Losing weight and getting fit on a budget

lizzie_b

Hello
I don't very often venture over here, usually lurk elsewhere, but I'm after some help so I hope I'm in the right place.
I need ideas on how to feed 2 adults who are trying to lose weight and get fit and healthy on a grocery budget of £100 a month.
I have no idea if this is doable so I hope you can point me in the right directions, don't really know what we should be eating.
Only things we don't eat are seafood (any fish) and mushrooms, and I'm allergic to mayonnaise.
So where do we go from here??
Thanks in advance
Lizzie xxxx

jinnywren

Vegetable soups are cheap, filling and low calorie.
Porridge for breakfast.
Eggs cooked in any form and plenty of dried beans added to stews etc are pretty cheap.

Walking for exercise. Free and healthy fresh air!! HTH's

Fire_Fox

If you want to be healthy start eating fish: you should be having at least two portions (one oily) a week for health. Otherwise you may wish to discuss supplementing long chain omega-3s and bioavailable vitamin D with your family doctor. Both nutrients also play a role in weight management as does calcium (from dairy products, canned fish with crumbly bones left in, homemade long cooked chicken stock). I make an easy fish pate from canned fish plus low fat soft cheese.

Reasonably priced nutritious foods include dried lentils, canned beans, jumbo oats, canned tomatoes, frozen vegetables, frozen rhubarb (Farmfoods), fresh root and cruciferous vegetables, butternut squash, whole fresh pineapple, organ meats like chicken liver and pigs kidneys, canned fish like pilchards and mackerel, ground spice blends from the World Foods section of the supermarket, block creamed coconut, peanut butter, reduced fat cocoa powder, frozen garlic cubes, dried crushed red chilli.

Consider starting with the official healthy living guidelines, noting that they are minimums/ maximums supplying a balance of all the macro and micro nutrients you need for health but not optimum nutrition. Guidelines include
- at least five 80g fruit and veg a day in the full rainbow of colours (dark green, orange/ yellow, red, blue/ purple)
- three servings of dairy a day (200ml milk, 150g yoghurt, 30g cheese)
- at least two servings of fish a week, one oily
- at least half of grains as wholegrains
- small portions of meat (100g-125g/ size and thickness of palm)
- maximum 6g a day of salt or the equivalent
- sugar added/ fat added foods maximum 10% daily calories
- eat the right amount to be a healthy weight
- eat a wide variety of different foods (so no wheat three times a day! )
- 10,000 steps every day at any pace and divided up if you wish.

Don't make the mistake of choosing low fat heavily processed products in order to lose weight, eat real foods with one or two ingredients. The body needs some fat for health: 'good' fats include those in oily fish, nuts, seeds, avocados, whole olives, coconut and cocoa powder. The body finds it easier to turn saturated animal fats (fatty meats, skin on chicken, full fat hard cheese, butter) to body fat than it does any of the above sources, so limit those plus any extracted/ processed fat like vegetable oils. Sugar and white/ refined starchy carbs are also relatively easily converted to bodyfat.

heartbreak_star

Lots and lots of frozen vegetables - usually pretty cheap and you can get good deals.

Stir-frys, soups and stews are pretty easy to make packed out with veg. I'd steer clear or bread and pasta but that's just me. Brown rice is great to bulk out meals, same with lentils and beans.

Exercise-wise, bodyweight exercises, cheap fitness DVDs, walking, running - all good for you and easy to fit around your day.

HBS x

kacie

Youtube had loads of fitness videos you can do for free

NigeWick

lizzie_b wrote: »

I need ideas on how to feed 2 adults who are trying to lose weight and get fit and healthy on a grocery budget of £100 a month.

Liver is very cheap and nutritious with kidney not far behind. Eggs are good too. Buy fresh veg and cook, looking out for bargains that are soon to be out of date. Eee when I were a lad we didn't have sell by dates and we knew when food was off.

Aim to lose about a pound a week which is 3500 calories, or, 500 less per day than your body needs. Work out your basic daily calorie requirement and use an online free calorie counter to keep on track.

Fitness:- Use body weight. Press ups, squats, plank/sit ups and dips between a couple of chairs for strength. You can devise ways to make these harder and find heavy things to lift and move once or twice a week. Sprint for 20 seconds three times in rapid succession and do this twice or three times a week. Walk everywhere at a fairly rapid pace.

I cut out grains apart from rice once or perhaps twice a fortnight. No bread, no cakes, no biscuits, no buns, no pasta, no pizza. This also meant I cut down on jam and cheese. I lost just over four stone in a year, stopped two blood pressure medications, statins and a steroid inhaler for late onset asthma.

I love my food so if I can do it, anybody can. The idea is to eat good quality nutrition that you do not need so much of. I used to get the shakes if I didn't eat at 12 and 5. Nowadays, I can go without a meal or two without a problem.

That leads on to intermittent fasting. A couple of days a week, you could try dropping to 500 or so calories. This wil save money on food and drop weight quicker, but, I wouldn't recommend it until you've got in the swing of your new food regime.

I hope this helps.

2sides2everystory

NigeWick wrote: »

Liver is very cheap and nutritious with kidney not far behind. Eggs are good too. Buy fresh veg and cook, looking out for bargains that are soon to be out of date. Eee when I were a lad we didn't have sell by dates and we knew when food was off.

Aim to lose about a pound a week which is 3500 calories, or, 500 less per day than your body needs. Work out your basic daily calorie requirement and use an online free calorie counter to keep on track.

Fitness:- Use body weight. Press ups, squats, plank/sit ups and dips between a couple of chairs for strength. You can devise ways to make these harder and find heavy things to lift and move once or twice a week. Sprint for 20 seconds three times in rapid succession and do this twice or three times a week. Walk everywhere at a fairly rapid pace.

I cut out grains apart from rice once or perhaps twice a fortnight. No bread, no cakes, no biscuits, no buns, no pasta, no pizza. This also meant I cut down on jam and cheese. I lost just over four stone in a year, stopped two blood pressure medications, statins and a steroid inhaler for late onset asthma.

I love my food so if I can do it, anybody can. The idea is to eat good quality nutrition that you do not need so much of. I used to get the shakes if I didn't eat at 12 and 5. Nowadays, I can go without a meal or two without a problem.

That leads on to intermittent fasting. A couple of days a week, you could try dropping to 500 or so calories. This wil save money on food and drop weight quicker, but, I wouldn't recommend it until you've got in the swing of your new food regime.

I hope this helps.

I agree with Ni - geW - ick !
I have only lost about two stone but basically all the above works for me. I can still eat unsensibly for a whole day once or twice a fortnight and get away with it but the interesting thing is that once you try the regime and become less of a potato and more fit you may well be alive enough to feel and discover that you are indeed what you eat, or rather - some foods just make you feel "off" when healthy foods keep you in good spirits.

If you really need to lose a lot of weight like Nigewick and I did, it might be tremendously good for your morale if you can couple a more sensible diet with starting to do much more exercise by even going to the gym and getting your heart rate up nicely for 90 mins two or three times a week (if you are in a dodgy state of health then you'd better speak to your doctor first of course). But with regular exercise you will then with luck be able to see the weight just falling off almost daily. And all the money you save on eating less you can put towards the new wardrobe you'll need when you look back in a year's time and say "Wow! I did it!" :j

Vlatko

Thanks for info.

clayton1106

paleo diet??

2sides2everystory

Is that Gods and straw ??

I can't see a little extra faith and fibre doing any harm, actually

heartbreak_star

I do semi-paleo and it's great. Lots of meat, lots of veg, no bread or pasta, little bit of potato and brown rice.

Lovely stuff.

Mind you, I also powerlift rather than doing bodyweight work lol!

HBS x