/ck/ - Food & Cooking

Steamed vegetables often. It's really really easy and inexpensive. Broccoli is a great vegetable for steaming, and you can get a big head that will provide a ton of nutrition for less than a dollar. There's also cheap greens which you can steam.
You can make simple everything-in-a-pot-and-cook soups. Water, stock or bouillon or equivalent, and chopped vegetables and chicken, and you have a soup.
You can rely on legumes like lentils and beans for most protein, they are ridiculously cheap. Red beans and rice is an example of a very simple dish you can make with them.
Fresh fish, if you live in a region where such a thing is within your budget, is great for variety. You'll need a frying pan though.

>>4808536
I didn't even think about steaming veggies; thanks.

>>4808496
Invest in a frying pan.

I am also low on cash, I get by on fried noodles (Look up yakisoba), Rice and vegetables.
Look for a farmers market nearby, Those are always cheaper.

>>4808496

I'm just going to eyeball it, but here's an ingredient list:

- Olive or rapeseed oil
- Red lentils
- Green lentils
- Pasta
- Tomato paste
- Salt
- Broccoli
- Carrot
- Parboiled rice
- Green pepper
- Sodium bicarbonate

You can make a rice salad with red and green lentil, the vegetables, salt and oil. Just soak rice and lentils before cooking, letting it rest, and mixing with chopped vegetables.

You can also make sauce with the red lentils which turn into a porridge – which can be made smooth by the addition of a tiny bit of sodium bicarbonate – and tomato paste. To serve over pasta.

In the past, I used to recommend Bachelor Chow v0.6b, but I found that the logistic chain left to be desired.

Op you should give us a better breakdown of what your income and costs look like.

>>4808747
Well, I have a min. wage job (nights from 6-11 on weekdays, 4-10 weekends), and my apartment's around 600/month (between 2 people). I don't get any financial help for the apartment from my parents.

>>4808759

I am in a simillar situation. But If you get a blender. You can make some soups tyhat will last a while to go with a lot of these rice dishes people are suggesting.

With less than twenty bucks worth of stuff. I had tomato bisque for weeks.

Rice noodles with tofu and broccoli, poor college student version

Ingredients:
Rice noodles (sometimes labeled "rice sticks," in the Asian food section)
Tofu
A single tasty vegetable (broccoli, pepper, asparagus, green beans, whatever)
Oil
Soy sauce

1. Heat water in your sauce pan and pour into glass bowl.
2. Heat more water in your sauce pan and pour that into the bowl too
3. Put rice noodles into the bowl of hot water. If they don't fit, you can keep poking the ends down until they're soft enough to bend and fit, or you can crack them in half. I'd wet them first and crack them over the sink, so noodle shrapnel doesn't fly all over your apartment. Let them soak, stirring just enough to keep them from clumping.
4. Put some oil in your sauce pan and start heating it as you quickly slice your tofu into half-inch thick triangles.
5. Throw the tofu into the pan to sear, and start chopping your tasty vegetable.
6. Flip the tofu triangles over when the cooked side is getting yellow or golden, and push them to one side of the pan.
7. Add the tasty chopped vegetable to the other side of the pan, and keep stirring that half for even cooking, while the side of the tofu is still cooking undisturbed.
8. After 2-3 minutes, drain your noodles, then add them to the sauce pan, and stir everything around.
9. After 2 more minutes, turn off the heat, and add some soy sauce, continuing to stir a bit as it cooks a bit more from the pan's residual heat.

You can also add any flavor enhancements, like salt, ground pepper, fresh/powdered garlic, onion, a chilli pepper, ginger, curry powder, a little sugar, a little lemon, some chili or other hot sauce, whatever you like and happen to have on hand. Fresh ginger/garlic should go in with the initial oil, fresh onion/chilli could go in with the tasty vegetable, any liquids/sauces could go in with the soy sauce, seasonings could go in pretty much any time.

>>4808496
You could invest in a rice cooker and slow cooker.

Been invaluable for me at college and pretty good. For instance this week me and room mate are using about 4lbs of beef (cut about the right size for stew), ~30 oz crushed tomatoes, 4-6 carrots, 2 bell peppers, 3 onions, corn, 3 jalapenos, red potatoes (this is a bit more expensive, for some reason potaotes can't sit anywhere in my kitchen for a week without going bad, so bags of 2lbs max), some russets, rice (25 lbs of saffron for $20 or $20 lbs of basmati at sams), pinto beans (going to check the hispanic market nearby, sams doesn't have shit and buying 2 lbs at a time seems like a waste), salad mix (I am lazy, and getting decent amount of precut greens for $2 from sams makes sense), bacon ends (cheaper than actual bacon and I do not like it in strips for any cooking, either used in recipes or breakfast tacos) along with some basic spices (curry powder, bay leaf, garlic, pepper, salt, soy, Worcestershire, chili powder)

>>4809311
Each trip is about $50-65 that is a pot of chili (Served with rice is 6-8 meals), curry (with rice 4-6 meals), stew (We like it with saltines, about 8 bowls), and a pot of pinto beans, along with what ever trash we deem necessary for out pleasure.

This is enough to last about 2 weeks for 2 healthy eaters (excluding bulk eggs, pancake mix, and occasionally eating out) by making chili, stew, curry, potato soup, and pinto beans. This can last a week and a half to 2 weeks depending on how many pots of beans you are willing to eat. And don't forget your vegetables, I like a salad and steamed broccoli, and stuff any vegetables I can into anything I make (chili gets carrots, corn, bell pepper, and onion).

>>4809315
Just mix up what you have and you can't go wrong. Alternate chili, curry, and stew. Red beans or lentils instead of pinto. Throw in something not made in a slow cooker like chicken parmigiana (just get thin sliced ckn breast, or get your own and pound it flat, let sit in bag with salt and pepper, cover each piece in flour, then egg, then some breadcrumbs/parmesan cheese, set in pan with some oil on the bottom and cook for a few minutes each side, take out and put red sauce on top (store bought is fine) with some mozzarella (or more Parmesan) and shove in the over (or toaster oven, even better) to broil until its melted and sauce is hot. Serve with pasta), potato soup, meatballs, eggs and bacon, stir fry, grilled cheese with tomato soup, sandwhiches.

Except for some outlets, none of these require anything but what you already have (maybe cooking chicken in a sauce pan could prove hard, or making a potato soup in it) but the rest goes fine in the slow cooker. Cheap slow cookers and rice cookers can be had at something like Goodwill if you are really low on $ for the slow cooker and toaster oven, and use the sauce pan to make rice. If you are eating on your own only, you can make slightly in bulk but I probably would not get more than a 2-3 qt slow cooker, since you don't have a freezer (and eating the same thing for a week does not sound pleasant to me). Also get something like a brita filter if you do not have one (for faucet or pitcher). Shit is so bear