off, generally loin chops I believe.
Get chicken breasts from lidl/aldi, half the price of elsewhere and not super watery.

Have you been instructed to eat no dairy? Lidl do good yogurt, fat free cottage cheese, reduced fat mozzarella and reduced fat camembert if you are allowed any. Tesco do a reduced fat feta style cheese.


After a week you will appreciate the taste of vegetables much more and the texture of whole wheat products- it doesn't taste like cardboard it's got a million times more flavour than gluey white junk I promise! A bowl of salad stops being rabbit food and starts being delicious, today I actually had a craving for a green salad with olives and mushrooms

Few meals ermm:
quality fish fillet, frozen peas, 2 carrots £1.20
large sweet potato half tin tuna or 125g cottage cheese or some bean chilli 60p
tin mackerel fillets, 2 slices brown toast, big tomato 85p
bean chilli/curry w/rice <30p
mussels in HM garlic tomato sauce w/pasta 75p
HM lentil soup 15p
Mix expensive and cheap meals: one day you could have porridge w/grated apple & cinammon (30p), lentil soup with bread (20p), fish with veg for dinner (£1.20). So one day costs you £1.70 but you can also have cheap days for under £1 or more expensive days. I would say £60 a month for one person is a very reasonable goal.

wogglemaker

I second low GI, It is so easy to make healthy versions of crumbles (swap 2/3 of the white flour for wholemeal and oats), even my son and daughter do not complain about wholemeal pastry and scones. The diabeties team that check up on me were very surprised this time after the way steroids were playing me up last year.

My fav treat is Morrisons salmon trimmings (80p) and low fat cream cheese on crispbread

Good luck

SailorSam

The base for many meals can start with tomatoes and onions. Wait until they're on offer to stock up and you can get tinned tomatoes for 20p and a couple of kilos of onions for £1.18. Add to that a handful of assorted pulses and some veg (i use mostly frozen to save waste) and you've got your soup; curry or casserole.

Thorndrop

Lentils are fairly cheap (considering you can get many meals out of a pack) and healthy. So are dried beans. It takes a long time to cook them but it works out SO much cheaper than canned ones.
Also, dunno about where you shop, but I go to Asda or Morrisons, and their cheap wholemeal bread is the same price as their white.

culpepper

You could do your own whole wheat pasta. If you have a food processor the dough part is easy.
You can do it by hand but it takes a bit longer.

You use about 8 oz of flour and an egg,then add cold water by the spoonful and mix,stop when it looks soft but not sticky. If it is too sticky,add more flour, if not soft enough to hold together,add more water.
When it can hold together when you squeeze it, take it out and roll it out as thin as you like and cut into strips or sheets.

It cooks very quickly from fresh and tastes lovely.
If you find you do it a lot, you would probably find a pasta machine useful.
I have one, it is a hand cranked roller like a mini mangle with some cutting rollers on one end to make flat noodles.

JBD

Apparently Icelands are very good for frozen fish fillets/steak.
Also Sainsbury's basic smoked mackerel is good value. For tuna fish try Poundland/the99p shop. I have bought the set of 3 little tins for £1 there.
I also find basic tinned kidney beans great [at 16p, they do 3 servings/tin, so just over 5p per serving of protein isn't bad.

Pentagon

I regularly sprout lentils and beans. A small packet of alfalfa grows into buckets full of salad.

And I really like green lentils, soak them for 12 hours, drain and rinse everyday. Eat when about 2 inches long.

http://onehotstove.blogspot.com/2005/06/primer-on-sprouting-lentils.html

Fenugreek seeds, and chickpeas also work well. Although fenugreek is quite smelly.

PasturesNew

janey183 wrote: »

Example: wholewheat pasta (usually buy the 40p stuff, now £1.15)

Try the website at: supermarketownbrandguide

A random wholewheat pasta find on there has Asda's Organics Wholewheat Penne, 500g at 64p

Here's the search I did, I ticked the shops I have near me and typed in the word "pasta" in the search box:

http://www.supermarketownbrandguide.co.uk/search.php?SearchString=pasta&Search.x=38&Search.y=18&score=&price=0&pricevalue=0.00&aldi=1&asda=1&coop=1&lidl=1&morrisons=1&sainsburys=1&tesco=1

If you fiddle about you'll find all sorts.

RAS

janey183 wrote: »

Im to stear clear: of red meat, added sugar/salt, fat, carbs overload, bread, white pasta, dairy
But try and include: oily fish, veg, some fruit, wholewheat stuff, brown stuff (e.g cardboard tasting food!!)

Oily fish - smoked mackerel, fresh mack or sardines. Tinned sardines and pilchards. Try Lidl.

Veggies and fruit - where is your nearest market? Are you allowed potatOes at all?

Oats?

Are you allowed eggs?

Go for lentils and beans (butterbeans and tuna mashed really well make a very more-ish dish to flavour loads of veggies). Or try a bean salad sharpened with olives, raw onion and oily fish and lemon juice.

Red lentils and blackeyed beans cook wthout much or any soaking. Black-eyed beans with spinach is one of my favourite dishes.

Think Mediterrean (sp) cooking, bean and veggie stews, tagines, Middle eastern cookery or curries.